Vox Sentences - It's Bidenomics, baby

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Here’s what’s on tap today: 

UP FIRST: Economic growth outpaces expectations

CATCH UP: An American shot in the West Bank

—Nicole Narea, senior reporter

The US economy is growing robustly under Biden

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

The US economy grew at an annual rate of 3.3 percent in the last quarter, outpacing financial forecasters’ expectations. That growth — along with cooling inflation, the stock market hitting a new all-time high, low unemployment, and a surge in consumer spending — suggests the US will likely avoid a recession in 2024. 

This is great news for President Joe Biden, whose approval numbers have been dragged down by Americans’ economic pessimism amid high inflation. It seems that consumer confidence was already increasing ahead of Thursday’s announcement of the economic growth figures: One University of Michigan index saw sentiment jump 28 percent between November and January. But the president now has more ammunition to argue that his economic policy, which he’s dubbed “Bidenomics,” is bringing home the bacon. 

Here’s what the news means for America’s economic outlook, and for the 2024 election:

• Don’t bank on interest rate cuts yet: The Federal Reserve may hold off on cutting interest rates so long as growth remains strong. Be on the lookout for clues at the Fed meeting starting January 30. 
• Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen credits Biden: After the new growth figures were released, she wrote on X that they were “driven by American workers and [the president’s] middle class-centered economic strategy.”
• Biden might not be out of the woods:  The question is whether the country’s economic mood is improving quickly enough for Biden to avoid being penalized. As my colleague Eric Levitz wrote, “[T]he fact that Biden’s approval rating fell as the economic outlook brightened in 2023 … raises the possibility that an election year boom won’t ensure his reelection.”
• Trump is in denial: Former President Donald Trump has been saying that some economic indicators are not what they seem in an attempt to discredit Biden. “We had the best unemployment rates ever. And they were real unemployment, not like you have today where nobody’s working and they consider it to be,” he said on January 21 at a campaign event. 

An American shot as West Bank violence escalates

Issam Rimawi/Anadolu via Getty Images

An American-Palestinian teenager, Tawfic Abdel Jabbar, was shot and killed in an unprovoked attack in the West Bank last week, the Associated Press reported, citing a new witness account.

Jabbar was driving a pickup truck when at least 10 bullets hit the vehicle, after which it overturned multiple times, according to Mohammed Salameh, the 16-year-old witness cited by the AP who was the only other passenger in the car.

Israeli police said the shooting seems to have involved “an off-duty law enforcement officer, a soldier and a civilian,” but they’ve yet to say who killed Jabbar. Police initially asserted that Jabbar and Salameh had been targeted because they were throwing rocks along a highway, a claim that Salameh denied. 

Here’s some background on the shooting:

• The Biden administration has called for an investigation: “We call on Israel to conduct a full, thorough, transparent investigation into his killing.  And, of course, we have every expectation that those responsible for it will be held properly accountable,” US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on January 22. 
• Escalating violence in the West Bank: Last month, the United Nations warned of “rapid deterioration” of human rights for Palestinians living in the West Bank. More than 300 Palestinians there have been killed amid increasing Israeli airstrikes, military incursions, and settler violence in the West Bank since Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel.

• Strikes in Argentina: A one-day general strike was held in Argentina Wednesday in protest of President Javier Milei’s sweeping proposed changes to economic and labor law. [Associated Press]
• E. Jean Carroll damages trial resumes: Former President Donald Trump testified Thursday in the damages case against him for defaming Carroll when he accused her of lying about her claim that he sexually abused her. [NBC News]
• Attack on a United Nations facility in Gaza: At least nine people were confirmed dead and at least 75 people injured in a strike on a UN training facility in Khan Younis where thousands of people were sheltering. [Reuters]
• Alabama inmate to face execution: Kenneth Eugene Smith will be the first person to be executed with nitrogen gas, an untested method that medical experts have denounced. [BBC]

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