Brazilian ​Senator Flavio Bolsonaro ‌said on Wednesday he ​left ​the country to the ⁠United ​States to avoid ​the "politicization of the justice system ​in Brazil," ​claiming without evidence ‌that ⁠he was the rightful president-elect despite ​his ​defeat ⁠to President Luiz ​Inacio Lula ​da ⁠Silva.

UPDATE: He edited the open letter and now refers to himself simply as "the leader of Brazil", lol.

Submission Statement: In the era of Big Tech pushing AI, verifiable facts and truthful answers about settled political questions (such as the legitimate winner of the 2020 election) are increasingly deemed "sensitive political matters" under the current US regime.

This is relevant to r/neoliberal as the intersection of technology, authoritarianism, free speech, and the current political moment in the US.

Americans have come to expect hateful campaign rhetoric from Republican candidates and their proxies. Comments that once were off-limits to politicians are now standard fare. Donald Trump did more than anyone to normalize such vicious attacks, and his example continues to inspire imitation. The 2026 midterm elections have spawned a hurricane of extremist vitriol.

Republicans used to rhapsodize about curbing federal deficits, minimizing government intervention in the economy, and standing for democracy around the world. But those themes are obsolete under Trump. Today, the GOP takes a distinctly different approach: vilifying one marginal and vulnerable group after another in an effort to provoke fear and anger among voters. And Trump’s noxious views and tactics have permeated to the lowest offices on the ballot.

There was a time not so long ago when appeals to racial prejudice had to be subtle and deniable, like Ronald Reagan’s denunciation of “welfare queens.” Those were bad enough. But Trump has normalized overt racism so thoroughly that some Republican candidates feel empowered to practice it openly.

The Texas Races

Bo French, running for the Texas Railroad Commission, posted a photo of dark-skinned students, apparently of South Asian descent, cheering at a University of Texas football game with the lament: “I heard UT graduation this year looked like this. I didn’t believe it. The problem is now obviously far worse than anyone imagined.” Facing criticism, he added: “Like body-cams expose criminals, social media is exposing how many Americans have been displaced by foreigners.”

For French, who chaired the Republican Party of Tarrant County, home to Fort Worth and 2.2 million people, this was nothing unusual. Earlier this year he demanded that Muslims “go home,” declaring, “That’s the only way we’re going to stop the Islamification of Texas and America.” He charged that the federal H-1B visa program replaces American workers with “low IQ, document mill fake diploma having, non assimilating third worlders.”

Such inflammatory invective would have rendered him radioactive with a previous generation of GOP leaders—even in Texas, where the comparatively moderate George W. Bush once reigned supreme. But those days are gone. The Texas Tribune reported, “Even as a long line of Republicans condemn French—calling his comments racist—none have rescinded their endorsements. Meanwhile, some party leaders—like Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick—have remained silent.” Gov. Greg Abbott’s prim response was that French’s tirades were “not my message.”

Texas has no peers when it comes to baseless smears and nasty abuse. Sen. John Cornyn lost to his primary foe, Attorney General Ken Paxton, after accusing him of being “soft on radical Islam”—an astonishing claim against someone who has sued to block a Muslim residential development near Dallas while vowing, “There will be no ‘Sharia city’ in Texas under my watch.” Paxton responded by asserting that Cornyn “helped radical Islamic Afghans invade Texas”—referring to a commendable program to admit people who had helped American forces in the war against the Taliban.

Islamophobia is not the only poisonous Republican theme in this Senate race. A Republican PAC has run ads accusing the Democratic nominee, state Rep. James Talarico, of voting to use “taxpayer dollars for sex change surgeries on children,” which he didn’t. White House aide Stephen Miller feigned surprise that Democrats would “nominate their first transgender senate candidate, who is clearly transitioning to female.”

Vice President JD Vance, who has turned the office into a delivery system for MAGA’s most inflammatory talking points, suggested that Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian with a longtime girlfriend, is gay. At a rally for Paxton, hearing an expression of support from a man in the audience, he said: “I love you too, sir. In a totally platonic way, to be clear. I’m the vice president, not James Talarico.” He also implied that Talarico is a pedophile: “He was asked what he loves in life besides his own family and friends, and he responded, without skipping a beat, and I quote, ‘trans children,’” said Vance. “Now, you gotta wonder what the Internet search history of a man like that looks like.”

It was a malicious misrepresentation. Talarico had been asked in an interview what he loves besides family and friends, and he mentioned transgender kids who had come to the Texas Capitol to speak up for themselves. His reply: “I love—and I’m just going to say this because it’s on my mind—the trans children who showed up at the State Capitol to advocate for their humanity. They shouldn’t have to, but it was an inspiration to watch.” The obvious term for that sentiment would be “kind.”

