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Democratic candidates are generally popular, Times/Siena polling finds, but retaking the Senate remains a big challenge.
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The Democratic Socialists of America's slate dominated the New York primaries last week, with Aber Kawas winning the Democratic nomination for a New York state Senate seat in the New York City borough of Queens with a 20-point lead against progressive State Assemblymember Steven Raga. Born and raised in New York to Palestinian parents, Kawas campaigned on affordable housing, universal healthcare, immigration reform, public transit, climate action and opposition to U.S. support for Israel's genocide in Gaza.
Over the past decade, the DSA has grown from about 5,000 members to over 100,000 members in 200 chapters across the United States. "What we are saying is that we want to make sure that people who are struggling are provided the best social services possible by our government," says Aber Kawas of DSA candidates. "That is not a threat to people. That is a really hopeful message that so many Americans and so many people are looking for, and that is why we were able to win in these landslide victories."
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The Trump administration has approved media conglomerate Paramount's $111 billion bid to acquire Warner Bros., one year after Paramount and Skydance Media signed a similar merger that placed Paramount's movie studio, streaming service and broadcast network CBS under the control of the multibillionaire Ellison family, founders of Skydance and close allies of Donald Trump. The Warner Bros. merger, if completed, would bring an even larger slice of the industry's market share into Ellison control. It's been contested for months as a likely violation of antitrust laws amid a wider trend of corporate consolidation in the media and entertainment industry. "This has been one of the most shallow and corrupt merger review processes we've ever seen," says Craig Aaron, co-CEO of the advocacy organizations Free Press and Free Press Action (not to be confused with Paramount Skydance's conservative news outlet The Free Press), about the Justice Department's greenlighting of the merger.
The deal will place two of the largest U.S. broadcast news networks — CBS News and CNN — under the control of a single company that "has shown it is willing to warp and manipulate news coverage to please the president," Aaron says. He warns that the many violations of press freedom committed by CBS News since its acquisition last year could soon be seen at CNN, including "getting rid of independent journalists asking hard questions [and] spiking stories about crimes being committed by the Trump administration." In a consolidated media landscape, he adds, "we get fewer and fewer choices, and we get more and more of the same kind of cookie-cutter content produced."
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More than 200 people have now been killed in U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. Since September, the Pentagon has struck more than 60 vessels, claiming, without evidence, that the boats were engaged in "narco-trafficking" operations. Human rights groups have roundly condemned the attacks as extrajudicial killings.
"The U.S. is not in active conflict with any of these groups," says Amanda Klasing, the national director of government relations and advocacy at Amnesty International USA. "These are law enforcement operations, … so the individuals on these boats have a right to life and a right to due process."
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