If opposition Republicans capture both the U.S. House and Senate in the November 8 midterm election, the legislative agenda of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, will be derailed. One of the most closely watched and tightest races is for an open Senate seat in Pennsylvania. It features Republican Party nominee Mehmet Oz against Democratic Party nominee John Fetterman, who is the state’s lieutenant governor.

Fetterman’s campaign has issued social media memes mocking Oz’s apparent lack of knowledge about Pennsylvania, portraying him as a wealthy, out-of-touch carpetbagger from over the border, in New Jersey.

Oz, a physician and political novice, has sought to cast doubts among Pennsylvania’s voters about Fetterman’s fitness to serve as a senator since he suffered an ischemic stroke in May, shortly after capturing the Democratic Party nomination. The condition has left him with auditory processing difficulties.

During Tuesday’s televised debate with Oz, Fetterman was allowed to use a closed captioning device.

“I might miss some words during this debate, mush some words together. But it [the stroke] knocked me down. But I’m going to keep coming back up,” Fetterman said near the start of the hourlong encounter, which took place in Harrisburg, the state capital, without a studio audience.

Fetterman did have difficulty during the debate, as he predicted. When the moderators quizzed him about his changing positions on fracking, a controversial process to extract gas and oil, the candidate was visibly flummoxed.

“I do support fracking. And I don’t, I don’t, I support fracking. And I stand and I do support fracking,” he responded.

Oz faces scrutiny for some of the products he endorsed during his 15 years on his nationally televised talk program, with critics saying the supplements had dubious health benefits, at best, and might have been dangerous.

During the debate, Oz brushed off such concerns and focused on his treatment of patients.

“I can make the difficult decisions as you do in the operating room as a surgeon. I’ll make them cutting our budget as well, to make sure we don’t have to raise taxes on a population already desperately in pain from the high inflation rate,” he said.

Oz has sought to portray Fetterman as soft on crime during his time as mayor of a small town and while he held the state’s second-highest elected office.

“These radical positions extend beyond crime, to one thing to legalize all drugs, to open the border, to raising our taxes,” said Oz during the debate.

Fetterman, on the campaign trail, drew a distinct line between himself and Oz on the highly-charged issue of abortion.

“If you believe that the choice for abortion belongs between you and your doctor, that’s what I fight for,” he said during the debate, defending the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision struck down by the high court this year.

Oz said the federal government should not be involved in abortion legislation.

“I want women, doctors, local political leaders letting the democracy that always allowed our nation to thrive, to put the best ideas forward so state can decide for themselves,” he said on the debate stage.

The economy is also expected to be a significant matter in the decision of many midterm voters across the United States and especially in some parts of Pennsylvania.

“On the outskirts of Pittsburgh, people are struggling, just to keep up with rent just to keep up with paying their bills and getting groceries and so that’s a major issue,” according to associate professor Gerald Dickinson of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

Dickinson cautioned that whatever the stances of Fetterman and Oz, their positions might not be the ultimate factor influencing voters’ decisions when they cast their ballots.

“It’s a very, very close race and, as a result of that, what I do think is going to happen is that the personalities of these candidates are going to end up swaying this election,” Dickinson said.

Fetterman, with tattooed arms and usually clad in short pants, promotes his Everyman persona even though he towers over most voters at a height of 2.03 meters.

Oz, the heart surgeon, is more polished, and a relaxed figure in front of the camera.

“It shows in the way that he’s been able to campaign, the way that he’s been able to communicate his issues to his audience,” said Dickinson, a former Democratic Party primary candidate for Congress.

Both candidates enjoy high-profile backers. Biden, a Pennsylvania native, has been campaigning for Fetterman, while Oz is supported by former President Donald Trump, who encouraged Oz to enter politics.

If elected, Oz, who is a dual citizen of the United States and Turkey, would become the first Muslim in the Senate.