Michigan’s Senate and House Races

But if Texas is second to none in crude hyperbole, Michigan can hold its own. Former Rep. Mike Rogers, running for the Senate against Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, said: “Never in a million years did I think that I would be running against someone who believes America deserved 9/11.” The remark cited by Rogers actually came from leftist commentator Hasan Piker, who campaigned with El-Sayed before the primary. But Piker retracted it, and El-Sayed has said, “Of course I don’t think 9/11 was justified.” Referring to an attack on a synagogue that houses a preschool in a Detroit suburb, Rogers has claimed that his opponent “could not condemn the terrorist who tried to attack and kill 140 Jewish children right here in Michigan.” El-Sayed did condemn the attack. Then, in a follow-up statement offering “context,” he said that “hurt people hurt people,” which sounded like a lame rationalization of the attempt. He later apologized, saying, “I made a mistake.”

Campaigning with Rogers, Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy said El-Sayed “sleeps in a bin Laden jersey.” When social media provocateur Dave Portnoy called the Democrat a “terrorist,” Rogers said he was “exactly right.”

Rogers charged that his opponent “has taken money from individuals on his campaign who openly support Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda.” PolitiFact concluded that Rogers was “cherry-picking donations and associations from El-Sayed supporters.” Let’s not forget that Rogers decided to run after getting a call from Trump saying, “I need you to do this”—the same Trump who incited the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, a shocking episode of domestic terrorism, and who accepted a $400 million plane from Qatar, a country with a long history of funding the Muslim Brotherhood.

Rogers has suggested that El-Sayed is a radical Islamist while, hilariously, also attacking him for supporting transgender rights. “Abdul thinks football is bad but men playing in women’s sports is good,” said a Rogers campaign ad. El-Sayed, who played football in high school, has talked about the dilemma of enjoying a sport that inflicts so much damage on players, which hardly makes him un-American. And on the subject of transgender participants in athletics, El-Sayed has said, “I think it’s perfectly within the means of local communities and sporting governing bodies to lead the conversation about high school sports.”

Michigan also boasts the candidacy of Tom Smith, the GOP nominee for Congress in its 8th District, who is firmly ensconced on the right-wing lunatic fringe. Earlier this year, he reposted a tweet that urged, “Eliminate every demonic violent liberal terrorist and deport the corrupt Somali infestation from American soil.” A CNN review of his social media history found “repeated accusations of treason, attacks on Muslim Americans and Islam, birther-style conspiracy theories about Barack Obama, and posts in which Smith said he had been awakened before dawn with a message from God for conservative radio host Dan Bongino.” Smith calls his Democratic opponent, Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, a “communist.” Rivet has signed on to the Promise to America, a project of centrist Democrats who reject democratic socialism.

Smith won the primary despite dropping out of the race. He beat Amir Hassan, who is Black and had Trump’s endorsement—but whose name apparently turned off GOP voters. After the primary, Laura Loomer, a notoriously extreme MAGA enthusiast, waxed triumphant, noting that Hassan “claims he’s not a Muslim, but it doesn’t matter. His name sounds like he’s fresh off the boat and MAGA voters reject the Islamic infiltration of our country and party.”

Beyond Texas and Michigan

There are plenty of other examples across the country. In the House, more than 65 Republicans have joined a “Sharia-Free America” caucus. In response to El-Sayed’s nomination, South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace posted on X, “Every single Muslim holding public office in America is a Trojan horse, and a threat to both national security and our republic.”

Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles, who lost his August reelection primary, said that “Muslims don’t belong in American society.” In 2024, asked about the deaths of Palestinian children in Gaza, he replied, “I think we should kill them all.” Bruce Blakeman, running for governor of New York, asked a group of Hasidic Jews, “If there is rioting here, if they’re burning down the yeshivas and your shuls, and burning down your house and raping your women, you think Zohran Mamdani is going to stop them?”

Trevor Lee, a Utah state representative running for reelection, responded to the entry of Democrat Liban Mohamed into a race for Congress by posting, “This is what happens when past policies to incentives (sic) foreigners and not protect your culture run unchecked,” while endorsing “prosecuting and deporting foreign invaders.” Mohamed, whose parents came from Somalia, was born in Utah.

As usual, the president is happy to join in. He has repeatedly called El-Sayed a jihadist and a terrorist. “If Abdul and the Democrats win, they will open the floodgates and invite hordes of jihadis to our shores, creating a nightmare of violence and terror until you cannot even have a Christmas,” he said at a Sunday rally in Port Huron. Asked in August for his advice to GOP candidates, he said, “We have jihadists being elected all over the place.” On Truth Social, he referred to South Carolina’s Democratic Senate candidate as “Annie ‘Trannie’ Andrews.” Andrews is not transgender. At a recent rally in Youngstown, Ohio, supporting GOP candidates, he bragged about expelling Haitians who had been here legally, recalling his absurd 2024 claim that those in Springfield were eating pets. He denounced Somali immigrants as “low-IQ people” from a country where “all they do is shoot each other.” He said Democrats favor the “transgender mutilization of your children.” He said Democratic Senate nominee Sherrod Brown is the choice of “Marxists, communists and anti-Americans.”

