votes

Tensions are palpable in the West African nation of Togo as highly anticipated local government elections are being held following weeks of angry protests calling for leader Faure Gnassingbe to resign.

Although small, Togo commands weight as a developing maritime and transit hub in the region because of an important port in the seaside capital, Lome, which is perched on the edge of the Atlantic. The country serves as a gateway into inland Sahel nations and is also home to a major West African airline, meaning unrest there could reverberate across the region.

Voters heading out to cast their ballots on Thursday, July 17, are expected to elect leaders of the country’s 117 municipalities, amid a heavier-than-usual security presence and shuttered land borders.

At the same time, demonstrators have scheduled protests in the capital, Lome, to intentionally clash with the date of the vote, prompting fears of possible widespread violence.

Led largely by the country’s youth population, antigovernment demonstrations erupted in June after a controversial constitutional change. Protests have been met with brute force from Togolese security forces; at least seven people have died, local rights groups say. The protests are only the latest in the restive country, where more frequent demonstrations in recent years are pressuring the decades-long dynastic government.

Here’s what to know about the current political situation in Togo:

Why are Togolese protesting?

Large demonstrations have been held in Lome in recent years, with Togolese calling for Gnassingbe, who has led the country since 2005, to step down.

Between 2017 and 2018, thousands of protesters took to the streets in demonstrations tagged “Faure Must Go” and “Togo stands up”. The uprising rocked the nation of four million and resulted in violent crackdowns from security officials. The government thereafter banned public demonstrations for “security reasons”.

Although officially a democracy, Togo operates in practice as a militarised state, with the army heavily involved in politics. The capital is crawling with stern-faced, armed gendarmes who are often accused of arresting and torturing dissidents.

This year’s bout of protests was triggered after popular rapper and TikToker Tchala Essowe Narcisse, popularly known as Aamron, was arrested for publishing a video where he called for protests to mark the president’s June 6 birthday.

However, anger had been simmering over the high costs of living in the country, and particularly, over new constitutional reforms that opposition leaders and civil society organisations say could see Gnassingbe rule for life. Thursday’s municipal elections will be the first polls held under the new reforms.

First approved in April 2024 by a parliament dominated by the governing Union pour le Republic (UNIR) party, the constitutional amendment swapped the presidential system in the country for a parliamentary one.

Controversially, though, it also introduced a new all-powerful position: President of the Council of Ministers. The role essentially regains all the powers of a president and is without clear official limits. Opposition leaders argued at the time that it would allow Gnassingbe to appoint a dummy president and remain the de facto leader until at least 2030. They called it a “constitutional coup”.

On May 3 this year, Gnassingbe was sworn into the new executive role, as critics predicted. Politician Jean-Lucien Savi de Tove, 86, is now president, and is the oldest in Togo’s history.

In late June, thousands of demonstrators poured into the streets of Lome in anger, calling for Gnassingbe to step down from office after rapper Aamron’s arrest and alleged torture. Protesters set up barricades and hurled stones at security forces, who responded with force, firing tear gas canisters into the crowd, according to reporting by the Reuters news agency.

Le Front Citoyen Togo Debout, a coalition of 12 civil society and human rights groups, accused security officials of arbitrarily arresting civilians, beating them with batons and ropes, and stealing and destroying private property.

At least seven people were discovered dead in the aftermath of the protests, according to the coalition, including two minors. Their bodies were discovered days after the demonstrations in various lagoons and lakes around Lome.

Meanwhile, a Togolese government statement said the deaths were caused by drowning and cautioned residents living near water bodies to be extra careful in the current rainy season.

The ‘Don’t Touch My Constitution’ movement demanded an international investigation into the claims, while Togo’s Catholic Bishops said the levels of violence were “unacceptable and unjustified”.

Who is Faure Gnassingbe?

Just days after his father died in 2005, Faure Essozimna Gnassingbe was hurriedly installed as the country’s president by the army, extending decades of his family’s rule over Togo.

Despite outrage in the country, which led to widespread protests in which at least 500 people were killed, the younger Gnassingbe did not relinquish power and went on to organise and win elections that year, which many critics called a ruse.

His father, the late Gnassingbe Eyadema, seized power in a military coup and ruled the country with a tight fist for 38 years (1967-2005), making him the longest-serving African ruler at the time he died. His “rule of terror” was characterised by a one-party system and deadly repression of dissent, according to Amnesty International. The younger Gnassingbe, while having fostered multi-party rule and infrastructural development in the country, appears to be angling for his father’s record, critics say.

Combined, the father-son duo has commandeered Togo for 58 years. With 60 percent of the population under 35, most Togolese have never experienced life under a different political administration.

Gnassingbe has won every election since 2005. In 2019, in an attempt to circumvent demonstrations calling for his resignation, parliament ushered in constitutional amendments that, the government argued, automatically reset Gnassingbe’s terms. That allowed him to run for the 2020 and 2025 presidential elections.

At first glance, the latest reforms from 2024 appear to acquiesce to what some critics have been demanding: A weakened president elected by the parliament for a single six-year term, rather than an all-powerful leader.

However, what most did not see coming was that Gnassingbe would be appointed to a more powerful position.

Are protesters being targeted? And what is the M66 Movement?

As tensions simmer, demonstrators and civil society accuse Togolese officials of targeting protest leaders, many of whom are living in exile in neighbouring countries, as well as France and the United States.

Last week, the government issued international arrest warrants targeting those believed to be leading organisers, especially members of the M66 Citizens’ Movement – a political collective of bloggers and activists, named after Gnassingbe’s June 6 birthday date. Officials say the group is “inciting unrest and terrorism” in the country.

“The countries where these individuals reside are urged to cooperate,” Security Minister Calixte Madjoulba said at a news briefing. “Wherever they are, we will pursue them.”

M66 members called for renewed protests on July 16 and 17 in a bid to boycott the municipal elections, which form part of a wider push by the government to devolve power at the centre and attempt to improve local governance. Local elections were not held between 1986 and 2020, as the government kept postponing them. Instead, the central authorities designated special administrators who critics say served the government’s interests.

Some opposition leaders have also called for boycotts, although Jean-Pierre Fabre, leader of the main opposition National Alliance for Change, told reporters this week that taking part in the vote was necessary to show Togolese what’s possible.

“The elections will not change anything in this country and we know it very well,” Zaga Bambo, a France-based music artist who claims to be a member of the group, said in a Facebook post. Bambo also dismissed the arrest warrants, telling French media channel RFI that he was unfazed by it.

Activist Farida Nabourema echoed calls for boycotts on social media platform X. “You participate, you lose, you cry out, then you fall silent. And every five years, you start over,” she wrote.

July 16 (UPI) — President Donald Trump said a deal has been made with almost all the Republican House members who sank a procedural vote on his cryptocurrency bills Tuesday.

“I am in the Oval Office with 11 of the 12 congressmen/women necessary to pass the Genius Act and, after a short discussion, they have all agreed to vote tomorrow morning in favor of the rule,” Trump said via Truth Social Tuesday.

“Speaker of the House Mike Johnson was at the meeting via telephone, and looks forward to taking the vote as early as possible,” he added.

Two of the bills in question are the aforementioned Genius Act, which would regulate stablecoins and the Clarity Act, which would set rules to decide if an asset is to be regulated as either a security by the Securities and Exchange Commission or as a commodity supervised by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The third bill would stop the creation of a central bank digital currency by the Federal Reserve.

It is unclear what guarantees Trump made to lock in the 11 switched votes of support for the procedural rule.

“I’m thankful for President Trump getting involved tonight,” posted Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to X Tuesday, who then declared that the Genius Act will pass when the new vote happens Wednesday.