Some of those viewing the hourlong debate at a nonpartisan watch party in Pittsburgh — a city evenly split between Republicans and Democrats — told VOA they did not see the encounter swaying the minds of many voters, even though Oz came across as more fluent than Fetterman.

“I think they both stuck to, primarily, what their party is saying. I think Fetterman had a disadvantage. He had to read before he responded and that comes across as if he’s unsure or thinking,” said Richard Covington.

“It was very much a performance, certainly by Dr. Oz — that’s what he’s used to doing. I think for John Fetterman it felt like a struggle. It was just very difficult. The whole thing was kind of painful to watch, frankly,” said Alma Wisniewski.

“When he’s pressured his speech becomes a little more challenging,” said Albert Moore, who expressed support for Fetterman, describing the Democrat as someone who was “not a real articulate guy” even before the stroke, but managed to get things done as a mayor and lieutenant governor.

Fetterman “deserves credit not ridicule” for taking the debate stage while recovering from the stroke, the Philadelphia Inquirer opined Wednesday, after the event.

“If elected to the U.S. Senate, Fetterman could become a role model in helping the nation better understand that a person’s struggles can also be a source of strength,” the newspaper said.

Fetterman appeared at a Pittsburgh rally on Wednesday evening with musician Dave Matthews.

“I may not get every word the right way,” Fetterman told the crowd. “I have a lot of good days. And every now and then I’ll have a bad day. But every day I will always fight just for you.”

More than 686,000 early ballots had been submitted by Wednesday, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State, so any assessment by those voters of the candidates’ debate performance will not make a difference.

In addition, neither candidate can take traditional party support for granted. Pennsylvania’s historical working-class areas, once reliably Democratic, have trended Republican, while many previously solid Republican suburbs now have Democratic Party majorities.

In a CNN poll, conducted by SSRS, a survey and market research firm, in mid-October and released the day prior to the debate, 51% of likely voters said they supported Fetterman while 45% of respondents backed Oz. Other recent surveys have shown the race closer, within the polls’ margins of error.
…

your ad here

The United States’ newest aircraft carrier has set sail on its first deployment around the North Atlantic. VOA Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb takes us aboard the USS Gerald R. Ford to show us what its new and improved design might mean against potential foes. Camera: Saqib Islam
…

your ad here

A judge on Wednesday ordered former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to testify before a special grand jury that is investigating whether President Donald Trump and his allies illegally tried to sway Georgia’s results in the 2020 election. 

Meadows, a former GOP congressman, is a key figure in the investigation. He traveled to Georgia, sat in on Trump’s phone calls with state officials, and coordinated and communicated with outside influencers who were either encouraging or discouraging the pressure campaign. 

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis opened the investigation last year into actions taken by Trump and others to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the state. Meadows is just one of several associates and advisers of the Republican former president whose testimony Willis has sought. 

Because Meadows doesn’t live in Georgia, Willis, a Democrat, had to use a process that involved getting a judge where he lives in South Carolina to order him to appear. First, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who’s overseeing the special grand jury, signed off on a petition certifying that Meadows was a “necessary and material witness.” 

Now, Circuit Court Judge Edward Miller in Pickens County, South Carolina, has honored McBurney’s finding and ordered Meadows to testify, Willis spokesman Jeff DiSantis confirmed. 

Meadows’ attorney Jim Bannister told The Associated Press that his client was “weighing all options,” including appeals. 

“Nothing final until we see the order,” he said. 

Willis has been fighting similar battles — mostly with success — in courts around the country as she seeks to compel Trump allies to testify. But an appeals court in Texas has indicated it may not recognize the validity of the Georgia summonses, and U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene after a federal appeals court last week ordered him to testify. 

In the petition seeking Meadows’ testimony, Willis wrote that he attended a Dec. 21, 2020, meeting at the White House with Trump and others “to discuss allegations of voter fraud and certification of Electoral College votes from Georgia and other states.” 

