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The Duchess of Sussex has made her first television appearance since her and Prince Harry's interview with Oprah Winfrey.

Far from losing influence over the party, critics say, Trump has in fact burrowed far into its DNA so that the two are now all but inseparableRon DeSantis was exultant. “The way Florida did it I think inspires confidence; I think that’s how elections should be run,” the state governor told reporters last November. “Rather than us be at the centre of a Bush v Gore in 2020, we’re now being looked at as the state that did it right.”This boast of a smoothly run election just six months ago makes DeSantis’s actions this week all the more curious. The governor suddenly found it necessary to impose sweeping reforms that limit mail-in voting and ballot drop boxes – and signed the new law live on the Fox News network on Thursday with no other media allowed. Continue reading...

A man fatally shot six other people including his girlfriend and then himself at a birthday party in Colorado Springs. A motive has yet to be determined. The shooting, which took place about 70 miles (110 km) south of Denver, is the latest in a resurgence of mass shootings in the United States after such incidents seemed to recede during the height of coronavirus pandemic restrictions

Shooting happened just after midnight Sunday in a mobile home park on the east side of Colorado Springs, police sayA gunman opened fire at a birthday party in Colorado, killing six adults before killing himself, police said on Sunday.The shooting happened just after midnight in a mobile home park on the east side of Colorado Springs, police said. Continue reading...

Daily new cases plummet in US with advent of vaccines while they rise at alarming rates in south Asia, with India bearing the bruntThe US is approaching a turning point where Covid vaccinations are sharply reducing infection and hospitalization rates, key figures in the fight against the disease said on Sunday, though the Biden administration is facing mounting pressure to do more to help other nations still in the grip of the disease.“We are turning the corner,” said Jeffrey Zients, the White House Covid response coordinator. With about 58% of adult Americans having received at least one shot of vaccine, and with some 113 million people now fully vaccinated, the country was on track to meet Joe Biden’s goal of 70% of the population at least partially vaccinated by 4 July, he said. Continue reading...

Goaded on by the ghostly figure of Trump, House Republicans are poised to eject Cheney from her number three leadership postInfighting within the Republican party is set to come to a head this week, goaded on by the ghostly figure of former president Donald Trump in his Mar-a-Lago hideout in Florida.House Republicans are gearing up to oust Liz Cheney on Wednesday from her position as the party’s number three leader in the chamber. Continue reading...

Ted Cruz and his allies have spent years criticizing Facebook, even as the network was propelling Donald Trump to victoryWhen Donald Trump’s ban from Facebook was upheld this week, the howls of bias could be heard from Republicans far and wide. Those shrieks, ironically, came mostly on social media.Republicans have spent recent years criticizing Facebook and Twitter, demonizing them as biased against the right. But they, not Democrats, have been the most enthusiastic embracers of social media, and the most successful in harnessing its potential. Continue reading...

The holiday can feel coercive, as though it tells us what to feel and leaves out the experiences of those who don’t fit its templateHalf our holidays are punitive, at least for those left out of what the the holiday is supposed to celebrate. If you don’t have money for gifts and a thriving family life or just avoid events at the intersection of Jesus and shopping, Christmas can be unpleasant; Valentine’s Day sprinkles a little salt in the wounds of the unattached; and Thanksgiving thumbs its nose at Native America. Then there’s Mother’s Day.Related: Hurray, I can meet people! Now, when can I get some alone time? | Coco Khan Continue reading...

