Palatin Technologies Eyes Growing $6B Dry Eye Disease Market With Late-Stage Study Data

 On Monday, Palatin Technologies Inc. 

PTN

 announced the presentation of topline results for its Phase 3 PL9643 MELODY-1 trial, which evaluated the safety and efficacy of PL9643 versus vehicle in the treatment of dry eye disease (DED) at the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery.

The company released the mixed topline data in February 2024.

The presentation included MELODY-1 Phase 3 data results, which indicate that the Intent-to-Treat PL9643 treatment population demonstrated clinically meaningful and statistically significant results at the change from baseline to week 12 for the co-primary symptom endpoint of pain (p<0.025) and multiple exploratory secondary symptom endpoints. 

The presentation also included an overview of the excellent and superior safety and tolerability profile of PL9643 compared to other approved treatments.

“Analysis of our successful Phase 3 MELODY-1 clinical trial results demonstrate that PL9643 has broad, robust, and rapid efficacy for multiple symptom endpoints. The efficacy results were statistically significant for the co-primary symptom endpoint of pain and 7 of 11 exploratory secondary endpoints, including eye dryness, as early as two weeks. The effect improved and maintained statistical significance over the 12-week treatment period,” said Carl Spana, President and CEO of Palatin. 

“Additionally, we have identified a substantial patient population with statistically significant efficacy results after two weeks of treatment with PL9643 for multiple sign endpoints, including all four fluorescein staining endpoints, which improves ocular surface disorders and facilitates the identification and treatment of epithelial damage and corneal injuries.”

“The early onset of efficacy for multiple symptoms and signs of dry eye disease and the excellent ocular safety and tolerability profile positions PL9643 as a highly differentiated product,” Dr. Spana continued.

Safety analysis from the Phase 3 MELODY-1 trial indicated PL9643 was well-tolerated. 

There were fewer ocular treatment-related adverse events in the PL9643 arm (5.6%) compared to the vehicle (6.3%) and fewer study discontinuations in the PL9643 arm (7%) compared to the vehicle (11.1%). 

A higher proportion of the vehicle-treated patients dropped out of the study before week 12 compared to the PL9643-treated patients.

While DED is one of the most common ocular disorders, affecting an estimated 38 million people in the U.S., only about 18 million are diagnosed, and less than 10% of those diagnosed are treated with a prescription product. 

The dry eye disease market is estimated at $6.11 billion in 2024 and is expected to reach $7.46 billion by 2029, growing at a CAGR of 4.09% during the forecast period (2024-2029). 

https://www.benzinga.com/general/biotech/24/04/38143290/palatin-technologies-eyes-growing-6b-dry-eye-disease-market-with-late-stage-study-data

Most Cancer Drugs Granted Accelerated Approval Fail Confirmatory Trials

 Most cancer drugs granted accelerated approval by the FDA have not demonstrated a benefit in overall survival (OS) or quality of life within 5 years, according to a cohort study presented here.

Of 46 cancer drug-indication pairs that received accelerated approval from 2013 to 2017, 43% demonstrated a clinical benefit in confirmatory trials, reported Edward Scheffer Cliff, MBBS, MPH, of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, during a press briefing at the American Association for Cancer Researchopens in a new tab or window annual meeting.

Of note, 63% (29 drugs) were converted to regular approval, 22% were withdrawn, and 15% were ongoing after a median of 6.3 years. Among drug-indication pairs that were converted to regular approval from 2013 to 2023, less than half were based on a pivotal trial or trials demonstrating an improvement in OS, Cliff and team detailed in JAMAopens in a new tab or window.

Among the 29 indications that were converted to regular approval, 69% showed clinical benefit: 24% showed improvements in both OS and quality of life, 24% improved OS without demonstrating a quality-of-life benefit, and 21% improved quality of life without improving OS. The other 31% were converted without showing benefits in OS or quality of life in confirmatory trials.

