Kenya Insights

Tag: US presidential election

  • Putin Hails ‘courageous’ Trump After Election Win

    Putin Hails ‘courageous’ Trump After Election Win

    • Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had a “very warm” and “productive conversation” with the president-elect.
    • US Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigated allegations of collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia in 2016, but said in a report three years later that had found no evidence of conspiracy.

    Vladimir Putin has congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory, calling him a “courageous man”.

    Speaking at an event in the Russian city of Sochi, the Russian president said that Trump was “hounded from all sides” during his first term in the White House.

    Putin also said that Trump’s claim that he can help end the war in Ukraine “deserves attention at least”.

    During his campaign, Donald Trump repeatedly said he could end the war “in a day” but has never elaborated on how that could happen.

    During Putin’s address, which lasted several hours and covered a wide range of topics, he also spoke of the assassination attempt on Donald Trump in July, saying it “made an impression” on him.

    After being shot, Trump punched his fist into the air and mouthed the words “fight, fight, fight”, before being hauled away by Secret Service agents.

    “He behaved, in my opinion, in a very correct way, courageously, like a man,” Putin said.

    Asked if he was ready to have discussions with Donald Trump, Putin replied: “We’re ready, we’re ready.”

    Trump had already said on Thursday that he was prepared to speak with Putin, telling NBC News: “I think we’ll speak”.

    The Kremlin was widely accused of interfering in the 2016 presidential election to boost Donald Trump’s campaign against Hilary Clinton, claims rejected by Moscow.

    US Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigated allegations of collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia in 2016, but said in a report three years later that had found no evidence of conspiracy.

    Elsewhere on Thursday, leaders gathering for the European Political Community in Budapest discussed Trump’s return to the White House.

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had a “very warm” and “productive conversation” with the president-elect.

    “But we have to do everything to ensure that the results of our interaction between Ukraine and America, the whole of Europe and America, are productive and positive,” he added.

    Many in Ukraine and Europe are worried that Trump might slow, if not halt, the flow of American military aid to Kyiv upon taking power in January.

    UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer assured Zelensky at the summit that the UK’s support for Ukraine in its war with Russia remains “iron-clad”.

    Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban – who previously said he celebrated Trump’s win by “tapping into the vodka supply happily” – said the US and Europe now face tough talks on trade.

    Orban, who is a close ally of Trump, told a press conference that “the trade issue with the US will come up and it will not be easy”.

    Before winning the election, Trump said he would impose tariffs of 10% on all imports.

    “There was an agreement that Europe should assume greater responsibility for its own peace and security in the future. To put it even more bluntly, we cannot expect Americans to be the only ones to take care of us,” Orban said.

  • Kenyans Frustrated With Their Government Celebrate Trump’s Win

    Kenyans Frustrated With Their Government Celebrate Trump’s Win

    Seven months after Kenya’s President William Ruto was hosted by President Joe Biden at the White House in a historic state visit, Donald Trump’s election victory sparked celebrations among opposition activists.

    Kenyans concerned over the perceived US backing of Ruto’s administration and some of its more unpopular economic policies are hoping for a reevaluation of US support under Trump.

    For a start, they’re calling for the removal of the Biden-appointed US ambassador to Kenya, former HP and eBay CEO Meg Whitman, who played a central role in the elevation of Kenya’s relationship with the US to non-NATO ally status in May. She has also led a push to attract investment by US tech firms to Kenya, East Africa’s largest economy.

    Calls for her removal were widely shared across social media, trending on platforms including X soon after it became apparent that Trump was headed for victory. Whitman — and by extension Washington’s — relationship with Ruto has long been seen as a problem in some quarters. Critics range from opposition activists in Kenya to officials in Washington.

    Ruto’s popularity took a hit in the months following the US state visit due to massive youth-led nationwide protests against proposed tax hikes and corruption as well as police abductions and killings of protesters. A survey published by research company InfoTrak in October said 73% of Kenyans thought the country “was headed in the wrong direction,” with corruption and police abductions among Kenyans’ top concerns.

    Ruto congratulated Trump on Thursday for his win, writing that he looked forward to “deepening our collaboration under your leadership as we work together to address global challenges”.

