Democracy Now!

As President Biden drops his reelection bid and endorses Vice President Kamala Harris, we discuss the next steps forward and whether there should be an open convention. James Zogby, former executive member of the Democratic National Committee, says an open convention is what democracy needs from our party right now." Meanwhile, Black Voters Matter co-founder LaTosha Brown says an open convention is a risk that would cause chaos" within the Democratic Party. This is a moment that we have to defeat Trump," says Brown.

Journalist Mehdi Hasan joins us to respond to President Joe Biden's announcement Sunday he is ending his campaign to seek reelection just four months before Election Day. In a letter posted on social media, Biden wrote he was stepping aside in the best interest of my party and the country," and then endorsed his Vice President Kamala Harris. She quickly received the backing of many powerful Democrats, but Harris could still face a challenge for the party's nomination in the four weeks before the Democratic National Convention. Questions about Biden's candidacy had been growing since at least last year. The activist group RootsAction launched a campaign called Don't Run Joe 20 months ago, and during the primary more than a half-million voters chose uncommitted" instead of Biden to protest his support for Israel's war on Gaza. Hasan says that this is a big, big moment for American democracy," and when it comes to Harris, we need to pressure her in a way that we failed to pressure Joe Biden."

President Biden Ends Reelection Bid & Endorses Kamala Harris, Israel Kills 39 in Khan Younis as Official Death Toll Tops 39,000, ICJ Rules Israel's Occupation of West Bank and East Jerusalem Is Illegal, Netanyahu Heads to Washington to Address Congress Despite ICC Arrest Warrant for Gaza Genocide, Israel Attacks Yemen's Hodeidah, Killing 6 People, After Houthi Drone Strike on Tel Aviv, Injured AFP Journalist Christina Assi Carries Olympic Torch to Honor Slain and Wounded Media Workers, Bangladesh Rolls Back Gov't Job Quota Rule Following Student Protests That Killed at Least 160, 40 Asylum Seekers Die Off Haitian Coast Amid Ongoing Humanitarian Crisis, U.S. Ambassador to U.N. Travels to Haiti; Court Charges 40+ in 2018 Massacre, Incl. Jimmy Cherizier, Calls to End Microsoft's Monopoly After Global Outage Wreaked Havoc Last Week, Illinois Officer Charged with Murder for Fatally Shooting Sonya Massey in Her Home, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Civil Rights Pioneer in Congress, Dies at at 74

As anger grows in Milwaukee over the police killing of 43-year-old Samuel Sharpe during the Republican National Convention, we speak with his sister, Angelique Sharpe, who says the family is fighting for transparency from the authorities and the full video of the fatal incident. We really want justice for my brother," says Angelique, who also explains that her brother's life had been threatened by a bully" and that he had actually called the police for help before he was killed. Samuel Sharpe was an unhoused Black man shot 27 times by police on Tuesday - but the officers were from Ohio, part of a deployment of thousands of outside law enforcement members in Wisconsin for the RNC. We are also joined by Wisconsin state Representative Darrin Madison, a Democratic Socialist, who says both Sharpe's death and the killing of D'Vontaye Mitchell by hotel security guards weeks earlier point to a larger problem of anti-Black violence in Milwaukee.

The Washington Post reports the word abortion" was not mentioned a single time from the stage during the first three days of the Republican National Convention. Reporter Amy Littlefield, abortion access correspondent at The Nation, says the silence from Trump and others at this week's RNC in Milwaukee does not reflect a change in attitude from the Republican Party, which is still fiercely opposed to reproductive rights. Republicans can read the polls. They know that abortion has triumphed in all seven instances where it's been on the ballot since the Dobbs decision. They know that a rising number of people support abortion rights," says Littlefield, who predicts that abortion is going to have a huge impact on this election" and calls for a Reproductive Justice New Deal."

Bishop William Barber, co-chair of the Poor People's Campaign, joins us as the Republican National Convention wraps up in Milwaukee. On the final night, Donald Trump's invective-filled speech, coming just days after the attempt on his life, was promoted as an address about unity. But Barber says it was only a unity of rejection" on offer - rejecting the rights of women, immigrants, workers, poor people, disenfranchised voters and more. They may have toned down their voices, but they did not tone down their extreme policies," he says.

A march through downtown Milwaukee Thursday called for justice for Samuel Sharpe and D'Vontaye Mitchell, two Black men killed before and during the Republican National Convention amid a massive security buildup. Sharpe was a 43-year-old unhoused Black man who was shot dead by police officers from Ohio who were in Wisconsin as part of a group of 4,500 law enforcement officials in Milwaukee for the RNC. The shooting took place a mile from the RNC's proceedings. Weeks earlier, security guards at the Hyatt Regency Hotel killed D'Vontaye Mitchell, a 43-year-old Black father who died after security guards pinned him to the ground. Democracy Now! was at the protest, and we feature the voices of grieving family members who spoke out.