Campaigning in Kansas, he did more of the same. “If you want to see what’s at stake in this election, just look at what’s happening in France, a once great nation, that is being conquered, looted and burned to the ground by migrants, jihadists and communists who hate Christianity, and they hate, frankly, Western civilization itself,” Trump said. “When you see burning steeples and raging fires in France, just remember that is what the radical Democrats want to do in America.”

(The left is hardly immune to demagoguery, but nothing on that side approaches the torrential downpour of extremism that Republicans, from candidates on the ballot to the president himself, are peddling.)

How the GOP Got Here

What happened to make such rhetoric not only acceptable but popular among much of the party rank and file? The immediate explanation is that given the unpopularity of their president, Republicans desperately want to change the subject. But their thuggish methods are not a new thing. The election of Barack Obama, who not only is Black but has an Arabic middle name (see: Loomer’s “insight,” above), brought out the latent racial and religious prejudice of many white Americans, which the GOP fanned and exploited. Bush’s war on terrorism induced many of the same people to equate Islam with extremist violence. The push to protect transgender people offends many Americans who have no experience with them and perceive a dire threat to religious dictates and gender norms. The growing share of immigrants and their kids in the national population has created fantastical fears that nonwhites will seize power, punish whites, and destroy American culture.

All these factors create a fertile environment for right-wing efforts to demonize Muslims, immigrants, transgender people, and conventional liberals. Democrats are likely to win a sweeping national victory in November in the face of this systematic fear-mongering. But given how far it’s taken them and Trump, it may be too much to hope that Republicans will give it up.

The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady Wednesday, days ahead of the midterm elections, even as inflation has picked up and spread beyond the gas pump into the broader economy.

While inflation “remains elevated,” the majority of the Federal Open Market Committee said in a statement accompanying the decision, the panel will await more information to decide the best future actions “to ensure a timely return of inflation to the Committee’s 2 percent goal.”

“Economic activity is expanding at a strong pace,” the committee’s statement said. “While uncertainty remains elevated owing, in part, to geopolitical developments, domestic spending has been resilient. Productivity growth is strong, and capital investment is robust.”

Fed officials added that “the unemployment rate has changed little.” Two committee members, Lisa D. Cook and Beth M. Hammack, dissented, saying they preferred to raise rates again.

The Fed had already raised interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point last month to fight inflation. That was the first increase in more than three years.

For households, Wednesday’s decision is a mixed blessing. Borrowing costs will remain steady on a wide variety of credit cards, car loans and business loans, but prices are still rising faster than paychecks.

Yet other economic signs point to more room to move slowly to address inflation. Americans and businesses are still spending, which fuels economic growth, and employers are still hiring, although at a much slower pace.

The move to hold rates steady puts Fed Chair Kevin Warsh in an awkward spot. Investors took his August speech in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, as a sign that he would get tough on inflation, and the Fed followed through with the rate hike in September. Since then, inflation has only picked up.

“He kind of risks the credibility factor, in my opinion, if he doesn’t raise rates,” Tracy Shuchart, senior economist at the futures trading platform NinjaTrader, said Tuesday ahead of the decision.

Shuchart said bond investors could read a pause as a sign that Warsh is “afraid to raise rates in front of the midterms,” which could revive questions about his independence from President Donald Trump, who has been lobbying the Fed to lower rates since he took office.

Congress set up the Fed to be insulated from political pressure, because presidents and other elected officials often prefer lower interest rates to spur immediate growth, even if it risks harm to the economy down the line.

Inflation rose 3.7 percent in September from a year earlier, continuing an upward march most of this year, according to the most recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Gasoline prices jumped 9.1 percent in September alone, and a gallon of regular cost $4.25 on average Wednesday, according to AAA. Prices also climbed for used cars, airline tickets and housing, a sign that the increases are no longer confined to energy. Inflation has exceeded the Fed’s 2 percent target for more than five years.

Stubbornly high prices have been a political problem for Trump and Republicans heading into the midterms. Some of that pressure traces to Trump’s own decisions. The war with Iran has driven up fuel prices, and his tariffs have raised the cost of imported goods, though some Fed officials said in September that the tariffs’ effect on prices was fading, according to minutes of their meeting.

Still, Fed officials had signaled that they are in no hurry. Fed governor Christopher Waller said in an Oct. 8 speech that he expected more rate increases. “The hikes do not need to come at consecutive meetings,” he said, “but they should be in place in an acceptable period of time.”

Warsh gave no hint of a hike when he spoke at the International Monetary Fund’s annual meetings in Bangkok this month, and investors took that as a sign that he wasn’t going to raise rates, Shuchart said. By Wednesday morning, traders who bet on the Fed’s moves put the odds of a hike at less than 10 percent, according to CME FedWatch.

Wednesday’s decision leaves the Fed’s benchmark rate at a range of 3.75 to 4 percent. The rate sets the cost of overnight borrowing between banks, which ripples out to what millions of consumers and companies pay to borrow. Mortgages and other long-term loans are priced off Treasury yields, which are set by markets according to their own expectations for growth and inflation. The average 30-year mortgage rate was 7.32 percent last week, according to Freddie Mac.

