US news | The Guardian

Trump's absence was felt in the New York courtroom, and on video it wasn't the outlandish display many might have expected

Up to 9in of snow expected in Arkansas and Tennessee as climate crisis leads to more frequent extreme weather casesMore than 80 million people across southern US states were on alert on Friday as a powerful winter storm that dumped heavy snow and glazed roads with ice across much of Texas and Oklahoma lumbered eastward.Some governors have declared a state of emergency as the weather forced school closures across the region and unleashed havoc for traffic. Continue reading...

Alice Weidel's livestreamed chat with the X owner made for excruciating listening - but even talk of Hitler won't deter her supportersImagine a politician fighting a general election being granted the opportunity of a publicly livestreamed chat with one of the most powerful figures in the world, only to be heard wriggling out of it after 70 minutes. I don't know what to continue (with)," Alice Weidel said to Elon Musk, in effect shutting down the unique audience the owner of X had gifted the AfD leader on Thursday evening.Admittedly, the rambling conversation felt longer than 70 minutes. It missed moderation and while Musk and Weidel giggled a lot and agreed on almost every issue, the sense that they were boring each other became increasingly acute as they droned on about space travel and religious belief rather than the alleged decline of western civilisation. Had Adolf Hitler not been mentioned, the highly anticipated live talk would have been shocking only for being so unnewsworthy.Thomas Vorreyer is a Berlin-based journalist with a focus on East German politicsDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Takeover combines electricity generators to become largest independent US power provider, with 2.5 million customersThe US nuclear power giant Constellation Energy has agreed to buy the natural gas and geothermal firm Calpine Corporation for $16.4bn, one of the biggest takeovers in the US power industry.The acquisition would combine two of the biggest electricity generators in the US into the largest independent power provider in the country, with some 2.5 million customers. Continue reading...

Now we have to make sure there's not a second, financial tragedy that follows the physical catastrophe,' says consumer advocate

An evacuation order when the Eaton fire threatened Galen Buckwalter's Sierra Madre home triggered a nightmare odyssey through chaotic streets

Trump and Maga allies are using the fires to attack leaders like Newsom - possibly foretelling power struggles aheadIf ever a situation cried out for elevating national unity over political divisions, the dystopian scenes emanating from the Los Angeles fires surely qualified.The catastrophe that has left at least five people dead, more than 1,000 structures destroyed and forced thousands fleeing their homes would - in an ideal and less polarised America - spur humane empathy and solidarity in place of tribal partisanship. Continue reading...

Media giants had hoped to attract younger viewers who don't subscribe to cable with NBA, NFL and Fifa offeringsDisney, Fox and Warner Bros Discovery on Friday abandoned plans to launch Venu Sports, their live sports joint venture, pulling the plug on a much-heralded effort that ran into substantial legal opposition.Shares of Warner Bros Discovery were down about 2% and Fox's stock fell about 1%, while FuboTV's shares were up nearly 8% after the surprise announcement. Continue reading...

The US president and his broligarch pal are treating their oldest allies as enemies. Britain can't face down that threat aloneFlood the zone with shit. So advised Steve Bannon, onetime chief strategist for Donald Trump, who understood long ago that if you want to get away with an outrageous act, follow it with another and then another. That way, the media will be sure to move on to the newest horror, so forgetting the one before.Trump continues to live by that rule, making it hard to keep up with everything he and his circle do and say - and he's not even back in office yet. It therefore requires a conscious effort to take a step back and see what's happening. That might be easier this week than others because the most egregious outrages form a pattern, one that poses a severe and direct challenge to Britain and its neighbours.Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Summer holidays are a time of memory-making. We asked Guardian writers and contributors to share some of the summer holiday photos that transport them back to a simpler time

At least 20 arrests have been made over looting, with Santa Monica declaring a curfew. Plus, the arguments for and against banning TikTokGood morning.Los Angeles officials expect the death toll from the wildfires in the county to continue to rise, as workers comb through incinerated neighborhoods with cadaver dogs.How big are the fires? The Palisades fire is 8,085 hectares and just 6% contained; Eaton is 5,540 hectares and not contained at all; Kenneth is 405 hectares and 35% contained; Hurst, 312 hectares and 37%; Lidia, 141 hectares and 60%.Why is he unlikely to be jailed or fined? In July, a US supreme court ruling granted presidents broad immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts. Merchan said that in weighing all the factors and concerns about presidential immunity, a sentence of unconditional discharge appears to be the most viable solution". That means that apart from being named a convicted felon, Trump won't face any penalty. Continue reading...

Program for skilled foreign workers pits Trump and Musk against Bannon - and progressive Bernie SandersSteve Bannon, one of the architects of Trumpism, is one the most influential voices on the right. Bernie Sanders, the veteran US senator from Vermont, is among the leading figures on the progressive left. In these divided times, they have found common ground.As Donald Trump returns to the White House, a bitter row over H-1B visas - designed to bring skilled foreign workers to the US - has exposed the delicate threads that tie together his broad coalition - and that of the Democrats. Continue reading...