    Whitman faced a backlash last Thursday after the US failed to appear among signatories of a joint statement by Western envoys condemning a reported increase in abductions and enforced disappearances in the country, having previously signed similar statements alongside European counterparts. Police in the country have denied involvement in abductions.

    “If President Donald Trump’s return to the White House brings an end to Meg Whitman’s ambassadorial tenure in Nairobi, then we as Kenyans have something to celebrate,” veteran lawyer and human rights activist Gitobu Imanyara wrote on X, referencing the abductions.

    As Kamala Harris perhaps realized a little too late, in 2024 the Joe Biden hug can be damaging for political ambition. The optics of Ruto’s association with Biden — capped by the first state visit by an African leader in 15 years and Whitman’s perceived closeness to the Kenyan president — has helped fuel disaffection against the government.

    Critics of Washington’s approach see the US as an enabler of harmful government decisions in Kenya.

    However, Caroline Wandiri, an international relations professor at the Nairobi-based Kenyatta University, told me Whitman’s future would ultimately not be determined by Kenyans’ complaints, but by whether she was aligned with Trump’s vision for the US and its interests around the world. Even though Whitman was appointed by a Democratic president, she has previously run as a Republican for the governorship of California.

    Kenya has increasingly been seen as a key geopolitical partner for the US on the continent amid waning US influence in West Africa, along with increasing Russian and Chinese presence.

    “If he feels that she (Whitman) or any other person is not representing the United States’ interests very well, or if he’d want someone to confide with or get along with easily, there’s no reason not to make a change,” Wandiri said. “That would not be strange.”

  • Donald Trump Elected 47th President Of US

    Donald Trump Elected 47th President Of US

    Republican candidate Donald Trump surpassed 270 Electoral College votes needed to win the 2024 US presidential election, The Associated Press said on Wednesday.

    Trump defeated his Democratic rival Vice President Kamala Harris in Tuesday’s race, winning 277 Electoral College votes and securing his spot as the nation’s 47th president.

    He won key swing states, including North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, as well as Indiana, Kentucky, West Virginia, Florida, Tennessee, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska, Louisiana, Ohio, Texas, Missouri, Utah, Montana, Kansas, Iowa, and Idaho.

    Trump has thanked Americans “for the extraordinary honor of being elected your 47th president and your 45th president,” referring to his earlier term in office, 2017-2021, before Joe Biden won four years as the 46th US president.

    “This is a magnificent victory for the American people that will allow us to make America great again,” he said.

    The win would make Trump only the second US president to serve non-consecutive terms, following Grover Cleveland, who served two separate terms in the late 1800s, with President Benjamin Harrison in between.

  • US Presidential Election: Follow Live Results

    US Presidential Election: Follow Live Results

    Follow live results HERE

  • ‪Harris Challenges Trump To CNN Debate In October, Trump Refuses‬

    ‪Harris Challenges Trump To CNN Debate In October, Trump Refuses‬

    Kamala Harris on Saturday, September 22, challenged Donald Trump to another debate in the lead-up to the US presidential election, with her campaign saying she had accepted a debate invitation from CNN for October 23.

    “Vice President Harris is ready for another opportunity to share a stage with Donald Trump,” campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon said in a statement. “Trump should have no problem agreeing to this debate.”

    The Republican snubbed the offer, saying it was “too late.” It would have been their second debate, after a September 10 encounter she was widely considered to have won.

    Speaking at a campaign rally in the battleground state of North Carolina, Trump said he would like to debate – calling it “good entertainment value” – but that the start of early voting in some states had taken the air out of the idea. “It’s just too late, voting has already started,” he said. However, in 2020, the last presidential debate between Biden and Trump took place on October 22. In 2016, the third debate between Hillary Clinton and Trump happened on October 19.

    He added, to a large and enthusiastic crowd of supporters, that while CNN had been “very fair” when he debated President Joe Biden in June, “they won’t be fair again” after criticism for the handling of the first debate.

    Vice President Harris replaced her boss at the top of the Democratic ticket after the 81-year-old Biden’s disastrous performance against Trump. His exit from the race left Trump, 78, now the oldest presidential nominee against a much younger Harris, 59.