Shares of stablecoin companies Circle and Coinbase had both dropped Tuesday upon the failure of the procedural vote, as did shares of the digital asset firm MARA Holdings, but all three had upward-heading premarket numbers Wednesday.

Already a ripe target for Democrats in the next election, Central Valley Rep. David Valadao put his political future in deeper peril this week by voting in favor of legislation that slashes the Medicaid coverage essential to roughly two-thirds of his constituents.

The Republican dairy farmer from Hanford said that despite his concerns about President Trump’s megabill, he voted to support it because of concessions he helped negotiate that will help his district, such as an additional $25 billion for rural hospitals, $1 billion for Western water infrastructure and agricultural investments.

More than a half-million residents in Valadao’s district are covered by the program known in California as Medi-Cal — the most of any district in the state — according to the UC Berkeley Labor Center. While preserving tax breaks benefiting the wealthy, the bill passed by a narrow Republican majorities in both the House and Senate would reduce federal Medicaid spending by $1.04 trillion over 10 years, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates.

Valadao said his constituents would directly benefit from several provisions in the legislation, including the extension of the tax breaks, the elimination of taxes on tips and overtime, and the expansion of the child tax credit.

“These are real wins that will put more money back in the pockets of hardworking families throughout the Valley,” he said. “No piece of legislation is perfect, but this bill ultimately reflects the priorities of [my district] — lower taxes, stronger farms, better infrastructure, and a commitment to protecting access to healthcare for Valley residents.”

Democrats vowed to use Valadao’s vote to oust him from office in the 2026 election. His district, which includes swaths of Kern, Kings and Tulare counties, is among the most competitive in the nation.

Valadao has repeatedly vowed to oppose legislation that would cut healthcare for his constituents, most recently on Monday, when he posted on the social media platform X: “I’ve been clear from the start that I will not support a final reconciliation bill that makes harmful cuts to Medicaid, puts critical funding at risk, or threatens the stability of healthcare providers across” his district.

After his vote on Thursday, Valadao said that he voted for the bill because it preserves Medicaid “for its intended recipients — children, pregnant women, the disabled, and elderly.”

“David Valadao just sealed his fate by voting for a bill that will rip health care away from tens of thousands in his district, where more than two-thirds of his constituents rely on the very program he’s gutting,” said Anna Elsasser, a spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, in a statement. “He lied to their faces, and then tried to sweep it under the rug. We all knew he’d fold when it mattered most. It’s spineless, it’s dishonest, and next November, it will cost him his seat.”

A billboard proclaiming “David Valadao Lied. He voted to gut Medi-Cal, giving CEOs a tax break. We’ll pay with our lives” was erected Thursday near the 99 Freeway in Valadao’s district by Fight for Our Health, a nonprofit coalition of health, labor, senior, disability and other groups.

Democrats also plan on targeting Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona) and Rep. Young Kim (R-Anaheim Hills) for their support of the bill. Hundreds of protesters descended on Kim’s Anaheim field office on Tuesday to urge the congresswoman to oppose the legislation.

Trump’s proposal narrowly passed the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, with Vice President JD Vance casting a tie-breaking vote because of the defection of three GOP senators who joined every Democrat in voting against it.

The legislation will dramatically overhaul the nation’s tax code by making tax cuts approved during the president’s first term permanent, a major benefit to corporations and the nation’s wealthy, while slashing funding for historic federal safety-net programs including Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps provide food to low-income Americans.

A CBO analysis released Sunday estimated that the Senate version of the proposal would increase the national deficit by nearly $3.3 trillion from 2025 to 2034 and would result in 11.8 million Americans losing health insurance in less than a decade.

The legislation created a rift among Republicans, with some opposing the amount of money it would add to the deficit while others expressing concerns about how it would impact their constituents. But ultimately, GOP members of Congress put aside their differences to get the bill on the president’s desk by Independence Day, as Trump desired.

In a marathon session that ended early Thursday morning, members of the House of Representatives voted 220-212 largely along party lines to approve a procedural rule that allows the legislation to be considered by the full body Thursday, a victory for Trump and GOP legislative leaders.

Valadao’s vote in support of the procedural vote before midnight Wednesday raised eyebrows, given the number of his constituents who rely on Medicaid, his previous willingness to oppose Trump and GOP concerns about holding onto control of his seat.

More than 40% of the district’s voters are Democrats, while 28.3% are Republicans and 23.3% registered as having no party preference, according to the nonpartisan California Target Book, which handicaps congressional races.

Valadao, 48, served one term in the state Assembly prior to being elected to Congress in 2012. He was reelected twice before narrowly losing reelection in 2018. He retook the seat in 2020.

He drew the ire of fellow Republicans as one of 10 GOP members of congress who voted to impeach Trump in 2021 after a violent mob of the president’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in the aftermath of the president’s loss in the 2020 presidential election. However, Valadao did not face the same retribution from Trump that the others did, reportedly because of the congressman’s long-standing relationship with former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday told reporters that Valadao should leave office if he votes for the bill.

“It’s the ultimate betrayal,” he said during a news conference in Burbank. “This is one of the most calamitous and devastating bills of our lifetime.”

Newsom predicted that if the bill passes, hospitals will close, Californians will lose access to healthcare and food stamps, and student loans will increase.

Valadao “might as well resign early and I can call a special election, if he supports it,” Newsom said. “What basis do you have of trust in your own district if you would betray your own constituency to such an extraordinary, extraordinary degree. It’s one of the poorest districts in the country.”

July 3 (UPI) — The House of Representatives approved the fiscal year 2026 federal budget bill, commonly referred to as “one big, beautiful bill,” with a 218 to 214 vote on Thursday afternoon.

The measure now goes to President Donald Trump for signing, which he might do on Independence Day.

Two Republicans, Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, voted against the measure. So did all House Democrats, CBS News reported.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries launched a marathon eight-hour speech on the House floor Thursday, seeking to delay a final vote, but his effort failed.

Jeffries, D-N.Y., began speaking at 4:52 a.m. EDT, describing frustration with the leaders of the House GOP, who only allowed one hour of debate over the more than 900-page bill.

Jeffries spent his speaking time telling the stories of people who will be harmed by the bill, focusing on those in Republican districts and calling out the House members who represent them.

Jeffries’ eight-hour speech set a record for the longest delivered on the House floor, USA Today reported.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., took the floor after Jeffries finished speaking to conduct the final vote after spending most of the day Wednesday negotiating with GOP House members.

Trump also met with skeptical GOP House members at the White House to work out a way to get the measure passed before the Fourth of July holiday.

Johnson said he and the president discussed having the measure, House Resolution 1, signed into law during Friday’s national holiday.

“What more appropriate time to pass the big, beautiful bill for America than on Independence Day?” He said, as reported by USA Today.

The funding bill is projected to increase the nation’s current $36 trillion deficit by another $3.4 trillion over the next decade.

It also makes income tax cuts enacted during Trump’s first term in office permanent instead of allowing them to expire this year.

The bill also gives tax breaks for income earned via tips and overtime pay, and it reduces tax breaks for clean energy projects that were created by the Biden administration.

The amendment comes after police investigated more than 100 women, including some who had natural miscarriages.

British parliamentarians have voted to decriminalise abortion in England and Wales after concerns sparked by the prosecution of women who end a pregnancy.

The House of Commons approved an amendment to a broader bill on Tuesday that would prevent women from being criminally punished under an antiquated law.

Currently, a woman can face criminal charges for choosing to end a pregnancy after 24 weeks or without the approval of two doctors, under laws that technically still carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.

The amendment passed 379-137. The House of Commons will now need to pass the crime bill, which is expected, before it goes to the House of Lords, where it can be delayed but not blocked.

Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi, the Labour member of Parliament who introduced one of the amendments, said the change was needed because police have investigated more than 100 women for suspected illegal abortions over the past five years, including some who suffered natural miscarriages and stillbirths.

“This piece of legislation will only take women out of the criminal justice system because they are vulnerable and they need our help,” she said. “Just what public interest is this serving? This is not justice, it is cruelty and it has got to end.”

Changes in the law implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic allow women to receive abortion pills through the mail and terminate their own pregnancies at home within the first 10 weeks.

That has led to a handful of widely publicised cases in which women were prosecuted for illegally obtaining abortion pills and using them to end their own pregnancies after 24 weeks.

In May, Nicola Packer was acquitted after taking abortion medicine when she was around 26 weeks pregnant, beyond the legal limit of 10 weeks for taking such medication at home.

The 45-year-old told jurors during her trial, which came after a four-year police investigation, that she did not realise she had been pregnant for so long.

Carla Foster was jailed in 2023 for illegally obtaining abortion tablets to end her pregnancy when she was between 32 and 34 weeks pregnant. The Court of Appeal eventually suspended her sentence.

June 12 (UPI) — The House of Representatives narrowly approved axing $8.3 billion in funding for the U.S. Agency for International Development and another $1.1 billion for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting on Thursday.

The House voted 214-212 to approve the rescissions package of bills and send them to the Senate, which could pass the measures with a simple majority.

The measures were passed after two House Republicans switched their votes after initially opposing their passage.

Reps. Don Bacon of Nebraska and Nick LaLota of New York opposed the rescission bills but voted for the measure with strong encouragement from House GOP leadership.

Four other GOP House members, Nicole Malliotakis of New York, Mark Amodei of Nevada, Mike Turner of Ohio and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania voted with 208 House Democrats to oppose the rescission package.

Four Democrats and two Republican House members did not vote on the rescission package.

The formerly Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency recommended the rescissions after reviewing USAID, PBS and NPR spending.

“I want to thank DOGE for their heroic and patriotic efforts,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters afterward.

“What we’re trying to do is ensure that every dollar spent by the federal government is used efficiently and effectively,” Johnson said.

Johnson conferred with LaLota and Bacon on the House floor while the vote was still open, but passage looked doubtful until they changed their votes.

LaLota said the conversation between him and Johnson involved state and local tax cuts in New York that are part of the “one big beautiful bill” that Trump wants passed to fund the federal government for the 2026 fiscal year.

“I had some conversations with the speaker that raised my level of confidence that will put this and future issues in the right trajectory,” LaLota told reporters afterward.

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., also joined Johnson and LaLota for the floor conversation and then voted in favor of the measure.

Bacon had announced on Monday that he wouldn’t support the rescission package “if it guts an AIDS relief program,” namely the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, which was started by former President George W. Bush.

President Donald Trump posted to Truth Social in April that “Republicans must defund and totally disassociate themselves from NPR and PBS,” further calling the stations “radical-left monsters.”

Johnson has called the request an opportunity to cancel “wasteful spending” that would “ensure greater accountability in government going forward.”

“There is no reason for any media organization to be singled out to receive federal funds, especially those who appear to have so little regard for the truth,” Johnson previously said.

As for USAID, Johnson said DOGE “went after USAID first for their review, their audits,” because it allegedly “opposed the loudest of this accountability measure,” which “put the scrutiny targets on their own backs.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., accused House Republicans of “debating legislation that targets Elmo and Big Bird and Daniel Tiger and Sesame Street” instead of legislation that could help the nation and its economy during floor debate on Thursday.

Congress has the ability to cancel funds that the federal government had previously appropriated but hasn’t spent under the rescissions process.

The president can temporarily defer or withhold such funds, but only with the approval of Congress.

Republicans currently hold a seven-seat majority in the House. In the case of the Senate, where there are 53 Republicans among its 100 seats, rescission bills only require a simple majority.

President Sheinbaum labels vote a ‘success’, but experts warn criminals could use it to infiltrate judiciary.

A landmark vote to select judges in Mexico has been labelled a “success” by the president despite a sparse turnout and widespread confusion.

Just 13 percent of eligible voters cast ballots in Sunday’s vote to overhaul the court system. President Claudia Sheinbaum proclaimed that the election would make Mexico more democratic, but critics accused her of seeking to take control of the judiciary, while analysts warned it could open the way for criminals to seize influence.

The vote, a cornerstone policy of Sheinbaum and predecessor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, aimed to fill about 880 federal judicial positions, including Supreme Court justices, as well as hundreds of local judges and magistrates.

But many voters said they struggled to make informed choices among a flood of largely unknown candidates, who were barred from openly disclosing party affiliations or engaging in widespread campaigning.

‘Largely empty’ polling stations

Al Jazeera’s John Holman reported from Mexico City that polling stations were “largely empty”.

“On what the government planned to be a historic day, the majority of Mexicans prefer to do something else,” he said.

Still, Sheinbaum hailed the election as “a complete success” that makes the country a democratic trailblazer.

“Mexico is a country that is only becoming more free, just and democratic because that is the will of the people,” the president said.

The reform, defended by supporters as necessary to cleanse a corrupt justice system, was originally championed by Sheinbaum’s predecessor, Lopez Obrador, who frequently clashed with the old judiciary.

‘Painstaking process’

Experts had warned that turnout would be unusually low due to the sheer number of candidates and the unfamiliarity of judicial voting.

To be properly informed, voters “would have to spend hours and hours researching the track record and the profiles of each of the hundreds of candidates”, said David Shirk, a professor at the University of San Diego.

That concern was echoed by voters at the polls.

“We are not very prepared,” said Lucia Calderon, a 63-year-old university teacher. “I think we need more information.”

Francisco Torres de Leon, a 62-year-old retired teacher in southern Mexico, called the process “painstaking because there are too many candidates and positions that they’re going to fill”.

Beyond logistical challenges, analysts and rights groups raised fears that powerful criminal groups could use the elections to further infiltrate the judiciary.

While corruption already exists, “there is reason to believe that elections may be more easily infiltrated by organised crime than other methods of judicial selection”, said Margaret Satterthwaite, the United Nations special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers.

Although all candidates were supposed to have legal experience, no criminal record and a “good reputation”, several have been linked to organised crime and corruption scandals.

Rights group Defensorxs identified about 20 candidates it considers “high risk”, including Silvia Delgado, a former lawyer for Sinaloa cartel cofounder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

Another candidate, in Durango state, previously served nearly six years in a US prison for drug offences.

Election results are expected in the coming days. A second round of judicial elections is scheduled for 2027 to fill hundreds more positions.

The European country chooses between conservative historian Karol Nawrocki and pro-EU Warsaw mayor Rafal Trzaskowski.

Poles are voting in a decisive presidential run-off that could have a major impact on the nation’s future role in the European Union.

Polling began at 7am local time (05:00 GMT), with pro-EU Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski from the centre-right Civic Platform of the governing Civic Coalition facing off against conservative historian Karol Nawrocki, who is backed by the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party.

The run-off follows a tightly contested first round on May 18, in which Trzaskowski won just more than 31 percent, and Nawrocki won nearly 30 percent, eliminating 11 other candidates.

The winner will succeed incumbent Andrzej Duda, the outgoing nationalist conservative president who was also backed by PiS and blamed for holding up justice reforms by using his veto against Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s centrist government.

The campaign has highlighted stark ideological divides, with the outcome expected to determine whether Poland continues along a nationalist path or pivots more decisively towards liberal democratic norms.

Trzaskowski, the 53-year-old son of a famous jazz musician, has promised to restore judicial independence, ease abortion restrictions and promote constructive ties with European partners.