Sadly, the Amazon-Melania deal has much the same flavor as the rest of Trump appeasement moves - not just by Bezos but by others of his ilkThe language in a New York Times article was extremely restrained as it described Jeff Bezos's evolving stance regarding Donald Trump.The Amazon founder and the president-elect had had a rocky relationship in the past, but in recent months, Amazon and Mr. Bezos have taken steps to repair it".Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading...

I loved to scour apps and charity shops for cheap clothes and toys - but now I know it is another kind of overconsumptionGuess how much this was," I say to my partner mischievously, revealing with relish the latest toy I've found for our youngest son. It's wooden, Montessori in style (apparently a ball dropping through a hole teaches him object permanence), and retails at about 20 new. A quid," my partner proffers, wearily: he is savvy to this game by now. This time, though, I can go one better. Free!" I screech with glee. Free! Can you believe that? Someone was giving it away on that secondhand WhatApp group." I'm giddy with my find, drunk on the size of the bargain, but, as I add the new (to me) toy to the teetering pile of others - dolls, a tunnel, toy cars, a lunchbox - I can feel something - guilt, I think - gnawing away at me. Am I a secondhand overconsumer?I've always been a champion of secondhand shopping. I was plundering charity shops before it was cool and, in a tale that has become family folklore, once found a standard lamp in a branch of the British Heart Foundation and carried it home on the bus. In fairness, that lamp has moved house with me seven times and still stands, resplendent, in my living room. But I fear too many of my other secondhand purchases have been flash-in-the-pan dopamine hits. These purchases gather dust in our bedroom, the study, my son's toy box. Clothes I've bought from charity shops, heady with the exhilaration of them being only 5", lie crumpled and forgotten in the depths of my wardrobe before, months later, being dragged out and sold on Vinted for a couple of quid. And still I buy more, ensnared in the grip of what I've started to believe is something akin to an addiction.Chloe Hamilton is a freelance journalist Continue reading...

The weekend promises a heap of drama in the NFC as the 14-3 Vikings meet LA, while in the AFC a pair of underdogs attempt to stage heistsWhat the Chargers need to do to win: The league's stingiest defense cannot afford the complacency that allowed Tampa Bay to rain 40 points down on them in December. The Chargers' stats look good - they gave up the fewest touchdowns (31) in the regular season, including 18 on 39 red-zone drives, a league-leading efficiency mark of 46% - but would be even better without a few aberrations. Handily, the away day will not faze them considering their 6-3 record on the road this season. LA should take care of an underpowered Houston offense if they can forget about their wildcard shocker against Jacksonville two years ago. Continue reading...

Populist trolling thrives on the oxygen of publicity. It's on all of us - media and voters - to start looking awayEven more than other forms of politics, populism needs an audience. Populist politicians want to be famous personalities, to make attention-getting claims and promises, to create new national myths. Like other ambitious but less ideological entertainers, they want their act to be widely noticed, and then requested again and again. Without a receptive audience, populism can just seem cranky and simplistic - little different from fringe political movements down the ages.In Britain, the US and many other democracies from India to Argentina, populism's current dominant variant is rightwing, and much of its intended audience is the rightwing media. Conservative commentators, reporters and public intellectuals are constantly required to amplify populism's messages and help maintain the public profiles of its leading figures. With only five Reform UK MPs, Nigel Farage needs the Tory press - just as the Tory press needs him, with rightwing politics in Britain otherwise at a low ebb.Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Satellite pictures reveal scale of destruction from the Pacific Palisades and Eaton fires in LA

Donald Trump Jr came here, but I sometimes wonder if the world knows anything about us. Our dream is independenceThe news that Donald Trump Jr was about to visit Nuuk felt like a flashback to almost six years ago, when his father, Donald Trump, famously floated the idea of buying Greenland. At the time, I had just moved back to Nuuk after finishing film school in Denmark. I remember working on the production of a segment for a travel series by the comedian Conan O'Brien. He came to Nuuk to film an episode poking fun at the idea of Trump buying us.This time, there's no late-night comedian in sight, and the next president of the United States has just refused to rule out using military force to take control of my country. Instead of poking fun at the latest US intervention, I found myself in my kitchen with four other women, planning a demonstration against Denmark's practice of removing Inuit children from their families. Continue reading...