A viral TikTok video captured an everyday reality reflected in the allegations against Matt Gaetz and Blake BaileyAt first the girl is animated and fast-talking, gesturing with her hands as she speaks to the camera. She’s wearing a tie-dye shirt that hangs cavernously around her thin frame; her long blond hair is stick straight. She speaks with the unrestrained enthusiasm of a kid. Later, I learn that she is 18. When the man approaches her, just out of frame, at first she thinks he just wants to take one of the empty chairs that is at her table and drag it away somewhere else; she’s in the courtyard of the motel where she’s staying with her mom, and she’s sitting at one of the outdoor tables alone. But he doesn’t want to take the chair, he wants to sit down in it. The man never enters the frame, but we can tell he is older, and he must be much bigger than she is: the girl, still seated, cranes her face to look up at him. The calm confidence behind her large glasses snuffs out; her shoulders tense up, rising toward her ears. He’s trying to sleep with her. Off camera, the man can be heard commenting on the girl’s visible discomfort. “I see your hesitancy,” he says. On the screen, the caption the girl eventually added to the video reveals that she has given him a fake name. Eventually, she reveals to him that she is taping. “I’m just doing a live and talking to some people,” she says, and glances towards her phone. That’s when he finally leaves her alone: not when he notices that she’s uncomfortable, but when he realizes that he is being watched.The video (in two parts), posted to TikTok by the teenage user @maassassin_, immediately goes viral. Women, young and old, saw in the exchange a microcosm of their own experiences of being young girls, and of being approached, harassed, groomed or merely leered at by older men in ways that scared them at the time, and which they only later learned to put into context. The video blasted into the public consciousness on the heels of two high-profile cases of sexual misconduct by adult men towards teenage girls: first that of the Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, who allegedly paid a 17-year-old for sex, and second that of Blake Bailey, the Philip Roth biographer who is accused of paying untoward attention towards his middle school students, and of sexually assaulting some of those students, as well as another woman, after they became adults. Gaetz and Bailey both deny wrongdoing. Continue reading...

Ted Trujillo has been fighting for years against the use of the racist ‘Redskins’ mascot in a high school in Morris, IllinoisOn a recent Friday evening, the teenage daughter of the then mayor-elect of Morris, Illinois, about 60 miles south-west of Chicago, led her high school’s marching band on to the football field wearing a headdress, face paint and clothes resembling Native regalia.As the band played the “war cry” for the pre-game event, the student, with her reddish blond hair in braids, stood in a wide stance in the middle of the field with her arms crossed.

With Biden what you see is what you get, says the Pulitzer prize winner, who has advised the president, but FDR informs his approach to democracy in perilHe has been described as Joe Biden’s “historical muse”, an occasional informal adviser to the US president and contributor to some of his major speeches including the inaugural address.In March, Jon Meacham put together a meeting between Biden and a group of fellow historians at the White House that lasted more than two hours. What did he learn about the 46th president? Continue reading...

Barack and Michelle Obama express sorrow at passing of ‘true friend and companion’Former President Barack Obama’s dog Bo died on Saturday from cancer, the Obamas said on social media.News of Bo’s death was shared by Obama and his wife, Michelle, on Instagram, where both expressed sorrow at the passing of a dog the former president described as a “true friend and loyal companion.” Continue reading...

The proposed legislation expands freelancers’ right to unionize but the current wording could have repercussions for the use of independent contractorsHidden inside President Biden’s $2.5tn infrastructure proposal is another piece of legislation that could have a significant impact on many small businesses, including mine. Or not.It’s called the Protecting the Right to Organize Act – or Pro Act – and if it passes one thing’s for sure: the use of independent contractors and freelancers in businesses of all sizes will be challenged. Continue reading...

The decision to have a child is a tough one for many women. No wonder the population is fallingIt didn’t take long for confident predictions of a Covid baby boom to emerge last spring. Locked up together, with only Netflix for company, what else are couples going to do? (Nudge, wink.) “Haven’t they heard of contraception?” one friend asked drily, as the country waited anxiously to hear about furlough while being warned the NHS was in mortal peril.Related: It is time to reassess our obsession with women’s fertility and the number 35 | Arwa Mahdawi Continue reading...

While harm reduction has largely been used to combat drug abuse and HIV/Aids, it could inform the coming months and how the US tackles future health crises, experts sayOver the course of the pandemic, the stark political divide in the US around implementing public health measures has at times been as perplexing for public health officials as the virus itself.On the one hand, the former Republican president Donald Trump avoided making any clear directives about Covid-19 while he was still in office last year, and the conservative talkshow host Tucker Carlson likened mask-wearing for children to “child abuse”. On the other, something as simple as easing restrictions on outdoor masking has revved up a new heated debate among cautious residents of Democratic cities. Continue reading...

