Berlin dismisses secretary of state's criticism over AfD designation; nine pro-Palestinian activists arrested at Swarthmore College - key US politics stories from Saturday 3 May at a glanceGermany's foreign ministry has pushed back after Marco Rubio criticised the country's decision to designate the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) party a confirmed rightwing extremist" force incompatible with its constitution.This is democracy," the ministry said in a post on X, adding that the courts would have the final say and that we have learnt from our history that rightwing extremism needs to be stopped". The US secretary of state had called the move tyranny in disguise". Continue reading...

Some students were also temporarily suspended as other colleges respond with disciplinary action to protestsOn the morning of 3 May, the Swarthmore borough police department disbanded a four-day pro-Palestinian encampment on Swarthmore College's campus and arrested nine activists.The demonstration calling on the college to divest from the tech company Cisco due to its ties to the Israeli government was a rare uprising in an academic year where higher-education institutions have been quick to quash them. One current and one former Swarthmore College student were among those arrested, while the rest were from outside the college community, the college's president, Valerie Smith, said in a statement. Continue reading...

After an earlier ruling raised hopes of getting VoA back on air, an appeals court sided with the Trump administrationA federal appeals court has foiled a plan to return more than 1,000 Voice of America (VoA) workers to their desks after an earlier court ruling granted a temporary stay on Donald Trump's executive order dismantling the US taxpayer-funded news service for overseas listeners. Now it seems unlikely that broadcasters will return to work until the case has been resolved by the courts.A Saturday ruling by a divided DC circuit court panel essentially decided that the courts must defer to the executive branch on employment matters. Judges Neomi Rao and Gregory Katsas - both Trump appointees - found that the lower court likely did not have jurisdiction to order the employees back to work. Their ruling paused the part of the lower court order requiring the administration take all necessary steps to return USAGM employees and contractors to their status prior" to the executive order. Continue reading...

Max Verstappen produced a stunning flying lap to secure his second consecutive pole at the Miami GPThere was rain a bit earlier, which doesn't sound very Miami, but there it is. This being a street circuit there is of course a fair chance of red flags during qualifying if anyone comes a cropper on a hot lap.Those helpful explanatory words courtesy of the official F1 website, just if anyone wanted to know how qualifying actually works. Which, I am not going to lie to you here, I did. Continue reading...

State becomes 16th to allow public funds to be used for private schools, which opponents say will benefit mostly wealthier childrenThe Texas governor Greg Abbott on Saturday signed a law making more than 5 million students eligible to use state funds for private schools, a watershed moment in the conservative campaign to remake public education in the US.Texas is allocating $1bn for the first two years of the program to offer parents vouchers to pay for school. It is the 16th state to make all students eligible to receive public funds for private education. Continue reading...

Billionaire shocked audience of investors with disclosure and said his vice-chair, Greg Abel, should take overWarren Buffett, the billionaire investor and philanthropist, has announced his intention to retire at the end of this year. He is 94 years old.Buffett, the fifth richest person in the world, shocked an arena full of shareholders on Saturday when he announced that he would step down as the CEO and chair of the trillion-dollar conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway at the end of 2025. He will recommend to the 11-person board that his vice-chair, Greg Abel, who currently oversees most of the company's investments, be named as his successor, Buffett said. Continue reading...

Far-right German party was labeled a confirmed rightwing extremist group' by country's domestic intelligence serviceGermany's foreign ministry has hit back at the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, following his criticism of Germany's decision to label the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland party as a confirmed rightwing extremist group".On Thursday, Rubio took to X and wrote: Germany just gave its spy agency new powers to surveil the opposition. That's not democracy - it's tyranny in disguise. What is truly extremist is not the popular AfD - which took second in the recent election - but rather the establishment's deadly open border immigration policies that the AfD opposes." Continue reading...

