We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
Former President Donald Trump walks out of the courtroom following the first day of jury selection at the Manhattan Criminal Court in New York, NY on Monday, April 15, 2024.
Supreme Court considers laws that could affect Jan. 6 charges
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court will hear a case that could eliminate some of the federal charges Donald Trump is facing in the case accusing him of plotting to subvert the 2020 election and the prosections of the hundreds of rioters involved in the Jan. 6 attack. This comes just a day after jury selection began in the People of the State of New York v. Donald J. Trump, with dozens of potential jurors being excused after they told the judge they could not be impartial.
The high court judges will consider whether the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, enacted in the wake of the energy giant Enron’s collapse, can be used against Joseph W. Fischer, a former police officer who participated in the Capitol assault.
The law makes it a crime to obstruct, influence, or impede any official proceeding. It was enacted to prohibit the destruction of evidence, but in this case, it is being argued that by entering the Capitol, rioters like Fischer obstructed the counting of electoral ballots.
The law is involved in two of the federal charges against Trump in his election subversion case. If the Supreme Court rules that it does not apply to Fischer, Trump is almost certain to argue it does not apply to his conduct either.
Former President Donald Trump attends a campaign event in Waterloo, Iowa, on Dec. 19, 2023.
Colorado's Supreme Court disqualifies Trump from state primary ballot
The Colorado Supreme Court accepted the argument that the 14th Amendment disqualifies former President Donald Trump from running in 2024 after determining that he played a role in the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol. The game-changing decision — which will inevitably be taken to the Supreme Court — mandates that Colorado’s secretary of state exclude Trump from the state’s Republican primary ballot.
The court's decision is the first to find that the insurrection clause of the 14th Amendment applies to Trump, and it could set a precedent for other states to pursue similar actions. So far, 14th Amendment cases in states like Michigan and Minnesota have failed to remove Trump’s name from any state ballot.
The ruling is stalled until Jan. 4, 2024, to allow time for Trump to appeal to the US Supreme Court. Trump's campaign promptly vowed to appeal the ruling to the nation's highest court. The primary season also begins in January, and if Trump becomes the nominee, the Supreme Court will need to rule quickly to avoid the unprecedented possibility of statewide disenfranchisement if the Republican presidential candidate is absent from an entire state’s ballot.
If the Supreme Court affirms this ruling, Trump could be disqualified from running in all states, drastically altering the landscape of the 2024 election. Many in the Republican Party will view the decision as an infringement on their right to vote for their candidate of choice while reinforcing their belief that Trump is the victim of a witch hunt. While this is unlikely to hurt Trump’s position as the Republican front-runner, a fierce legal battle lies ahead.
Bharara: Clarence Thomas' donor trips may not be illegal, but not a good look
US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has come under fire for failing to disclose taking luxury trips paid for by a billionaire Republican donor. How big of a problem is this for him, SCOTUS, and the judiciary?
Preet Preet Bharara, former US attorney for the Southern District of New York, says that Thomas probably didn't violate any actual rule related to conflicts of interest. But the optics are bad — especially coming on the heels of his wife's involvement with the Jan. 6 insurrectionists. "At a time when confidence and trust in the integrity of the court is low, it's not a great thing to do," Bhararara tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World.
To be sure, there's no evidence that the gifts influenced how Thomas ruled on cases. After all, the ex-prosecutor says he's a "dyed-in-the-wool conservative."
Still, Preet Bharara thinks he should have disclosed the gifts. If he didn't, it's likely because Thomas knew how bad it would look.
Brazil insurrection over, but not the threat to democracy
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take:
Hi everybody. Ian Bremmer here, and a Quick Take to kick off your week.
And my god, Brazil, January 8th. We've seen something like that before. Yes, we have, if you're the United States. This was a large number, thousands of Brazilians wanting to stop the steal, that fake election that they had in Brazil just a couple months ago that Lula won, won it legitimately. But former President Bolsonaro refused to concede, made his chief of staff do it. And his supporters believe that the election was unfair, was rigged. And they've been in encampments for a couple of months now, thousands of them, and decided over the course of the weekend, a week after the inauguration, to forcibly occupy the headquarters, the most important buildings for the legislature, the Congressional palace, the executive, the Presidential palace, and the Supreme Court. And as a consequence, you saw all this damage, this vandalism being done, furniture being destroyed, windows being broken, art being stolen, you name it. And it's just an incredible shame, day of sadness for Brazil.