The next day, Willis wrote, Meadows made a “surprise visit” to Cobb County, just outside Atlanta, where an audit of signatures on absentee ballot envelopes was being conducted. He asked to observe the audit but wasn’t allowed to because it wasn’t open to the public, the petition says. 

Meadows also sent emails to Justice Department officials after the election alleging voter fraud in Georgia and elsewhere and requesting investigations, Willis wrote. And he took part in a Jan. 2, 2021, phone call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, during which Trump suggested that Raffensperger, the state’s top elections official and a Republican, could “find” enough votes to overturn the president’s narrow loss in the state. 

According to a transcript of the call with Raffensperger, Meadows said Trump’s team believed that “not every vote or fair vote and legal vote was counted. And that’s at odds with the representation from the secretary of state’s office.” He goes on to say he hopes they can agree on a way “to look at this a little bit more fully.” 

Raffensperger disputed the assertions, addressing Trump, “We don’t agree that you have won.” 

After the election, Meadows was widely seen in the White House as a chief instigator of Trump’s fixation on the election, passing along debunked conspiracies about fraud that other officials were forced to swat down. He pushed one theory that people in Italy had changed votes in the U.S. with satellite technology, a claim that former Justice Department official Richard Donoghue labeled “pure insanity.” 

On the legal front, in a court filing this week, Meadows’ lawyer Bannister argued that executive privilege and other rights shield his client from testifying. 

Bannister asserted in a filing that Meadows has been instructed by Trump “to preserve certain privileges and immunities attaching to his former office as White House Chief of Staff.” And Willis’ petition calls for him “to divulge the contents of executive privileged communications with the President,” Bannister wrote. 

Meadows previously invoked that privilege in a fight against subpoenas issued by the U.S. House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

Meadows has been fighting investigations into the violent 2021 insurrection since last year and has so far avoided having to testify about his role and his knowledge of the former president’s actions. He turned over thousands of texts to the House Jan. 6 committee before eventually refusing to do an interview. 

The House held Meadows in contempt of Congress for defying the subpoena, but the Justice Department declined to prosecute. 

Special grand juries in Georgia cannot issue indictments. Instead, they can gather evidence and compel testimony and then can recommend further action, including criminal charges, in a final report. It is ultimately up to the district attorney to decide whether to seek an indictment from a regular grand jury. 

Grand jury secrecy is “paramount” in South Carolina, Bannister wrote. Because the special grand jury is expected to ultimately issue a public report, ordering Meadows to testify would violate his state right to privacy, Bannister argued. 

McBurney, the Fulton County Superior Court judge, has made clear in rulings on other attempts by potential witnesses to avoid or delay testimony that he considers the special grand jury’s investigation to be a criminal proceeding. He has also stressed a need for secrecy for the panel’s workings. 

 
…

your ad here

The U.S. trade deficit in goods widened sharply in September, likely as a strong dollar and softening global demand weighed on exports, but that did not change expectations that trade led an anticipated rebound in economic growth in the third quarter.

The report from the Commerce Department on Wednesday also showed moderate increases in wholesale and retail inventories last month, suggesting slowing domestic demand was forcing businesses to become more cautious about ordering more goods.

The Federal Reserve is aggressively hiking interest rates to tame inflation, boosting the dollar and curbing spending.

“Trade will likely be a significant tailwind for growth in the near term,” said Abbey Omodunbi, a senior economist at PNC Financial in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The goods trade deficit increased 5.7% to $92.2 billion last month. September’s increase reversed only a portion of the prior months’ declines, leaving the goods trade deficit considerably lower in the third quarter.

Exports of goods fell $2.8 billion to $177.6 billion. The decline was led by a 14.0% tumble in food exports. Shipments of industrial supplies, which include crude oil, fell 3.1%.

Exports of consumer goods also declined. But there were increases in exports of capital goods, motor vehicles and other goods. The dollar has gained nearly 11% against the currencies of the United States’ main trade partners this year.