The researchers noted that "despite its origins in HIV treatment, accelerated approval is now most common in oncology, with approximately one-third of all oncology drug approvals using the pathway and more than 80% of all accelerated approvals being granted for cancer therapies."

In his presentation, Cliff said that "the FDA should ensure that manufacturers run confirmatory trials powered to robustly assess clinically meaningful endpoints, and physicians should consider -- and communicate to their patients -- a residual uncertainty of clinical benefit when they offer a novel therapy to their patients."

Cliff and colleagues also reported that the time from accelerated approval to projected confirmatory trial completion increased from 3.4 years in 2013 to 4.5 years in 2017. For the withdrawn indications, duration from accelerated approval to withdrawal decreased from 9.9 years to 3.6 years. For the 29 converted indications, duration from accelerated approval to conversion to regular approval increased from 1.6 years to 3.6 years.

The authors also conducted an analysis of 66 drug-indication pairs that received accelerated approval and were either converted to regular approval (48) or withdrawn (18) between 2013 and 2023.

Of those 48, 18 had the same indication for accelerated and regular approval, 18 included an earlier line of therapy, eight were broadened without moving to an earlier line of therapy, three were narrowed, and one was changed in an alternate way.

Cliff reported that most of these conversions to regular approval relied on measures other than OS:

• 40% were converted based on OS
• 44% on progression-free survival
• 10% on response rate plus duration of response
• 4% on response rate
• 2% despite a negative confirmatory trial

Shivaani Kummar, MD, of Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, who moderated the press briefing, said that as a practicing oncologist she welcomes the possibility that her patients can get more rapid access to novel therapies through the accelerated approval process, but that "once you do that, it's hard to do confirmatory trials because patients won't accept some other treatment and [oncologists are hesitant] to randomize patients to something else."

Cliff suggested that one way of addressing that problem would be to ensure that confirmatory trials are "recently or reasonably accrued at the time of accelerated approval."

For this study, Cliff and colleagues identified 129 cancer drug-indication pairs that received accelerated approval from January 2013 to July 2023. They looked at accelerated approvals with more than 5 years of follow-up (approved through December 2017), which included 46 indications, of which 52% were original indications and 48% were supplemental.

Forty-one percent of drugs had preapproval pivotal trials with response rate as the primary endpoint, with a mean response rate of 50.6%, and 46% used response rate with duration of response, with a mean response rate of 40.7% and average median duration of response of 10.1 months. Progression-free survival was used in 9% of trials, and OS and complete remission rate were each the primary endpoint for one accelerated approval.

Cliff and team acknowledged that the study had several limitations, including the fact that they only looked at confirmatory trial data to evaluate the clinical benefit of cancer indications for accelerated approvals, and that subsequent or larger trials in the same trial population could provide evidence of clinical benefit. In addition, seven drugs were still awaiting confirmatory trial results -- drugs that may eventually show clinical benefit.

Disclosures

This study was funded by Arnold Ventures and the Commonwealth Fund.

Cliff had no disclosures.

A co-author reported relationships with Gilead, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, and the Federal Trade Commission.

Primary Source

JAMA

Source Reference: opens in a new tab or windowLiu ITT, et al "Clinical benefit and regulatory outcomes of cancer drugs receiving accelerated approval" JAMA 2024; DOI: 10.1001/jama.2024.2396.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/meetingcoverage/aacr/109549

Peters Scrutinizes Physician Staffing Firms and Their Private Equity Owners

 A Michigan senator has asked four emergency department staffing firms and the three private equity companies that own them for more information about their business practices following concerns raised by emergency physicians.

Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), chair of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, asked for information from Blackstone, KKR, and Apollo Global Management and their respective staffing firms TeamHealth, Envision Healthcare, US Acute Care Solutions (USACS), and Lifepoint Health.

Peters wants to know more about business operations, staffing decisions, patient care, and safety at emergency departments across the country, following interviews by his office with more than 40 emergency physicians who raised significant concerns about patient care at private equity-owned hospitals and staffing companies.