We host a roundtable the morning after Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination for president on Thursday, just five days after surviving an assassination attempt, delivering the longest acceptance speech in convention history. Trump began with a somber recounting of what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a bullet grazed his right ear, and soon went off script to deliver a rambling diatribe against various political enemies and repeatedly demonized immigrants. The first three or four days of the convention were pitched as a display of unity," says Benjamin Wallace-Wells of The New Yorker, who says the nominee got in the way" of the party's plans. Trump was just straightforwardly weird." Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa, founder of Futuro Media, says the vicious anti-immigrant rhetoric from Trump and almost every other speaker throughout the week is built on lies. If everything that he said is true, then our American economy would be tanking, right? And, actually, there would be rampant crime across the streets. That is not the truth. And even Trump supporters ... know that's not the truth," says Hinojosa. We also speak with former Ohio state Senator Nina Turner, who says both Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance are promoting a false populism that does not actually support workers or challenge the power of big money. We do need a president that will put the working-class people ahead of corporations. We do need a president that will line up the supposed values of this country with policy. The problem is, President Donald J. Trump is not it, and neither is J.D. Vance," says Turner, a senior fellow at The New School's Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy.

Trump Accepts GOP Nomination with Longest-Ever Convention Speech, 2nd Dem. Senator Calls on Biden to Step Down Amid Reports He May Be on Verge of Ending Campaign, Israel Bombs Another U.N. School; Families Grieve Loved Ones as Bodies Exhumed from Al-Amal Hospital, Israel's Weaponization of Water" Leading to Death, Disease as Polio Virus Is Detected in Gaza, Houthis Claim Responsibility for Strike in Tel Aviv That Kills One, Death Toll Climbs to 28 in Bangladesh Student Protests as Crackdown Intensifies, Microsoft Outage Grounds Planes, Causes Global Chaos, U.K. Court Hands 4- and 5-Year Prison Sentences to Climate Activists for Planning Nonviolent Protest, Court Blocks Student Debt Relief Plan as Biden Admin Cancels Another 1.2B in Federal Loans, DOJ Sues U.S.'s Largest Contractor Housing Immigrant Children over Systemic Sexual Abuse, Lou Dobbs, Racist and Xenophobic Fox News Star, Dies, WSJ Reporter Evan Gershkovich Convicted of Espionage, Sentenced to 16 Years in Prison, Israeli Settlers Ramp Up Attacks in Occupied West Bank; U.K. Resumes UNRWA Funding, Long-standing Rwandan President Paul Kagame Wins Reelection with Over 99% of Vote, Indigenous Leaders in Peru Declare State of Emergency After Murder of Mariano Isacama Feliciano, Amnesty Says Peruvian President Dina Boluarte Criminally Responsible for Deaths of Protesters, Uber and Lyft Drivers Take to NYC Streets to Call for End to Lockout" Policies

The Democratic National Committee is moving ahead with a plan to virtually nominate Joe Biden ahead of the Democratic convention in Chicago despite growing calls for him to step aside and as a new Associated Press poll shows nearly two-thirds of Democrats want Biden to withdraw from the race following his disastrous debate with Donald Trump. Top Democrats including Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer are reportedly privately lobbying for Biden to step aside. With Biden as the presidential candidate, Democrats have a vanishingly thin chance of recapturing the House," says Chris Lehmann, who rejoins us to discuss the unprecedented" and contentious fight over Biden's reelectability occurring within the Democratic Party ahead of its convention next month.

American historian and the author of White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America, Nancy Isenberg, calls Republican vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance a peddler of the self-made man myth." Isenberg criticizes Hilbilly Elegy, the memoir that propelled him to fame, as a deceptive way of selling this myth and the conservative politics it comes with. Much of what his memoir says tells us nothing about real class conditions," Isenberg says, pointing to her own historical and sociological research on the rural poor in the United States.

Politico reporter Ian Ward interviewed Ohio Senator J.D. Vance at length for a recent profile and joins us to discuss Vance's biography and ideology after he formally accepted the Republican vice-presidential nomination to run with Donald Trump, whom he once staunchly opposed.

We continue to look at the record of Donald Trump's vice-presidential running mate, Senator J.D. Vance, with a focus on his foreign policy actions, with Matt Duss of the Center for International Policy, former adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders. Vance is very aligned with Trump," says Duss, such as in his support of the Abraham Accords, the Arab-Israeli normalization deal signed under the Trump administration that sought to increase Israel's power in the region at the expense of Palestinian rights.

