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Promising young skaters also among those onboard as well as passengers from Germany, the Philippines and Russia

This liveblog is closed - please follow our new liveblog hereMultiple media including the New York Times, Reuters and CNN are saying the Black Hawk helicopter was carrying three soldiers. No senior army officials were onboard, they reported, citing US defence officials.Multiple sources are now saying that about 60 people were onboard the American Airlines plane that collided with the helicopter. Continue reading...

An American Airlines passenger jet with 64 onboard was coming in to land at Ronald Reagan National airport when it collided with a military helicopter

Recorders from plane are currently at National Transportation Safety Board labs for analysis, agency says

Bankrupt Roman Catholic archdiocese replaced members at church-affiliated non-profit over $16m disputeThe archbishop of New Orleans' bankrupt Roman Catholic archdiocese on Thursday abruptly fired and replaced top leaders at a church-affiliated food bank, with those dismissed saying it was because the non-profit refused to contribute to paying survivors of child sexual abuse by clergymen.The ousted members of Second Harvest's board of directors say the changes follow months of increasingly aggressive pressure placed on Second Harvest to contribute as much as $16m toward helping to resolve victims' claims related to the church's sexual abuse-related bankruptcy", which has been pending since May 2020. Continue reading...

Conservative New Orleans court ruling for people between 18 and 21 comes amid major shifts in firearm legal landscapeA conservative US appeals court on Thursday ruled that a ban on handgun sales to people between the ages of 18 and 21 violates the second amendment.The ruling, handed down by a panel of three judges on the fifth US circuit court of appeals in New Orleans, comes amid major shifts in the national firearm legal landscape following a landmark US supreme court decision that expanded gun rights in 2022. Continue reading...

Canada and Mexico draw plans to mitigate effect of duties Trump has threatened, possibly sparking a trade war

Former chief resigned 10 days ago, after Elon Musk, a close adviser to Donald Trump, called for him to quit

Hours after the Washington plane crash, the president's desire to politicise tragedy was breathtaking in its audacity

Skeptical senators ruthlessly questioned Trump's national intelligence director nominee ahead of confirmation vote

Key Trump ally strives to extricate himself from statements he had made earlier, claiming mischaracterization'Kash Patel sought to allay concerns about his fitness to serve as the FBI director at his Senate confirmation hearing on Thursday, but declined to engage with questioning that explicitly asked whether he would use his position to investigate some of Donald Trump's top political opponents.The hearing revolved around Patel's provocative public remarks attacking the FBI and his ability to resist political pressure from the White House, a topic that has come to the fore with the justice department rocked by the ouster of prosecutors who worked on cases against Trump. Continue reading...

More flights, staffing shortages and mounting safety questions may have played a role in deadly air collision

Non-profit alleges Grants Pass shelters are inaccessible and that many have no legal option for their continued survival'The small Oregon city at the heart of a major US supreme court ruling last year that allowed cities across the country to fine and jail unhoused people sleeping outside is facing a fresh lawsuit over its anti-camping rules.Disability Rights Oregon sued Grants Pass on Thursday, accusing it of violating a state law requiring cities' camping regulations to be objectively reasonable". Continue reading...

Advocates report harassment and loss of gender-affirming care as trans women face transfers to men's prisonsTransgender women incarcerated in federal prisons have been placed in isolation, told they will be transferred to men's prisons and advised they will lose access to gender-affirming medical treatments in response to Donald Trump's executive order defending women from gender ideology extremism", according to civil rights advocates and people behind bars.LGBTQ+-rights lawyers say the moves will have major consequences for the health and safety of trans people in federal custody, and blatantly violate federal laws and a range of constitutional protections. Continue reading...

Three-week-old program to curb vehicle emissions received approval from Biden administration, which Trump may pullDonald Trump's administration is reportedly considering putting a stop to New York City's three-week-old congestion pricing program, which aims to curb emissions from auto vehicles.The program received crucial federal approval from the Biden administration last year. Trump's transportation department is weighing the possibility of pulling that authorization, the New York Times reported, which would probably incite a legal battle between state and federal officials and could put a stop to the program. Continue reading...

More than 60 people are believed to have died after an American Airlines regional passenger jet collided with a US army helicopter

Trump's health secretary pick transferred ownership of Maha slogan application to anti-vaccine ally Del BigtreeRobert F Kennedy Jr, the anti-vaccine activist and conspiracy theorist nominated for US health secretary by Donald Trump, recently applied to trademark his own Make America Healthy Again" slogan for use in marketing potential products including food supplements, vitamins, essential oils - and vaccines.Documentation filed with the Office of Government Ethics lists $100,000 earned from a licensing agreement to use Maha brand marks". Continue reading...