Goods imports rose 0.8% to $269.8 billion. They were lifted by a 4.4% jump in imports of capital goods, which bodes well for business spending on equipment. There were also increases in imports of motor vehicles and consumer goods. But imports of food, industrial supplies and other goods fell.

“Net exports will contribute significantly to GDP growth in third quarter, adding about 3.0 percentage points,” said Daniel Silver, an economist at JPMorgan in New York.

“While the trade deficit looks to have narrowed substantially in third quarter, we think that the stronger dollar will help push the deficit wider over time.”

The Commerce Department also reported that wholesale inventories increased 0.8% last month after advancing 1.4% in August. Stocks at retailers gained 0.4% after rising 1.4% in August. Retailers are finding themselves saddled with excess merchandise, a function of both easing supply chain bottlenecks and slowing demand for goods, forcing them to offer discounts.

Motor vehicle inventories increased 1.9% after surging 3.5% in August. Excluding motor vehicles, retail inventories dipped 0.1% after rising 0.7% in August. This component goes into the calculation of gross domestic product.

The data was published ahead of the release on Thursday of the government’s advance estimate of third-quarter GDP. According to a Reuters survey of economists, GDP likely rebounded at a 2.4% annualized rate last quarter after declining at a 0.6% pace in the April-June quarter.

The economy contracted in the first half of 2022, but is likely not in recession, with more than 2.5 million jobs created during that period.
…

your ad here

More than five months after experiencing a stroke, Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman struggled at times to explain his positions and often spoke haltingly throughout a highly anticipated debate Tuesday against Republican Dr. Mehmet Oz as they vie for a critical Senate seat.

In the opening minutes of the debate, Fetterman addressed what he called the “elephant in the room.”

“I had a stroke. He’s never let me forget that,” Fetterman said of Oz, who has persistently questioned his ability to serve in the Senate. “And I might miss some words during this debate, mush two words together, but it knocked me down and I’m going to keep coming back up.”

When pressed to release his medical records later in the debate, he refused to commit.

Oz, a celebrity heart surgeon, ignored his opponent’s health challenges throughout the debate, instead seizing on Fetterman’s policies on immigration and crime and his support for President Joe Biden. At one point, Oz said Fetterman, the state’s lieutenant governor, was “trying to get as many murderers out of jail as possible.”

“His extreme positions have made him untenable,” he charged.

The forum had many of the trappings of a traditional debate, complete with heated exchanges and interruptions. But the impact of the stroke was apparent as Fetterman used closed-captioning posted above the moderator to help him process the words he heard, leading to occasional awkward pauses.

The biggest question coming out of the debate was whether it would have a lasting impact coming two weeks before the election and more than 600,000 ballots already cast. The stakes of the race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Pat Toomey are huge: It represents Democrats’ best chance to flip a Senate seat this year — and could determine party control of the chamber and the future of Biden’s agenda.

But rather than watch the full hour as the candidates debated abortion, inflation and crime, many Pennsylvanians may only see clips of the event on social media. And both parties are preparing to flood the airwaves with television advertising in the final stretch.

Independent experts consulted by The Associated Press said Fetterman appears to be recovering remarkably well. Stroke rehabilitation specialist Dr. Sonia Sheth, who watched the debate, called Fetterman an inspiration to stroke survivors.

“In my opinion, he did very well,” said Sheth, of Northwestern Medicine Marianjoy Rehabilitation Hospital in suburban Chicago. “He had his stroke less than one year ago and will continue to recover over the next year. He had some errors in his responses, but overall he was able to formulate fluent, thoughtful answers.”

Problems with auditory processing do not mean someone also has cognitive problems, the experts agreed. The brain’s language network is different from regions involved in decision making and critical thinking.

Oz, a longtime television personality, was more at home on the debate stage. He cast himself as a moderate Republican looking to unite a divided state, even as he committed to supporting former President Donald Trump should he run for president again in 2024.