The labor market has also slowed, giving officials another reason for caution.

Paychecks aren’t keeping up: Average hourly pay rose 3 percent over the past year, less than inflation. Employers added 29,000 jobs in September, well short of forecasts, and the unemployment rate ticked up slightly to 4.2 percent.

Most Fed officials signaled in September that they expected to raise rates again before the end of the year.

Trump picked Warsh in January after spending a year attacking his predecessor, Jerome H. Powell, for refusing to cut rates. Warsh has promised to set rates without regard to politics, and he has stopped the Fed’s practice of signaling its next moves in advance. “I don’t believe in saying now what I might do at the meetings that we have in the balance of this year,” he said this month in Bangkok.

EU countries have dropped the idea of offering Canada "associate member" status in the 27-member bloc, opting instead for softer language promising "ever closer association" ahead of a landmark EU-Canada summit, according to the latest version of the draft statement, seen by POLITICO.

A group of countries including Germany, Italy, Greece and France all objected to mentioning associate membership in a joint EU-Canada statement to be issued in Montreal, the diplomats said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen had originally proposed "associate membership" for Canada in her State of the European Union speech in September, catching some EU countries off-guard.

A previous draft of the joint statement had read that the EU and Canada would "work to define by the 2027 EU-Canada Summit the concept of Associate Member that will reflect, through this even closer association, our common endeavour and cooperation towards our shared goals of prosperity, economic security and strategic autonomy."

In the final version, the text reads: "We will create an even closer association between Canada and the EU... and work to define by the 2027 EU-Canada Summit the concept of an ever closer association of Canada to the EU, short of full membership itself."

Later in the statement, the language changes from "even closer" to "ever closer."

The text still needs final approval. EU countries have a deadline of 6 p.m. to raise objections.

Submission Statement: European gas prices have surged above €100 a megawatt hour for the first time in almost four years as markets brace for renewed US air strikes and a possible cold snap in Europe.

Dutch natural gas for delivery in November jumped 5 per cent to €100.95 per MWh on Wednesday, a level last touched in December 2022 during the European energy crisis that followed Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Traders are also weighing the impact of a wide range of weather forecasts, including predictions of a much cooler winter than usual, driving demand for gas as people use more to heat their homes.

This would push up consumption at the start of Europe’s peak demand season, at a time when its gas storage facilities are emptier than usual.

Forecasters have warned of a potential “sudden stratospheric warming” — a major meteorological event involving a rapid rise in temperatures high in the polar stratosphere — that could drive a blast of cold Arctic air into northern Europe in November.

While prices are soaring across Europe, US prices fell to their lowest in almost two years this week amid warmer than usual near-term weather forecasts.

The US military said vessels that have no need to move between ports in the Gulf of Oman and the Strait of Hormuz should stay away, as tensions ratchet up in the region.

“Due to the current geopolitical situation, vessels which do not need to transit the area are advised to remain well clear to avoid unnecessary delays to their voyage,” the US Naval Forces Central Command said in an advisory on Wednesday issued via the Joint Maritime Information Center.

“Vessels transiting this area are advised to plan additional transit time to allow for increased traffic density and military blockade enforcement operations,” the notice said.

It remains unclear what prompted the advisory. The US military last publicly issued a similar notice in mid-July, when it began its blockade of Iranian shipping. Back then, it said that the blockade would not impede neutral passage through Hormuz, though ships should expect to be questioned on their intentions.

Traffic through the chokepoint has recovered in recent months, with shuttle tankers making up a big part of the traffic carrying crude oil. These ships make multiple runs in and out of the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, where other tankers unwilling to risk the Strait await to receive cargoes.

Dozens of crude tankers willing to take the risk have helped lift oil flows from the Persian Gulf to near prewar levels, while the US blockade has pushed Iranian crude exports close to zero. At the same time, Iran has been ramping up its attacks on ships to a wartime high of almost 30 in October.

The latest US advisory said that neutral vessels with neutral cargo or are in ballast sailing between these neutral ports may be subject to questioning, visit, and search to confirm their intentions regarding the blockade.

The US Central Command and the US Naval Forces Central Command — the naval unit that is part of Centcom and oversees the naval blockade of Iran — did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

A British far-right agitator was found guilty in London on Wednesday of harassing two journalists and causing a fear of violence.

The man, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who goes by the name Tommy Robinson, was charged last year with harassing the two journalists, Andrew Young and Jacob Dirnhuber, who both worked for The Daily Mail at the time. Mr. Robinson denied the charges.

Mr. Robinson, 43, was granted bail before his sentencing on Dec. 16, by the judge overseeing the case, John Cavanagh. Harassment can carry a maximum sentence of up to 10 years in prison, according to sentencing guidelines.

The jury was unable to come to a unanimous decision, but the judge said on Wednesday that they would be allowed to give a majority verdict, and 10 out of 12 jurors found Mr. Robinson guilty on the two counts of harassment.

