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The stories that matter on money and politics in the race for the White House

US President Joe Biden has abandoned his re-election bid following overwhelming pressure from fellow Democrats and endorsed his vice-president Kamala Harris to succeed him, saying it was “in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down”.

The president announced his decision to quit the race in a letter published to social media on Sunday, throwing this year’s White House contest into turmoil with less than four months to go until voters in the world’s biggest economy elect their new leader on November 5.

“It has been the greatest honour of my life to serve as your president,” Biden said. “And while it has been my intention to seek re-election, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as president for the remainder of my term.”

The president added that he would speak to the country “later this week in more detail about my decision”. Biden has not been seen in public since Wednesday, when he was diagnosed with Covid-19.

He said in a second social media post that he would “offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year”.

“Democrats — it’s time to come together and beat Trump,” Biden added. “Let’s do this.”

Harris later issued her own statement saying she was “honoured” to have Biden’s endorsement, adding: “My intention is to earn and win this nomination.

“I will do everything in my power to unite the Democratic party — and unite our nation — to defeat Donald Trump,” she added.

Harris, who would become the country’s first female president should she win, quickly picked up the backing of several influential Democrats.

Former president Bill Clinton and the party’s 2016 nominee Hillary Clinton issued a joint statement saying they were “honoured to join the president in endorsing vice-president Harris”, adding they would “do whatever we can to support her”.

Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, and Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer — both considered possible presidential candidates themselves — were also expected to endorse Harris, said three prominent Democratic party donors and operatives with direct knowledge of the matter. Representatives for Newsom and Whitmer did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Barack Obama, who selected Biden as his own vice-president in 2008, issued a statement calling him “one of America’s most consequential presidents, as well as a dear friend and partner”. Obama stopped short of endorsing a successor, but said he had “extraordinary confidence that the leaders of our party will be able to create a process from which an outstanding nominee emerges”.

Democrats will need to rally behind a new presidential candidate in the weeks before the party’s official nominating convention on August 19. Democratic National Committee chair Jaime Harrison on Sunday said the party would “in short order” lay out the “next steps and the path forward for the nomination process”.

Biden’s unprecedented decision will reverberate across the globe, injecting new uncertainty into US policy at a moment of acute geopolitical tension, from the Indo-Pacific to Ukraine to the Middle East.

Biden’s announcement follows more than three weeks of wrenching debate among Democrats about his candidacy after a disastrous debate performance against Donald Trump reignited concerns about the 81-year-old’s mental acuity and damaged his standing among American voters. An Associated Press poll out last week found nearly two-thirds of Democratic voters said Biden should drop out of the race.

Trump had opened up a significant polling lead over Biden in national and swing state surveys in recent weeks. In a statement posted to his Truth Social platform on Sunday he said Biden was “not fit to run for president” and “certainly not fit to serve”.

Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson issued a statement calling for Biden’s immediate resignation from the presidency.

“If Joe Biden is not fit to run for president, he is not fit to serve as president,” Johnson said.

But Biden’s decision earned him immediate praise from several top Democrats, including Senate leader Chuck Schumer, who described him as a “great president . . . a great legislative leader” and “a truly amazing human being”.

“His decision of course was not easy, but he once again put his country, his party, and our future first.”

Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic House leader, said the country would be “forever grateful” to Biden for his leadership.

The decision by the 46th American president not to seek a second term marks the beginning of the end of one of Washington’s most storied political careers. Biden entered the Senate in 1973, became vice-president to Obama in 2009, and gained the Oval Office in 2020 in an era marked by a global pandemic, economic recovery, inflation and war.

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Warner Brothers Discovery has until Monday to match proposals for purchasing the next round of broadcast rights to the US National Basketball Association, which are set to more than double in value to roughly $75bn over 11 years.

The negotiation between the league and media company, whose TNT network has aired NBA games since the 1980s, has become a referendum on the future of live sports rights. For WBD the stakes are high: it is at risk of losing its cornerstone live sports programming amid changes in the broader media landscape.

Last week NBA team owners approved proposals from Disney, Amazon Prime Video and Comcast’s NBC for broadcast rights beginning with the 2025-26 season. WBD’s current contract gives it a chance to match any third-party offers — in this case, those from Amazon and NBC. It has until Monday evening to furnish its own proposal. 

People familiar with the discussions, which are ongoing and subject to change, told the Financial Times the definition of what terms constitute a “matching offer” is complex in the current landscape, as traditional cable and linear companies compete directly with tech platforms.

In this case, WBD is more likely to target the proposal by Amazon, the people said, in part because the $1.8bn average annual value for its proposed rights is closer to the $1.2bn per year WBD pays now. The proposal from NBC is worth roughly $2.5bn per year.

It is unclear what could happen next, depending on WBD’s response. One person familiar with the process stressed that WBD would match one of the offers or not, but “this is not a bidding war”.

A spokesperson for TNT Sports said the company had received the proposals from the NBA and was “preparing a response in view of our matching rights”. The NBA, NBC and Amazon all declined to comment.

People familiar with the league and WBD agreed that dollar figures would not be the only criterion evaluated for determining who will prevail. Adam Silver, the NBA commissioner, said last week the league’s goals in negotiating the next round of media rights were partly economic and partly fan services, including offering a mix of broadcast and streaming options as well as international capabilities.

“That’s something that we’ve been very focused on in these deals, not just reach in the United States but reach globally as well,” Silver said, adding that details needed to be worked through “with existing partners” before the contracts could be finalised.