When an irresistible force (Saudi Arabia's boxing program) met an immovable object (the New York Police Department), the immovable object prevailedOn 2 May, Turki al-Sheikh (chairman of the Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority and the architect of his country's Riyadh Season boxing program) planted a flag in Times Square with a fight card styled FATAL FURY: City of the Wolves".Fatal Fury is a combat video game. The Times Square event was presented by SNK Corporation (the game's developer) and The Ring (now owned by Al-Sheikh) with Golden Boy (Oscar De La Hoya's promotional company) as the lead promoter. Given the dangers inherent in boxing, Fatal Fury" is a questionable name for a fight card. But SNK underwrote much of the cost of the promotion and was its primary sponsor. Continue reading...

From the local sports team to local businesses, Saginaw is intimately intertwined with its northern neighborThere are few entities that embody the close, fraternal ties between the US and Canada quite like the Saginaw Spirit junior ice hockey team.In a place whose fortunes have been more down than up in recent decades, the Dow Event Center hockey arena in Saginaw, Michigan, comes alive with more than 5,000 fans once these young stars take to the ice. A huge banner depicting the players adorns the main street into the city. Continue reading...

Custodians of global wealth have reacted with anger at attempts by people like Trump and Truss to revolutionise the economyYou say you want a revolution, sang the Beatles back in 1968. And that seems to be the interpretation of electoral results across the industrialised world.From the seismic shifts in recent US and German elections to the rise of Reform and the Green party in the UK, electorates are signalling that they reject the status quo. Continue reading...

Reginald, a great dane, and Pearl, a chihuahua, met after winning their respective Guinness World Records categoriesA playdate between the world's tallest and smallest living dogs went the way of most dog park encounters despite the 3ft (0.91-meter) height difference - lots of tail wagging, sniffing and scampering.Reginald, a seven-year-old great dane from Idaho, and Pearl, a chihuahua from Florida, are both certified winners in their respective height titles by Guinness World Records. The fact that Reginald is the size of a small horse and Pearl is as small as an apple didn't stop them from getting along famously. Continue reading...

The Freedom to Learn campaign included panels and coffee meetups and will end Saturday with a protest and prayerA coalition of civil rights groups have launched a weeklong initiative to condemn Donald Trump's attacks on Black history, including recent executive orders targeting the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) in Washington DC.The national Freedom to Learn campaign is being led by the African American Policy Forum (AAPF), a social justice thinktank co-founded by the law professor Kimberle Crenshaw. Crenshaw is a leading expert on critical race theory (CRT), a framework used to analyze racism's structural impact. She has fought against book bans, restraints on racial history teaching and other anti-DEI efforts since the beginning of the Republican-led campaign against CRT in 2020. Continue reading...

I have a suggestion for conspiracy theorists: instead of searching for secret plots, why not grapple with some very clear facts?Last weekend the terrible news broke that Virginia Giuffre, one of the most prominent victims of the disgraced US financier Jeffrey Epstein, had died by suicide. Conspiracy theorists immediately started circling. A tweet from 2019, in which Giuffre said she wasn't suicidal, was dredged up. Donald Trump Jr, the president's eldest failson, then amplified the theory to his millions of followers, adding that other than the Clinton's [sic] no one has more suiciding going on".Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Exclusive: Insiders sound alarm over catastrophic' impact of widespread departures and cuts under TrumpA catastrophic" exodus of thousands of employees from the US Department of Labor threatens all of the core aspects of working life", insiders have warned, amid fears that the Trump administration will further slash the agency's operations.The federal agency has already lost about 20% of its workforce, according to employees, as nearly 2,700 staff took retirement, early retirement, deferred resignation buyouts or fork in the road" departures earlier this year. Continue reading...

A new lawsuit seeks to examine ransom notes linked to the 1932 kidnap and murder of the transatlantic aviator's sonHL Mencken, the prominent journalist and critic, once called it the greatest story since the Resurrection". Though it has been 93 years since the Lindbergh baby kidnapping case merged crime, fame and mass media together, the enduring mystery of the crime still holds fascination for many in the US.The case was shocking. The transatlantic aviator Charles Lindbergh and his wife Anne Morrow Lindbergh suffered the kidnapping and murder of their 20-month-old baby son on 1 March 1932. Now a new lawsuit filed in New Jersey - where the crime played out - seeks to force the state police to allow mitochondrial DNA testing on envelopes used to send a series of ransom notes. Continue reading...

While many are outraged over the chaos, others have embraced some policies promised on the campaign trailI'm not a fan of Trump, but he's delivering a long-overdue kick in the pants to the bloated bureaucracy of the US federal government," said Martyn, a marketing executive from California. Seems odd to ask Trump to focus on eliminating corruption, but sometimes you need a crook to catch a crook. It's been, however, way more chaotic than I thought was possible."Martyn was among thousands of Americans who shared with the Guardian how they felt about the first weeks of Donald Trump's second term, painting a picture of voters who felt disoriented and maximally alarmed on one side, and exhilarated, hopeful or positively surprised on the other. Continue reading...

The Encampments tells the story of campus activism last year. But Palestinian films are facing intimidation campaignsRecently, The Encampments opened at the Angelika Film Center in New York to a record-setting box office for an independent film - along with a storm of controversy. For us, as the distributor, the atmosphere was far from celebratory. The theater was forced to hire additional security, notify police and prepare staff for harassment in response to protests and threats from people who hadn't even seen the film.What is so dangerous about Palestinian films? Continue reading...

The president's little used social media platform offers him a forum for his nonstop haranguing and score-settlingNo political leader has used social media quite like Donald Trump. But his recent posts on Truth Social, the social media platform he founded in 2021, have become increasingly bizarre: the president using the lack of scrutiny afforded by the platform's small user base to truly let loose.In the hundreds of Truths" since he took office, Trump has variously used Truth Social to reimagine himself as a king and to urge Americans to BE COOL!" as the stock market tanked in the wake of his trade war, the president's seemingly random use of capital letters, punctuation and inaccurate spelling consistent across the messages. Continue reading...

The act of labelling journalists foreign agents' is deliberately chilling. On World Press Freedom Day, be aware of the peril involved in seeking the truthLast month, Georgian president Mikheil Kavelashvili approved a new law inflicting criminal charges, including prison sentences and fines, on any organisation or individual who fails to comply with the country's foreign influence" bill.The news didn't trouble the front pages of the international press and went largely unnoticed, but it marks a significant inflection point in the decline of global press freedom. Continue reading...

Growth in the first three months was challenged by Trump's overhaul plans, and execution of his tariffs created widespread confusion and uncertaintyDonald Trump promised to usher in a new golden age" for the US economy - one with lower prices, more jobs and greater wealth. This week, his first quarter report card came in, and the new age is off to a chaotic start.Gross domestic product (GDP) shrank for the first time in three years during the first quarter, abruptly turning negative after a spell of robust growth as trade distortions and weaker consumer spending dampened activity. Continue reading...

Saudi Arabia's extension of its soft power through sport reached into the heart of New York City on Friday night with a grandiose boxing card for a select audience backed by Turki al-Sheikh, the chairman of the Kingdom's General Entertainment Authority

Today is World Press Freedom Day. The Guardian is determined to highlight the dangers faced by reporters working in some of the world's most perilous places, and to tell their storiesSupport the GuardianThere is a war on journalists raging across the world. Last year, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) recorded the highest number of media workers killed since it began collecting data three decades ago.According to that data, at least 124 journalists and media workers were killed in 2024 - nearly two-thirds of them Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in Gaza and the West Bank. Continue reading...

CIA to lose 1,200 while NSA among other agencies reported to face downsizing amid president's drive to shrink federal workforceThe White House plans to cut staffing at the Central Intelligence Agency by 1,200 positions while other intelligence agencies including the National Security Agency will also shed thousands of jobs, the Washington Post has reported.A person familiar with the plan confirmed the changes to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity. Continue reading...