They also worried about their ability to provide care in the event of a major emergency, such as a mass casualty event, terrorist attack, or future pandemic, according to a statement from the committeeopens in a new tab or window.

"I am concerned that our nation's largest emergency medicine staffing companies may be engaging in cost-saving measures at the expense of patient safety and care, which could put our nation's emergency preparedness at risk," Peters said in the statement.

In each of the four letters, addressed to the CEOs of the companies, Peters noted that while many of these issues "are not limited to private equity, they are exacerbated by the private equity business model, which hinges on highly leveraged debt, little equity, and the need to obtain outsized returns within a limited time."

He added that data on private equity ownership of physician staffing firms is "largely nontransparent."

The letters said that the four largest staffing firms in emergency medicine are owned or controlled by private equity companies -- which is problematic in light of recent financial troubles among those companies. Envision filed for bankruptcy last May,opens in a new tab or window and TeamHealth has a payment of over a billion dollars due this year, the letters stated. In addition, USACS is facing a forced sale if it is unable to pay its private equity investors by 2026, according to the letters.

Another private equity-owned staffing company, American Physician Partners, abruptly shuttered in July 2023opens in a new tab or window and filed for bankruptcy 2 months later, the letters added.

These companies ran into financial troubles following the enactment of the No Surprises Act, which ended the practice of "surprise billing" or balance billing. Peters said Envision and TeamHealth engaged in balance billing for many years.

The letters follow discussions between Peters' office and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine and Take Medicine Back, two physician organizations that have long decried the impact of private equity and business concerns on the practice of medicine.

Mitch Li, MD, founder of Take Medicine Back, told MedPage Today in an email that Peters' office was "compelled by the gravity and substantiveness of our concerns, and the implications for the country's readiness (or lack thereof) for disaster preparedness -- man-made, natural, terrorist, pandemic, etc."

"Although they [Peters' office] fully recognize that the problems affect all of the profession -- all of healthcare -- and that they are not limited to the emergency department, the ED is where all other failures of the broken system end up," Li added.

He said investigators from Peters' office have been "diligent in following up with us, and following leads across the country."

Leah Davis, DO, a Michigan radiologist who is on the advisory board of Take Medicine Back, noted in an email that Peters' federal investigation is happening as the Michigan State Medical Society and the Michigan Osteopathic Association asked for an investigation into violations of Michigan's Corporate Practice of Medicine (CPoM) law by the state's attorney general.

Also, a union of emergency physicians in Michigan is "on the brink of a strike against TeamHealth," she said.

"The actions were not coordinated," Davis said, "but the fact that they are occurring simultaneously is evidence of how widespread and problematic CPoM has become."

Concerns about private equity's impact on healthcare in Michigan came to a head last year when emergency physicians and other clinicians contracted by TeamHealth to work at Ascension St. John Hospital in Detroit formed a unionopens in a new tab or window, the Greater Detroit Association of Emergency Physicians.

Peters' letter to TeamHealthopens in a new tab or window and its private equity owner Blackstone highlighted St. John's emergency department workers' concerns about physician staffing levels and patient safety, noting that doctors have sometimes been responsible for over 20 beds at a given time and "patients routinely had a 16-hour wait time in the emergency department."

A TeamHealth spokesperson told MedPage Today in an email that in 2023, "the median door-to-doctor wait time was 25 minutes and, in 2024, that has declined to 17 minutes," and physician staffing levels at the hospital "are higher than published medians for comparable emergency rooms across the country."

He also said that TeamHealth "has not balance billed patients in its 44-year history, keeping patients out of the middle of any dispute with an insurer for underpayment."

Peters' letter to Envisionopens in a new tab or window and its former owner KKR said that while the private equity company no longer owns the staffing firm, "its bankruptcy and restructuringopens in a new tab or window raise questions about its impact on patient care." He specifically pointed to staffing issues at Tucson Medical Center and Chandler Regional Medical Center in Arizona.

A spokesperson for Envision said in an email that the company "intends to work transparently with Sen. Peters on his request" and that its "number one priority is always the well-being of our clinicians and the patients they serve."