The charges date to August 2024, when anti-immigration riots broke out in Britain in the wake of a stabbing attack that killed three girls and injured eight others at a dance class in northwest England. In the hours afterward, misinformation about the attacker, including false claims that he was a Muslim immigrant, spread rapidly on social media. The attacker was, in fact, a British citizen, born in Wales to Christian parents originally from Rwanda.

Mr. Robinson posted repeatedly about the attack and the riots on social media platforms, including on Telegram and on X. He said the rioters were “justified in their anger” and wrote: “Get there and show your support. People need to rise up.”

During the riots, mosques and sites housing asylum seekers were attacked and dozens of police officers were injured.

On Aug. 5, 2024, The Daily Mail published a front-page story revealing that Mr. Robinson was posting messages from a luxury resort in Cyprus. The headline read: “Stoking Race Riots From His Sunbed” and was illustrated with a photograph of Mr. Robinson in a lounge chair. The article included a photo of his ex-wife and references to his children, who were traveling with him.

Mr. Robinson told the court that after the article was published, he had hired private investigators to find and photograph the two journalists and their families, in order to “put pressure” on them.

He said that he was upset by the publishing of images of his family and of details that identified their vacation, which he said made him feel “desperate.” He said threats were made online against his daughter that made him feel “sick.”

Mr. Young and Mr. Dirnhuber gave testimony during the trial about threats and harassment they received from Mr. Robinson and his supporters on social media, in phone calls and in voice messages.

An expletive-laden voice mail that was left on the phone of Ted Verity, The Daily Mail’s editor, was played in court, in which Mr. Robinson said he had located the journalists.

“I’m not threatening you with violence or anything like that,” he said. “What I’m promising you is I’ll make you famous and your families because that’s what you’ve done to me.”

Ben Holt, the prosecutor, said Mr. Robinson had used “bully boy” intimidation tactics and had circulated images of the journalists’ homes to millions of followers on social media.

“He chose to frighten them, arrange for individuals to go to their addresses,” Mr. Holt said, adding that Mr. Robinson’s supporters had also threatened the journalists. “Understandably, you might agree, they were scared; in some circumstances, being forced to leave their homes.”

In a statement read to the court, Mr. Dirnhuber said that he and his partner had had to leave their home for a week in the face of a deluge of threats after Mr. Robinson published a photo of their house on X.

Mr. Dirnhuber said Mr. Robinson had sent him direct messages on X, including one saying “I’ll be knocking at your door.”

Mr. Young, in his statement that was read to the court, said that he had received a call from a man who introduced himself as Mr. Robinson and who was “increasingly menacing, swearing and shouting,” adding: “I believe he said the words ‘I’m coming to get you.’”

Mr. Robinson recited his home address over the phone, Mr. Young said. Mr. Young’s daughter told him that a suspicious car had been parked outside their home that day, with a man sitting inside.

A police officer was assigned to provide security to Mr. Young’s family after they received the intimidating messages, the prosecution said.

Mr. Robinson’s defense lawyer argued in court that the interactions with the journalists did not amount to harassment and that Mr. Robinson had not intended to expose the two to threats of violence.

Outside the courtroom before the start of his trial, Mr. Robinson was asked by a reporter if Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, was supporting his defense. Mr. Robinson replied: “Yes.”

Mr. Robinson had previously posted on X thanking Mr. Musk for funding his case, and said his court fees had amounted to 400,000 pounds, about $445,000. Mr. Musk could not be reached for comment.

In 2025, Mr. Musk appeared by video link at a mass protest in London organized by Mr. Robinson, where the tech executive called the left “the party of murder” and urged protesters to “fight back.”

Mr. Robinson was the founder of the now-defunct English Defence League, an anti-Muslim group known for violent street protests in the late 2000s. More recently, he has become one of the most prominent anti-immigrant voices in Britain.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has for the first time acknowledged Russia’s need for security guarantees as part of a future settlement to end the war in Ukraine, in a significant shift amid a renewed US diplomatic push to restart peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow.

Ukraine’s president said western powers could eventually discuss Moscow’s demands for security guarantees, but insisted Kyiv’s own security needs must be addressed first. Until now, Kyiv and its western allies have dismissed Russia’s demands for security assurances from Nato and a sweeping overhaul of Europe’s security architecture as attempts to reassert Moscow’s sphere of influence and undermine the sovereignty of its neighbours.

“First, we need to resolve the issue of this war, and only then look for answers to the questions Russia is raising based on its own views and expectations about security,” he told reporters in Kyiv.

Negotiating teams from Ukraine, Russia and the US are supposed to meet in early November in Abu Dhabi for what the Ukrainian president described as technical talks on possible de-escalation measures, including an elusive energy and maritime ceasefire, as well as to discuss security guarantees for Ukraine.

Discussions on a postwar settlement and security guarantees would have to involve Europe, Zelenskyy insisted: “We can discuss the conceptual issues with the Russians through American mediation. But if we move on to the security guarantees format and it’s agreed that these guarantees will require Europe’s involvement, then Europe has to be part of those discussions.”