After Ohio Senator J.D. Vance makes his nomination official as the Republican vice-presidential candidate in 2024, we spend the show looking at his record. We begin with a discussion on Vance's professed economic populism with independent journalist Zaid Jilani and The Nation's Chris Lehmann. Jilani argues Vance's pro-working class image is not only genuine, but that he may also hold enough sway to bring the Republican Party closer to the labor movement. Big business does fear Vance to some extent," he says. Lehmann counters, I don't see the Republican Party, at the end of the day, moving toward these ... redistributive policies," citing its hostility toward immigrants, who are a major driver of economic growth. The forgotten working class is going to stay forgotten," he concludes.

Biden Tests Positive for COVID, Cancels Campaign Events, Amid Mounting Calls to Step Aside, Biden Says He Is a Zionist, Before Claiming He Did More for Palestinians Than Anybody", Israeli Soldiers Sicced a Dog on a Gazan Man with Down Syndrome, Less Than Half of U.N. Health Facilities in Gaza Are Operational, Israel Passes Resolution Rejecting Palestinian Statehood, J.D. Vance Tops RNC Speakers on Day 3 as He Accepts VP Nomination, Reporter Says WSJ Fired Her Due to Leadership Role with Hong Kong Media Union, Colombia Ends Ceasefire Agreement with FARC Faction, At Least 6 Heat-Related Deaths Recorded in Texas After Hurricane-Triggered Power Outage, Extreme Rains in Eastern Afghanistan Kill at Least 47, Injure Hundreds, I Can't Breathe": Eric Garner Remembered 10 Years After NYPD Choked Him to Death, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Civil Rights Activist and Musical Icon, Has Died at 81, Everything Is a Challenge": U.N Aid Coordinator Discusses Plight of Displaced Gazans, CodePink Facing Death Threats After Republican Lawmaker Falsely Claims a Member Attacked Him, Elon Musk Plans to Move SpaceX from CA to TX After Newsom Signs New Law Protecting Trans Students, Lawmakers Seek Data on Child Labor Violations in Federal Work Program, Puerto Rico Sues Oil Giants over Climate Crisis

The Democratic National Committee is moving to confirm President Joe Biden as the party's presidential nominee with a virtual roll call" as early as next week, despite serious doubts from many Democratic lawmakers and voters about his viability following a disastrous debate performance in late June. Joe Biden could be nominated for president next week, even though the convention is almost a month away," says The Nation's John Nichols.

Anti-immigrant hate speech and misinformation about the U.S.-Mexico border took center stage on the second day of the Republican National Convention. Donald Trump's campaign screened an ad that scapegoated migrants and asylum seekers for rising crime in the U.S. and falsely claimed Biden's so-called open border policies have facilitated the smuggling of fentanyl. Christine Neumann-Ortiz, executive director of Voces de la Frontera and Voces de la Frontera Action, says Trump's platform is promoting hateful rhetoric" and the GOP has become a white supremacist party and is a real threat to democracy."

Ohio Senator J.D. Vance is preparing to make his first speech Wednesday at the Republican National Convention after being tapped by Donald Trump to be his running mate. On Tuesday, ProPublica published a newly uncovered speech Vance made a year before he was elected to the Senate in which he said the devil is real," praised conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, denigrated transgender people and more. We speak with reporter Andy Kroll, who says the video gives this unvarnished look into what J.D. Vance believes and into what he says to an audience of his peers." Kroll also responds to President Biden's proposed Supreme Court reforms, sparked in part by ProPublica's reporting on ethical violations committed by sitting justices.

Activists and community members in Milwaukee gathered in the streets Tuesday to condemn the police killing of 43-year-old Milwaukee resident Samuel Sharpe. The officers who killed Sharpe, an unhoused Black veteran, are from Ohio, part of a group of 4,500 law enforcement officials in Milwaukee for the Republican National Convention. But the shooting took place a mile from the RNC's proceedings. Sharpe appeared to be in the middle of an altercation with another man when the police officers charged toward him before fatally shooting him. Journalist Bob Hennelly, who is in Milwaukee to cover the convention, says the shooting is what happens when you militarize your politics."

A federal jury on Tuesday convicted New Jersey Democratic Senator Bob Menendez of corruption on all 16 counts he faced. He was found guilty of bribery, wire fraud, extortion, obstruction of justice, conspiracy and acting as a foreign agent for Egypt. Award-winning investigative reporter Bob Hennelly, who has been covering Menendez for decades, says it's a condemnation of the political culture of New Jersey that's corrupt."

As the Republican National Convention enters its third day, we speak with political science professor Clarence Lusane on how Donald Trump is trying to increase his appeal with Black voters. A number of Black lawmakers have spoken at the RNC, including South Carolina Senator Tim Scott and North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson. Lusane says that Donald Trump never has anything positive to say about the Black community," and that his effort to showcase diversity at the RNC is to gaslight the Black community."