Nawrocki, a 42-year-old former boxer, who is favoured by United States President Donald Trump, has positioned himself as a defender of traditional Polish values, and is sceptical of the EU.

Amid rising security fears over Russia’s war on Ukraine, both the candidates support aid to Kyiv, though Nawrocki opposes NATO membership for neighbouring Ukraine, while Trzaskowski supports it.

The two candidates have taken a similarly hardline approach to immigration, both using anti-Ukrainian rhetoric, building on growing resentment among Poles who see themselves as competing for strained social services with 1.55 million Ukrainian war refugees and migrants.

While Trzaskowski has proposed that only working Ukrainians should have access to the country’s child benefit, Nawrocki has gone further, saying he would also be against Ukraine joining NATO or even the EU.

Polls close at 9pm (19:00 GMT) when an exit poll is expected. Final results are likely to be announced on Monday.

Despite war losses, Hezbollah is using the vote as an opportunity to show it still has political influence.

Voters in southern Lebanon are casting their ballots in municipal elections seen as a test of support for Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim political and armed group.

The vote on Saturday in the mostly Shia area, where Hezbollah is allied with Amal – the party led by Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri – marks the final phase of Lebanon’s staggered local elections.

It comes after a November 2024 ceasefire between the group and Israel was supposed to end months of attacks. lsrael, however, has continued sporadic strikes as recently as on Thursday, when air raids hit multiple locations in the south.

Both Hezbollah and Amal are widely expected to dominate the municipal races, having already secured control of numerous councils unopposed.

Turnout was high in border villages ravaged by last year’s conflict, with residents of Kfar Kila – a town nearly levelled by Israeli attacks – voting in nearby Nabatieh. Others from surrounding areas cast ballots in Tyre.

“The will of life is stronger than death and the will of construction is stronger than destruction,” Lebanese President Joseph Aoun told reporters on Saturday, as he made a tour of the country’s south. He said he voted for the first time in 40 years in his hometown of Aaichiyeh.

Among those heading to the polls were Hezbollah members still recovering from a series of Israeli attacks in September 2024, when thousands of pagers exploded nearly simultaneously, killing more than a dozen people and wounding nearly 3,000.

“Southerners are proving again that they are with the choice of resistance,” Hezbollah legislator Ali Fayyad, who represents border villages, said in Nabatieh.

Hezbollah still holding political influence

The vote comes at a critical time for Hezbollah. While the group emerged from the conflict with reduced military capabilities and diminished political leverage, the elections offer a platform to reaffirm its influence in the region.

“Lebanon has still not fully recovered from last year’s war between Hezbollah and Israel. In fact, Israel continues to target Hezbollah despite a ceasefire,” said Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from Nabatieh.

“Hezbollah, no doubt was militarily weakened during the conflict; it lost a lot of its military power but it is using these elections as an opportunity to show that it still has political influence,” Khodr added.

Many feel Hezbollah failed to shield them during the war, yet fears of isolation persist, she said. “They feel vulnerable … not just towards Israel, but also in a deeply divided country and they feel that opponents of Hezbollah are also marginalising the community as a whole.”

Lebanon’s new government has pledged to create a state monopoly on arms, raising pressure on Hezbollah to disarm as required under the United States-brokered truce with Israel.

Lebanon now faces the massive task of rebuilding after 14 months of war, with the World Bank estimating its reconstruction needs at more than $11bn.

In October 2023, Hezbollah launched a rocket campaign on Israel in support of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, which was being bombarded by Israel following a surprise attack led by Palestinian group Hamas.

Israel responded with shelling and air attacks on Lebanon that escalated into a full-blown war before the ceasefire went into effect in late November.

The Republican-controlled U.S. Senate defied congressional norms and voted Wednesday to revoke California’s progressive vehicle emission standards that would’ve effectively banned the sale of new gasoline-only cars by 2035.

In a 51-44 vote, the Senate overturned a Biden-era waiver that enabled California and a contingent of Democratic-led states to enforce zero-emission requirements for the sale of new passenger vehicles. After several hours of debate and testimony, legislators struck down a landmark regulation that aimed to drastically accelerate electric vehicle sales in California and nearly a dozen other states that chose to follow its lead, substantially reducing air pollution and planet-warming carbon emissions from tailpipes.

The Advanced Clean Cars II rule, enacted in 2022 by the California Air Resources Board and granted a federal waiver by the Biden administration’s Environmental Protection Agency in December 2024, required car manufacturers to sell an increasing percentage of zero-emission or plug-in hybrid vehicles to California dealerships over the next decade. Starting next year, the rule would have mandated that 35% of all new vehicles supplied to California dealerships be zero-emission vehicles or plug-in hybrids. By 2035, it would’ve prohibited the sale of new, gas-only cars statewide.

By invalidating the rule, Republican senators stamped out one of California’s most ambitious environmental policies and, more broadly, challenged the state’s authority to enact vehicle standards to combat its notoriously unhealthy air quality. If the measure is signed into law by President Trump and survives impending legal challenges, the vote would serve as a coup de grace to the state’s decades-long efforts to comply with federal smog standards in Southern California and meet California’s own ambitious climate goals.

The zero-emission requirements were expected to eliminate nearly 70,000 tons of smog-forming emissions and 4,500 tons of soot statewide by 2040, preventing more than 1,200 premature deaths and providing $13 billion in public health benefits, according to the California Air Resources Board. It also was expected to prevent the release of 395 million metric tons of carbon emissions — roughly the amount released by 100 coal plants in a year.

Ahead of the vote, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) warned that nullifying this rule and stripping California’s regulatory power would have serious health effects across the state.

“We are sowing poison seeds for the future,” Schiff said. “Seeds that will grow to be more asthma and more sickness and more hospitalization and more death. That is the bleak but blatant reality of what we are debating here today.”

Republicans, however, argued that California’s zero-emission requirements threatened to cripple the American auto industry and significantly limit the options for car buyers. In the coming days, Republicans plan to undo additional California clean-air rules that require the state’s heavy-duty truck fleet to adopt cleaner engines and a growing percentage of zero-emission vehicles.

“Democrats have this delusional dream of eliminating gas-powered vehicles in America,” Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said Tuesday from a lectern on the floor of the U.S. Capitol. “They want to force-feed electric vehicles to every man and woman who drives in this country. Well, Republicans are ready to use the Congressional Review Act to end this Democrat electric vehicle fantasy.”

Republicans moved ahead with the vote despite the warnings from the Government Accountability Office and the Senate Parliamentarian that the waivers could not be overturned with the Congressional Review Act — a law that was meant to allow legislators to inspect and potentially block federal rules adopted in the waning days of a previous presidential administration.

Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, said the vote was a flagrant abuse of the Congressional Review Act. He threatened to block or delay the confirmation process for four Trump nominees to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency if Senate Republicans voted to overturn California’s vehicle emission standards.

“It appears that Republicans want to overturn half a century of precedent in order to undermine California’s ability to protect the health of our residents by using the Congressional Review Act to revoke California’s waivers that allow us to set our own vehicle emission standards,” Padilla said. “Republicans seem to be putting the wealth of the big oil industry over the health of our constituents.”

Environmental advocates, many of whom had spent years supporting California’s emissions standards, expressed their disappointment in the vote.

“This is a major blow to the decades-long public health protections delivered under the Clean Air Act,” said Will Barrett, senior director of nationwide clean air advocacy for the American Lung Assn. “It is more important than ever that California and all other states that rely on Clean Air Act waivers continue to cut tailpipe pollution through homegrown, health-protective policies.”

Because of its historically poor air quality, California has been an innovator in clean car policy, enacting the nation’s first tailpipe emissions standards in 1966. California was later granted the special authority to adopt vehicle emission standards that are more strict than the federal government’s under the Clean Air Act. But the state must seek a federal waiver from the U.S. EPA for any specific rule to be enforceable.

In the five decades since then, the state has enacted dozens of rules to reduce air pollution and planet-warming greenhouse gases. Padilla stressed that these rules were largely meant to alleviate lung-aggravating smog, which was a persistent threat where he grew up in Los Angeles.

“On a pretty regular basis, we would be sent home from grade school because of the intensity and dangers of smog that settled over the San Fernando Valley,” Padilla said. “That’s the case for far too many Californians, still to this day. But it’s the reason why, decades ago, Congress recognized both California’s unique air quality challenges and its technical ingenuity, and granted California special authority to do something about it.”

Due to its enormous economy and population, automakers have conformed to California’s rules. In addition, many Democrat-led states have chosen to adhere to California’s auto emissions rules, applying more pressure on car companies first to make cleaner engines and later to manufacture more electric vehicles.

California leads the nation in zero-emission vehicle sales. In 2023 and 2024, about 25% of new cars sold in California were zero-emission or plug-in hybrids, according to the California Energy Commission. This year, the share of zero-emission vehicle sales has slightly slumped, making up only 23% of light-duty vehicle sales.

But the Advanced Clean Cars II rule would require a jump in zero-emission sales next year, with at least 35% of vehicles supplied to car dealer lots to be zero-emission or plug-in hybrids.

Mike Stanton, president of the National Automobile Dealers Assn., contended that consumer demand for electric vehicles falls far below California’s requirements, in part, because of unreliable charging infrastructure.

“Banning gas and hybrid cars is a national issue that should be decided by Congress, not an unelected state agency,” Stanton wrote in a letter to senators, referring to the California Air Resources Board.

In February, EPA administrator Lee Zeldin brought the Biden-era waivers to Congress, suggesting that they were federal rules that had not been reviewed. However, none of California’s waivers for the state’s vehicle emission standards had been brought before Congress for review, because they were largely regarded as administrative orders.

The House of Representatives voted this month to advance the resolution to the Senate. Thirty-five Democratic lawmakers, including California Reps. George Whitesides (D-Agua Dulce) and Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana), joined with the Republican majority.

In the Senate, the 51-44 vote was split along party lines.

Experts say the Senate vote could have lasting implications for congressional procedures.

To topple California auto emission standards, Senate Republicans controversially invoked the Congressional Review Act, a 1996 law that allows an incoming Congress to rescind major federal rules approved near the end of a previous presidential administration. This process notably allows federal legislators to bypass a filibuster and requires only a simple majority to repeal federal rules rather than the typical 60 votes.

However, the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan government watchdog, said federal waivers for California emission standards were not subject to the Congressional Review Act, because the federal waiver is technically not a rule; it’s an order. The Senate Parliamentarian, a non-partisan advisor to the congressional body, upheld that interpretation, ruling that the Senate couldn’t use the Congressional Review Act to repeal California’s waivers.

The Senate vote proceeded in defiance of the parliamentarian’s ruling, marking a stunning rebuke of congressional norms.

The decision by Republican senators amounted to a “nuclear option” that would set a dangerous precedent, Padilla said.

“The old adage says, ‘What goes around comes around,’” he said. “It won’t be long before Democrats are once again in the driver’s seat, in the majority once again. And when that happens, all bets would be off.”

Foreign policy under Prime Minister Donald Tusk, LGBTQ rights and abortion have been major issues on the campaign trail.

Voters in Poland are casting their ballots to elect the next president in what is expected to be a close contest between the liberal mayor of Warsaw and a conservative historian.

Polls opened at 7am (05:00 GMT) in Sunday’s election, and the results of exit polls are expected to be released after the polls close at 9pm (19:00 GMT). The final official results of the contest, in which 13 candidates are running, are expected on Monday.

The frontrunners are Rafal Trzaskowski, the pro-European mayor of the Polish capital, and Karol Nawrocki, a historian backed by the nationalist Law and Justice party, which lost power 18 months ago.

Neither is expected to reach the required 50 percent threshold for victory, making a run-off on June 1 likely.

The election is being closely watched for whether voters endorse the pro-European path set by Prime Minister Donald Tusk or favour a return to the nationalist vision of Law and Justice, which ran the country from 2015 to 2023.

Tusk was elected prime minister in December 2023 after defeating Law and Justice, which had engaged in repeated disputes with the European Union.

The Polish president has limited executive powers but is commander-in-chief of the armed forces, steers foreign policy and can veto legislation.

Security fears loom large

The campaign has largely revolved around foreign policy at a time of heightened security concerns in Poland, a key NATO and EU member bordering war-torn Ukraine, and fears that the United States’s commitment to European security could be wavering in the President Donald Trump era.

Trzaskowski, deputy leader of Tusk’s centre-right Civic Platform, has pledged to cement Poland’s role as a major player at the heart of Europe in contrast with Law and Justice, which was frequently at odds with Brussels over rule-of-law concerns.

“I would definitely strengthen relations with our partners … within NATO and the EU,” Trzaskowski told state broadcaster TVP Info on Friday.

Social issues have also been a major theme on the campaign trail with Nawrocki framing himself as a guardian of conservative values and Trzaskowski drawing support from liberal voters for his pledges to back abortion and LGBTQ rights.

Malgorzata Mikoszewska, a 41-year-old tourism agency employee, told the AFP news agency that she was a fan of Trzaskowski’s liberal stance on social issues.

“Above all, I hope for the liberalisation of the law on abortion and sexual minorities,” she said.

Apartment scandal

Nawrocki’s campaign received a boost when he met with Trump in the Oval Office of the White House this month.

But it then took a hit over allegations that he bought an apartment in Gdansk from an elderly man in return for a promise to provide lifelong care for the man, which was not delivered. Nawrocki denied the allegations.

Polish authorities have reported attempts at foreign interference during the campaign, including denial-of-service attacks targeting the websites of parties in Tusk’s ruling coalition and allegations by a state research institute that political advertisements on Facebook were funded from overseas.

“With Nawrocki as president, the government would be paralysed, and that could eventually lead to the fall of the ruling coalition,” political scientist Anna Materska-Sosnowska told AFP.

His victory could see “the return of the populists with renewed force” at the next general election, she said.

The new president will replace Andrzej Duda, who has served two terms and is ineligible to stand again.

WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives impeached President Clinton on Saturday, tarnishing his legacy by making him only the second president in the nation’s history ordered to stand trial in the Senate.

In approving two articles of impeachment largely along party lines, the Republican-controlled House alleged that Clinton perjured himself before a federal grand jury and obstructed justice as he sought to conceal his extramarital affair with Monica S. Lewinsky, a former White House intern.

But two other articles–charging Clinton with lying in a legal deposition in the Paula Corbin Jones sexual harassment case and abusing his presidential power–were voted down. In addition, a Democratic attempt to censure rather than impeach Clinton failed on a strict party-line vote.

And in a stunning symbol of the personal politics that has savaged a growing number of public officials at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, speaker-designate Bob Livingston (R-La.) shocked the packed House chamber by announcing that he will resign over the disclosure of his own adulterous affairs.

At the White House, the president urged Livingston to reconsider and, while impeachment votes were being cast, huddled in the Oval Office with one of the ministers he asked to provide spiritual guidance in his self-imposed penance for breaking his marriage vows.

With the outcome of a likely Senate trial uncertain, Livingston and other Republicans called on Clinton to resign, saying that it was the honorable thing for him to do.

Yet within hours of the votes for impeachment, the president appeared in a White House garden and–in a brace of solidarity with First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and scores of congressional Democrats–declared that he was determined to continue the work of his presidency “until the last hour of the last day of my term.”