In his letter to USACSopens in a new tab or window and Apollo Global Management, Peters raised concerns about physician staffing levels and patient safety, noting that "while USACS is technically a 'physician-owned company,' its financial arrangement with Apollo is substantially different from traditional physician-owned emergency medicine groups and raises questions about physicians' clinical independence."

A spokesperson for USACS said the company is "confident our physician-owned model of care is in the best interests of patients, physicians, and hospitals."

Finally, the letter to Michigan-based Lifepoint Health and Apollo Global Management focused on physician staffing levels and emergency department wait times. Lifepoint Health did not return a request for comment from MedPage Today.

Overall, according to Peters, TeamHealth operates about 600 emergency departments across the country; Envision operates 440 emergency departments in the U.S., and USACS operates about 300 emergency departments in the country. Lifepoint Health owns more than 60 acute care hospitals.

Peters asked that the companies provide answers to his questions by April 17, and hold meetings with the committee by May 3.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/special-reports/features/109556

Democratic tensions over Israel threaten to boil over at Chicago convention

 The debate within the Democratic Party over Israel could come to a head this summer at its convention as it faces a significant intraparty divide on how to approach the ongoing conflict. 

Members of the party critical of U.S. support for Israel amid its war with Hamas have rallied around a movement to buck President Biden in the Democratic primaries and vote “uncommitted” as a protest vote against him. The movement has seen moderate success and attained some delegates to be sent to the convention, which will be held in Chicago in August.

Some Democrats are concerned that the divisions on display will just grow worse ahead of the quadrennial process of approving the party’s official platform this summer.

“I do think at the convention, for sure, I would be really surprised if there weren’t significant protests on this issue, and unfortunately, I don’t think there’s a lot that Biden can do between now and then to change that,” said Heather Gautney, a member of the 2020 Democratic platform drafting committee. 

Each party drafts its platform every four years ahead of the nominating conventions after an extensive process to set its policies on all the key issues facing the country. In 2020, then-candidate Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) agreed to form a series of task forces to bridge the divide between two factions of the Democratic Party following a serious primary battle between the two of them. 

From the task forces that developed policy positions on the most critical issues, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) created a drafting committee composed of some Biden and Sanders supporters to draft the exact language of the platform. The committee was mostly comprised of Biden supporters, but Sanders supporters did make up a decent-sized minority. 

The committee held a few public hearings featuring testimony on its proposals and eventually submitted the platform to the DNC for final approval at the convention. 

But former members of the drafting committee from past years said that extensive process may not happen in 2024 since Biden isn’t facing serious opposition to the nomination. 

Gautney, who is also a professor of sociology at Fordham University, said the Biden campaign may seek to avoid a “public performance” of the dissent within the party over the situation in Gaza but may provide an opportunity for a “soft debate” on the issue that won’t harm Biden politically. 

“I’m not really sure about this year because there is no Bernie Sanders wing at the table this time,” she said. “He’s running uncontested, and so there isn’t that pressure for him.”

But she noted that Biden has been and will likely continue to be in a difficult position with the party’s divide over the war in Gaza. 

Biden has had to walk a careful wire for months as the death toll has risen in Gaza amid Israel’s offensive in response to the Oct. 7 attack from Hamas that killed 1,200 people. In a sign of how the intraparty criticism is becoming a political headache for him, he issued his sharpest critique yet of the Israeli government’s handling of the war to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a phone call the two leaders had Thursday. 

Biden told Netanyahu that U.S. policy on the war would depend on Israel better protecting civilians and humanitarian workers. The call came after an Israeli airstrike killed seven World Central Kitchen workers who were providing food to people in Gaza. 

Numerous congressional Democrats have called for placing conditions on additional aid to Israel depending on protecting civilians and allowing humanitarian relief to get through. The internal divisions facing the party could present a difficult challenge for crafting an official policy acceptable across the spectrum of Democrats. 