Two new bills could secure higher pay and add support, but advocates say they're only the beginning of reforms neededFirefighters from across the US fought side by side to quell the firestorm in Los Angeles this month, working tirelessly together in dangerous and chaotic conditions. But there was one glaring difference among them: federal firefighters are paid just a fraction of what state and local crews make doing the same work.It's a problem that's long plagued the federal crews who play a crucial role in protecting the country when catastrophes unfold. Continue reading...

The president wants to detain thousands of people at a site that is notorious for its secrecy and history of abuseIt has been denounced as America's gulag": a secretive, abuse-ridden Caribbean prison camp for terror suspects that Donald Rumsfeld once said contained the worst of the worst".All of us have scars in our souls, deformities, from living at Guantanamo," a former Yemeni inmate recalled of his time at the notorious military detention facility in south-east Cuba. Continue reading...

Handover delayed by jostling crowd in Khan Younis, Gaza, with Netanyahu suspending release of Palestinian prisoners Middle East crisis - live updatesThree Israelis and five Thai citizens held in Gaza have been freed, as Donald Trump's Middle East envoy met hostages' relatives, reportedly telling them he was optimistic the ceasefire would hold to allow the return of all the living and the dead.The handover on Thursday of seven hostages in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, was delayed by a chaotic crowd surging towards the group, despite an escort of heavily armed militants, jostling and blocking their passage to waiting Red Cross vehicles. Continue reading...

Exchange between six governors and Senate minority leader exposes divisions in party over opposition approach

Sha'Nya Bennett, 23, gave birth to son Dallas in parking lot of doughnut chain during historic snowstormA newborn baby may not be able to eat doughnuts but one has been supplied with a year's worth of the treats after being born in the parking lot of a Krispy Kreme outlet in Alabama.Sha'Nya Bennett, 23, gave birth to her new son, Dallas, on Krispy Kreme property in Dothan, Alabama, on 22 January after a historic snowstorm prevented her and her partner, Keon Mitchell, Dallas's father, from reaching hospital in time. Continue reading...

More than 30 bodies reportedly recovered so far after American Airlines flight collides in midair with Black Hawk helicopter

At least 30 bodies were recovered from the Potomac River, local media reported, after a passenger jet collided with a military helicopter on Thursday. The American Airlines plane was carrying 64 people - 60 passengers and four crew members - and three service personnel were onboard the US army Black Hawk helicopter. All takeoffs and landings from Reagan national airport in Washington were halted as emergency services searched the river for survivors. The world champion Russian figure skaters Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov were confirmed to be on the passenger flight

Residents worry about leaving their homes, but many in the city are organizing legal aid, workshops and virtual servicesSome corners of Chicago have been unnervingly quiet this week.Residents who have lived in the city for decades without immigration documents have been worried about leaving their homes. Undocumented parents have been signing powers of attorney to ease custody issues if they are detained and separated from their children. Business owners are deputizing employees to take care of their affairs if anything happens. Continue reading...

NIH fellows say policy changes including funding freeze would severely limit' researchers' ability to do their workA union representing about 5,000 researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has issued a legally binding demand to bargain over Donald Trump's sweeping policy changes, including a funding freeze, a communications blackout and a staff travel ban.The NIH is the largest biomedical institution in the world, providing more than $40bn annually to fund health research, providing grants to more than 300,000 researchers at more thab 2,500 universities, medical schools and other research institutions globally, with nearly 6,000 scientists performing research in its own labs. Continue reading...

These new initiatives are not about shrinking the size of the federal government. They're about centralizing control in Trump's handsChaos on a huge scale.On Wednesday, Trump rescinded an order he had made late on Monday night that froze up to $3tn in federal grants and loans.Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His newest book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com Continue reading...

Democrats' current approach to political messaging is broken - and party leaders have no conception of how to fix itAs Donald Trump stood in the Capitol Rotunda last week, blundering his way through his second oath of office, online liberals were preoccupied with debating another matter: who will be the first Democrat to call Republicans the R-word? Setting aside the question of whether they should a term widely considered an ableist slur, that very debate was revealing, for a number of reasons.The former and now current president's narrow but nonetheless triumphant victory in November made clear that America's so-called wokeness movement" is in an advanced stage of decay. And if Trump's first week back in the White House serves as any indication, he intends to further accelerate the process.Peter Rothpletz is a freelance writer Continue reading...

