Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
A Republican bill to avert a US government shutdown cleared a crucial procedural hurdle on Friday afternoon after Senate Democrats paved the way for its passage.
The Senate voted 62-38 in favour of advancing the measure, which will fund the federal government through to September 30. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and a handful of other Democrats sided with Republicans in pushing the so-called continuing resolution forward.
Republicans control the Senate, but required a “supermajority” to overcome a potential filibuster. The chamber is expected to vote on the bill, which was passed in the House of Representatives earlier this week, later on Friday, and will now only require a simple majority to send it to President Donald Trump’s desk for signing.
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One Republican, Rand Paul, opposed bringing the bill to a vote.
The final vote will cap a week of tense talks among Democrats, who struggled to unify behind a strategy for negotiating with Republicans. Though they control both chambers of Congress, Republicans lack a supermajority and needed help from across the aisle to bring the bill to a vote.
The Republican bill includes provisions Democrats are unhappy with. Some Democratic lawmakers expressed concerns that it hands Trump too much room to enact his agenda over the next six months. Still, Democrats did not want to be blamed for a government shutdown, which the president and Republicans made clear they would do.
Schumer had initially pushed back strongly against the stop-gap bill but reversed his stance and helped to convince others in his caucus to vote in favour of the measure.
There was a risk that Trump and close adviser Elon Musk would use a shutdown as an executive power grab, Schumer argued, noting that Musk and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) could speed up their cost-cutting frenzy with fewer checks on their power.
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Trump praised Schumer for the move: “I have great respect, by the way, for what Schumer did today,” he said in remarks at the justice department. “He went out and he said that they have to vote with the Republicans because it’s the right thing to do. I couldn’t believe what I heard, but . . . I think he’s going to get some credit for it.”
Schumer’s support for the bill paved the way for other Senate Democrats to follow suit, but he was criticised by some in the party for doing so, particularly in the House.
Ahead of the vote on Friday, Hakeem Jeffries, the top Democrat in the House, said his caucus was “strongly opposed to the partisan Republican spending bill”, saying Trump and Musk presented a “false choice” between the stop-gap and a government shutdown. But Jeffries declined to say whether he had lost confidence in Schumer.
Democrat representative Nancy Pelosi, former House Speaker, also took a swipe at Schumer before the vote. “Let’s be clear: neither is a good option for the American people. But this false choice that some are buying instead of fighting is unacceptable.”
Progressive Democrat representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on Thursday that “I hope Senate Democrats understand there is nothing clever about” their move. “Those games won’t fool anyone.”
Canadians have long flocked to the South Carolina beach town. This year, many are offended by the president and threatening to stay away.
WHY WE’RE HERE
We’re exploring how America defines itself one place at a time. At one popular South Carolina beach town, locals are hoping that Southern charm can offset hard feelings among Canadian tourists.
By Richard Fausset
Photographs by Travis Dove
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Reporting from Myrtle Beach, S.C.
The Southerners at the Myrtle Beach Welcome Center had brewed Tim Hortons coffee for their northern guests. They were giving away cookies adorned with maple leaves, and lapel pins featuring the twinned flags of Canada and South Carolina.
It was Monday morning at the kickoff party for Can-Am Days, the annual ritual that honors the Canadians who have long bolstered the city’s tourist economy in the winter months. For more than 60 years, it had been the most easygoing of international summits: The local Lions Club would welcome Lions from Canada. There were garden tours and golf tournaments. In pre-internet days, the local paper would print the Canadian news.
Now it had gotten complicated and weird, a result of the trade war being waged against Canada by a capricious American president whose image is all over the Myrtle Beach T-shirt shops, his famous fist pump as popular as sea gulls and sunsets.
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Along with brandishing ever-changing tariff policies — threatening, imposing, rescinding them — President Trump has repeatedly asserted that he wants to make Canada the 51st state, leaving many Canadians astonished and furious. Some have canceled plans to visit conservative Myrtle Beach, part of a broader grass-roots travel boycott that is threatening to put a dent in the $20.5 billion that Canadian visitors spend in the United States each year.