The Ukrainian president made the comments on Tuesday during a discussion with reporters held at the president’s office in Kyiv’s heavily secured government quarters. It came hours after President Alexander Stubb of Finland and Norway’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre held a phone call with Vladimir Putin, the first direct conversation with European leaders since July last year.

Zelenskyy said he had talked with Stubb and Støre the night before their call with Putin and immediately after. The two leaders said they had the impression Moscow was “serious” about planned talks between Ukrainian, Russian and American negotiating teams in Abu Dhabi, Zelenskyy said.

“I have a positive view of [Stubb and Støre] . . . I understand their communication format,” he added.

But Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday ridiculed the Nordic leaders’ attempts “to insert themselves into the negotiating process” and said “nothing new was discussed” on the call with Putin. The war, Lavrov said, “will continue and, even I will say, is likely to escalate”.

The Ukrainian president also acknowledged the Europeans’ call to Putin came at a moment of renewed contacts between Russia and the US, saying Moscow was looking to offer the US “a kind of ‘economic marriage’”.

US negotiators have been discussing major business deals with Russia in a bid to convince Moscow to end its war in Ukraine, the FT reported. US and Russian negotiators discussed potential joint ventures between US and Russian oil majors, the reopening of the Russian airspace for transit and overflights for US airlines or restarting co-operation with Russia on the production and supply of titanium.

The deals would only come online after the end of the war, people familiar with the matter told the FT. 

The Ukrainian president said the 2025 Anchorage meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Alaska had “ended Russia’s diplomatic isolation” and fear the “diesel deal” secured this month between the US and Russia would be followed by more agreements.

Zelenskyy also repeated a longstanding demand that territorial issues be only discussed at the leaders’ level. Zelenskyy also said Ukraine had been “prepared” to discuss a US proposal of a demilitarised zone created on both sides of the front line.

The comments on Russian security demands and renewed discussion between the west and Moscow highlighted Kyiv’s growing unease with the latest rapprochement between Russia and the US.

The Ukrainian president said he “heard signals” regarding a possible reduction of US troops in Europe.

“In my view, security guarantees for Russia — as Russia understands them — mean changing the security framework in Europe and the world,” he said.

In August of last year, Zelenskyy had dismissed Russian demands for security guarantees during a press conference with Nato secretary Mark Rutte: “When Russia raises the issue of security guarantees, I honestly don’t know who is threatening them yet. They attacked us, they are on our land. I don’t quite understand what guarantees the aggressor needs. Guarantees of what?”

Rutte and key Nato leaders have long rejected Russian demands for negotiations on security guarantees before a final peace settlement with Ukraine is reached, and any discussions about European security negotiated without their participation and consent.

Three months before launching his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Putin demanded far-reaching limitations on Nato, including a ban on further enlargement of the US-led military alliance, the withdrawal of forces and equipment from countries bordering Russia, and limits on certain military deployments and exercises. European governments rejected the proposals as an infringement of their sovereignty.

Russian demand for security guarantees “isn’t a new issue”, Zelenskyy acknowledged.

The leaders of France, Germany and the UK, together with Zelenskyy, agreed a joint declaration in June stating: “European security interests must be safeguarded in any [Ukraine peace] deal. Elements of any negotiation related to the EU and Nato would need the consent of the EU and its member states and Nato allies respectively.”

Relations between Washington and Kyiv deteriorated sharply in October after Donald Trump pressed Ukraine to halt its long-range drone strikes on Russia’s oil industry. Ukrainian officials also complained about delays in deliveries of critical air-defence missiles, a suspension of intelligence sharing on incoming missile attacks and restrictions on the Starlink satellite communications system.

Although intelligence sharing and Starlink access were eventually restored, the disruptions fuelled fears in Kyiv that Washington could withdraw its support for Ukraine altogether.

Zelenskyy said on Tuesday the US had supplied an average of just 12 interceptor missiles a month for Ukraine’s Patriot air-defence systems this year. He estimated in early October that Russia had stockpiled about 700 ballistic missiles and was producing another 130 each month.

The Ukrainian president acknowledged Kyiv had recently decreased the tempo of its attacks on Russian oil refineries since Trump declared a unilateral energy ceasefire: “During those days our guys were probably trying to be a little more cautious.”

Submission Statement: The European Union is planning to use safeguard measures to cut imports of products from sectors including chemicals, furniture and machinery from China, according to people familiar with the matter. The measures, which could take the form of either import caps or tariffs, may be presented as soon as the first quarter of 2027, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The latest action is part of a broad push by the EU to reduce its massive trade deficit with China, which reached €360 billion ($404 billion) last year. The commission, which handles trade matters for the EU, is walking a fine line, trying to give its industry a boost without causing retaliation from Beijing and triggering a trade war.

“Our industries have called for action and we have heard them, and we will respond, including some more safeguards,” Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters earlier this month.

