Le Pen beats Macron in France as nationalists gain in EU vote

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Marine Le Pen’s far-right party edged just ahead of the centrist alliance of President Emmanuel Macron in exit polls as French voters led what pollsters expected to be a nationalist surge in an EU parliament election on Sunday. The defeat was narrow - just one seat - but a bitter one for those who hope the French leader can inspire Europeans to embrace the Union as an answer rather than part of the problem in the face of what for many is nerve-wracking social change. However, a first official projection of all 751 seats by the European Parliament indicated that losses for the pro-EU center may have been no worse than expected, with the Greens and liberals also gaining at the expense of the center-right and center-left.

Brussels officials and pro-EU party leaders also took heart from a substantial increase in turnout — the first in the 40-year history of direct elections to the Parliament. It was about 50%, up from 43% in 2014 - hardly massive, but an end to the declines that have fueled talk of a “democratic deficit” that undermines the legitimacy of EU lawmaking. Dropping about 40 seats each, the conservative European People’s Party and Socialists & Democrats lost the majority they formed in a “grand coalition” with the EPP on top, according to the projection.

Gains for the liberal ALDE and its allies under Macron put them in the frame for a bigger say. The Greens, in fourth place, could be kingmakers as the Socialists eye their chances of taking a lead, despite again trailing the EPP by 20-30 seats. The elections have consisted of four days of ballots across the 28-nation bloc. A clearer picture of the legislature will come once the final polls close - in Italy at 2100 GMT.

The far-right League of Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini stands a chance of pipping Chancellor Angela Merkel’s German conservatives as the party with the largest number of seats in the chamber. Another contender will be the new Brexit Party of veteran British anti-EU campaigner Nigel Farage, set to top the vote in the country that was supposed to have left the bloc two months ago. He is determined to make the departure happen and that his MEPs will not sit for long - though drama after the resignation of Prime Minister Theresa May leaves the fate of Brexit still very uncertain.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-election/le-pen-beats-macron-in-france-as-nationalists-gain-in-eu-vote-idUSKCN1SV0QQ?il=0

>>6595405

Graphics for the EU Elections

https://graphics.reuters.com/EU-ELECTION/010092GD353/index.html

Race to succeed UK PM May centers on 'no deal' Brexit battle

LONDON (Reuters) - The prospect of a “no deal” Brexit was fast becoming the central battle of the race to succeed British Prime Minister Theresa May on Sunday, as environment minister Michael Gove became the eighth candidate to declare. May said on Friday she was quitting over her failure to deliver Brexit, potentially opening the way for a new leader who could seek a more divisive split with the European Union and lead to confrontation with the bloc or a possible parliamentary election.

Setting out their pitch to the Conservative Party’s largely pro-Brexit membership who will decide the outcome of the contest, four of the leadership hopefuls have said Britain must leave the EU on Oct. 31 even if this means a no-deal Brexit. “I will fight for a fairer deal in Brussels … if not I will be clear we will leave on WTO terms in October,” former Brexit minister Dominic Raab, who bookmakers rank as the second favorite to win, told BBC TV. “If you’re not willing to walk away from a negotiation, it doesn’t focus the mind of the other side … I will not ask for an extension.” Fellow contenders Esther McVey and Andrea Leadsom both made similar comments on Sunday. Former foreign minister Boris Johnson, the bookmakers’ favorite to replace May, wrote in his weekly column for the Daily Telegraph newspaper: “No one sensible would aim exclusively for a no-deal outcome. No one responsible would take no-deal off the table.”

Gove, a leading campaigner for Brexit during the 2016 referendum campaign and a candidate in the Conservative leadership contest that May ultimately won, told reporters on Sunday that he planned to run again. “I am ready to unite the Conservative and Unionist Party, ready to deliver Brexit and ready to lead this great country,” he said. In an interview with the BBC later, he said Britain would “be able to get through” a no-deal Brexit but it was “ultimately better for all of us if we secure a deal and leave in an orderly way.”

