Politics and views in the United States.

A deadly school shooting is under investigation in Wisconsin. The Electoral College convenes today as the Senate considers abolishing it, and Trump discusses media lawsuits, TikTok's future and drone sightings in a scattered news conference. 

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to 2024 talks where we're following our democracy and historic times.

Every child, every person in that building is a victim and will be a victim forever.

Madison Police Chief Sean Barnes says right now they don't know the motive for a deadly shooting at a private Christian school in Wisconsin.

A teacher and student were killed and several injured.

The shooter was a student who likely died by suicide.

This comes two days after the 12th anniversary of the Sandy Hook school shooting.

Electoral college delegates are gathering across the country to formally cast their votes for the next president.

The electoral college allocates electoral votes to each state based on their congressional representation.

Patricia Crowley with the League of Women Voters in Illinois says that structure means candidates can win even when they lose the popular vote.

The electoral college turns losers into winners.

A direct popular vote would solve this problem.

You would just go with the candidate with the most votes.

And this is not a abstract problem.

It's happened five times in our history.

A constitutional amendment was just introduced in the Senate that would abolish the electoral college, noting it disenfranchises millions of Americans.

Some blue states are also considering making their delegates vote for the popular winner, but only if enough states do the same.

In a scattered press conference from Mar-a-Lago, President-elect Donald Trump suggested he may sue influencers in newspapers after ABC News settled his defamation lawsuit.

I'm doing this not because I want to.

I'm doing this because I feel I have an obligation to.

During the conference, the president-elect described himself as a big believer in the polio vaccine and said he might block enforcement of a law that could ban TikTok.

With a deadline looming, the social media company is asking the Supreme Court to intervene.

Trump also criticized the Pentagon and President Joe Biden for not revealing more about the hundreds of recent drone sightings from New Jersey to Ohio.

Our military knows and our president knows, and for some reason they want to keep people in suspense.

Also Monday, Senate Majority Leader and New York Democrat Chuck Schumer asked Humbling Security to deploy wide-ranging radar systems capable of detecting drones to New York and New Jersey.

There certainly is the technology that can track the craft with precision and determine what the heck is going on.

With no budget stopgap in sight, lawmakers are returning to Capitol Hill.

Government funding lapses Friday night unless Congress acts.

The holdups include a dispute over how to extend farm bill programs and provide relief to agriculture.

Arkansas Republican Senator John Bozeman says farmers are struggling with high production costs.

When you pencil it out and you look at what they're going to receive for their crops, they're going in the hole.

If you're growing something right now, you're losing many, many dollars per acre.

Some plan would offer more than $10 billion in aid, but there's debates over the scope of the assistance and how it would be structured.

Some Republicans are questioning the cost.

I'm Mary Sherman for Pacifica Network and Public News Service.

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