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Crowd gathers to mourn victims of Bondi Beach shooting

admin - Latest News - December 15, 2025
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Crowd gathers to mourn victims of Bondi Beach shooting



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Dec. 15, 2025, 5:00 AM ESTBy Peter NicholasFEASTERVILLE, Pa. — Fishing through his wallet, David Teeling pulls out a wrinkled newspaper clip showing Donald Trump working the drive-thru of a local McDonald’s — this McDonald’s, the very same one where he and a few friends routinely meet to talk politics and sports.Teeling keeps the picture as verifiable proof for those who don’t believe him when he explains what happened: The once and future president turned up in suburban Philadelphia toward the end of the 2024 campaign and scooped French fries for the customers pulling up to the window.“Some people believe me and some don’t, so I keep that,” says Teeling, 70, over a cup of coffee.A year ago, Trump visited this site to make the point that he was attuned to everyday people who felt overlooked in the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris economy.Trump touts economic policies as recent polls show disapproval05:13These days, it’s Trump who’s in danger of appearing out of touch. Ahead of midterm elections next year, voters are feeling squeezed by high prices and blaming Trump for not doing enough to ease the cost of living, polling shows.A new NBC News Decision Desk survey shows that 53% of adults have changed their grocery-buying habits to stay within budget, while 55% have cut back on entertainment and “extras” so that they can afford life’s necessities.A sampling of grocery prices shows the price of eggs has dropped 29% since Trump was sworn in, though beef prices are up nearly 13%, chicken prices are up 2% and bread is up 4%. Orange juice prices have climbed 28% since the start of Trump’s term, according to Nieslen IQ data in the NBC News grocery price tracker.Overall, an AP-NORC poll found that just 31% of adults approved of Trump’s handling of the economy, the lowest rating he’s notched in either his first or second term.“We can improve those numbers,” John McLaughlin, a Trump pollster, said in an interview. “We did it in 2023 and 2024 and we can do it again. In an election year, Trump will be able to spend more time with voters outside the Beltway.”“The White House doesn’t have a choice but to have President Trump campaign in the midterm elections,” McLaughlin added. “Without Trump on the ballot, it’s hard to get his voters to turn out. If you can’t motivate the Trump voters, we’re not going to win in the midterms.”The White House seems to agree. Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief of staff, said in a podcast interview that the idea is to put Trump “on the ballot” by having him campaign as if it’s 2024 all over again.For Trump, the question is whether he can muster the discipline to consistently deliver a two-part message. He needs to show he grasps that people are struggling while also hammering the point that he’s committed to making their lives better, political strategists say. That’s a tricky balance requiring some humility on Trump’s part, a recognition that “the golden age” he promised at the start of his term is still unrealized.Thus far, Trump blames lingering inflation on Biden, a bogeyman he continues to bash even as the economy bears his imprint with each passing day. He says there is much for voters to cheer, including gas prices, which have fallen from $3.03 a gallon one year ago to $2.92 now; the stock market, where the S&P 500 index is up 16% this year; and new foreign investment in the U.S. totaling trillions of dollars.As for the affordability issue, he calls it a “hoax” perpetrated by Democrats.On his social media site last week, Trump wrote that “affordability, just 13 months ago, was a disaster for the American people, but now, it’s totally different! Prices are coming down fast.”Still, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said last week that Trump’s tariffs are pushing inflation higher than the rate would be otherwise. After falling to a low this year of 2.3% in April, inflation rose to 3% in September for the first time since January. September