Saying that he had accepted responsibility for his actions, he again invited lawmakers to censure him as punishment.

“I hope it will be embraced by the Senate,” he said. “I hope there will be a constitutional and fair means of resolving this matter in a prompt manner.”

The historic votes and successive episodes of high drama made for a political day like no other as the close of the American Century nears. It also came at the end of a year of unprecedented bitter political enmity, which gave way to only one moment of unity on the House floor when both sides rose to applaud a call for an end to “slash-and-burn-and-smear politics.”

It was from that chaotic environment that the case against Clinton was formally carried by Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), along with the other dozen GOP managers of the impeachment case, to Secretary of the Senate Gary Sisco.

A Solemn, Rule-Bound Senate Trial Looms

There, unless a plea bargain or some other compromise is reached, the case that has consumed Washington for 11 months will be tried in a solemn, rule-bound procedure that was last used against a president 130 years ago. If two-thirds of the Senate finds Clinton guilty on even one of the articles, he will immediately be removed from office as 42nd president of the United States.

On other fronts Saturday:

* With Livingston announcing that he will not accept the speakership when the 106th Congress convenes in January, the scramble for the position, second in the line of succession to the presidency, began anew only six weeks after House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) decided to step down in the face of Republican losses in the midterm elections. Rep. J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), a conservative, emerged quickly as the new GOP favorite.

* Before the debate resumed Saturday morning, the first lady arrived on Capitol Hill and met behind closed doors with House Democrats to thank them for their support and ask for fairness in their votes on impeachment.

* After the debate had quieted and the votes impeaching Clinton had been cast, many Democrats left the Capitol for the White House, some riding in a blue-and-white bus that rolled down Pennsylvania Avenue.

Then crowding around the president, first lady and Vice President Al Gore outside the Oval Office, they readily accepted the administration’s gratitude for fighting to keep Clinton in the White House.

* Immediately after adopting the articles, the House appointed 13 Republican lawmakers as managers to present the case before the Senate.

Led by Hyde, they include Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.), who began calling for Clinton’s ouster long before the public ever heard the name Lewinsky, and Rep. James E. Rogan (R-Glendale), a junior member of the Judiciary Committee who once served as a municipal judge. Also selected was Rep. Asa Hutchinson, who holds the Arkansas congressional seat that Clinton himself once sought.

* In California’s 52-member delegation, lawmakers heeded the party line on the first article against Clinton, with all 23 Republicans supporting impeachment and 28 Democrats opposed.

But there was some splitting among GOP lawmakers on subsequent articles as Rep. Tom Campbell of San Jose voted against Articles 2 and 4; Rep. Jay C. Kim of Diamond Bar opposed Articles 2, 3 and 4; and Reps. Frank Riggs of Windsor and Brian Bilbray of San Diego voted against Article 4. Rep. George Miller (D-Martinez), recovering from hip surgery, did not vote.

* The 16 hours of debate over two days and Saturday’s votes came against the backdrop of U.S. and British strikes against Iraq. Saturday evening, Clinton announced an end to the four-night assault. But Saturday morning, the war still cast a shadow over the House chamber as lawmakers debated the future of the man who had ordered those attacks.

“Every single man and woman in Operation Desert Fox at this very moment is held to a higher standard than their commander in chief,” said Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach). “Let us raise the standard of our American leader to the level of his troops. Let us once again respect the institution of the presidency.”

Although most observers expect Clinton to win acquittal in the Senate, the specter of a potentially long and lurid trial is so ominous that the White House, its Democratic allies and lawyers already have begun efforts to broker a bipartisan compromise to end the ouster process before Chief Justice of the Supreme Court William H. Rehnquist gavels a trial to order.

Hyde Urges Colleagues to Send Stern Message

Hyde, who led the Clinton impeachment inquiry, urged his colleagues to send a stern message to all elected officials that they must support such basic constitutional precepts as telling the truth under oath.

“Equal justice under the law, that’s what we’re fighting for,” he said in a closing statement.

“And when the chief law enforcement officer trivializes, ignores, shreds, minimizes the sanctity of the oath and justice is wounded and you’re wounded and your children are wounded, follow your conscience and you will serve the country.”

On the opposite side of the aisle, House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) argued that censure of the president is the proper course.

“America is held hostage to tactics of smear and fear,” he warned. “Let all of us here today say no to resignation, no to impeachment, no to intolerance of each other and no to vicious self-righteousness.”

But the politics of rancor are likely to carry over into the Senate, where the Republicans hold a 55-45 majority. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) has said that he expects a flurry of pretrial motions early next month by the Clinton team. He said that it will be difficult to determine when the trial will begin.

“That time,” he said, “will depend greatly on the president and his lawyers.”

Meanwhile, he added, the Senate legal counsel will be presenting an explanation of historical background and current rules governing impeachment proceedings.

“The process,” Lott said, “is governed both by the Constitution and by our rules and precedents.”

In 1868, President Andrew Johnson escaped ouster on the thinness of a single Senate vote. In 1974, President Nixon resigned before the full House could vote on the three articles of impeachment voted against him by the Judiciary Committee.

The two articles approved by the House accuse Clinton of lying under oath during his appearance before a grand jury and obstructing justice in attempting to conceal his relationship with Lewinsky.

Article 1 says that Clinton “willfully provided perjurious, false and misleading testimony to the grand jury” about his relationship with Lewinsky, his efforts to influence the testimony of witnesses and gifts the couple exchanged. It passed on a 228-206 vote, with five members from each side breaking party ranks.

While Clinton’s lawyers have admitted that the president may have been misleading in his testimony, they have bluntly denied that he intentionally lied.

Article 3 says that Clinton “prevented, obstructed, and impeded the administration of justice, and to that end engaged personally, and through his subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or scheme designed to delay, impede, cover up and conceal the existence of evidence and testimony.”

The White House has argued that independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr twisted the facts against the president to make his actions appear incriminating, but the vote was 221 to 212, with 12 Republicans voting no and five Democrats voting yes.

Articles 2 and 4, which failed, accused Clinton of committing perjury in a deposition in the Jones case and abusing his power by submitting false statements in written responses to the Judiciary Committee. Article 2 was defeated, 229 to 205, and Article 4, 285 to 148.

Impeachment Grew All but Certain

Although impeachment appeared a long shot a month ago, it was all but certain when the bell rang for the first vote.

The corps of undecideds who held the president’s fate in its hands turned on the president in the end. Only five Republicans bucked their party’s leadership to oppose all four articles of impeachment. Just as many Democrats favored Clinton’s ouster.

Rep. Gene Taylor of Mississippi was the only Democrat to vote for all four articles. Four other Democrats joined him in voting for the first three articles: Reps. Virgil H. Goode Jr. of Virginia, Ralph M. Hall of Texas, Paul McHale of Pennsylvania and Charles W. Stenholm of Texas.

Saturday’s debate began after the obligatory Pledge of Allegiance, followed immediately by a loud and sustained “aawwwww” sound from Democrats who appeared to be making the sound of gagging.

It was clear that there would be no love lost on either side.

In stark contrast to the scene of Friday’s debate, almost every seat on the House floor was taken and the visitors’ and press galleries were filled to capacity. Lines of tourists and spectators snaked along the third-floor hallways.

Print reporters jammed the Speaker’s Lobby, just off the House floor, and on the sweeping East Lawn of the Capitol television correspondents jostled shoulder to shoulder for position in front of their camera crews.

Inside the House chamber, the first to rise in debate was Rogan. “The evidence is overwhelming; the question is elementary,” he said.

‘He Repeatedly Perjured Himself’

What this impeachment would be all about, he said, was Clinton’s initial intent to do anything he could to get out from under the Jones lawsuit.

“The president was obliged under his sacred oath faithfully to execute our nation’s laws,” Rogan said. “Yet he repeatedly perjured himself and obstructed justice, not for any noble purpose, but to crush a humble, lone woman’s right to be afforded access to the courts.”

Next to speak was Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Oakland). “The Republican process is cynical and it’s dangerous. It will be recorded that they stood on the wrong side of history.”

Rep. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a Judiciary Committee member, evoked the name of Nixon and noted that the same panel had voted articles of impeachment against him during the Watergate scandal.

While President Nixon cheated the political system by trying to hide a political break-in, he said, Clinton subverted the country’s legal system.

“Let it be said that any president who cheats our institutions shall be impeached,” he said.

But it was Livingston’s remarks that set the House on fire.

Addressing the president, the speaker-nominee said that Clinton had “done great damage to the nation over this past year.”

“You have the power to terminate that damage and heal the wounds that you have created,” he thundered. “You, sir, may resign your post.”

Democrats Roar With Disapproval

To Livingston’s right, Democrats roared with disapproval. With Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.) presiding in the speaker’s chair and pounding his gavel, Democrats screamed: “No, you resign! You resign!”

And then Livingston did just that, announcing that he would not run for speaker next month and would resign in six months from his seat of 11 years.

The room gasped. The Democrats were suddenly silent (although some would later rise to ask him to reconsider) and when Livingston offered one final “God bless America” in closing, politicians on both sides stood and applauded.

Other speakers followed. Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), who in his angst called a town meeting last week to help him decide how to vote, announced that he was for the president.

“We’ve all tried to do our best,” he said. “And we will all have to live with our votes the rest of our lives.”

Some spoke with fury.

Rep. J.C. Watts (R-Okla.), a former football star and rising voice in the GOP, spoke with emotion about how a vote to uphold the law was a vote for “our children.” In a pointed reference to the perjury allegations against Clinton, Watts said: “Ask your children. The kid who lies doesn’t last.”

Equally passionate was Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), a veteran of the civil rights campaigns of the 1960s who asked for the two sides to come together.

He recalled a violent storm when he was a youngster in Alabama, huddled with his family inside their home.

“We never left the house,” he said. “The wind may blow, the thunder may roll, the lightning may flash, but we must never leave the American house. We must stay together as a family, one house, one family, the American house, the American family.”

When lawmakers had debated impeachment for a final two hours, they spent another hour discussing the Democrats’ censure alternative.

Rep. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who in January will join the Senate, said: “The rule of law requires that the punishment fit the crime. Allow us to vote for censure, the appropriate punishment under the rule of law.”

But Rep. Charles T. Canady (R-Fla.), who like Schumer sits on the Judiciary panel, rejected the proposal as unsuitable.

“The constitutional method is impeachment by the House and trial in the Senate,” he said. “Other methods may seem to us more convenient or more comfortable, but our standard cannot be comfort or convenience.”

The House voted, 230 to 204, on a procedural motion that defeated Democrats’ effort to censure.

Then came the votes on impeachment.

And with that, the lame-duck session of the 105th Congress adjourned.

Times staff writers Edwin Chen, Melissa Healy, Robert L. Jackson, Art Pine and Alissa J. Rubin contributed to this story.

Times on the Web: Video clips from Saturday’s impeachment proceedings, Times political writer Ronald Brownstein’s audio analysis and a complete list of House members’ votes are on The Times’ Web site: https://www.latimes.com/scandal

IMPEACHMENT

* Looking Ahead: The stage is set for a partisan struggle focused on the question of whether the president lied under oath. A48

* Legacy Stained: Clinton can claim other achievements, but history will remember him as the second president to be impeached. A48

* Reaction From Right: Conservatives avoid celebrating even though they see vindication of effort to cut short Clinton’s career. A45

* View from home: Weary Arkansans describe feeling a mixture of melancholy and disengagement over the historic vote. A47

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Next Step: The Senate

On Saturday, just after the historic vote to impeach President Clinton, the House appointed 13 managers who will act as prosecutors in the Senate trial.

The appointment is one of several traditions inherited from the British legal system under which the U.S. Senate has conducted impeachment trials since 1868. Here are some of the others:

The Proceedins:

* The Senators each take an oath as a juror.

* The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court serves as judge and has the power to make and enforce rulings.

* The Senate has subpoena power. Witnesses are sworn in.

* The accused is advised of the charges against him, but the trial will proceed with or without his presence.

* One person on each side–the prosecution and the defense–makes an opening argument.

* Any witness called by one side must be cross-examined by the other side.

* Senators are not to talk during the trial. If a Senator wants to ask a question of a witness, the Senator must submit that question in writing to the chief justice.

* The Senate doors must remain open unless the Senators are deliberating.

* The vote for each article of impeachment is taken separately and without debate. During the deliberations, Senators may speak to each other within limited rules set down by the chief justice.

* Two-thirds vote (67) needed to remove president

*

The Senate

The political party makeup of the 106th Senate did not change from the previous Senate.

Republicans: 55

Democrats: 45

*

Newly elected senators

Republicans

Jim Bunning (Ky.)

Michael D. Crapo (Idaho)

Peter Fitzgerald (Ill.)

George Voinovich (Ohio)

*

Democrats

Evan Bayh (Ind.)

John Edwards (N.C.)

Blanche Lamber Lincoln (Ark.)

Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.)

*

Senators not returning in January

Republicans

Dan Coats (Ind.)

Alfonse M. D’Amato (N.Y.)

Lauch Faircloth (N.C.)

Dirk Kempthorne (Idaho)

*

Democrats

Dale Bumpers (Ark.)

Wendall H. Ford (Ky.)

John Glenn (Ohio)

Carol Moseley-Braun (Ill.)

Researched by TRICIA FORD / Los Angeles Times

Lisbon, Portugal — Portugal is summoning its citizens to vote in their third general elections in three years on May 18, amid rapid shifts to the country’s political landscape that have left the country facing the prospect of yet another fractured mandate after decades of relative stability.

This year’s snap election comes at a moment when rising living costs, a housing crisis, the future of the national health service and perceptions of immigration are all significant issues on the public agenda – as is a corruption scandal that precipitated the upcoming vote.

The government of Prime Minister Luis Montenegro, the leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), fell in March, when parliament voted against a motion of confidence, triggering elections. It’s the second Portuguese government in a row that had left office under a cloud of corruption allegations.

Now, the country’s 10 million voters will need to choose the makeup of their next parliament, where 230 seats are up for grabs – and a divided mandate appears likely.

‘A very serious case’

Montenegro led a right-wing minority government for less than a year before accusations of corruption emerged over a consultancy firm that he set up, called “Spinumviva”.

A string of media investigations into potential conflicts of interest revealed the firm had received thousands of euros a month in consultancy fees from previously undisclosed clients, including companies with government contracts.

When a defiant Montenegro appeared on national television back in March to issue his response, he insisted that he had not broken the law because he had transferred his shares in the company to his wife and sons before he became prime minister in 2024.

But his defence is controversial, say experts.

“Under Portuguese civil law, even if it was possible to sell shares to someone you’re married to, you’d still be a joint owner of them, and, therefore, still able to profit from them,” said Portuguese lawyer and political commentator Carmo Afonso. “Spinumviva is a very serious case – and revelations are still emerging.”

Just hours before a live debate a few weeks later with his main rival, the Socialist Party’s Pedro Nuno Santos, Montenegro submitted an updated declaration of his business interests to the national online transparency portal.

