Ex-Bush Officials Launch Super PAC Backing Biden

Australian PM Walks Middle Path on Post-Virus Support

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has warned against creating a dependency on COVID-19 support measures as economists urge the government to continue welfare schemes. The Grattan Institute has recommended the government spend between $70 billion and $90 billion on extra economic stimulus measures. The International Monetary Fund is calling for a gradual exit from support programs, with public investment to accelerate the recovery. Morrison says economists vary across the spending spectrum. “They want us to spend nothing and they want us to spend everything – the truth is going to be somewhere in the middle,” he said on July 2. He said the government would not let dependence on support stop businesses, and the federal budget, from bouncing back. “That will cost jobs and livelihoods,” Morrison said. “The other thing is,…

A group of former George W. Bush administration and campaign officials have launched a new super PAC supporting Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, the latest in a growing number of Republican groups to come out in support of Biden over President Donald Trump.

The group, 43 Alumni for Biden, has recruited at least 200 former White House officials, campaign aides and Cabinet secretaries who worked under Bush to join the push against the Republican incumbent. They’re planning to roll out supportive testimonial videos featuring high-profile Republicans and launch a voter turnout effort in key states, aimed at turning out disaffected Republican voters. News of the group was first reported by Reuters.

Kristopher Purcell, who worked in the Office of Communications in the White House and in the State Department during the Bush administration, said many of the members of the group still consider themselves Republicans but see the need to defeat Trump as beyond their personal politics.

“You don’t have to agree with a president on all of his policy decisions or agenda. We ask them to go to the White House and do what they think is in the best interest of the country. That’s what we as alumni of George W. Bush did, and we think Joe Biden will deliver that as well,” he said.

The group has been in touch with the Biden campaign and other GOP groups opposed to Trump to coordinate some of its activities going forward, and it’s alerted Bush’s office of their activities, though it remains unaffiliated with the former president directly.

In a statement, Erin Perrine, the Trump campaign’s director of press communications, said “this is the swamp—yet again—trying to take down the duly elected president.”

“President Trump is the leader of a united Republican Party where he has earned 94 percent of Republican votes during the primaries—something any former president of any party could only dream of,” she said.

Two groups, Republican Voters Against Trump and the Lincoln Project, have already been airing ads in key states boosting Biden and attacking Trump. And last month, a group of GOP operatives opposed to Trump launched Right Side PAC, which is aimed at turning out disenchanted Republican voters.

By Alexandra Jaffe

Focus News: Ex-Bush Officials Launch Super PAC Backing Biden

Australia’s Trade Surplus Rose 2Pct in May

Australia’s trade surplus rose 2.0 percent to $8.03 billion in May, as imports fell faster than exports. Exports dropped 4.0 percent to $35.7 billion, while imports dropped 6.0 percent to $27.7 billion, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed on July 2. Imports of consumption goods was steeply lower, down 14 percent to $8.9 billion. Exports of rural goods fell 10 percent to $3.6 million, driven by a 31 percent drop in cereal grains and cereal preparations. Coal export earnings dropped by 13.3 percent, or $635 million. “Australia’s international trade surplus has – on balance – been boosted by the net impacts of the pandemic,” Westpac economist Andrew Hanlan said in a note. “Imports are trending lower as domestic demand contracts. Goods exports, while not immune from the global…