Amy Gleiser, who works at an academic teaching hospital in Ontario, is among those who have taken a stand. Reached by telephone on Wednesday, Ms. Gleiser, 47, said that she and her family had canceled their trip to Myrtle Beach, losing the deposit on their condo, and were heading instead to the Yucatan Peninsula. All because of Mr. Trump.
“It’s bullying,” she said of his treatment of Canada. “That’s how we feel.”
No one in Myrtle Beach is quite sure what the bad blood means for their community,which offers a less stuffy alternative to Hilton Head Island, down the coast. With its beachwear superstores, go-kart tracks and mini golf, Myrtle is the kind of laid-back beach town where the Hooters restaurant chain’s tongue-in-cheek motto — “Delightfully Tacky, Yet Unrefined” — could very well appear on the city seal. And it takes a certain pride in offering affordable vacations to the working and middle classes of the American South.
Canadians, too, have been charmed by Myrtle Beach’s sunshine and comparatively low prices — as well as by the crucial fact that it is much closer than Florida when traveling by minivan.
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Tracy Conner, interim president of the area chamber of commerce, said it was too early to tell whether a significant number of Canadians stayed home for this year’s Can-Am Days, which run from March 8 to March 16.Tourism officials noted that there were still plenty of license plates from Ontario and Quebec in restaurant parking lots.
On Monday morning, a few dozen Canadians, most of them retirees, had stopped by the visitors center for the kickoff party. Mayor Brenda Bethune, in a short speech, tried to put some distance between Myrtle Beach and the White House — a challenge given Mr. Trump’s lopsided November victory in Horry County, which includes the city.
“I know there is a lot of tension right now, and we can’t help that, on those levels,” said Ms. Bethune, who, as it turns out, supported Nikki Haley in last year’s Republican primary. “We have to accept what we are given. And we are going to do that graciously, with a smile on our faces, with Southern hospitality, and say, ‘Welcome.’”
A local musician, of the mellow sort found on the patios of beach-adjacent seafood restaurants, played a cover of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” following it up with a James Taylor paean to friendship. (The Burlington Teen Tour Band of Ontario, which had been scheduled to march from the welcome center to the beach, had canceled in protest).
The snowbirds mingled. And, through the veil of politeness for which they are renowned, they vented.
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Patricia Cape, 80, a retired pharmacy worker from Hamilton, Ontario, said her children had been trying to persuade her and her husband, Gary, to cut their vacation short for patriotic reasons. She was giving it some thought. “I am very disappointed by President Trump,” she said. “Why would he want to alienate Canada? I love the United States.”
Arthur and Kathy Jadischke, of Mississauga, Ontario, had already changed their plans and were heading home early. Mr. Jadischke, 82, said he did not know if he would return to Myrtle Beach. He compared Mr. Trump with Hitler and Vladimir Putin. “If this stuff keeps happening, I can’t see myself coming,” he said. “Because I’d be ashamed.”
Wayne Gray, a Myrtle Beach native and former city councilman, said that Can-Am Days were more crucial for the local economy a few decades ago, when the influx of Canadians between January and April gave a boost to local businesses before the big crush of American visitors between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
These days, Mr. Gray said, Canadians’ contributions to the economy have diminished in importance as the population of Horry County has exploded, and as the area became a destination not just for vacations but for events like youth travel sports tournaments.
“I think we’re all very appreciative of the Canadian visitors who come here,” Mr. Gray said. “But the Canadian American Days are just not as impactful as they once were.”
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The visitors bureau estimates that international travelers, the bulk of whom were Canadian, contributed about 2 percent of the $1.9 billion spent by tourists in 2023, the last year such data was available.
Some business owners said they have not felt a drop in business this year, at least so far. Others say they have noticed missing Canadians. Judith Davies, chairwoman of the Horry County Democratic Party, said that a number of local rental property owners had called her, worried about Canadians canceling their vacation rentals.
