Jury finds New York Times did not defame Sarah Palin – live | US news

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans have come through on their threat to not show up to the banking committee meeting on the Federal Reserve confirmations:

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin has lost her libel lawsuit against the New York Times when a jury rejected today her claim that the newspaper maliciously damaged her reputation by erroneously linking her campaign rhetoric to a 2011 mass shooting in Arizona that left six dead and former congresswoman Gabby Giffords severely wounded, the Associated Press is reporting.

A judge had ruled yesterday that if the jury sided with Palin, he would set aside its verdict.

In an editorial about gun control, the Times blamed overheated political rhetoric after a man opened fire on a Congressional baseball team practice in Washington, wounding congressman Steve Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana. The shooter had a history of anti-GOP activity.

The editorial likened the shooting to the 2011 shooting in Arizona that left six dead and Giffords severely wounded, and said Palin’s political action committee had contributed to an atmosphere of violence at the time by circulating a map of electoral districts that put Giffords and 19 other Democrats under stylized crosshairs.

In a correction, the Times said it had “incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting” and that it had “incorrectly described” the map; a tweet read, “We got an important fact wrong.”

Joe Biden is expected to make some comments in about an hour on the situation in Ukraine, and the threat of a Russian invasion. Make sure to follow along on our live blog dedicated to the unfolding situation for live updates:

In his address to the National Association of Counties, Joe Biden talked about Build Back Better, the rising costs of healthcare and prescription drugs, as well as his Moonshot Initiative to reduce the death rate by cancer by 50 percent in the next 25 years.

“We’re on the verge of some significant breakthroughs in healthcare,” he said. “But should it be based upon what you can afford to pay? If Congress acts we can take care of things with the stroke of a pen tomorrow.”

Elizabeth Warren, the progressive Democratic senator from Massachusetts, has issued a statement about her vote to confirm Robert Califf as the new head of the Food and Drug Administration:

Her counterpart Ed Markey, the other Democratic senator from Massachusetts, voted against the confirmation.

Joe Biden delivered some remarks to the National Association of Counties just now, touting the American Rescue Plan and the bipartisan infrastructure law to local officials from across the country – the National Association of Counties represents county governments in the US.

“Not only has infrastructure week finally arrived, you can look forward to infrastructure decade,” he said. “Just 92 days after I signed the law, it’s already making a tangible difference. We announced billions in funding allocations to put people to work in good-paying jobs, cleaning up rivers in Ohio, chemical plants in Florida and dozens of other sites, bolstering the energy grid with stronger transmission lines and towers and modernizing bridges.”

Biden continued: “This is only the beginning: hundreds of billions in new investments are on their way. Now it’s time for the counties to get ready.”

Robert Califf’s appointment as the new head of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was confirmed today, but the process was not as straightforward as the Biden administration first thought.

Senator Joe Manchin, a Virginia Democrat, urged senators to oppose Califf’s appointment earlier this week, saying he bears “a great deal of responsibility” for many of the US opioid overdose deaths in the years since Califf’s first stint as FDA commissioner under the Obama administration.

The Associated Press reports that at that time, Califf “added new warning labels to opioids and commissioned outside recommendations on how to tighten regulation of the drugs. But he was replaced by President Donald Trump before implementing any major changes.”

Califf has promised to launch a review of opioids as one of his first actions in his new role.

The US senate has narrowly confirmed Joe Biden’s pick to lead the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the powerful regulator that hasn’t had a permanent leader in more than a year.

The 50-46 vote means Dr Robert Califf, a cardiologist, will helm the agency, which regulates billion-dollar industries including prescription and over-the-counter drugs, as well as most foods on sale in the US.

Califf previously held the job for 11 months in the final years of Obama administration after securing overwhelming support in the senate – a contrast to Tuesday’s tight result.

The FDA has played a key role in the US response to the Covid-19 pandemic, including reviewing and approving vaccines against a backdrop of deep political polarization over public health measures.

Senate Republicans are so strongly opposed to the nominees for the Federal Reserve that some are threatening to boycott the afternoon committee vote.

Sarah Raskin is the wife of Jamie Raskin, a Democratic congressman from Maryland.

The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, is trying to bring the postal service reform bill to the Senate floor this week following a technical error blocking its way: House clerks mistakenly enrolled the wrong version of the bill, meaning that Schumer filed cloture on the wrong version.

Schumer has issued a unanimous consent request to file cloture on the correct bill, but as the name implies, it requires unanimous consent – and Rick Scott, the Republican senator from Florida, is standing in the way because he doesn’t like the legislation.

It’s not the end of the world – this just means that the bill will be delayed a few weeks – but it’s frustrating development for postal reform advocates, nonetheless.

Kathleen Rice, a Democratic congresswoman from New York, has announced that she is not running for re-election. She becomes the 30th Democrat in the House who is not running for reelection, putting their 222 to 212 majority at risk.

The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, had sounded off on the funding issue:

Remington, the manufacturer of an assault rifle used to kill 20 schoolchildren and six adults in the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook elementary school in Connecticut, has agreed to settle liability claims for the families of nine of the victims.

This will be the first time a gunmaker is held responsible for a mass shooting in the US, and comes one day after the four-year anniversary of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland, Florida, when Joe Biden called for such accountability to take place.

“Congress must do much more – beginning with requiring background checks on all gun sales, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and eliminating immunity for gun manufacturers,” Biden said.

Details of the settlement are still unclear, but in July, Remington offered $33m, which was substantially less than what the victims’ families were seeking. In a February court filing, their attorneys estimated the wrongful death claims likely totalled in excess of $225m, rising above $1bn with punitive damages.

The federal government runs out of money at the end of the week, but the usual tense will-they, won’t-they drama of a government shutdown has been muted with by the situation in Ukraine.

Punchbowl News is reporting that the senate is currently stuck on two unrelated government funding snafus.

One of the two snafus stems from Marsha Blackburn, the Republican senator from Tennessee, who is holding out on a three-week stopgap funding bill because she believes that the Biden administration is trying to set aside money to hand out crack pipes. Though the White House has denied this, Blackburn is allegedly waiting on the Biden administration to formally respond to her concerns before she allows the bill to go through.

The last tussle comes from several Republican senators, led by Mike Lee of Utah, who are demanding a vote on the amendment to ban the federal government from funding a vaccine mandate for federal workers, contractors and the military.

However, Punchbowl News noted that these last-minute disputes have become standard for the senate ahead of funding talks, and will likely be resolved – there likely won’t be a shutdown.

Yesterday we reported on how Mazars, the longtime accountancy firm for the Trump Organization, had cut ties with Donald Trump after admitting in a court filing that nearly a decade’s worth of Trump’s filings should “no longer be relied upon”.

The Guardian’s Dominic Rushe has more details here:

Ahoy there, live blog readers. Happy the Valentine Candy is on Sale Day.

As it has been in recent weeks, much of the focus in Washington has been on Ukraine, and the imminent threat of a Russian invasion. Make sure to check out our live blog here for live updates as the situation unfolds.

Meanwhile, in the US, progressive congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been making waves as she campaigns for progressive candidates in Texas and talks about turning the once staunchly red state blue.

Today, her New Yorker interview raised more eyebrows when she said there was a “very real risk” that democracy would not exist in the US 10 years from now.

Read more about her comments here: