Top House Republican takes credit for new charges against Hunter Biden – live

A federal appeals court upheld most of the gag order judge Tanya Chutkan imposed on Donald Trump following incendiary comments he made about people involved in his trial on charges related to overturning the 2020 election. The former president is barred from attacking court staff, prosecutorial staff and potential trial witnesses, but the appeals judges did allow him to criticize Chutkan, the justice department, the Biden administration and the case itself as politically motivated. Elsewhere, Hunter Biden’s legal trouble deepened after prosecutors filed new tax charges against him, and in an interview with the musician Moby, the president’s son said the GOP is “trying to kill me” to undermine Joe Biden’s presidency.

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Here’s what else happened today:

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• Hunter Biden’s attorney said the latest charges against his client were the result of “Republican pressure”.

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• Trump’s campaign discouraged speculation over who might be hired to staff his administration, if he wins next year’s presidential election.

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• The rightwing House Freedom Caucus demanded Congress approve hardline immigration policies that Democrats oppose in exchange for more Ukraine aid.

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• Joe Biden’s approval ratings have hit a record low, poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight reports.

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• A protest against a Philadelphia Jewish restaurant by demonstrators calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip was more complicated than it initially appeared.

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Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Donald Trump, has released a statement that attempts to reframe today’s federal appeals court decision upholding the gag order against the former president:

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Today, the D.C. Circuit Court panel, with each judge appointed by a Democrat President, determined that a huge part of Judge Chutkan’s extraordinarily overbroad gag order was unconstitutional. President Trump will continue to fight for the First Amendment rights of tens of millions of Americans to hear from the leading Presidential candidate at the height of his campaign. The Biden-led witch hunts against President Trump and the American people will fail.

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While the court did strike down parts of the order, it upheld the aspects banning Trump from attacking the prosecutors, witnesses and court staff.

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In their ruling upholding most of federal judge Tanya Chutkan’s gag order against Donald Trump, the US court of appeals for the district of Columbia circuit found his statements could threaten his trial on charges related to trying to overturn the 2020 election.

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“We agree with the district court that some aspects of Mr. Trump’s public statements pose a significant and imminent threat to the fair and orderly adjudication of the ongoing criminal proceeding, warranting a speech-constraining protective order,” judge Patricia A Millett wrote for the court.

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Among the statements cited was one Trump posted on social media the day after his initial appearance in the case: “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!” The appeals court also noted that he attacked Chutkan as a “fraud dressed up as a judge” and “a radical Obama hack”, and that a supporter responded with a threat to kill the judge that used what appears to be a racial slur.

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A federal appeals court has upheld most of a gag order against Donald Trump imposed by the judge handling his trial on charges related to attempting the overthrow of the 2020 election.

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Washington DC-based judge Tanya Chutkan imposed the order in October that prevented the former president from making inflammatory statements and social media posts attacking prosecutors, potential witnesses and court staff in the case. Trump appealed the order, arguing it unconstitutionally infringed on his first amendment rights and hindered his political speech amid his campaign for a second term in the White House.

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The order was put on hold as appeals judges considered his challenge. In its ruling, the court generally upheld Chutkan’s order, but said Trump was now also allowed to assail the special counsel Jack Smith, who brought the criminal case against the former president.

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Hunter Biden’s legal trouble deepened after prosecutors filed new tax charges against him. In an interview with the musician Moby, the president’s son said the GOP is “trying to kill me” to undermine Joe Biden’s presidency, while James Comer, the Republican chair of the House oversight committee, claimed his panel’s work led to the new charges. The president, meanwhile, had nothing to say about the latest developments in the prosecution, instead cheering better-than-expected employment data and announcing new investments in high-speed rail.

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Here’s what else is going on:

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• Hunter Biden’s attorney said the latest charges against his client were the result of “Republican pressure”.

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• The rightwing House Freedom Caucus demanded Congress approve hardline immigration policies that Democrats oppose in exchange for more Ukraine aid.

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• Joe Biden’s approval ratings have hit a record low, poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight reports.

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Besides federal prosecutors, Hunter Biden’s most tenacious nemesis is James Comer, the Republican chair of the House oversight committee, who has been leading the investigation into his overseas business dealings.

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Comer has alleged that the Bidens are a “crime family”, even though his months of hearings and inquiries have yet to reveal any evidence that the president benefited from his son or any other family member’s forays overseas.

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The oversight committee has been dogged in keeping the focus on Hunter Biden, and earlier this year held a hearing in which two IRS whistleblowers alleged the investigation into his taxes had been slow-walked and mismanaged.

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In a statement released yesterday following the announcement of new charges against Biden, Comer said that testimony was crucial in getting the charges filed:

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Two brave IRS whistleblowers, Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, placed their careers on the line to blow the whistle on misconduct and politicization in the Hunter Biden criminal investigation. The Department of Justice got caught in its attempt to give Hunter Biden an unprecedented sweetheart plea deal and today’s charges filed against Hunter Biden are the result of Mr. Shapley and Mr. Ziegler’s efforts to ensure all Americans are treated equally under the law. Every American should applaud these men for their courage to expose the truth.

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Comer then goes on to say, “The House Oversight Committee’s investigation of the Bidens’ influence peddling schemes reveals how Joe Biden knew about, participated in, and benefitted from his family cashing in on the Biden name.” However, that’s not quite true. The committee has made public lots of evidence about Joe Biden’s financial relationships with Hunter and other family members, but none of it quite adds up to proof of him being enriched by their business activities. Here’s a Washington Post story that shows how some allegedly damaging evidence Comer released is less than it appears.

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The “sweetheart deal” he speaks of was a plea agreement Biden’s attorneys briefly reached with prosecutors, which collapsed unexpectedly in a July court hearing, leading to his indictment. Here’s more on that, from the Guardian’s Joan E Greve:

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Joe Biden has released a statement taking credit for the labor market’s continued strength, which was illustrated earlier this morning when new government data showed robust hiring in November and the unemployment rate ticking down slightly.

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“The economy created 199,000 jobs in November, for a total of over 14 million jobs since I took office. That’s more than 14 million additional Americans who know the dignity and peace of mind that comes with a paycheck,” Biden said.

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“On my watch we have achieved better growth and lower inflation than any other advanced country. A year ago, forecasters said it couldn’t be done,” he continued, while acknowledging the political toll taken by the wave of price increases felt by Americans since he took office in 2021. Economists view that inflation as driven by a number of factors, including rebounding demand as Covid-19 ebbed, supply chain problems and the disruptions caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

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“I know prices are still too high for too many Americans. So my top economic priority is to lower costs for hardworking Americans. I’m doing everything in my power to bring down prescription drug costs, health insurance premiums, and utility bills,” the president said.

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Biden’s polls have been underwater for nearly two years, which many analysts view as a consequence of the price hikes. In his statement, the president argued that Republicans would make the economy worse: “Instead of fighting to lower costs for middle-class families, Republicans in Congress are fighting to raise prescription drug costs and increase profits for Big Pharma. They’re fighting to lower taxes for the wealthiest Americans and large corporations that have earned record profits in recent years. Congressional Republicans are fighting to cut Medicare and Social Security. That’s just wrong.”

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Hunter Biden gave a rare interview to the musician Moby that was released today, in which he says Republicans and their allies in the media are trying to demonize him to harm the presidency of his father, Joe Biden.

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“What they’re trying to do is they’re trying to kill me, knowing that it will be a pain greater than my father could be able to handle, and so therefore destroying a presidency in that way,” Hunter Biden said, according to HuffPost.

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The president’s son published a memoir in 2021 but has otherwise avoided granting interviews as federal prosecutors amped up their investigations of him, and Republicans seized on his legal troubles to make the thus-far unproven claim that his father was corrupt.

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Biden told Moby he felt sorry for some of his antagonists in Congress, particularly Marjorie Taylor Greene, the rightwing Republican congr