To say the relationship is symbiotic is an understatement. Trump has the political power; Musk has endless moneyTwo men, two huge egos, two quests for endless amounts of power and money - joined, for now, in the pursuit of those common goals. That's the story behind the tight relationship between Donald Trump and Elon Musk, the billionaire who hangs out in the West Wing of the White House and has the ear of the president.But there are cracks in the facade of closeness, and - based on Trump's past intolerance for anything but total loyalty among his allies - one must wonder how long it will last. And should the bromance come apart, it is likely do so with a bang heard 'round the world.Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist writing on media, politics and culture Continue reading...

Confirmation hearing was a spectacle as Democrats tried to hold a mirror to nominee, only for him to step right throughRobert F Kennedy Jr's testimony was a through the looking glass" moment for some senators, as lawmakers questioned one of the nation's most influential vaccine critics for a job as the top US health official.The hearing was a testament to how quickly Republicans have integrated Make America Healthy Again" rhetoric into their own, lauding Kennedy, who was called a predator" only hours earlier in a letter by his own cousin, as the correct man to head the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Continue reading...

Abrupt decision to pause all foreign aid could exacerbate violence in region already struggling with organized crimeThe Trump administration's abrupt decision to immediately pause all US foreign aid programmes could exacerbate violence in Latin America, driving more migration from a region already struggling with the rise of organised crime, experts have warned.The world's largest aid provider by far, the US disbursed $1.5bn (1.2bn) to South American countries in the 2023 financial year, funding a broad range of projects, including humanitarian, military, environmental and economic aid. Continue reading...

With the Super Bowl on the horizon we pick the outstanding players, coaches and moments from the 2023 season in the NFLJosh Allen, QB, Buffalo Bills. Take your pick between transcendent quarterbacks: Allen or Lamar Jackson. Neither answer is wrong. I edge towards Allen here, for the sole reason that he hasn't won the award before. That's not right; it's not fair. But it's the only way to split the fine margins between the two. Continue reading...

There are rational explanations for the continent's muted response to US threats - but that's not how you deal with this presidentDonald Trump's antics over the past week have put paid to the refrain, often heard in Europe, that the president should be taken seriously but not literally". It turns out that Trump literally wants Greenland. He doubled down on his aggressive rhetoric in a raging 45-minute call with the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, a few days ago, threatening crippling tariffs unless she agreed to sell the autonomous territory to the US. In response to Denmark's sharp increase in military spending for the Arctic, including ships and drones, he derided Copenhagen's dog-sled" defences for Greenland, the world's largest non-continental island, which pale in comparison with the strength of the US military base there.The threat to take over the territory of a European country by force is something that Europeans now know all too well. Russia has repeatedly threatened east European countries, making good on those threats by invading Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine since 2014. Yet many Europeans are gobsmacked that such a threat is now coming from its greatest ally. Continue reading...

An American Airlines passenger jet collided with a military helicopter while landing at Ronald Reagan national airport near Washington DC. Video from an observation camera at the nearby Kennedy Center shows two sets of lights consistent with aircraft appearing to conjoin in a fireball. The American Airlines Flight 5342 departed from Wichita, Kansas, according to the FAA. According to American Airlines' website, the jet has a capacity for up to 65 passengers

This blog has now closed. Read our latest story hereTim Walz, the Minnesota governor and former Democratic vice-presidential nominee, argued that Donald Trump's federal funding freeze closely mirrors many of the proposals included in Project 2025.We were preparing for it. They wrote it out. If you go back and look at that now, you'll see this go step by step," Walz told MSNBC on Tuesday night. Continue reading...

The facility has in the past two decades been used to deal with prisoners accused of terrorism-related offences with few ever charged or convictedAs part of his administration's crackdown on illegal immigration, US president Donald Trump has announced that the United States will hold migrants at the notorious Guantanamo military detention facility in Cuba.Known primarily for holding suspects accused of terrorism-related offences, Trump ordered the preparation of a 30,000-person migrant facility" that he said would be used to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people." Continue reading...