Safeguard measures allow the EU to restrict products from a sector if there’s been a surge of imports into the bloc. The EU has already started to assess trade data to see where that’s the case, Bloomberg reported earlier.

The measures can take the form of import quotas, as in the case of the hybrid vehicles, or tariff-rate quotas, which apply a levy on imports above a certain volume to curb excess flows.

The EU can choose to introduce the measures unilaterally without Beijing’s agreement. The people cautioned that the plans and the exact sectors the EU would target could change following discussions with member states and China.

Low-cost and at times subsidized goods from China have been flooding the continent, eroding domestic industries and putting local jobs at risk. That, coupled with falling demand and limited market access in China for many European goods, has led to a massive trade deficit of more than $1 billion a day — and rising.

EU leaders were united at a summit in Brussels earlier this month in urging the bloc’s executive to quickly take action across economic sectors and establish new powers to help cut the trade deficit and deter China from retaliating.

The commission is planning to present proposals before mid-December for a tool to diversify supplies as well as an instrument to rapidly react to any aggressive trade actions. A new instrument would do that by cutting access to the bloc’s single market for select goods and services in ways that are more agile and broader than current options allow, the people said.

Submission Statement: India needs about $220 billion in clean energy investment over the next three years as it races to expand renewable power and grid infrastructure ‌to meet its target of 500 GW of non-fossil fuel capacity by 2030, a senior government official said on Wednesday.

Santosh Kumar Sarangi, the top official at the federal clean energy ministry, said the investments will be needed across solar and wind ⁠power, battery energy storage, green hydrogen and transmission infrastructure.

India currently has about 308 GW of non-fossil fuel-based power generation capacity and is aiming to increase that to 500 GW as part of its broader efforts to reach net-zero emissions by 2070.

The country has already developed a market for about 550,000 tonnes of green ammonia demand from overseas buyers, including Japan and South Korea, he said

India will meet investors ⁠next week at a clean energy summit in New Delhi to discuss potential investments from several countries, including pension funds from Canada, he added.

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Relevance: This is the second major deadly train accident this year in Spain. Railway maintenance and safety has suffered greatly during Sachez's time in office. The technical reason is still unknown. Signaling systems and safety systems should have stopped this.

The AfD leaks reveal how prominent pollsters, legal experts, and journalists offered their services to the party at an early stage—and which far-right extremists were awarded contracts.

Alice Weidel was preparing for a television appearance and evidently wasn’t sure exactly what she should say. So, she sent an email to a confidant, asking if he could provide her with some talking points on social justice and pensions—adding, "You always have such good ideas." The man replied promptly, saying he would be happy to give some thought to what could be said on the subject—"including some punchy, headline-grabbing points." That would be standard enough—if the confidant were an AfD party strategist. But the person responding was Hermann Binkert, head of the independent polling institute Insa.

This email exchange took place in September 2017, ahead of Weidel’s appearance on the ZDF program hosted by Maybrit Illner. Even then, Binkert was a highly sought-after guest for interviews; his polls influence both public debates and elections. Insa’s weekly "Sunday Question" (a poll on voting intentions), published in the Bild newspaper, reaches millions of people. Late that night, Binkert sent Weidel arguments to use during her talk-show appearance.

The owner of an ostensibly non-partisan polling institute was advising the AfD’s lead candidate shortly before the federal election—a state of affairs that is, to say the least, highly disconcerting.

The email exchange between Weidel and Binkert is part of what has become known as the "AfD Leaks." Unknown hackers stole 421,155 emails and more than 200,000 other files from the AfD and posted them online. Analyzing this data offers a deep look into the party’s inner workings. An investigation by DIE ZEIT reveals just how early on prominent legal experts, journalists—and, indeed, the pollster Binkert—began offering their services to the party.

The polling institute Insa has long faced criticism for its proximity to the AfD. Insa has been working for the AfD since 2014. These allegations stem primarily from a contract that an Insa subsidiary undertook for the state parliamentary group of the Thuringian AfD—a branch now classified as right-wing extremist—as well as a donation made to the party by Hermann Binkert in 2014.

Insa head Binkert rejects the accusation that his institute lacks independence. He told DIE ZEIT that he works for "all parties without distinction," noting that he has also made donations to other parties in the past. Binkert claims that "politicians from all parties" receive "advice on political topics" from him, describing this simply as "client relations—provided free of charge." Until now, Binkert had consistently denied providing any advice to the AfD beyond conducting polls. However, emails to Weidel that have now come to light suggest otherwise.

It appears that Binkert provided political counsel to Weidel on several occasions. In an email from November 2017, the Insa chief suggested that Weidel leverage the awarding of the Federal Cross of Merit to an "important staff member of the AfD’s parliamentary group" for the party’s benefit, arguing that it could help the AfD and that it would be a shame not to take advantage of it.

In another email sent two weeks before the 2017 federal election, Binkert offered to include specific party topics in an upcoming poll on short notice: "If there is anything you would like to see included, I would be happy to add it. Internally, confidentially, and free of charge." Whether the AfD accepted this offer is not clear from the leaked data. When asked for comment, Weidel declined to respond. Binkert said that, in this case, he had apparently offered to expand an existing assignment to include additional questions. "We offer this all the time—to other clients as well."