Prime minister Abiy Ahmed opened the way for victimisation of women with disastrous decision to attack TigrayThe use of rape as a weapon of war is as old as warfare itself. In Bosnia in the 1990s, thousands of Muslim women were brutalised by Bosnian Serb forces, who set up “rape camps” as part of a policy of “ethnic cleansing”. In 2001, the UN’s Yugoslav war crimes tribunal redefined mass rape as a crime against humanity. Yet there have been many similar atrocities since then, including in South Sudan, Syria, Iraq, and Myanmar.Now the world looks on – or rather, looks away – as it happens again. Today, in Tigray, in northern Ethiopia, large numbers of women and girls are again being subjected to “unimaginable” terror and suffering as a result of pervasive sexual violence. The word “unimaginable” is taken from a disturbing new report on Tigray by Parliament’s international development committee – a report largely ignored by the British government and media. Continue reading...

House committee is arguing to federal judge that with Trump out of office, he no longer has a viable claim to withhold materialsA powerful Democrat-led House committee is pushing a federal judge to order Donald Trump to comply with a subpoena for his financial records, arguing he no longer has a viable claim to withhold materials now that he is out of office, according to a source familiar with the matter.The move from the House oversight committee, led by the chair Carolyn Maloney, marks the latest salvo from Democrats in their years-long pursuit to secure Trump’s tax records and related documents, in a case testing the scope and limits of Congress’s oversight authority. Continue reading...

Californians have voted to purge their governor only once. The campaign was driven by showbiz carnival and partisan fury as much as it was by democratic idealsWhen California granted its voters the ability to recall a sitting governor, back in 1911, it meant to offer a stern reminder to over-entitled elected officials that they serve the people, not the other way around.The reality, though, has been a lot less edifying. Continue reading...

Americans like to look forward but the effects of Trump’s lies about Covid and the 6 January insurrection are still with usAmerica prefers to look forward rather than back. We’re a land of second acts. We move on.This can be a strength. We don’t get bogged down in outmoded traditions, old grudges, obsolete ways of thinking. We constantly reinvent. We love innovation and disruption. Continue reading...

It took nearly three hours to capture the zebra, who had escaped an exotic livestock auctionLaw enforcement officials helped capture a loose zebra in middle Tennessee after it escaped from an exotic livestock auction.According to news outlets, the Cookeville police department and Putnam county sheriff’s office assisted Triple W employees to capture the “agitated” zebra early Friday morning. Cookeville is about 80 miles (128km) east of Nashville. Continue reading...

Newspaper ‘deeply troubled’ by revelation that records were secretly obtained over three months in 2017The phone-call records of three reporters with the Washington Post were secretly obtained by officials with Donald Trump’s justice department over a period of three months in 2017, the newspaper reported.Related: The sleazy, sordid Matt Gaetz scandal: are the walls now closing in on him? Continue reading...

According to a lawyer for an alleged Capitol rioter, his client was brainwashed by Fox News into participating in the 6 January attackFor decades a debilitating disease has been spreading across America. Risk factors include being over 65, Republican and white. Symptoms include unhinged muttering, delusional thinking and an irresistible urge to storm the Capitol. The disease is called “Foxitis” and a lawyer called Joseph Hurley, who is representing alleged US Capitol rioter Anthony Antonio, wants us to believe his client is suffering from it. Continue reading...

Judge and prosecutor toss out remaining convictions on gun charges in case that became the Netflix documentary Trial 4Sean Ellis, a Black man who featured in a Netflix documentary after spending decades in prison wrongly convicted of murdering a white police officer, has finally been fully exonerated.A Massachusetts judge and prosecutor earlier this week closed the door on his case after tossing out lingering additional convictions on gun charges. Continue reading...