    Race remains neck-and-neck

    Saturday’s announcement came as some states have already begun early voting in what is an agonizingly close race. On the campaign trail on Friday, Harris cast Trump and his party as “hypocrites” over abortion, blaming the former president for an abortion ban in the battleground state of Georgia that she said had caused the deaths of two women.

    Trump has frequently bragged on the campaign trail that his three Supreme Court picks paved the way for the 2022 overturning of the national right to abortion, turning the decision over to states. At least 20 states have since brought in full or partial restrictions, with Georgia banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.

    The race remains neck-and-neck, with Trump running with the support of a conservative religious voter base and others, many of whom feel disaffected by the country’s political and economic status quo. Hardline anti-immigrant rhetoric has become a centerpiece of his election campaign.

    The race between Harris and Trump has continued amid a tense atmosphere that was brought to the fore last weekend when a gunman appeared to have tried to assassinate Trump in Florida, the second such threat in as many months. Every vote will count in the race, whose result Trump has once again refused to say he will accept if he loses.

    Trump faces criminal charges for allegedly trying to overturn the 2020 result, after which his supporters violently stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. The result is expected to hinge on just seven battleground states, including North Carolina.

    Trump has sought to lay the blame for any potential loss at the door of Jewish American voters, sparking outrage. “If I don’t win this election… in my opinion the Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss,” Trump told an anti-Semitism event on Thursday, repeating his grievance that Jewish voters have historically leaned Democratic.

  • Trump Warns Of ‘Bloodbath’ If He Loses Presidential Election

    Trump Warns Of ‘Bloodbath’ If He Loses Presidential Election

    (AFP)- Days after securing his position as the presumptive Republican nominee, the former president also warned of a “bloodbath” if he is not elected – though it was not clear what he was referring to, with the remark coming in the middle of comments about threats to the US auto industry.

    “The date – remember this, November 5 – I believe it’s going to be the most important date in the history of our country,” the 77-year-old told rally-goers in Vandalia, Ohio, repeating well-worn criticisms that his rival, President Joe Biden, is the “worst” president.

    Criticising what he said were Chinese plans to build cars in Mexico and sell them to Americans, he stated: “We’re going to put a 100 percent tariff on every single car that comes across the line, and you’re not going to be able to sell those cars if I get elected.”

    “Now if I don’t get elected it’s going to be a bloodbath for the whole – that’s going to be the least of it, it’s going to be a bloodbath for the country. That’ll be the least of it. But they’re not going to sell those cars.”

    As Trump’s comment gained traction on social media, Biden’s campaign released a statement calling the Republican a “loser” at the ballot box in 2020 who then “doubles down on his threats of political violence.”

    “He wants another January 6 but the American people are going to give him another electoral defeat this November because they continue to reject his extremism, his affection for violence, and his thirst for revenge,” the campaign said, referring to the deadly attack on the US Capitol by Trump supporters in 2021.

    Later, Biden spoke at a dinner in Washington, where he also warned of “an unprecedented moment in history.”

    “Freedom is under assault… The lies about the 2020 election, the plot to overturn it, to embrace the Jan. 6 insurrection pose the greatest threat to our democracy since the American Civil War,” he said.

    “In 2020, they failed, but … the threat remains.”

    The 81-year-old, who has waved off concerns that he is too old for a second term, leavened his rhetoric with humor.

    “One candidate’s too old and mentally unfit to be president,” he said of the presidential race. “The other guy’s me.”

    Border issues

    Earlier this month Trump and Biden each won enough delegates to clinch their party nominations in the 2024 presidential race, all but assuring a rematch and setting up one of the longest election campaigns in US history.

    Among the issues Trump is campaigning on is sweeping reform of what he calls Biden’s “horror show” immigration policies, despite the ex-president successfully pressuring Republicans to block a bill in Congress that included the toughest border security measures in decades.

    On Saturday he invoked the border again as he reached out to minorities who have traditionally voted Democrat.

    He said Biden had “repeatedly stabbed African-American voters in the back” by granting work permits to “millions” of immigrants, warning that they and Hispanic Americans “are going to be the ones that suffer the most.”

    For decades Ohio had been seen as a bellwether battleground state, though it has trended more strongly Republican since Trump’s White House win in 2016.

    The rally came a day after Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, said he would not endorse his old boss for a second White House term.