On Tuesday night, several of Donald Trump's former rivals endorsed the Trump ticket, including former Ambassador Nikki Haley, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Vivek Ramaswamy. Much of the evening focused on the Republican Party's hard-line border and immigration policies. The 2024 Republican platform backs Trump's pledge to carry out the largest deportation operation in American history" and to stop what it calls a migrant crime epidemic." We speak with journalist Jean Guerrero, who says what was shown at the RNC was the politics of hate" and that the Republican Party is not letting up on its anti-immigrant hatemongering."

Where Is the World?": Gaza Mourns Victims as Israel Continues to Target Humanitarian Refuges, CCR Files FOIA Request for Gov't Communications Around ICC's Israeli War Crimes Case, Israeli Attacks in Southern Lebanon Kill 5 Syrians, Incl. 3 Children, Federal Jury Convicts New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez on All 16 Corruption Counts, Milwaukee Community Outraged After Ohio Police Kill a Black Man, Samuel Sharpe, 1 Mile from RNC, RNC Dominated by Xenophobic Hate Speech on Day 2 as Republicans Line Up Behind Trump, Rep. Adam Schiff Warns Dems Could Lose Presidency and Senate If Biden Remains in the Race, Biden Proposes Limiting Rent Hikes at 5%, Rep. Greg Casar Challenges GOP to Back PRO Act as Union Leaders Warn Against Trump-Vance Ticket, One Dead in Kenya as Anti-Gov't Protests Step Up Demands for Pres. Ruto to Resign, Jan. 6 Rioters Could See Charges and Convictions Lessened or Even Dropped After SCOTUS Ruling, Biden Expected to Back Term Limits, Ethics Code for SCOTUS Justices, Yemen's Houthis Attack More Vessels in Red Sea as Israel's War on Gaza Continues, Tens of Thousands, Incl. Unaccompanied Children, Pour into Sudan's Qadarif as Conflict Rages On, 6 Killed in Bangladesh as Student Protests Seek End to Gov't Job Quota, French PM Attal Resigns But Remains as Caretaker Amid Impasse over New Gov't, French Police Evict Immigrants Ahead of Olympics; Amnesty Blasts France over Hijab Ban for Athletes, Amazon Prime Day Resulted in Nearly Half of Warehouse Workers Becoming Injured

A lawsuit led by Palestinians and Palestinian Americans that accused President Joe Biden and other top U.S. officials of enabling genocide in Gaza was rejected Monday by a federal appeals court, which upheld a lower court's dismissal of the lawsuit. The three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court ruled that courts cannot review the executive branch's decisions on foreign policy, even when there is a risk of breaking domestic and international law. We speak with Katherine Gallagher, senior staff attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, which helped represent the plaintiffs in the case. She says the court has essentially given a blank check" for U.S. governments to do whatever they want in times of war.

As Donald Trump and his new running mate J.D. Vance try to soften their anti-abortion position ahead of the 2024 election, new documents uncovered by The Lever show Vance lobbied just last year to let police track people who cross state lines for abortions. Vance, a first-term senator from Ohio, pressured federal regulators to kill a privacy rule designed to prevent state and local police in anti-abortion states from using private medical records to prosecute people who access abortion services elsewhere. What's really shocking and scary about this story is that the rule was just implemented by the Biden administration, it wasn't signed into law. So, an incoming Trump administration could potentially repeal it," says reporter Veronica Riccobene.

We speak with journalist Robert Kuttner about Donald Trump's selection of Ohio Senator J.D. Vance to be his running mate in the 2024 election. Vance rose to fame in 2016 after writing the memoir Hillbilly Elegy about his upbringing in Appalachia. He was elected to the Senate in 2022 with the backing of right-wing billionaire Peter Thiel, who spent $10 million on his candidacy. While he was a vocal critic of Trump's politics, once comparing him to Hitler, Vance has since embraced the MAGA movement and is now one of the most vocal defenders of the former president. Vance's elevation is very dangerous" because it lets Republicans pretend to care about working-class voters, says Kuttner, co-founder and co-editor of The American Prospect. Vance is much more effective at connecting Trump's cultural and social and racist populism to what looks like pocketbook populism, except it's a fake," he says. We are really screwed if we can't find somebody who can beat this ticket - and the ticket is beatable. You just need a stronger candidate than Biden."

We were given a genocidal man and a fascist man, and that is a terrible decision to pick from," says one of the protesters who joined a broad coalition of progressive groups and unions to march in Milwaukee against the Republican Party Monday on the first day of the Republican National Convention. We speak with people calling for an end to racist policies supported by the GOP; defending the rights of women, LGBTQ people and abortion access; supporting Palestine and more.