Judge rules Perkins Coie executive order violates constitution; Trump administration asks supreme court to lift block on Doge accessing data. This blog is now closed.The seeds were sown for yesterday's ousting of Mike Waltz as national security adviser long before Signalgate", notes Politco.The outlet reports that his approach to the job was unpopular and Waltz was seen as too cocky. One person close to the White House said:He's a staff, but he was acting like a principal.Waltz has been on thin ice for a while. [Signalgate] made the ice thinner but at the same time ... may actually save him for now because they don't want to give [Jeffrey] Goldberg a scalp. Continue reading...

US district judge Beryl Howell says order violates first, fifth and sixth amendments and permanently blocks itA federal judge on Friday permanently struck down Donald Trump's executive order that targeted the firm Perkins Coie, which once worked with his 2016 presidential election rival Hillary Clinton, after declaring in an extraordinary ruling that the order was unconstitutional and unlawful.The decision from the US district judge Beryl Howell, which criticized virtually every aspect of the order in a 102-page opinion, marks a major victory for Perkins Coie and could be used as a model by other judges weighing cases brought by other law firms in similar orders. Continue reading...

Military spending plans would also see $163bn cuts in non-defense spending - key US politics stories from Friday 2 May at a glanceThe Trump administration is considering cuts worth $163bn to departments including health and education as well as environmental schemes while increasing spending on defense, according to a White House budget blueprint.In contrast to the squeeze on discretionary social programmes, the administration is planning a 13% rise - to more than $1tn - in the Pentagon budget, a commitment at odds with Donald Trump's frequent vows to end the US's involvement in forever wars" in the Middle East and elsewhere. Continue reading...

Joseph Czuba, 73, killed Muslim boy and severely injured his mother in vicious attack days after war in Gaza beganAn Illinois landlord who killed a six-year-old Muslim boy and severely injured his mother in a vicious hate-crime attack days after the war in Gaza began was sentenced on Friday to 53 years in prison.Joseph Czuba, 73, was found guilty in February of murder, attempted murder and hate-crime charges in the death of Wadee Alfayoumi and the wounding of his mother, Hanan Shaheen. Continue reading...

Real-life anguish or confected entertainment? One thing is clear - the soap opera endures because millions still love to watch itWell, isn't this a plot turn? You switched on for the latest cinematic episode of Prince Harry fights the fight - not against the Mirror this time, not against Murdoch either, but against those who have stripped him of his security protection - and then the script goes to places that no one expected.He loses his legal challenge in the court of appeal over the degree of security he is entitled to on the public purse while in the UK - that was pretty much expected. But then, in the second instalment of Britain's longest-running potboiler, he exclusively opens an anguished heart to the BBC, post the appeal court verdict, and all sorts of dramatic twists ensue.Hugh Muir is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Education, health, climate and more on chopping block and 13% rise - to over $1tn to Pentagon - in skinny budget'Donald Trump is proposing huge cuts to social programmes like health and education while planning substantial spending increases on defence and the Department of Homeland Security, in a White House budget blueprint that starkly illustrates his preoccupation with projecting military strength and deterring migration.Cuts of $163bn on discretionary non-defence spending would also see financial outlays slashed for environmental and renewable energy schemes, as well as for the FBI, an agency Trump has claimed was weaponised against him during Joe Biden's presidency. Spending reductions are also being projected for the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Continue reading...

Plans for a large military parade coinciding with the president's 79th birthday would likely cost tens of millions

President says neither NPR nor PBS presents fair, accurate or unbiased portrayal of current events'Donald Trump has signed an executive order that seeks to cut public funding for National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service, accusing them of leftwing bias.The order, signed late on Thursday, directs the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which sends funds to NPR and PBS, to cease federal funding" for the two outlets. Continue reading...

Live, rolling coverage of business, economics and financial markets as the FTSE nets its longest-ever winning run, Amazon's Bezos to sell stock worth up to $4.75bn; US employment figures higher than expectedEurozone unemployment was steady 6.2% in March - unchanged relative to a revised February reading.The youth unemployment rate was 14.2%, down from 14.3% in the previous month. Continue reading...