was the last month data was available.Even members of Trump’s own party have said that prices are too high and Republicans can’t ignore them. “People aren’t dumb. They know when they go to the grocery store what it costs and what it doesn’t,” Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told NBC News last week.Michael DuHaime, former political director at the Republican National Committee, put it this way: “You can continue to talk about Biden or even Obama or Jimmy Carter if you want. The voters will only tolerate it for so long.”Past presidents faced a similar conundrum, with uneven results. No sitting president wants to concede that their economic policies haven’t delivered. Yet a president risks appearing callous by denying what’s obvious to people who can’t afford to buy ground beef at the supermarket. “One of the mistakes we made as part of the Biden team was not leading with more empathy,” Sam Cornale, former CEO of the Democratic National Committee, said in an interview. “We jumped right into trying to explain away the numbers, but voters weren’t feeling it.”An early look at Trump’s midterm campaign message unfolded last week when he traveled to a casino resort in the Poconos for a rally devoted to the economy. He showed slides and talked up his record, saying his tariffs are sparking a wave of AI, auto and other types of factory construction. But true to form, he also veered off topic, trashing Biden, Powell, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, late night comedian Jimmy Kimmel, windmills and the African nation of Somalia.“We’re a little behind the 8-ball going into the 2026 election,” said Neil Newhouse, a Republican pollster, in an interview. “The bottom line on the Republican side is we need to focus on what voters are most concerned about: the economy and the cost of living,” he said, adding that people don’t care “what happens in Somalia or the Middle East or other places. For the most part, they’re focused on their pocketbooks. So that’s what we need to be focused on.”Back at McDonald’s, there is no sign that Trump once traded his suit jacket for an apron in one of his most memorable campaign stops. In the wake of Trump’s visit, Yelp disabled its reviews of the restaurant because of caustic write-ups.On occasion, customers will take pictures of the drive-thru window where Trump made his appearance. The staff has turned over since that time; none of the employees at work on a recent weekday were there when Trump showed up. As a company, McDonald’s has faced pressures from what its CEO called a “two-tier economy.” A steep drop in traffic from lower-income customers played a part in the company’s decision to revive its “Extra Value Meal” combos this fall, according to chief executive Chris Kempczinski.Teeling said he’s prepared to be patient while Trump’s economic policies kick in. “It has gone up,” he said of the cost of living. “No question about that. But Trump is a CEO. He can turn these things around. It’s going to take a year, maybe two.”Janice Hall, 72, a retired Philadelphia city employee who was eating a cheeseburger and French fries, agrees.“It’s going to slowly go down,” she said. “We haven’t given it any time yet. It’s not even been a year.”She said she’d vote for Trump again if she could.“I think he’s funny; he’s hysterical. He has a personality,” she said.William Sanginiti, 72, a retired engineer, said over a hamburger and a Coke: “There’s always someone who’s going to complain about something. I’m not. I try to live within my means.”A dissenting note came from one of the regulars. Drinking a coffee, a 76-year-old retired truck driver said he doubts Trump will succeed in reducing prices. He said he’s had to alter his spending habits to make ends meet.“I used to eat a lot of beef; I can’t afford that,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Even when I see reduced prices at different supermarkets, they’re still on the expensive side.”He mentioned the unemployment rate, which stood at 4.4% in September, the highest it has been in the last four years.“A lot of the people who voted for him, they didn’t vote for the layoffs,” he said.Peter NicholasPeter Nicholas is a senior White House reporter for NBC News.Monica Alba, Joe Murphy and Steve Kopack contributed.