As the Republican National Convention opened on Monday, Donald Trump scored a major legal victory when a Trump-appointed federal judge in Florida dismissed the criminal case against the former president for illegally keeping classified national security documents after his presidency ended. Judge Aileen Cannon ruled Attorney General Merrick Garland had no power to appoint Jack Smith as a special counsel. Her ruling stunned many legal experts, and the Justice Department plans to appeal. This comes after the conservative-dominated Supreme Court recently granted Trump, and presidents more generally, almost complete immunity from prosecution for official" actions taken in office. This was an opinion in search of a result," says Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist David Cay Johnston, who has covered Trump for decades. This is just deeply offensive, and I suspect it will be overturned, but the real result is there is no prospect that Donald Trump will be tried before the November elections."

As Donald Trump selected Ohio Senator J.D. Vance to be his vice-presidential candidate Monday, we look at the record of the 39-year-old political rookie, who rose to fame after writing the memoir Hillbilly Elegy and who once compared Trump to Hitler and called him unfit for the presidency. He was elected to the Senate in 2022 with backing from right-wing billionaire Peter Thiel, and he has since embraced the MAGA movement and become one of Trump's most loyal supporters. For more on Vance's rise and his appeal to the Republican base, we go to Pikeville, Kentucky, to speak with famed sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild, who has been speaking with Trump supporters for her forthcoming book, Stolen Pride: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right, which is a follow-up to her 2016 book, Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, described as a Rosetta stone" for understanding the rise of Donald Trump.

Trump Names Ohio Senator J.D. Vance as Running Mate, We Are Here, and We Care": Protesters Rally Outside RNC, Cheri Honkala Arrested While Attempting to Deliver Citizen's Arrest to Republican Officials, Trump-Appointed Judge Dismisses Classified Docs Case Against Trump; DOJ Plans to Appeal, GOP Calls for Secret Service Dir. to Resign After Trump Assassination Attempt, Biden Says He Made Mistake in Language Used Against Trump as He Appeals for Cooling Down" Rhetoric, UNRWA Gaza City Headquarters Flattened as Israeli Strikes Continue to Kill Palestinians, Turkey Vows to Bring Israel to Justice over Its Destruction of Gaza's Only Cancer Hospital, Accumulating Waste in Gaza Leads to Deepening Sanitation and Public Health Crises, Blinken Says Gaza Death Toll Unacceptably High" as U.S. Continues to Fund Israel's Slaughter, EU Sanctions Israeli Settlers in Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, Zelensky Says He Hopes to Host International Peace Summit in Kyiv in November, Russian Court Sentences Journalist Masha Gessen in Absentia to 8 Years in Prison, Children Caught Up in El Salvador's Gang War Are Suffering Major Abuses, Rights Groups Accuse Buffalo ICE Prison of Chronic Abuse, Retaliation Against Immigrants, J.D. Vance Is a Climate Supervillain": Climate Groups Blast Trump's VP Pick, Panel of Federal Judges Dismisses Genocide Case Against Biden and Top U.S. Officials, Judge Dismisses Giuliani's Bid for Bankruptcy Protection, Climate Groups Call for Moratorium on Deep Sea Mining, Bolivia Announces Discovery of Natural Gas Mega Field", Much of U.S. Faces More Blistering Heat Amid Record Seasonal Highs, Gambian Lawmakers Defeat Move to Reinstate Female Genital Mutilation, Upholding 2015 Ban, At Least 22 Students Dead After School Collapse in Central Nigeria, Peter Buxtun, Whistleblower Who Exposed the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, Dies at 86

Milwaukee, Wisconsin, holds significance for today's Republican Party, not only as the site of the 2024 Republican National Convention, but also as a bellwether for American conservatism, argues Dan Kaufman, author of The Fall of Wisconsin: The Conservative Conquest of a Progressive Bastion and the Future of American Politics. Kaufman shares Wisconsin's history of progressive state politics, and how that progressivism was overtaken and eroded by Republican governance, particularly under former Governor Scott Walker, who dismantled organized labor's power in the state. Walker himself boasted that, 'If we can do it here, we can do it anywhere,'" explains Kaufman. So, in terms of becoming a national laboratory, [Wisconsin] became an important symbol for the transformation of Republican politics."

In Milwaukee, Democracy Now! speaks with members of an unhoused encampment that's been set up just minutes from the site of the Republican National Convention to protest policies that have exacerbated poverty and a housing crisis nationwide. The encampment is organized by the Poor People's Army, which is also set to host a protest rally and march on the first day of the convention. Cheri Honkala, the national spokesperson for the Poor People's Army, also joins us in Milwaukee. People are not surviving poverty in this country," Honkala says of the motivation behind the march, in which hundreds of protesters, many of whom are themselves struggling with homelessness, are expected to join.