One point the stakeholders are quibbling over is the size and reach of streaming platforms. Amazon Prime Video has more than 200mn monthly viewers as of last year, while WBD’s direct-to-consumer streaming has reached nearly 100mn subscribers through the first quarter of 2024. That includes Max, where US viewers were able to watch simulcasts of NBA games on TNT this season.

A person familiar with WBD noted the disparities between the two companies’ streaming subscriber bases but said any assessment of the NBA rights in question — for domestic US distribution — should be limited to domestic comparisons.

The discussions come at a critical time for WBD, whose executives have weighed a potential break-up of the company as it contends with a $39bn net debt load. Its market capitalisation has fallen by a third to $20.8bn over the past year. 

Those circumstances, particularly the market capitalisation, are a consideration for the league, one of the people said. 

People on all sides of the negotiations stressed “unknowns remain unknown”, as one person put it — meaning the final rights contracts will not be determined until WBD submits its counterproposal. When all is said and done, however, the overall value of the rights package is set to double, in a reflection of how important live sports are to keeping cable and streaming subscribers.

Analysts at MoffettNathanson wrote this spring that “having the NBA has been a significant source of leverage in driving [affiliate] rates for TNT and across WBD’s broader linear portfolio”.

Some of TNT’s A-list talent have also been outspoken about wanting to keep NBA games on the network, including Hall of Famer Charles Barkley, a co-host of the company’s flagship basketball programme, Inside the NBA. In interviews in recent months, he has criticised WBD chief executive David Zaslav for publicly equivocating over the decision to keep the rights.

“When we merged [with Discovery in 2022], that’s the first thing our boss said, ‘we don’t need the NBA’,” Barkley said on The Dan Patrick Show in May. “Well, he don’t need it, but the rest of the people [on TNT], we need it.”

The Food and Drug Administration’s proposal to ban the use of formaldehyde as an ingredient in hair relaxers and hair straighteners on the market in the U.S. has been pushed back yet again. The deadline for the agency’s proposal, at this time, still remains unclear.

The FDA’s proposed rule takes a large step in shedding light on the potential harm that formaldehyde — a highly toxic, colorless gas — can cause to the many Black women and other women of color who typically use straightening products.

In October, NPR reported that the federal agency proposed the ban and scheduled its implementation for April 2024. The first deadline for the scheduled ban implementation was missed and pushed back to July 2024. Most recently, the agency moved the target date to September 2024.

On April 3, the FDA told NPR in an email that the action date for the proposed ban was set for April 2024 and that officials were “still developing the proposed rule.”

At that time, a spokesperson declined to comment further about the timing or the ban’s detailed content.

But when pressed about the status of the ban to the federal agency in May and, most recently, this month, an FDA spokesperson told NPR that the proposed rule “continues to be a high priority.” They declined again to comment further about its timing or content.

When asked Friday for clarification about why there have been numerous delays in implementing the proposed ban, a spokesperson told NPR that the process for implementing proposed rules “takes time.”

“Before a proposed rule can be published in the Federal Register for public comment, it must be reviewed and approved within FDA and other parts of the Federal government,” the FDA spokesperson said in a statement.

Allison Stevenson, an attorney who represents product manufacturers and retailers, says that while we should expect to see a ban on formaldehyde, it’s no surprise that the FDA has delayed the proposed ban several times.

“There are a lot of moving parts … this all falls under legislation that is still relatively new, in almost all respects. And so it’s not uncommon to see things get delayed for one reason or the other,” she said.

Stevenson predicts that the ban will likely not occur until 2025. She says the proposed ban is necessary to protect the health and safety of communities of color.

“The regulation is necessary to protect the health and safety of communities of color, Stevenson said. “I certainly don’t believe that the delay should be indicative to anyone that the FDA is not making this issue a priority,” she added.

What are the health risks associated with formaldehyde?

Formaldehyde is a toxic, colorless and strong-smelling gas that presents health hazards when breathed into the lungs or when it comes into contact with the eyes or skin, according to the FDA.

In 2022, researchers at the National Institutes of Health released a study that showed an increased risk of hormone-related cancer in women who have used the chemicals in their hair. The findings in the report were especially concerning for Black women, who are far more likely to report using such products, including many kinds of chemical relaxers, Brazilian blowouts and keratin treatments.

“We estimated that 1.64% of women who never used hair straighteners would go on to develop uterine cancer by the age of 70; but for frequent users, that risk goes up to 4.05%,” lead author Alexandra White, the head of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Environment and Cancer Epidemiology group, told NPR in 2022.

Once the gas is present in the air at levels exceeding 0.1 parts per million, those in contact with it can experience harmful side effects such as watery eyes, burning in the eyes, nose, and throat, coughing, wheezing, nausea, and skin irritation. (Essentially, the more exposure one has to products containing formaldehyde — in terms of time and concentration — the higher the health risk.)

The long-term effects associated with the use of formaldehyde

The use of formaldehyde can have several long-term effects associated with it, which can include an increased number of headaches, asthma, contact dermatitis and possibly cancer.

Hair relaxers and hair straightening products have also been linked to risks associated with uterine cancer, breast cancer and even ovarian cancer — especially for Black women.

According to the New York State Department of Health, more than 150 hair-straightening products on store shelves contain formaldehyde. Investigators discovered that products that claimed to be “formaldehyde-free,” “organic,” or even “natural” actually contained the highly toxic chemical when tested.

Aside from hair straighteners and smoothers, formaldehyde is used in glues, resins, dyes, textiles, disinfectants, building materials, automobile parts, embalming, and laboratories, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.