A few things that we should talk about. The first is that Bolsonaro has said nothing over the course of these last couple of weeks. He has certainly been promoting the idea that the election was stolen from him, but he's been in Florida. He was with Donald Trump in Mar-a-Lago bringing in the New Year, and since then has been in Orlando where he rented a house. And most recently after the protestors came in and formed this insurrection, he basically said that he condemned the violence. And that's a smart thing for him to do because everyone in Brazil is condemning this right now. All the political parties and the court and the military leaders, some 1,200 have already been arrested that participated in the break-ins.
Also, there's going to be a major investigation specifically into who funded. This was well organized, it was financed. There were buses that brought the people in to Brasilia. Where did that money come from? There's a lot of speculation given some of the advising that Trump, MAGA types have been providing to Bolsonaro, his son, Eduardo, and others, people like Steve Bannon, the former chief strategist of Trump, that some of the money came from the United States. That's speculation. There's no proof, there's no evidence at this point, but there will be a serious investigation. And when that comes out, that will clearly lead to knock-on effects, both for relations with the United States as well as the impact of politicization and polarization inside Brazil itself. Keep in mind that if it is found that there are such fingerprints on these demonstrations, the far-right wing in Brazil will call it fake news and disinformation. And for them, it will be yet another argument, a conspiracy theory that the establishment is against them no matter what.
There's not much impact on Brazil in the near-term, in the sense that all of the protestors have been cleared out. Lula is president and there was an easy and peaceful transfer of power to his administration just as there ultimately was in the United States in 2021. That's not going to change, but long-term, this is an agitated, radical, and potentially violent, serious number of people in Brazil that are willing to break things. They're angry and they're willing to break things. And as Lula's popularity, which is in the high fifties now, which is pretty good, but low for a honeymoon in Brazil, slips, both because he's been there for a while and also because Brazil's economy is under a lot of pressure, the potential for this to become a much more serious threat to Brazilian democracy over time is very real indeed.
One final point that I would make, and that is that this is an American export. We mentioned in our Top Risks back a week ago, risk number three, weapons of mass disruption, where we said that the United States, which had been the leading exporter of democracy in the world back when the wall came down in '89, frequently hypocritically, frequently without success, but nonetheless, in 2022-23, the US has become the leading exporter of tools that destroy democracy, and that is very much the case with what we're seeing in Brazil right now. Social media algorithms leading to political polarization and leading to an export of these tools into other countries that are more brittle, whose democratic institutions haven't been around for as long, whose institutions are not as legitimized and aren't as entrenched, and has the potential to break those democracies.
Horrible to see that coming from the United States, not the intention of what these social media companies and these technology billionaires are trying to do, but it is certainly an indirect effect that comes from the business model, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.
That's it for me. I'll talk to you all real soon.
January 6th Committee votes on criminal referrals against Trump.
What We're Watching: Jan 6. panel's final report, Japan's nuclear U-turn, Fiji's unresolved election, Venezuela's opposition shakeup
Jan. 6 committee suggests Congress ban Trump from office
After an 18-month inquiry, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol has released its final report, blaming Donald J. Trump of a “multi-part conspiracy” to overturn the 2020 presidential election results and of failing to stop the insurrection when he knew the situation was spiraling out of control. The report also points fingers at some of Trump’s former wingmen – such as Mark Meadows, Trump’s final White House chief of staff, and his lawyer Rudy Giuliani – naming them as potential “co-conspirators.” So what now? The report lays out steps to prevent this sort of calamity from happening again, including a proposal to strengthen the 14th Amendment's ban on insurrectionists that would prevent Trump and his enablers from ever holding office again. Though the report – which Trump has called “highly partisan” – carries no legal weight, it sends a powerful message to the US Justice Department, which is conducting its own investigation into the Jan. 6 attack.
Japan reverses course on nuclear power
Japan announced on Thursday that it will extend the lifespan of its existing nuclear power plants, restart mothballed ones, and build new facilities to replace those that get phased out. PM Fumio Kishida says this is necessary to maintain the power supply while reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But it's a major about-face for Japan, which in 2011 shut down all its atomic plants after the Fukushima meltdown, the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl. On the one hand, public support for embracing nuclear has turned around recently due to rising energy costs and Japan's push to wean itself off Russian oil and natural gas. On the other, the archipelago remains as vulnerable to seismic activity as it did when a magnitude 9 earthquake triggered a tsunami that rocked Fukushima — not to mention what happened to Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Do you think Japan is doing the right thing? Let us know here.
A self-coup in Fiji?
Fiji is known for its pristine beaches, world-class scuba diving, and kava, the mildly hallucinogenic national drink. But its politics have a dark side: Every few years, there's a military power grab. After a recent messy election delivered a hung parliament, an alliance of three opposition parties on Friday confirmed an earlier deal to return former PM Sitiveni Rabuka to the premiership. But current PM Frank Bainimarama won't concede and had responded by deploying the army to help the police maintain "law and order." Many Fijians are suspicious — after all, Bainimarama came to power 16 years ago in a bloodless coup, as did Rabuka in 1987. What's more, the recent unrest has rekindled a long-held beef between majority ethnic Fijians and minority ethnic Indians. We don't know how this will all turn out, but things are not looking good in this Pacific island paradise.