In the aftermath of the assassination attempt on Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, we speak to writer Jeff Sharlet, author of The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War. Sharlet says, The Trump campaign and this kind of authoritarianism is driven by not just the use of violence, not just the invocation of violence, but a kind of reverence of violence, a redemption through violence." Sharlet, who researches the rise of far-right extremism in the United States, also responds to Project 2025, the far-right policy platform that is expected to guide Trump's potential second term in office.

The Israeli military carried out one of its deadliest attacks in weeks when it bombed al-Mawasi in Khan Younis - designated as a safe zone" - killing at least 90 Palestinians and injuring hundreds more on Saturday. Israel claimed it was targeting Hamas military chief Mohammed Deif, but the group denied that Deif had been hit. Israel also struck a makeshift mosque during noon prayer in the Shati refugee camp in west Gaza City, killing 20, and a United Nations school sheltering thousands of displaced Palestinians in the Nuseirat refugee camp, killing 22. We speak with writer and analyst Muhammad Shehada, chief of communications at Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, who says, We've got a situation where Israel is being told, 'You can do whatever you want, anything you want at all.'"

Saturday's assassination attempt of Donald Trump is widely viewed as the Secret Service's biggest failure since 1981, when a gunman shot President Ronald Reagan just over two months into his first term. Reagan was hospitalized for nearly two weeks. Three other people were injured, including Reagan's press secretary James Brady, who was shot in the head and left partially paralyzed. Brady and his wife Sarah would go on to become prominent gun control advocates pushing for a bill that became known as the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. Brady was also involved in a gun control organization that changed its name to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, now known simply as Brady. Reasonable and appropriate gun violence prevention measures save lives," says Kris Brown, the president of Brady. Brown advocates for critical gun control measures that would interrupt the Republican Party's vision of guns everywhere, for anyone, at any time."

We begin our weeklong coverage from the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in the wake of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump on Saturday at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump was shot in his right ear. One person in the crowd was killed, and two others critically injured. The shooter was killed at the scene after members of the Secret Service opened fire on him on a nearby roof. The Nation's national affairs correspondent John Nichols joins us in Milwaukee to detail the long history of political violence in the United States and says it may not prove as significant to the presidential election as many believe. There is a tendency after a shooting like this to assume it's going to have a huge political impact - and it may. I'm not dismissing that. But what I will tell you is that there's history that suggests that the country is horrified, the country reacts with sympathy, but it doesn't necessarily say, 'Oh, well, we have to elect this wounded warrior or this wounded candidate.'"

FBI Seeks Motive in Trump Assassination Attempt; President Biden Calls for Cooling Down" Rhetoric, Biden Pulls TV Ads After Trump Shooting and Amid Mounting Calls for His Withdrawal from Election, Trump Arrives in Milwaukee as Protests Call Attention to Poverty, Inequality Ahead of RNC, Israeli Attacks Kill 91 Gazans in al-Mawasi Safe Zone," Dozens of Others in Schools, Shelters, West Bank Protesters March in Jenin After al-Mawasi Massacre, Rwanda Votes in Election Widely Expected to Keep Paul Kagame in Power, Pakistani Gov't Moves to Ban Imran Khan's PTI Party After Set of Legal Wins for Khan, Ecuador Convicts 5 in Pre-Election Assassination of Presidential Candidate Fernando Villavicencio, U.S. Has Continued to Deport Immigrants for Nonviolent Drug Offenses That Have Been Decriminalized, Many Houstonians Remain Without Power One Week After Hurricane Beryl Amid Stifling Heat Wave, There Is No Alternative to UNRWA": Guterres Calls for World to Support Palestinian Agency, Israel Launches New Strikes in Syria as Syrians Vote in Parliamentary Elections, Sudanese Officials in Geneva for Talks Amid Devastating Civil War, At Least 9 Killed in Mogadishu Bombing Outside Cafe That Was Airing Euro 24 Finals, Bolivian Union Leaders Support President Luis Arce in Rally Weeks After Coup Attempt, Finland Passes Measure Allowing Border Agents to Deny Entry to Asylum Seekers, Judge Dismisses Charges Against Alec Baldwin in Fatal Shooting of DP Halyna Hutchins on Movie Set

We speak with reporter Oren Ziv of +972 Magazine, whose latest investigation details how Israeli forces in Gaza have been authorized to open fire on Palestinians virtually at will. Six soldiers who fought in Gaza describe a near-total absence of firing regulations, with soldiers shooting as they please, setting homes ablaze, leaving corpses to rot on the streets and more. It seems soldiers were shooting not from a tactical reason or a real military reason, but just out of being bored, to pass the time or just because they could," says Ziv. Soldiers felt they can do whatever they want, that they won't be accountable. And all this is done also with the awareness of the commanders." We also hear from Yuval Green, one of the reservists who spoke to Ziv and who now refuses to continue serving in the Israeli military. I believe that continuing this war and continuing the death of Palestinians and Israeli soldiers is not right. I believe that right now the right thing to do is to sign the ceasefire treaty that is going to release the hostages and end this war," Green says.