Many Canadians are repeat visitors who come to Myrtle Beach for weeks or months at a time. This week, some were further offended by the Trump administration’s decision to enforce a law requiring Canadians who stay in the United States for 30 days or more to register with the authorities.
But the affronts all seemed to be coming from the top. Canadians reported no hostility from pro-Trump locals. It was the same relaxed hospitality they had experienced for years.
Even so, Rick McCall, 74, a retired car dealer from Simcoe, Ontario, said that he no longer felt comfortable in the United States. Mr. McCall describeshimself as a conservative but said he considers Mr. Trump “unstable” and a “madman.”
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For the past five years, Mr. McCall said, he has owned a vacation house in North Myrtle Beach. Mr. Trump’s war of words, he added, had him seriously considering selling it.
“I’ve got to tell you, it’s just not a welcoming thing. I think it’s really changed the dynamics,” he said. “I think it’s tragic. I really do.”
On Tuesday, behind the counter of a kite store that had been partially transformed into a Trump-themed emporium, David Sandifer was listening to classic rock and offering merchandise like a “White Privilege Card,” vaguely modeled on an American Express card. There was also a fake dollar bill featuring what was advertised as “Hillbilly Veep” JD Vance clutching an assault rifle.
Mr. Sandifer, 75, a former electrical contractor, said that he could see the nation losing a significant number of Canadians avoiding the United States if Mr. Trump kept the pressure on. But he did not seem to mind. God, he said, was working through Mr. Trump.
The Canadians, he suggested, should heed the collective advice of many a beach-themed T-shirt, and chill out.
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“You can’t let things like that get in the way of your life,” he said. “You still have to have a good time.”
As a podcaster and freelance journalist, Ole Nymoen admits he enjoys freedom of expression and other democratic rights in his home country of Germany.
But he would not want to die for them.
In a book published this week, Why I Would Never Fight for My Country, the 27-year-old argues ordinary people should not be sent into battle on behalf of nation states and their rulers — even to fend off an invasion. Occupation by a foreign power might lead to a “shitty” life, he told the Financial Times. “But I’d rather be occupied than dead.”
Nymoen, a self-described Marxist, does not claim to be representative of Generation Z in Germany. But his stance — and his striking honesty about it — taps into a wider questions facing Europe as it re-arms on a scale not seen since the end of the cold war.
Berlin has poured close to €100bn into new equipment for the Bundeswehr, the German armed forces, since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz has announced plans to allow unlimited borrowing to fund defence spending as he promised to do “whatever it takes” to protect freedom and peace in Europe.
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But, while those funds are helping to plug gaps in arms and equipment, one of the biggest remaining issues is manpower.
Germany’s armed forces commissioner, Eva Högl, this week warned the country was not closer to its goal of having 203,000 active troops by 2031, as the overall size of the armed forces slightly declined last year, partly because of a high number of dropouts. A quarter of the 18,810 men and women who signed up in 2023 left the armed forces within six months.
“This development must be stopped and reversed as a matter of urgency,” Högl said.
A Bundeswehr spokesperson told the FT the military had taken steps to try to stem the outflow of young recruits, including a notice period to avoid “last-minute, emotional” decisions.
But one senior army commander said members of Generation Z — renowned in the business world for their efforts to reshape corporate culture — were also going into the armed forces with different ideas and outlooks. “People are vulnerable, they cry easily,” he said. “They talk about work-life balance.”
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“I understand that,” the commander added. “They grew up in a different time. It’s not a bad perspective. But it doesn’t match that well with a wartime situation.”
As Europe has again reckoned with the fear of an aggressive Russia, the continent’s political and military leaders have dramatically stepped up their language about what they expect from the public.
A senior UK general, Sir Patrick Sanders, last year told the British people they were part of a “prewar generation” that may have to prepare itself to enter combat. In Germany, whose 1949 constitution includes a commitment to promoting global peace, defence minister Boris Pistorius last year caused shock by declaring the nation had to be “ready for war”.