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-eu/race-to-succeed-uk-pm-may-centers-on-no-deal-brexit-battle-idUSKCN1SW0E5?il=0

Hope Hicks subpoena article in New York Times draws torrents of criticism

The New York Times is facing criticism from the left on social media for an article about former White House communications director Hope Hicks. The Times and reporter Maggie Haberman were the target of some on social media for an article that said Hicks is “facing an existential question” about whether to comply with a congressional subpoena. The article begins: “One of the best-known but least visible former members of President Trump’s White House staff is facing an existential question: whether to comply with a congressional subpoena in the coming weeks.”

Hicks, who was communications director from 2017 to 2018, was mentioned in 28 pages of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler of New York subpoenaed both Hicks and former White House counsel Don McGahn aide Annie Donaldson last week. Some left-wing social media figures and politicians weighed in on the piece, which also featured an image from a professional photoshoot of the 30-year-old Hicks.

Democratic Trump opponent Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York responded by comparing Hicks to the media’s coverage of shootings. “Yup. Where’s the 'no angel' take now? In the immediate aftermath of shootings, media routinely post menacing photos of people-of-color victims + dredge up any questionable thing they’d ever done. But when Hope Hicks considers not complying w a subpoena, it’s glamour shot time,” she tweeted. Yup. Where’s the “no angel” take now?

In the immediate aftermath of shootings, media routinely post menacing photos of people-of-color victims + dredge up any questionable thing they’d ever done. Nadler also subpoenaed McGahn to testify, but the White House directed him not to participate, setting the stage for Nadler to hold him in contempt. Attorney General William Barr was also held in contempt by the committee after he refused requests to release an unredacted version of Mueller’s report.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/nytimes-hope-hicks-subpoena-article-draws-torrents-of-criticism

>>6595592

Ian Bremmer defends and then deletes false Trump statement about North Korea

Ian Bremmer, a geopolitical analyst, journalist, and cable news regular, on Sunday shared a fabricated tweet featuring a false quote from President Trump about North Korea, which Bremmer later admitted making up. But not before it was shared widely by Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., a prominent Trump critic, and a swath of commentators and journalists, including anti-Trump analyst Ana Navarro-Cardenas — leading Bremmer to later delete it. Bremmer's tweet captured a supposed quote from Trump, “Kim Jong Un is smarter and would make a better President than Sleepy Joe Biden.”

President Trump in Tokyo: “Kim Jong Un is smarter and would make a better President than Sleepy Joe Biden.”— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) May 26, 2019

The quote was unverified by journalists in the traveling pool with Trump in Japan. Once confronted about it online by a Washington Examiner reporter, Bremmer admitted it was false, though he said it could be "plausible.” Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group and GZERO Media, is a foreign affairs columnist and editor-at-large for Time Magazine. Bremmer later defended sharing a fake Trump quote by saying that “it’s a comment on the state of media and the twitterverse today.”

Bremmer also responded to the reporter’s tweet by calling his own tweet an “objectively ludicrous quote.” And Bremmer tried to defend his spreading of false information by calling his fake quote “kinda plausible … especially on Twitter, where people automatically support whatever political position they have.” “That’s the point,” Bremmer claimed.

Bremmer’s fabricated statement follows a controversial tweet from President Trump himself earlier Sunday, where Trump dismissed concerns about North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un’s ongoing missile tests. Trump attacked former Vice President Joe Biden, saying that Kim Jong Un “smiled when he called Swampman Joe Biden a low IQ individual and worse.”

North Korea fired off some small weapons, which disturbed some of my people, and others, but not me. I have confidence that Chairman Kim will keep his promise to me, & also smiled when he called Swampman Joe Biden a low IQ individual, & worse. Perhaps that’s sending me a signal? — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 26, 2019

>>6595763

Agree 100%

>>6595777

Digits Agree 100%

>>6595848

All Irish, the Irish are known for serving on both sides of the Civil War.