As the world watched Thursday night, President Biden held his first solo press conference this year, after hosting a NATO conference in which he accidentally referred to Ukrainian President Zelensky as Russian President Putin before quickly correcting himself. While speaking with reporters, Biden defended his record and vowed to finish the job," but at one point referred to Kamala Harris as Vice President Trump." As more Democrats continue to call for him to step aside, we host a roundtable discussion on Biden and Trump and the 2024 race, and the impact on U.S. foreign policy, with American Prospect executive editor David Dayen; longtime labor, racial justice and international activist Bill Fletcher Jr., co-founder of the Ukrainian Solidarity Network; and CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin, co-author of the books NATO: What You Need to Know and War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict.

Biden Remains Defiant, But Fails to Quell Mounting Doubts, as He Holds First Solo Presser This Year, Spanish PM Urges NATO to End Double Standards" in Treatment of Ukraine and Gaza, Israel Continues Deadly Attack on Gaza City, Leaving Dozens Dead, Neighborhoods in Ruins, 70 Media Organizations Call for Israel to Allow Int'l Journalists to Enter Gaza Strip, Israeli Military Report Admits Failures on Oct. 7, Leaves Questions Unanswered, 1 Million Remain Without Power in Houston as Record-Breaking Heat Leads to 28 U.S. Deaths, 60+ People Could Be Dead After Buses Swept into River by Landslide, Kenya's Ruto Dismisses Cabinet 2 Weeks After Scrapping Tax Bill That Set Off Mass Protests, Saudi Court Sentences Man to 2 Decades in Prison for Tweets Critical of MBS, UAE Sentences Dozens of Government Critics to Prison in Mass Trial, U.S. Court Rules Activist DeRay Mckesson Cannot Be Held Responsible for Protest Injury, Arkansas Blocks Abortion Ballot Amendment on Technicality

Former Israeli peace negotiator Daniel Levy discusses ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas, the ruling party in the Gaza Strip, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's continued hostility to compromise and the Biden administration's ineffectual mediation. Contrary to its claims of brokering peace, the U.S. will continue to send the weapons" Israel uses to devastate Gaza, unremittingly fueling an increasingly unpopular war, says Levy, who is now president of the U.S./Middle East Project.

As calls mount for President Joe Biden to step down as the presumptive Democratic Party nominee over concerns surrounding his mental and physical capacity to lead, we host a debate between two longtime members of the Democratic Party: Wajahat Ali, who recently authored a column subtitled Biden Is Very Old and Out of Touch, and Here's Why You Should Vote for Him," and Norman Solomon of RootsAction.org, which sponsors the Step Aside Joe campaign. At 81 years old, Biden is already the oldest person to ever serve as president of the United States. His recent public appearances, including a poor performance at his first presidential debate against presumptive Republican Party nominee Donald Trump - who, if reelected, would be the second-oldest person to ever serve as president - have renewed questions about his health and ability. Biden has thus far resisted pressure to suspend his reelection campaign, even as the U.S. liberal coalition fractures over his candidacy. Ali says that now is the time to unite over a candidate to prevent a second Trump presidency, and that without a clear alternative, only Biden can run a winnable campaign. Meanwhile, Solomon argues that Biden's performance thus far has already critically weakened his chances of winning the election. Uniting behind a losing candidate is a bad idea," he says.

Israel Continues Deadly Attacks on Gaza City, Pulls Out of Shuja'iyya After Decimating It, Ceasefire Talks Continue After Doha Meeting Btw. CIA Dir. Burns and Officials from Qatar, Egypt and Israel, U.S. Resuming Delivery of 500-Pound Bombs to Israel, NATO Reaffirms Weapons, Membership Support for Ukraine, Attacks Beijing for Ties with Russia, Russia Issues Arrest Warrant for Yulia Navalnaya, Sentences 2 Women to Prison for Theater Production, U.N. Report Confirms Ugandan, Rwandan Support of M23 Rebels in Eastern Congo, Biden to Deliver Press Conference Amid Spiraling Debate over His Run for Presidency, They Don't Want You to Vote": Rep. Summer Lee Blasts Racist GOP Voter Suppression Bill, Nevada County Refuses to Certify Results of 2 Local Elections, AOC Launches Impeachment Effort Against Justices Thomas and Alito, Bipartisan Group of Senators Introduces ETHICS Act to Ban Lawmakers from Stock Trading, Jury Deliberations Beginning in Sen. Bob Menendez's Corruption Trial, Chicago Mayor Addresses Gun Violence After Weekend of Shootings Kills 19, Injures 100, Bullet-Dispensing Vending Machines Have Been Installed in Texas, Oklahoma and Alabama, 14 More Victims Buried on 29th Anniversary of Srebrenica Genocide