Saturday Night Live is using a controversial figure to drum up ratings, even if it means further legitimizing a man with too much power and egoSelf-declared “Technoking” Elon Musk is hosting an upcoming episode of Saturday Night Live (SNL). This is par for the course of the late-night sketch comedy show’s commitment to profit and ratings over a sense of political responsibility. While it may be easy to dismiss the show as simply comedy for comedy’s sake, the power of laughter can’t be denied while one standup comedian holds the presidential office of Ukraine and another holds the title of co-founder of one of Italy’s most powerful political parties. Musk’s expected appearance on the show is just another clear example of Saturday Night Live using a controversial figure to drum up ratings, even if it means providing further legitimacy to a man with too much power and ego for his own good.Related: Outcry after Saturday Night Live announces Elon Musk will host Continue reading...

Cheney privately called Republicans’ embrace of the stolen-election conspiracy theory ‘a poison in the bloodstream of our democracy’. She’s right

Wangechi Mutu’s I Am Speaking, Are You Listening? juxtaposes the Kenyan American artist’s large-scale, matriarchal works against neoclassical bustsThe racial reckoning that has swept the US for the last year has touched many institutions, high and low. But it’s only now, as the country reopens, that the results are becoming visible.Fine arts museums have grappled with questions of representation and cultural equity, as well as their historical role in imperialism and outright theft, and now their public programming reflects these discussions. Continue reading...

UnitedHealth Group, reported $4.9bn in profits in the first quarter of 2021 while CVS Health reported $2.2bnUS health insurance companies beat analyst expectations and reported billions in profits in the first quarter of 2021, after making a windfall in the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic.The insurers’ success comes as small healthcare providers face unprecedented financial stress and millions of Americans struggle to cover health costs. The large profits reaped by the insurance firms are also likely to increase criticism of the US healthcare sector. Continue reading...

Investigation into Florida congressman is reported to have grown beyond sex trafficking allegationsThere could have been no more fitting venue for the bellicose US congressman Matt Gaetz to launch his nationwide “America first” speaking tour than The Villages. Where better to perpetuate the fantasy that all is going well for a politician seen as the “ultimate Maga bro” than Florida’s ultra-conservative “Disney World for retirees”?Related: Florida governor signs new restrictive bill in ‘blatant attack on right to vote’ Continue reading...

Case of terminally ill Gerald Pizzuto renews debate about capital punishment for people who are sick or very oldGerald Pizzuto is near death, but it’s unclear whether the cancer or the state of Idaho will get to him first.For more than a year, the 65-year-old has been in hospice care on Idaho’s death row, suffering from advanced bladder tumors, along with type 2 diabetes, and a variety of heart and lung diseases. According to his defense team, he’s been prescribed 42 different drugs in the last year, and his medical records say he has “begun experiencing memory loss and mild disorientation associated with the death process”. Continue reading...

Wife of a decorated veteran who was forced to break up her family in 2018 is one of the first beneficiaries of Biden’s programThree years ago Alejandra Juarez fell victim to Donald Trump’s cruelty as the wife of a decorated US Marine Corps veteran and mother of two young US citizen daughters was deported to Mexico under the former president’s zero-tolerance immigration policies.On Saturday Juarez will rejoin her family in Florida as one of the first beneficiaries of a humanitarian program set up by Joe Biden’s administration to reunify parents Trump separated from their children. Continue reading...

A roundup of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Colombia to China Continue reading...

The Republican congresswoman is all but certain to lose her leadership role. Her crime? Rejecting the ex-president’s big lieShe is a champion of the hawkish foreign policy espoused by her father, a former US vice-president dubbed “Darth Vader”. She is a hardline conservative whose opposition to gay marriage pained her lesbian sister.Related: Trump asserts power over Republicans as Liz Cheney faces ousting Continue reading...

US joins call to action two years after Trump administration declined due to free speech concernsThe United States will join an international bid to stamp out violent extremism online, the White House has said, two years after the Trump administration declined to do so.The Biden administration spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Washington “will join the Christchurch Call to Action” in “a global pledge by member governments and technology partners to work together to address terrorist and violent extremist content online”. Continue reading...