Former pardon attorney Liz Oyer said president erased more than $1bn in debts owed by wealthy Americans'The justice department's pardon attorney, who was recently fired, has claimed on social media that Donald Trump's recent wave of pardoning white-collar criminals has erased more than $1bn in debts owed by wealthy Americans" to the public purse.In a TikTok video, Liz Oyer, who has said that she was terminated in March after refusing to comply with an order to restore the gun rights of the actor Mel Gibson - a supporter of Trump's - explained that when you're convicted of a financial crime like fraud or embezzlement, the law requires you to pay back the money that you stole. It's called restitution." Continue reading...

Americans are beginning to worry about their future amid a shrinking economy, warnings of empty shelves - and the president's failed promisesHe says it's the best 100-day start of any president in history", but you can file that along with his boast about crowd sizes and his claim to have won the 2020 election. In truth, the first three months of Donald Trump's second presidency have been calamitous on almost every measure. The single biggest achievement of those 100 days has been to serve as a warning of the perils of nationalist populism, which is effective in winning votes but disastrous when translated into reality. That warning applies across the democratic world - and is especially timely in Britain.Start with the numbers that matter most to Trump himself. A slew of polls appeared this week, but they all told the same story: that Trump's approval ratings have collapsed, falling to the lowest level for a newly installed president in the postwar era. He has now edged ahead of his only rival for that title: himself. The previous low watermark for a president three months in was set by one Donald Trump in 2017. Continue reading...

Despite plunging opinion polls, for those attending a campaign-style rally in Michigan the president is deliveringIn Trump they trust. While pundits and protesters have called it 100 days of hell, talk to Donald Trump's most faithful supporters and you will hear them use words such as amazing", fantastic" and ecstatic" about his presidency.The Trump base, that amorphous group that has long intrigued pollsters, remains rock solid in its support for the 78-year-old and quite ingenious in finding new ways to eulogise his leadership. Continue reading...

Heidy Sanchez says she was told her 17-month-old, who has health problems and is breastfeeding, couldn't go with herA mother deported to Cuba reportedly had to hand over her 17-month-old daughter to a lawyer while her husband, a US citizen, stood outside unable to say goodbye.Heidy Sanchez was told she was being detained for deportation to Cuba when she turned up at her scheduled Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) check-in appointment in Tampa, Florida, last week. Continue reading...

Attorney general accused of targeting political foes, halting prosecutions and placing premium on loyalty to presidentDonald Trump's Department of Justice has taken radical steps to target his political foes, back a harsh agenda against undocumented immigrants and help business allies - steps which underscore its politicization under the attorney general Pam Bondi and undermine the rule of law, say ex-prosecutors and legal experts.Some even say that the department has in effect become Trump's personal law firm". Continue reading...

The country has exported a myth of progressivism. It's time to confront who we really areCanada has been canonized - safely, predictably.It's the great, grave story we've exported - retold in economic rankings, stitched into tourism ads, held up in classrooms and cable news panels. We're the cooler, mellower cousin nextdoor. The country that has it figured out. Where healthcare is universal, democracy is calm and diversity is politely managed.Whereas the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick have expressed their desire to be federally united into One Dominion under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland ... Continue reading...

Supreme court justice also spoke of White House's undermining of the constitution and rule of law

Mike Waltz, ousted national security adviser at heart of earlier chat group fiasco, pictured using third-party clonePhotographs taken at Donald Trump's cabinet meeting this week have revealed that top White House officials are now communicating using an even less secure version of the Signal messaging app than was at the center of a huge national security scandal last month.The images, taken by Reuters on Wednesday, show the phone screen of Mike Waltz, the since-ousted national security adviser who last month accidentally included a journalist in a group chat in which top US officials discussed operational plans to bomb Yemen, attacks that were then carried out as described. Continue reading...