President Biden is hosting heads of government from NATO member nations for a three-day summit in Washington, D.C., to mark the 75th anniversary of the expanding nuclear-armed military alliance as leaders pledge to continue supporting Ukraine against Russia's invasion. We get response from German lawmaker Sevim Dadelen, who is in D.C. to protest the summit and is the author of the new book NATO: A Reckoning with the Atlantic Alliance. She lays out how NATO is based on a series of myths about its purpose, respecting democracy and upholding human rights - as exemplified by member states' staunch support for Israel's war on Gaza. You have rising contradictions and crisis within the European Union and the NATO states," Dadelen says.

A panel of United Nations independent experts has accused Israel of engaging in a campaign of starvation and genocide in Gaza as the effects of the famine are being felt across Gaza. Palestinian physician and activist Mustafa Barghouti says what we see today is a purposeful act of starvation" and that the real intention of the Israeli government has never changed. Their main goal is the total ethnic cleansing of all of Gaza people and all of the Gaza Strip." Barghouti joins us from Washington, D.C., on his first U.S. visit in more than a decade.

We get an update from journalist Akram al-Satarri in Gaza, as Israel orders the full evacuation of all civilians from Gaza City after one of the deadliest days in Gaza in weeks. An Israeli airstrike killed at least 30 Palestinians at a school housing displaced people near Khan Younis, mostly women and children. There's no safe haven" anywhere in Gaza, says al-Satarri. The people who are bearing the brunt of those bombardments are the Palestinian displaced people." He also responds to ceasefire talks.

Israeli Strike Kills 30 in Khan Younis as Army Orders All of Gaza City's Residents to Flee, U.N. Experts Declare Israel's Targeted Starvation Campaign" Has Led to Famine and Genocide, Mourners Bury 13-Year-Old Child Killed in Israeli Raid on West Bank, U.N. Security Council Members Condemn Russia's Assault on Ukrainian Children's Hospital, Biden Launches NATO's 75th Anniversary Summit Pledging Air Defenses to Ukraine , Putin Awards Russia's Highest Civilian Honor to Visiting Indian PM Narendra Modi, France's National Rally to Lead New Far-Right Bloc in European Parliament, Military Leaders of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger Form New Alliance to Replace ECOWAS, Democratic Senators Call for Criminal Probe of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Rep. Mikie Sherrill Calls on Biden to End 2024 Campaign, Joining Other House Democrats, Trump-Appointed Judge Upholds Ban on Protests Outside Republican National Convention, Family Demands Justice After Hotel Security Guards Kill Black Milwaukee Resident Dvontaye Mitchell

We speak with journalist Jeremy Scahill, co-founder of The Intercept, about how he just announced he is leaving after more than a decade and launched a new investigative journalism outlet Monday called Drop Site News, alongside colleague Ryan Grim. What Ryan and I are trying to do is build a lean, sustainable, reader-supported news organization that's going to take big swings at powerful people ... and to operate with no fear or favor of those in power," says Scahill. Our pledge ... is to be accountable to the readers, the viewers and the listeners."

With the war on Gaza now in its 10th month, we speak with journalist Jeremy Scahill about the state of negotiations for a possible ceasefire and hostage deal between Israel and Hamas. Scahill recently spoke to senior Hamas officials about the ongoing ceasefire negotiations and the group's broader goals. He is a co-founder of The Intercept, and he recently announced he was leaving after more than a decade to launch a new investigative journalism outlet, Drop Site News, alongside colleague Ryan Grim. Scahill's new article, On the Record with Hamas," examines the militant group's motivations to launch the October 7 attacks in Israel, as well as its stance on the negotiations, based on interviews with a number of senior Hamas officials and other sources. October 7 didn't happen in a vacuum," says Scahill. The primary motivation, Hamas members told me, was to try to shatter the status quo on Gaza. They felt that the situation was becoming untenable."

As Israel's war on Gaza enters its 10th month, we speak with Mohammed Abu Hashem, a Palestinian American who ended a 22-year career in the U.S. Air Force after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza killed his aunt in October. It was clear to me that I needed to step away," says Abu Hashem, who served as a first sergeant in the 316th Civil Engineer Squadron of the U.S. Air Force. He recently co-signed a letter with 11 other former U.S. officials who rsesigned over the Biden administration's policy toward Gaza, Palestine and Israel. The American people deserve to have a government that follows ethical and moral standards," says Abu Hashem, who also talks about briefly meeting Aaron Bushnell before the airman died by self-immolation in February to protest U.S. support for Israel.