The neighbourhood sure isn't what it used to be

Order asks agencies to explore ways to deport activists, including students with visas, who engaged in protestsDonald Trump has signed an executive order to combat antisemitism" that asks agencies to explore ways to deport pro-Palestinian activists, including student protesters.The US president's order instructs federal agencies to identify available civil and criminal authorities in order to combat antisemitism", specifically by deporting resident aliens - such as students with visas - who were found to have broken the law during protests. Continue reading...

Lawyers avert trial after reaching agreement on how money should be disbursed, two years after devastating fireA last-minute deal reached between lawyers representing victims of a deadly Hawaii wildfire has averted the need for a trial to determine how to split a $4bn settlement.The unusual trial had been expected to delve into difficult questions about survivors' losses. Some victims were ready to take the witness stand, while others submitted pre-recorded testimony, describing pain made all the more fresh by the recent destruction in Los Angeles. Continue reading...

Press secretary insists administration isn't backing down on fight to curb what they consider government waste

Democrats confront Trump's pick for health secretary over his seemingly contradictory statements

Robert F Kennedy Jr, Donald Trump's pick for health secretary, appeared to U-turn on previously made comments about the safety of vaccines and his views on abortion during Senate confirmation hearing. RFK Jr was grilled by senators, who put his previous comments back to him

Organizations find posts censored, removed or made difficult to find in days after Trump return to White HouseOver the last week, the accounts of some major organizations that help Americans find abortion pills had their Instagram posts censored, were removed or, at least one group said, became difficult to find through searching - a practice known as shadow-banning".Censorship of abortion-related content on social media is a longstanding issue. In the days and weeks after the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade in June 2022, several abortion rights groups had their Instagram and TikTok posts removed or accounts suspended, while Instagram and Facebook deleted the posts of users who mentioned abortion pills. Continue reading...

President signs executive order instructing preparation of facility to house 30,000 immigrants at US naval base in Cuba

Claim was first made in press conference, prompting Fox host to say condoms were also being used to bomb IsraelSpeaking at the White House on Wednesday, Donald Trump boasted that his administration had stopped $50m being sent to Gaza to buy condoms for Hamas", doubling down on a claim first made by his press secretary which appears to be contradicted by the facts.As the Guardian reported on Tuesday, a comprehensive report issued in September by the US Agency for International Development (USAid), not a penny of the $60.8m in contraceptive and condom shipments funded by the US in the past year went to Gaza. In fact, the accounting shows, there were no condoms sent to any part of the Middle East, and just one small shipment, $45,680 in oral and injectable contraceptives, was sent to the region, all of it distributed to the government of Jordan. Continue reading...

Democrat from New Jersey was found guilty in July on 16 charges including bribery and fraudThe Democratic former US senator Bob Menendez was sentenced in federal court on Wednesday to 11 years in prison over his 2024 conviction for taking bribes, including receiving gold bars in exchange for doing favors for Egypt and for New Jersey businessmen.Last year he also became the first former senator to be convicted of acting as a foreign agent. Continue reading...

Trump brought suit against firm over allegations in dossier written by Christopher Steele, but claim was thrown outDonald Trump has refused to pay 290,000 ($360,000) in legal fees after his English lawsuit against a private investigations firm was dismissed, a court in London has heard. Trump brought a data protection lawsuit against Orbis Business Intelligence over allegations in a dossier written by its co-founder, Christopher Steele, but his claim was thrown out in February last year.The Steele dossier alleged ties between Trump's 2016 election campaign and Russia as well as other salacious allegations, all of which Trump denied. Continue reading...

Government employees' union says offer pressures career workers to quit and will cause chaos in federal programsThe Trump administration has offered buyouts to almost all of the roughly 3 million people who work for the US government if they leave their jobs by 6 February, as the White House attempts to gut the civil service.The US office of personnel management (OPM), the government's human resources agency, sent an email to the entire federal workforce on Tuesday evening with four directives that it says Trump is mandating. They included a full-time return to the office for most employees. Continue reading...

President's move has convulsed Washington in a manner arguably unseen since the Saturday Night Massacre of 1973For its potential to provoke a constitutional crisis, Donald Trump's attempted freezing of trillions of dollars of federal funds - rescinded on Wednesday in what appeared to be a panicked retreat in the face of an angry backlash - evoked the darkest days of Watergate.Monday's memo from the White House office of management and budget (OMB) ordering a temporary pause" on a vast array of spending activities across the US federal government convulsed official Washington in a manner arguably unseen since the Saturday Night Massacre of 1973. Continue reading...