His mother says he was groomed by drug gangsters despite her attempts to get help. Let his death spark fresh debate about how we care for vulnerable peopleThe last time Mary Bokassa saw her 14-year-old son alive was around lunchtime, on his first day back to school after Christmas. She had no way of knowing that within an hour and a half, her child would be dead, stabbed 12 times on a bus in broad daylight in Woolwich, south London.And yet, as his mother explained in a bleak and haunting interview, his death was a shock but not a surprise. Her son Kelyan had been targeted by gang members trying to recruit him since he was six, she told the BBC: I tried to prevent it. I've tried so many, so many times. I screamed it, I said, My son is going to be killed.'" But the family hadn't, she said, got the help they needed. She had fought for her little boy and she had lost, and there is something about the starkness with which she said it that will have stopped parents across the country in their tracks.Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

The World Sports Photography Awards are the only global awards for sport photography and are designed to recognise and celebrate incredible sports images and the photographers who take them. More than 2,200 professional sports photographers from over 96 countries submitted more than 13,000 images across the 24 categories to this year's competition, which all tell compelling stories of the emotion, passion, athleticism and focus that are at the heart of sport Continue reading...

The Los Angeles fire department has issued another mandatory evacuation order for a new brushfire, named the Kenneth fire. Law enforcement officials are also working to issue a curfew for affected burn zones in Los Angeles, in order to combat looting, though it is unclear when it will go into effect. Continue reading...

This blog has now closed. Our new California fires live blog is here and you can read our full report on the Californian blazes here.

Burned areas cover more than 30,000 acres of LA and teams search for casualties as fires continue to rage

Injunction barring the release of Jack Smith's report remains in place for at least three more daysA federal appeals court on Thursday rejected an attempt to block special counsel Jack Smith from releasing his final report into the two federal criminal cases he brought against Donald Trump but, crucially, did not lift a temporary injunction that prevents it from becoming public.The order from the US court of appeals for the 11th circuit means the injunction imposed by the US district judge Aileen Cannon who handled the president-electTrump's prosecution on charges of mishandling classified documents will remain in place for at least three more days. Continue reading...

Where once kids played and a California neighborhood gathered, the land is now devastated by a ferocious fireIn Los Angeles' Pacific Palisades neighborhood, street after street is laden with carnage that tells part of the story of the ferocious firestorm that swept through the area over the last two days.Buckled trees and telephone poles are strewn across roads, their piled branches and hanging wires a testimony to the winds that whipped the flames. Intersections are flooded with water, even after the loss of water pressure hampered efforts during the harrowing firefight. Mansions lining the yellow beaches hollowed out, homes in the neighborhoods' canyons reduced to dust. Continue reading...

Drone footage from Altadena captured the devastation of the fires that have burned through the area. Across Los Angeles county, fast-moving wildfires, fanned by hurricane-force winds, have destroyed 2,000 homes, forced nearly 180,000 people to evacuate and left at least five people dead in the last two days. The Los Angeles county sheriff has warned that the death toll is likely to rise as teams search burned areas

Fire crews are facing dire challenges, hurdles that have intensified the fires and are complicating the responseAs multiple fires rage around the Los Angeles basin, the 7,500 fire and emergency personnel on the ground are facing unprecedented conditions.At least five LA residents have been killed, and the death count is expected to rise as responders search burned areas. At least 10,000 structures have been destroyed, and several of the five blazes are still burning out of control. Continue reading...

Bryant was Miss Oklahoma and Florida Citrus spokesperson before leading anti-LGBTQ+ Save Our Children' campaignAnita Bryant, a multi-Grammy nominated singer and former Miss Oklahoma who later became a high-profile campaigner against gay rights in America, has died at the age of 84.In an announcement on Thursday, Bryant's family announced that Bryant died at her home in Edmond, Oklahoma, on 16 December 2024. May Anita's memory and her faith in eternal life through Christ comfort all who embraced her," her family said. Continue reading...

Jimmy Carter's six-day farewell to the US nation culminated on Thursday morning with a eulogy from President Joe Biden on faith and character, as the 39th president received a state funeral at Washington National Cathedral. During the service, Biden said he was perhaps the first senator to endorse Carter for president. He highlighted how Carter had seen challenges well into the future' and taught him the power of morality. Jimmy Carter's friendship taught me ... that strength of character is more than title or the power we hold,' Biden said. It's the strength to understand that everyone should be treated with dignity, respect, that everyone, and I mean everyone, deserves an even shot'

This live blog is now closed. You can read our dispatch from the funeral here:

Memorial service heard of humility and integrity amid a hyper-partisan, smash-mouth political landscape of 2025

More than 170,000 people have been evacuated as firefighters battle flames across five areas of the Californian city. The largest fire, in Pacific Palisades, west of Santa Monica, left a trail of devastation, with hundreds of homes and buildings destroyed. In a preliminary death toll, officials said five people had died as a result of the fires