This year more than 80 laws targeting trans people have been proposed by conservative lawmakers nationwideMontana’s governor has signed a bill that bans transgender athletes from competing on school and university sports teams that correspond with their gender.Greg Gianforte’s signing on Friday makes Montana the latest Republican-controlled state to approve such legislation. Continue reading...

Noah Bryant, four, who is on the autism spectrum, sent a 51-case order of SpongeBob treats to his aunt’s houseA four-year-old New York boy has left his family with a huge bill after he secretly ordered a staggering $2,618 worth of SpongeBob popsicles from online retailer Amazon.Noah Bryant, from Brooklyn, ordered 51 cases containing a total of 918 popsicles to be shipped to his aunt’s house, the local TV station ABC7 reported. Continue reading...

A tawdry week in Texas ends with a world title fight – and Billy Joe Saunders may pay for making Saúl ‘Canelo’ Álvarez angry“I have no regrets whatsoever,” Billy Joe Saunders said defiantly a few weeks ago as he began to beat the drum for his world title unification fight against the formidable Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez in front of an expected crowd of 60,000 in Arlington, Texas on Saturday night. “I never regret anything – otherwise I wouldn’t do it.”Saunders spoke in typically fiery fashion after he was asked if he felt any remorse for some of his antics over the years. A small selection could start with Saunders being an unrepentant and very loud supporter of Daniel Kinahan, his mentor, who is exiled in Dubai. This year a BBC Panorama investigation into Kinahan’s continued involvement in boxing insisted that the Irish courts “have accepted that the Kinahan Organised Crime Group is involved in drug trafficking, money laundering and gangland executions”. Saunders led the backlash against the BBC and also appeared to taunt Barry McGuigan, who spoke out against Kinahan, over the death of the former world champion’s daughter from cancer. Continue reading...

Population fell by 182,000 amid declining birth rate, reductions in immigration and an increase in deaths because of CovidCalifornia’s population fell by more than 182,000 people in 2020, marking the first year-over-year loss ever recorded for the nation’s most populous state.State officials announced Friday that California’s population dipped 0.46% to just under 39.5 million people from January 2020 to January 2021. Continue reading...

SB7 was passed in a procedural vote, opening the doors for the Republican-controlled legislature to rework the bill behind closed doorsTexas Republicans passed their bill restricting voting rights on Friday afternoon, after cutting a deal with Democrats in backroom negotiations overnight.“Nobody deserves to wake up and find out that their rights have been further restricted. But time and time again during this legislative session, that’s what Texans have experienced,” said Wesley Story, communications manager for Progress Texas, a rapid response media organization for progressive messaging. Continue reading...

Initiative would park vans administering the Johnson & Johnson Covid vaccine in tourist locations across the cityTourists visiting New York City may soon be able to get vaccinated under the bright lights of Times Square or in the shadows of the Empire State Building or Brooklyn Bridge.Related: Pfizer and BioNTech seek full FDA approval of coronavirus vaccine in US Continue reading...

LAPD policies are among the most transparent in the US, but it remains difficult to obtain footage, advocates and attorneys sayBody-worn camera footage can be crucial in cases where police are accused of using excessive force – it helped a Minnesota jury understand the full details surrounding George Floyd’s death, and also shed light on the police killings of 13-year old Adam Toledo in Illinois and 16-year old Ma’khia Bryant in Ohio this spring.In Los Angeles, advocates and attorneys say that despite the existence of a large-scale body-worn camera program, it remains incredibly difficult to obtain police body-cam footage in the vast majority of cases and that even for police interventions that lead to serious injuries, it takes time and effort to get access to all relevant images. Continue reading...

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news, as the recovery in the US labour market slows unexpectedly

Joe Biden did not appear downhearted by a disappointing jobs report: he said it would not be a sprint, but 'a marathon' after April's report severely missed economists' expectations.The president noted his $1.9tn coronavirus relief package, which he signed into law in March, was meant to aid the US economy over the course of a year and insisted the country is 'moving in the right direction' as businesses begin to reopen