The 2020 Democratic platform declared the party’s commitment to Israel’s security and right to defend itself while calling for a two-state solution to the conflict and recognizing the “worth of every Israeli and every Palestinian.” It also stated that the party was opposed to any unilateral steps by either side “that undermine prospects for two states.” 

Gautney said the 2024 platform may look similar to the 2020 one because Biden has not strayed much from that language, but the focus may be more so on the state of the divide than the platform itself. 

“I don’t think it will focus on the language of the platform … but certainly at the convention I think that’s where people are going to express their dissent,” she said. 

Jim Zogby, who has been involved in drafting numerous platforms in past election years, said he is unsure what the platform point on Israel will look like but expects it will be “largely cooked as it usually is on the Middle East.” 

Zogby, who is the president of the Arab American Institute, a civil rights advocacy group that advises on policies affecting the Arab American community, said the administration has not had meetings with the community about policy positions. He said they have had meetings with Secretary of State Antony Blinken but not the White House. 

“I’m going to continue to hope to change the policy, change in language, change in outreach, a sincere effort to understand what our concerns are and try to accommodate them,” he said. “I think it’s critical for November. I think it’s critical just for sound policy. But they haven’t shown an inclination to do that to date.” 

Zogby noted that the administration has reached out to Arab American leaders in various states, but the meetings have been more focused on getting their support than discussing policy. 

“People have come away from those meetings pretty frustrated, that they wanted to talk policy, they wanted to talk about cease-fire, they wanted to talk about aid to Israel. There was no discussion about any of those issues,” he said. 

Zogby said he considers himself in the “change Biden” group rather than the “abandon Biden” group, but the abandon Biden movement is “getting ammunition every day” in turning against the president, citing the recent sale of F-35 fighter jets to Israel. 

All of this could culminate in the platform feeling like “another slap in the face” to those frustrated with the administration and lead to protests at the convention, he said. 

“The odds are better that [protests] will happen, and I don’t think anyone is in a position to stop that. I think it’s a pretty dangerous environment,” Zogby said, referring to the anti-Vietnam War protests that rocked the 1968 Democratic convention. “We could very well get a replay of ‘68 in Chicago, which is not going to be pretty.”

Democratic strategist Jon Reinish said the intensity of the protests will depend on where the war stands at the moment, but Biden has changed his tone in the past few days with the deaths of the World Central Kitchen workers. 

“The current strategy has gone on for too long and nobody’s winning,” he said. “So [Biden] is absolutely correct, and I think that the party is absolutely correct, to recognize that and to not only push our ally but also show their own voters that they recognize the deterioration of the facts on the ground.”

He said he expects Biden will let the protests proceed as he has not argued that members of the party shouldn’t vocalize their point of view. He said protests happening at the convention are not necessarily harmful, but he views Biden’s response to the deaths of those workers as a “major turning point” to usher in a new phase of the war. 

“I think meaningful facts on the ground, provided they are seen adequately and communicated adequately, that will mean something,” Reinish said. “Is that going to make every person who’s currently protesting on the issue, sit back and say, ‘I’m gonna put my bullhorn down’? No, but if people see changing facts on the ground toward a more acceptable situation, I think that that does alter the facts and levels of protests.”

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4577481-democrats-israel-gaza-hamas-palestinians-joe-biden-chicago/

TSMC Gets $11.6 Billion in US Grants, Loans for Chip Plants

The US plans to award Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. $6.6 billion in grants and as much as $5 billion in loans to help the world’s top chipmaker build factories in Arizona, expanding President Joe Biden’s effort to boost domestic production of critical technology.

Under the preliminary agreement announced by the US on Monday, TSMC will construct a third factory in Phoenix, adding to two facilities in the state that are expected to begin production in 2025 and 2028. In total, the package will support more than $65 billion in investments at the three plants by TSMC, the go-to chipmaker for companies such as Apple Inc. and Nvidia Corp.