According to an investigation by the Portuguese newspaper Expresso, some of Spinumviva’s clients earned at least 100 million euros ($112m) a year in government contracts during Montenegro’s mandate alone. Montenegro, meanwhile, says that he has not been involved with Spinumviva since becoming prime minister in March 2024.

How the race is shaping up

Still, the attention on Spinumviva may not have damaged Montenegro’s chances of re-election. According to Portuguese political scientist Vicente Valentim, “perceptions of corruption in Portugal are traditionally high, but it may not to be a significant factor in how people vote”.

Despite the ongoing scandal, the conservative Democratic Alliance (AD) coalition, in which Montenegro’s Social Democratic Party (PSD) is the majority party, leads the race, and is polling at 34 percent.

And according to a poll by Lisbon’s Catholic University, a third of voters think the Spinumviva case and its potential legal ramifications are irrelevant to the elections.

Montenegro’s brief period in government has seen him enjoy the support of the professional class, riding on a budget surplus attained by the previous government of the centrist Socialist Party (PS) of Antonio Costa, who was prime minister from 2015-2024.

Meanwhile, “the loss of the charismatic Antonio Costa has affected the PS’s popularity,” says Afonso. “Costa is a hard act to follow.”

“Ironically, the more Spinumviva gets talked about, the better it is for Montenegro, is what some commentators are saying,” says Afonso, who believes Montenegro was well aware of this when the government collapsed. “Montenegro chose to bring a vote of confidence in parliament knowing full well that he would lose it, because there really couldn’t be a better time to hold elections – better for him, that is.”

The PS, by contrast, is polling several points below the AD at about 26 percent.

Currently, it looks highly improbable that any of the parties or alliances running will win an outright majority of 116 seats or more. That leaves two likely possibilities: either a post-electoral coalition of parties that forms a majority in alliance; or a minority government, which needs the tacit support of other parties in parliament to push through essential legislation, including budgets.

About half a dozen parties are serious contenders for the rest of the 230 seats in parliament. These include the traditional players such as the Communist Party-Greens alliance (CDU), the Left Bloc, and the People-Animals-Nature party, as well as new parties including the Europeanist-Socialist party Livre (“Free”), the radical right-wing Iniciativa Liberal (“Liberal Initiative”), and the extreme right Chega (“Enough”).

The rise of the far right

Chega, which opposes immigration, abortion, and LGBTQ rights, and has targeted minorities like Portugal’s substantial Romani population, won a surprising 50 parliamentary seats in the 2024 elections, with Andre Ventura as leader. It won 18 percent of the national vote.

The party is currently in third position in the polls and is predicted to win close to what it did in the last elections.

Valentim, the political scientist, warns against interpreting Chega’s support base as representing a protest vote.

“A lot of people who vote for them already held the ideas they espoused, long before the party actually appeared; generally, the rapid growth of radical right-wing parties is not down to them changing people’s ideas,” he said. “So, Chega going from 1 percent of votes, to 7 percent, to 18 percent over the course of the last three elections doesn’t mean that the number of people with right-wing ideas has grown in those proportions.”

What it means, he said, is that “more and more people who already had those ideas, but used to feel that they were not socially acceptable, and that they would be judged, or made social pariahs or disadvantaged professionally because of them, no longer feel that”.

With the campaign period now well under way, Chega has been appealing to potential voters who might normally abstain. While polls suggest the party might not make major gains compared with the 2024 election, Valentim said he believes it’s here to stay.

“Portugal was previously the exception in the European landscape, because no far-right party had had any notable success there; that’s no longer the case,” he said. “We can be fairly certain in saying that Chega is not going to just disappear, as suddenly as it appeared. The political landscape has changed, definitively.”

And that has a range of consequences, he said.

“Citizens and politicians feeling at greater ease to express extreme right-wing ideas in public,” he said. There’s “greater polarisation around specific issues such as immigration and minority rights, and, of course, the dilemma of how the more traditional centre right deals with the far right”.

Under Montenegro, the PSD has maintained it will not cut a deal with Chega. However, its options for forming a government are limited. According to Valentim, centre-right parties often try to overcome the popularity of new radical right parties by shifting further right themselves – including, at times, by forming partnerships with them.

That rarely actually works for the centre right, he said. “Power-sharing agreements with the extreme right legitimise those parties, without actually bring any long-term gains for the centre right,” he said. “Studies have shown that the rapprochement of the centre right to the far right neither takes votes away from the far right, nor does it bring more votes back to the centre right. But it does result in a normalising of extreme right discourse, turning extreme right-wing ideas like xenophobia more acceptable.”

This effect was visible even before election campaigning began on the issue of immigration, which Portugal has actively encouraged in recent years. Almost a quarter of Portuguese companies now employ foreign workers, according to the Bank of Portugal. According to a study by the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation in December, the number of immigrants in Portugal tripled between 2015 and 2023.

However, right-wing parties have also stirred a backlash against immigration, and in particular the presence of agricultural and shop workers from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The FMS Foundation report showed that negative perceptions of migrants outweighed positive ones considerably – with 67 percent of the people they polled responding that they thought the presence of foreigners was associated with an increase in crime. Last year, Chega brought a motion to parliament for a national referendum on immigration but was voted down.

Earlier this month, Montenegro’s government notified 4,500 migrants that they would have to leave the country within 20 days. Following the permanent closure of the border agency SEF in 2024, the government cancelled a scheme that allowed migrants originating from outside the European Union to apply for residency once already working in the country. Some of those facing deportation have been waiting several years for a reply on their applications, and thousands more such notices are expected in the coming months.

These policies sit in contrast with Portugal’s demographic situation, with a falling birthrate, an ageing population and a declining fertility rate. In addition, it suffers from an ongoing trend of youth emigration – about 30 percent of the population between 15 and 39 is living abroad, one of the highest rates in the world.  A study from Porto University in December 2024 said that Portugal would need to ensure 138,000 immigrants arriving per year to guarantee economic growth over the next decade.

Housing and costs

Meanwhile, a housing crisis is the biggest ongoing issue in Portugal in the run-up to the elections. House prices rose by 106 percent between 2015 and 2023, according to the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation, compared with 48 percent in Spain and 8 percent in Italy. The increase in property value has been caused by deregulation, large influxes of foreign investment in properties, speculation on real estate and a tourism boom.

As a result, young people and professionals are increasingly unable to afford housing in cities like Lisbon and Porto, where soaring rents have also prompted the closures of small businesses, and left low-income tenants stretched to pay rents or facing eviction.

Rising housing prices have also contributed to a general increase in the cost of living, with energy and food prices rising. Factors such as the war in Ukraine – because of its effect on the global supply chain – have amplified this crisis.

What’s next?

As of Thursday night, almost 20 percent of voters were undecided, meaning a range of outcomes is possible after the Sunday vote: An AD-led minority government, a less likely PS-led minority government, or a coalition between a variety of political players.

If that happens, it would be the second time a row that Portugal will not have a majority government: The AD won 80 seats in 2024 out of 230, just ahead of the PS, which won 78.

To Valentin, this is no longer an anomaly – he expects this scenario to be repeated in future elections, too.

“Portuguese democracy went through a very long period of relative stability,” he said, reflecting on the fact that Portugal this year celebrated 50 years since its first fully free elections, following the overthrow of the Estado Novo dictatorship. “For decades it had a multiparty system that barely changed, with governments alternating between the centre left PS and centre right PSD, and some interventions by a small number of other parties.”

“But now there’s been a lot of changes in a short period of time, with more and more new parties having made it into parliament,” he added.

That has meant fewer votes for the mainstream centrist parties, the PS and the PSD, as newer parties like Chega eat into their traditional base.

“We’re now entering a new paradigm,” said Valentin. “And it remains to be seen how these different political forces will balance out.”