Five living presidents gathered at the service in Washington. They were a reminder of how much has changed in US politicsHeavy with honours, attended by all living US presidents, and swathed in public affection, JimmyCarter received a solemn state funeral on Thursdayon the kind of cold and crystalline Januaryday atwhich Washington DC's climate can excel. Within hours, though, the 39th US president's remains were interredin a private ceremony alongside his wife Rosalynn, in the shadow of the modest house they built in 1961 in Plains, Georgia, where Mr Carter was born more than a century ago, and where he died at theend of December.This sharp juxtapositions of Mr Carter's final day in the world's eye were somehow appropriate. He made his home in Washington for the four years of his presidency, but his roots and heart were always in Georgia. His manifest personal decency and lack of Beltway experience made him the not-Nixon" that the US needed after Watergate. Yet after a presidency marked by spiralling oil prices and the Iran hostage debacle, America quickly turned to a not-Carter" candidate in the shape of Ronald Reagan.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Physicians call Kennedy dangerous' and point to harmful conspiracy theories about vaccines and scienceMore than 15,000 doctors have signed a letter circulated by the Committee to Protect Health Care in opposition to Donald Trump's nominee for secretary of health and human services, Robert F Kennedy Jr.As physicians who care deeply about the health and safety of our patients and communities, we are appalled by Donald Trump's reckless decision to appoint Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS)," the letter states. Continue reading...

World leaders and luminaries were in Washington DC to pay respects to the former US president. After the state funeral, Carter's remains will return to Plains, Georgia Continue reading...

Service marks end of 39th president's lying in state at ceremony attended by all five living presidents

Wildfires have been burning around Los Angeles for two days, killing at least five people and destroying almost 2,000 homes and buildings. A powerful windstorm fanned the flames in the Pacific Palisades neighbourhood, prompting thousands to flee. Drone footage from one of the neighbourhoods shows rows of houses completely destroyed.

Rise in abortions and patients from states such as Texas show how access has shifted since Roe's overturningKansas providers performed a historic number of abortions in 2023 - and most of them were performed on out-of-state residents - in a sign of just how much the 2022 overturning of Roe v Wade has rewritten the map of abortion access and led women to flee their home states for the procedure.More than 19,000 abortions took place in Kansas in 2023, a 58% increase from 2022, according to a recent report from the Kansas department of health and environment. Of those, roughly 4,300 abortions were performed on Kansas residents, while about 15,000 were done on out-of-state residents. Continue reading...

PJ Lechleitner says president absolutely' could have acted earlier and expects a lot more support' from TrumpThe outgoing director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, PJ Lechleitner, claims President Joe Biden absolutely" should have acted sooner to tighten security at the US and Mexico border to reduce the flow of migrants into the US, according to an interview with NBC News.Lechleitner became the acting director of Ice in July 2023 and his departure comes ahead of President-elect Donald Trump taking office on 20 January. Continue reading...

Wildfires have been burning around Los Angeles for two days, killing at least five people and destroying almost 2,000 homes and other buildings. The blaze has forced the evacuation of more than 130,000 people and spread to the hills above Hollywood Boulevard. As firefighters battled five separate blazes, the White House announced that Joe Biden had cancelled his final overseas trip of his presidency, to Italy, to focus on directing the federal response to the fires. Timelapse footage taken from the surrounding mountains shows the speed at which the flames have spread because of high winds.

US defense secretary says Ukraine's fight matters to all' when revealing aid bundle days before Trump's returnThe Biden administration has given its final injection of military support to Ukraine, unveiling a $500m weapons package just days before Donald Trump's return to the White House threatens to upend western backing for Kyiv.The aid bundle - including air defense missiles and F-16 fighter jet equipment - was announced on Thursday by outgoing US defense secretary Lloyd Austin during a summit at Germany's Ramstein air base. Continue reading...

Santa Ana winds, drought and a hotter planet have helped exacerbate the fires in California

Disgraced ex-congressman requested a few more months to come up with half a million dollars in court finesThe disgraced former congressman George Santos, facing a federal prison sentence, has won a few months' freedom to come up with more than half a million dollars in court fines - including revenue from his new podcast.A New York judge on Wednesday granted the Republican's request to delay his 7 February sentencing after he pleaded guilty this summer to federal fraud and identity theft charges. Continue reading...

A fast-moving fire broke out in the hills above Hollywood Boulevard and threatened some of Los Angeles' most recognisable tourist spots as firefighters battled to gain control over two other major blazes that killed five people, put 130,000 people under evacuation orders and ravaged communities from the Pacific coast to the inland city of Pasadena

DEI refers to three simple but important words: diversity, equity and inclusion. These three values are indispensableIf the US wants to achieve economic growth, empower the best talent and have a fair and just society for all, it must embrace diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Otherwise, we can simply devolve into a backsliding democracy ruled by a billionaire class that pillages our wealth as it divides us through manufactured culture wars.On cue, conservatives are blaming DEI for the devastating fires currently ravaging California and for a recent terror attack in New Orleans committed by a US citizen. Continue reading...