TSMC’s third fabrication site, or fab, will rely on next-generation 2-nanometer process technology, and is slated to be operational before the end of the decade. US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the 2nm chips are essential to emerging technologies including artificial intelligence, as well as for the military.

“For the first time ever, we will be making at scale the most advanced semiconductor chips on the planet here in the United States of America, by the way, with American workers,” Raimondo told reporters in a briefing ahead of the announcement. TSMC is planning to first make 2nm chips in Taiwan in 2025.

It will be months before TSMC receives any of the promised funding, as the company enters a due-diligence period before reaching a final, binding agreement. Money will then be disbursed based on construction and production benchmarks, and could be clawed back if TSMC doesn’t hold up its end of the deal.

TSMC’s award marks another milestone in Biden’s push to boost the US semiconductor industry with the 2022 Chips and Science Act. It’s one of the largest announced under the program, which set aside $39 billion in direct grants — plus loans and guarantees worth $75 billion — to persuade semiconductor companies to build factories in America after decades of shifting production abroad.

TSMC’s American depositary receipts rose as much as 2.8% Monday morning in New York to $145.35.

Intel Corp. has already inked a preliminary agreement for nearly $20 billion in grants and loans, while Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea is expected to receive a grant of more than $6 billion. The Commerce Department has also handed three awards to companies that manufacture older-generation chips and is expected to announce a multibillion dollar package for Micron Technology Inc. in coming weeks.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tsmc-gets-11-6-billion-090000429.html

White House Ramadan dinner highlights Biden’s struggles with Arab, Muslim voters

 The efforts of President Biden and White House officials to reach out to the Arab and Muslim American communities in the wake of the war in Gaza have fallen short, highlighted last week by an at times tense, scaled-down iftar event compared to previous years.

The relationship with the Arab and Muslim American community has been fraught in the six months since the war began, with many protesting or fully withdrawing support for Biden over his pro-Israel stance since the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks. White House officials have held a handful of meetings with leaders but sometimes have their invitations rejected. Biden himself has not engaged much directly with the community.

The strained relationship was on full display after a meeting with community leaders in which a Palestinian American doctor who had worked in Gaza walked out. The administration was faced with tough questions after the incident, including whether that was the first time Biden had ever engaged with someone who had actually been in the devastated enclave.

It once again underscored the risks Biden faces heading into election season, where a swath of disaffected voters upset over his handling of the war in Gaza could be enough to cost him key battleground states.

This year’s small dinner and meeting celebrating Eid al-Fitr — which falls on Tuesday and marks the end of Ramadan — were held in place of the nearly 350-person reception the White House hosted last year.

Thaer Ahmad, an emergency medicine physician who worked in Gaza in January, told CNN he was the only Palestinian in the room at the stakeholders meeting and that he shared with Biden: “Out of respect for my community, out of respect for all of the people who have suffered and who have been killed in the process, I need to walk out of the meeting.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre later told reporters the president respected Ahmad’s right to peacefully protest, and officials understand the strong feelings around the war in Gaza.

Jean-Pierre offered little insight into how the White House built its guest list for the more intimate event, which was not publicized, but she said the smaller setting was intended to foster a more direct, honest conversation. She confirmed there were three doctors in attendance who recently returned from Gaza at the dinner who shared their experiences with Biden.

“We’ve done outreach for [the] past several weeks, several months to the Muslim, to the Arab community, Palestinian community and heard from them directly,” Jean-Pierre told reporters. “And they spoke; we listened. And we hope that they feel like they had an opportunity to express themselves and had an opportunity — in front of the president and the vice president — to talk about an incredibly painful time.”

Additionally, a source familiar told The Hill that Ahmad has been to the White House on multiple occasions to meet with White House officials about the situation in Gaza.

Since the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, Biden has been adamant that Israel has a right to defend itself and that the U.S. would provide support. But in recent months, he has been more outspoken that Israel has not done enough to protect civilians and humanitarian workers, as tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed.

Biden’s tone significantly shifted Thursday, however, when he said future U.S. support may change if Israel does not take concrete actions following a drone strike that killed seven World Central Kitchen workers in Gaza.