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Dec. 6, 2025, 5:00 AM ESTBy Matt DixonTALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida could be the final state the White House can count on to pick up additional seats as part of the rare mid-decade redistricting cycle it has pushed ahead of the midterm elections.The Republican-controlled state officially entered the fray this past week by holding a legislative hearing, kick-starting a lengthy process that will stretch into the new year. Florida is following the lead of GOP-led states like Texas, Missouri and North Carolina that have enacted new congressional maps at President Donald Trump’s behest to protect the GOP’s narrow House majority.But as Democratic states like California follow suit with new district lines of their own and GOP efforts in states like Indiana have been rockier than anticipated, the advantage Trump and his allies thought they could gain through the push could be much smaller than they initially hoped.That’s where Florida comes in. Though all elements of the state government are dominated by Republicans, infighting between some lawmakers and Gov. Ron DeSantis has gotten messy and appears poised to have some impact on the state’s redistricting effort. In addition, Florida’s state constitution has anti-gerrymandering language — though watered down in recent years — that broadly bans lawmakers from redrawing maps with the intent of helping or hurting certain political parties.Those thorny legal issues are among the reasons the White House applied less pressure on Florida to draw a new map than it did on other states, and why the state is one of the last to begin its process. DeSantis has long urged lawmakers to redraw Florida’s congressional map but has said the state should wait for the U.S. Supreme Court to rule on a Louisiana case that could erode a key provision of the Voting Rights Act that was enacted to protect minority voters.DeSantis said that if the court further weakens the Voting Rights Act, that would “necessitate new congressional redistricting.”DeSantis and Florida Senate leaders have said they would like to hold a special legislative session to redraw districts in April, which could be just weeks before the April 20 qualifying deadline for federal candidates. It would also put them at odds with state House leaders, who have quarreled with DeSantis on a range of issues. They have said that any new map should be considered during the regular legislative session that begins in January.“It would be irresponsible to delay the creation and passage of a new map, especially until after session,” said state Rep. Mike Redondo, a Republican who chairs the state House’s redistricting committee. “It would also be irresponsible to any who are called to civil service, and most importantly it would be irresponsible to the citizens of Florida.”Redondo’s committee met for the first time on Thursday, holding a brief meeting that offered no time for public comment for the dozens of protesters who traveled to Tallahassee to express their concerns about the abrupt redistricting process.The meeting focused on how the process would work and featured no conversations about specific map proposals, which have not yet been filed.Republican leaders tried to downplay the notion that the redistricting push had anything to do with overt politics, even though the White House has pushed the effort nationally and other state lawmakers have openly stated the goal is to maximize partisan advantage.“Let me be very clear: Our work as a committee and as a legislative body is not directed by the work of other states or partisan gamesmanship,” Redondo said.During Thursday’s meeting, activists who packed the committee room audibly laughed at the contention that politics was not driving the process. None were given time to address the committee during the meeting.“It’s a publicly noticed meeting and people are here,” Jessica Lowe-Minor, president of the Florida League of Women Voters, said of those who traveled to Tallahassee not being allowed to speak. “It seems like if there’s time available, it would have been reasonable for the committee to take testimony, especially since people traveled a long way to be here.”It is expected, according to three veteran Republicans who spoke with NBC News, that a new Florida map could net the GOP anywhere from three to five additional House seats, but approaching a five-seat pickup could trigger legal concerns. Republicans currently represent 20 of the state’s 28 congressional districts.“That number [five] I think could get us into some trouble, and I think we need to be very careful,” said a veteran Republican operative closely following the redistricting process, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “There are a lot of national implications for all of this, and Florida is unique in what it can and can’t do.”The seats mostly likely be be affected are an Orlando-area seat currently held by Democratic Rep. Darren Soto and two South Florida seats held by Democratic Reps. Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz.Florida could give a key boost to Republicans nationally ahead of the midterms, especially considering the White House-inspired redistricting project has not gone as smoothly as officials there once thought it would.The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday said that a new Texas map that was drawn to give the GOP a five-seat boost could be used during the midterms, overturning a lower court ruling. In Indiana, the state House passed a new congressional map Friday that could net Republicans two seats. But its fate is unclear in the Senate, where some Republicans have resisted the push.In Ohio, Republicans agreed to a map that could give them a slight boost, but did not go as far as Democrats feared. In Utah, a court-ordered map will likely lead to a new seat for Democrats. And Republicans in states like Kansas, Nebraska and New Hampshire have declined to join the fray.In addition to California’s new map, Democrats in Virginia have taken steps toward revamping congressional boundaries to boost their party. And other Democratic-led states like Illinois and Maryland are still considering whether to pursue redistricting.“With a narrow majority heading into a midterm, they need more seats for a buffer in order to hold the House. If they can ultimately net five or six seats, then it will be the story of the midterms of success for Republicans,” a GOP strategist who is deeply involved in House races told NBC News last month as it became clear the process might not be a clean win for Republicans.“If the whole thing here was to net one seat across the country, then it will not have been worth it,” the person added.Matt DixonMatt Dixon is a senior national politics reporter for NBC News, based in Florida.
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