Is Guaido’s time up?
Four years ago, Juan Guaido was touted as Venezuela's rising political star, who was going to rescue the country from strongman President Nicolas Maduro and bring better days to the people of Venezuela. Now, the former wunderkind is on the verge of being ousted as head of the opposition ahead of a vote next week in the National Assembly. At least 70 lawmakers from three of the four parties that make up Venezuela's opposition say they will back a motion to ditch Guaido as leader. “We can’t continue with a strategy that has shown no results,” one lawmaker said. In 2018, after general elections that were broadly seen as a power grab by Maduro, Guaido set up a shadow government backed by the West. But as Maduro has retained control of the military, and Guaido’s domestic popularity has plunged to around 17% – only a handful of Western governments (including the US) now recognize him as the country’s legitimate president. Infighting within the opposition is good news for the Maduro regime, which was already buoyed by the US recently easing some sanctions on its oil sector. Critics say Guaido has made no progress in moving the country towards new elections. But who will replace him?
The House select committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol holds their final meeting to vote on criminal referrals against former President Donald Trump.
What We’re Watching: Trump’s tough week, SCOTUS issues Title 42 stay, UK-Rwanda migrant deal is on
Jan. 6 panel recommends criminal charges for Trump
Donald Trump’s week got off to a rocky start on Monday, when the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol referred the former president to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution. The referral is based on four alleged crimes related to the insurrection, including inciting or assisting an insurrection, obstruction of an official congressional proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the U.S., and conspiracy to make a false statement. It remains unclear whether the Justice Department – which is conducting its own investigation into the events of Jan. 6 – will take up the committee’s referral, which holds no legal weight. The panel also notably referred four Republicans, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who is vying to become the next House speaker, to the House Ethics Committee for having ignored subpoenas to testify. But this is likely to have little effect because the committee, which is split evenly along party lines, rules by majority vote. Today, meanwhile, the House Ways and Means Committee will discuss whether to release Trump’s tax returns, which it finally has in its possession following years of legal wrangling. With the clock ticking on the Democrat’s House majority, the committee is expected to release the returns before Republicans take control next month. Attorney General Merrick Garland must now decide whether to charge Trump based on the historic recommendation by Congress.
Supreme Court issues stay for pandemic-era Title 42 migration policy
The future of Title 42 — the pandemic-era immigration rule invoked in 2020 by the Trump administration that allows the US to expel migrants without processing their asylum applications on public health grounds — is in flux after the Supreme Court issued a temporary stay late Monday. The Biden administration has until 5 p.m. EST to respond to an appeal by Republican-led states that succeeded in their last-ditch effort to convince SCOTUS to keep Title 42 in place, at least temporarily. Meanwhile, the government is now bracing for an influx of migrants at the US southern border, with some estimating that as many as 14,000 migrants could cross daily. For example, New York City Mayor Eric Adams has called for federal and state aid as he braces for a surge of migrant arrivals in the Big Apple that he says will crush the city’s already-strained shelter system. Indeed, immigration has always been a lightning-rod issue in the US, but temperatures are particularly high as Republican governors in southern states continue to transport thousands of migrants to blue states on buses and planes. This comes as a record number of migrants – many from Haiti and Venezuela – have already arrived at the US-Mexico border this year in a bid to flee economic hardship and political crises.
UK High Court deems Rwanda immigration deal legal
The British government says it remains committed to its Rwanda asylum plan after the High Court on Monday deemed it lawful. Introduced by former PM Boris Johnson, it was part of a deal struck in April between London and Kigali, whereby migrants who arrive in the UK would be sent to Rwanda to have their asylum applications processed – and would ultimately be resettled in the East African country. Rwanda, for its part, received £140 million ($170m) for playing ball. But because the deal has faced a slew of legal challenges, no migrants have yet been transported. Indeed, European human rights groups say the proposal violates international law and that it’s especially egregious given Rwanda’s poor human rights record. The court's decision landed just days after new UK PM Rishi Sunak, who backs the Rwanda policy, outlined a new plan to stop migrants from traveling in rickety boats across the English Channel. Still, appeal applications are expected in response to Monday’s ruling, and the Rwanda plan must remain on ice until all legal avenues are exhausted.* Correction: This Watching has been updated since our morning Signal newsletter to reflect SCOTUS' temporary block on lifting Title 42.