Outside of Washington, White House officials have met with members of the community in Michigan and Illinois in recent months. There has also been outreach to elected officials who are Arab Americans or Muslim Americans, or who represent large areas with large Arab or Muslim populations, including the mayors of Dearborn, Mich.; Gainesville, Fla.; and Paterson, N.J. 

Within the White House, chief of staff Jeff Zients hosted a listening session with Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian staff in recent months. And the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs and Public Engagement has consistently engaged with Churches for Middle East Peace, interfaith leaders from Pilgrimage for Peace, and a coalition from the National Faith Table.

Campaign officials have also reached out to community members in Michigan and other states to foster conversation and listen to their concerns. Biden himself did not meet with Arab American community members during recent trips to Michigan.

But some in the community think the outreach hasn’t been enough.

Hassan Abdel Salam, an Abandon Biden co-founder and sociology professor at the University of Minnesota, told The Hill that the White House’s outreach to the Muslim and Arab American community is “tone deaf” and that Biden has “alienated” people in the community.

He said two Abandon Biden leaders based in Michigan had been contacted by the White House to meet in recent months, but the organization’s position is not to meet or have contact with the White House unless a permanent cease-fire in Gaza is called.

Another time there was outreach to Abandon Biden was in December, he said, when a Democratic-operative “doing the bidding of the White House” asked the group to cancel a press conference it was hosting with swing-state leaders in Dearborn.

Protesters have interrupted numerous Biden events and gathered outside fundraisers for months to express their discontent with the president’s handling of the war in Gaza. Demonstrators interrupted Biden’s high-profile fundraiser last week with former Presidents Obama and Clinton, with one yelling “Shame on you, Joe Biden!”

Obama jumped in to defend Biden, telling demonstrators, “You can’t just talk and not listen. … That’s what the other side does.”

But the political risks to Biden are clear. Thousands of voters have cast protest ballots during the Democratic primaries over his handling of the war in Gaza, including last week in Wisconsin, where nearly 50,000 people voted for “uninstructed.” While Biden won the primary easily, if even a fraction of those protest voters stay home in November or back a different candidate, it could cost him in the Badger State, which he won in 2020 by slightly more than 20,000 votes.

The Abandon Biden movement, which has been behind the protest vote efforts in Democratic primaries, declared Biden’s overall outreach to the Muslim and Arab community a failure this week.

“The Biden administration needs to understand the unequivocal message we are sending: they do not have our vote. The attempt to engage our community has not only fallen flat but has also served to further galvanize us towards ensuring accountability and seeking justice for our people,” the group said in a statement.

Abandon Biden said the boycott of the Ramadan event at the White House was “a significant juncture in the American political landscape.”

“Our community’s refusal to be used for public relations maneuvers by the Biden administration became resoundingly clear on Tuesday night,” the organization said. “This defining moment was not just about the decline in participation by numerous Muslim American leaders—motivated by principle or the fear of backlash—but it also saw the outright cancellation of what would have been a token iftar, replaced by a policy discussion that failed to address our concerns adequately.”

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/4577299-white-house-ramadan-dinner-highlights-bidens-struggles-with-arab-muslim-voters/

Dimon Calls Push to Stop All Oil, Gas Projects Enormously Naïve

 

• JPMorgan CEO touts LNG as a boon for US in shareholder letter
• Replacing coal with gas is best way to cut emissions, he says

Jamie Dimon said US delays of liquefied natural gas projects were done for “political reasons” to pacify those who believe oil and gas projects should be stopped — a position he calls “wrong” and “enormously naïve.”

The head of JPMorgan Chase & Co. made the comments Monday in his annual shareholder letter, in which he touted replacing coal with natural gas as one of the best ways to reduce carbon dioxide emissions for the next few decades. Dimon also called LNG exports a “great economic boon” for the US as well as a “realpolitik goal.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-08/dimon-calls-push-to-stop-all-oil-gas-projects-enormously-naive