Hermann Binkert maintains close ties not only to the AfD but also to circles associated with the "New Right." He has made appearances for the weekly newspaper Junge Freiheit and the radical-right online outlet Deutschland-Kurier—a publication for which his firm, Insa, conducted exclusive polling.

David Bendels, the editor-in-chief of Deutschland-Kurier, also sought to establish a close relationship with Alice Weidel at an early stage. The leaked material includes emails in which Bendels writes to Weidel in a highly familiar tone, addressing her by the informal "du" as early as 2017.

Then there is a message from November 16, 2017. At the time, the CDU/CSU, the FDP, and the Green Party were exploring the possibility of forming a coalition following the federal election. The status of these negotiations had been summarized by the four parties in an internal protocol the previous day. The very next day—November 16—Bendels forwarded the document to Weidel, labeling it "Paper of Shame" in the subject line.

Invoices totaling nearly 40,000 euros

Typically, journalists receive information from politicians, not the other way around. In this instance, however, an editor-in-chief sent an internal document to the rival party of his source—because Bendels had obtained the exploratory paper from an old friend within the CDU.

Sebastian Reischmann is a local politician from Hesse. He has known Bendels since 2010, when both were active in the Junge Union, Reischmann told DIE ZEIT. According to a report by Der Spiegel, a few months before the email containing the "document of shame" was sent, the two had traveled to Berlin—accompanied by someone who is now an AfD politician—to attend a New Year’s reception hosted by Junge Freiheit.

Reischmann no longer recalls exactly where he obtained the internal exploratory document. It might have come from a CDU WhatsApp group. Until now, Reischmann was unaware that Bendels had immediately forwarded the document to the chair of the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag. He does not see anything remarkable about this, however: "As we speak, hundreds of such documents are being passed around; it’s not a question of whether they are shared, but merely whether you happen to receive one half an hour earlier than someone else," Reischmann said.

The AfD was elected to the Bundestag for the first time in 2017. At that time, Dietrich Murswiek, a legal scholar from Freiburg, reached out. He is a man who deals with grand questions: public law, constitutional law, and state law. This did not, however, prevent him from offering his services to Weidel for matters of a less fundamental nature. When Weidel was referred to as a "Nazi slut" in a satirical segment on the NDR program Extra 3—a piece that caricatured her own previous statements—Murswiek actively offered his assistance to the politician. "The fact that you challenged political correctness does not justify such abusive criticism," he wrote to Weidel in May 2017. "I do not wish to force legal advice upon you. (...) However, should you decide to pursue a legal defense and require support regarding constitutional law, please feel free to contact me." Whether Weidel accepted Murswiek’s offer is not clear from the available emails. Weidel declined to comment on the matter.

The following year, the AfD commissioned Murswiek to produce an expert report. In it, he analyzes how civil servants who are also party members should conduct themselves to avoid coming into conflict with their official professional duties.

The emails from Binkert, Bendels, and Murswiek are nine years old. In the meantime, the AfD has undergone several transformations, shifting further and further toward the far right. The party’s political environment has also changed—a fact that is likewise evident from the messages in the leak. While the party attracted mostly men from the right-wing conservative spectrum a decade ago, it is now far-right extremists who are receiving commissions from the AfD.

The data leak includes, for instance, invoices submitted to the AfD in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania by far-right activist Michael S. just a few weeks ago. He reportedly received nearly 40,000 euros from the party for producing a campaign advertisement and working as a cameraman for the 2026 state election campaign. The broadcaster SWR was the first to report on this. Michael S. is said to be the "head of media" for the far-right Identitarian Movement and works for the media agency Filmkunstkollektiv—an agency founded by Identitarians. The Identitarian Movement is on the AfD’s list of organizations deemed incompatible with party membership.

According to information obtained by DIE ZEIT, a second activist from the Identitarian milieu, Annie H., was also involved in campaign work in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. She and Michael S. were commissioned by Daniel Fiß—a former co-chair of the Identitarian Movement in Germany. Fiß has since become a member of the AfD and, in 2026, coordinated the party’s election campaign in the north.

For the state parliamentary election campaign, Fiß also enlisted other old acquaintances. Tannwald Media, a Leipzig-based advertising agency run by former Identitarian activist Alexander K., was tasked with producing an AI-generated campaign song, which was released under the title "Petermännchen – Blaue Wende (feat. Die Fidel)."

Tannwald Media had previously worked as an advertising agency for the Junge Alternative (Young Alternative) in Brandenburg, the AfD in Lower Saxony, and the AfD during the 2025 federal election campaign. Leaked data points to further commissions from the AfD to the agency; in 2024, for instance, Tannwald produced a lighter for the AfD’s state parliamentary group in Saarland, featuring the design: "Heating System – 'Habeck' Model."

Text translated by Google Translate, mistakes are my own.