The warnings have escalated since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January and began pushing Ukraine to agree to a ceasefire as well as threatening to withdraw long-standing US security guarantees for Europe. Donald Tusk, prime minister of Poland, last week said his country was preparing “large-scale military training for every adult male”.
Germany has not gone that far. Top officials from the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats, the two parties likely to form the next government, have ruled out a revival of traditional conscription. Merz favours a year of national service that would offer military and non-military options.
Still, the question remains to what extent populations in Europe are willing to accept the calls to join up for the armed forces in much larger numbers.
Sophia Besch, senior fellow at the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International, said that although the threat perception among the European public was changing rapidly, “the next step [that governments are asking citizens to make] is a huge one — I want to fight for my country and I want my children to fight for my country.”
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Besch said nations including Germany lacked that deep trust and the shared understanding of threat between citizens and government that had been forged in places such as Finland, which is famed for its decades-long focus on preparedness for an attack from Russia.
Moreover, she added, in the worst-case scenario, young Germans would most likely not be asked to fight for their own country but for Latvia or another frontline nation. “We have to ask ourselves what young Germans would be willing to fight for today. Is it Germany? Is it the European project?”
Since Russia’s full-scale Ukraine invasion, Germany has had a steep rise in the number of conscientious objectors (including both regular soldiers and part-time reservists). The figure reached 2,998 last year — up from 200 in 2021.
Klaus Pfisterer, of the German Peace Society — United War Resisters, a campaign group, said many of them did military service years ago, before conscription was abolished in 2011, and had then been assigned as reservists. In previous years that had not seemed like a difficult commitment. But today, against the current global backdrop, “they see this decision in a completely different light”, he said.
Christian Mölling, Europe director at the Bertelsmann Foundation, estimates that German troop numbers need to rise from 181,000 today to 270,000 in the years ahead in order to reach Nato targets — and fill gaps left if American forces stationed in Europe withdraw.
That excludes reserve forces, which currently stand at 60,000 but defence officials have said it must rise to 260,000.
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Mölling said the Bundeswehr needed to drastically improve its recruitment campaigns to compete in a tight and competitive labour market, as well as doing more to modernise the military and make it an appealing employer.
“It can’t be mimicry, where you pretend you’re a modern army,” he said. “You have to do it.”
But many young Germans may simply be fundamentally opposed to the idea of signing up. Last month’s federal elections resulted in two parties that oppose arming Ukraine — the far-right Alternative for Germany and the far-left Die Linke — claimed almost half the votes of those aged 18 to 24.
While a recent survey by the pollster YouGov found 58 per cent of Germans would support a return to conscription, only a third of those aged between 18 and 29 felt the same way.
Nymoen, himself a Die Linke voter, is deeply suspicious of Europe’s race to re-arm. It was all very well for European leaders to sound belligerent, he said. “The thing is that, in the end, it’s going to be me in the trenches.”
Graves with flags for Memorial Day are seen in Section 60 of Arlington National Cemetery, in Arlington, Va., Monday, May 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
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Jacquelyn Martin /AP
Arlington National Cemetery has begun wiping from its website histories highlighting Black, Hispanic and women veterans. The change is in line with President Trump’s directive to remove references to and support for diversity, equity and inclusion from the federal government.
A U.S. official not authorized to talk to media told NPR the removal of links and sections about these groups have been dubbed a “digital content refresh” by top Pentagon officials.
The story was first reported by The Washington Post.
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Articles, photos and videos that are seen as promoting DEI will be removed under the new approach.
For example, General Colin Powell was the first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the 8666 Postal Corps was the first corps comprised only of Black women to work overseas during World War II. Their stories are no longer prominent on the website, but can still be found using the search function.
Additionally, the Pentagon has marked thousands of photos representing diverse veterans to be removed from the website, according to the Associated Press.