“I’m a surgeon, I’m not a politician,” Oz said. “We take big problems, we focus on them, and we fix them. We do it by uniting, by coming together, not dividing.”

Fetterman similarly committed to supporting Biden should he run again in 2024.

The Democratic president campaigned with Fetterman in Pittsburgh during the Labor Day parade and just last week headlined a fundraiser for Fetterman in Philadelphia. There, Biden said the “rest of the world is looking” and suggested a Fetterman loss would imperil his agenda.

While backing Biden, Fetterman also said, “he needs to do more about supporting and fighting about inflation.”

Abortion was a major dividing line during the debate.

Oz insists he supports three exceptions — for rape, incest and to protect the life of the mother. When pressed Tuesday night, he suggested he opposes South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham’s bill to impose a nationwide ban on abortion after 15 weeks because it would allow the federal government to dictate the law to states.

“I don’t want the federal government involved with that at all,” Oz said. “I want women, doctors, local political leaders letting the democracy that always allowed our nation to thrive, to put the best ideas forward so states can decide for themselves.”

Fetterman delivered a blunt message to women: “If you believe that the choice for abortion belongs with you and your doctor, that’s what I fight for.”

Fetterman is a star in progressive politics nationwide, having developed a loyal following thanks in part to his blunt working-class appeal, extraordinary height, tattoos and unapologetic progressive policies. On Tuesday, the 6-foot-9-inch Democrat swapped his trademark hoodie and shorts for a dark suit and tie.

But even before the debate, Democrats in Washington were concerned about Fetterman’s campaign given the stakes.

For much of the year, it looked as if Fetterman was the clear favorite, especially as Republicans waged a nasty nomination battle that left the GOP divided and bitter. But as Election Day nears, the race has tightened. And now, just two weeks before the final votes are cast, even the White House is privately concerned that Fetterman’s candidacy is at risk.

Fetterman’s speech challenges were apparent throughout the night. He often struggled to complete sentences.

When pressed to explain his shifting position on fracking, a critical issue in a state where thousands of jobs are tied to natural gas production, his answer was particularly awkward.

“I do support fracking. And I don’t, I don’t. I support fracking, and I stand and I do support fracking,” Fetterman said.

At another point, the moderator seemed to cut off Fetterman as he struggled to finish an answer defending Biden’s student loan debt forgiveness program. He also stumbled before finishing a key attack line: “We need to make sure that Dr. Oz and Republicans believe in cutting Medicare and Social Security …”

The Pennsylvania Senate hopefuls faced each other inside a Harrisburg television studio. No audience was allowed, and the the debate host, Nexstar Media, declined to allow an AP photographer access to the event.

Oz had pushed for more than a half-dozen debates, suggesting Fetterman’s unwillingness to agree to more than one was because the stroke had debilitated him. Fetterman insisted that one debate is typical — although two is more customary — and that Oz’s focus on debates was a cynical ploy to lie about his health.

Fetterman refused to commit to releasing his full health records when asked repeatedly Tuesday by the moderator.

“My doctor believes that I’m fit to be serving. And that’s what I believe is where I’m standing,” Fetterman said.

While it is customary for presidential candidates to release health records, there is no such custom in races for the U.S. Senate. Some senators have, in the past, released medical records when running for president.

Democrats noted that the televised debate setting likely would have favored Oz even without questions about the stroke. Oz hosted “The Dr. Oz Show” weekdays for 13 seasons after getting his start as a regular guest on Oprah Winfrey’s show in 2004. Fetterman, by contrast, is a less practiced public speaker who is introverted by nature.

Many Republicans were thrilled by the debate’s outcome, although most — including Oz — tried to avoid piling on to concerns about Fetterman’s health.

Donald Trump Jr. was less cautious.

“If Fetterman is some sort of leftist decoy to make Biden actually sound somewhat intelligent and articulate he’s doing a great job,” the former president’s son tweeted. 

 
…

your ad here