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If the vote is close, swing states will matter less than a few hundred thousand voters in the middle of the countryFor Joe Biden and Donald Trump, the road to the White House runs through battleground states clustered along the Great Lakes, and in the fast-growing sun belt" of the south. But if the election turns out to be extremely close, the two candidates' fortunes may hinge on a few hundred thousand voters clustered in a single congressional district in the middle of the country.This lesser-known front can be found in Nebraska, one of only two states in the country, along with Maine, that allocate a portion of their electoral votes by congressional district, rather than giving all of them to the winner of the state. Continue reading...

A Boston jury was unable to reach a verdict in the death of police officer John O'Keefe - now the city is readying for another trialIn the days since a jury failed to reach a verdict on charges against Karen Read, a 44-year-old financial analyst, there's been no shortage of her name in the headlines.She's been seen getting cozy with her married defense lawyer. The lead investigator has been relieved of duty for sending crude texts about her and searching her phone for nude photos. Police have said they are investigating a dead turtle left outside the family home of a blogger, aptly named Turtleboy. Continue reading...

Polling shows critical group unenthused about Biden and Trump - and moved by economy over abortionThe independent voter is the elusive prize in any election. This year, Democrats are hoping that widespread support for abortion rights will draw in women who might have previously shied away from the party.But polling shows that independent female voters, a critical group for any candidate, are particularly unenthused about the prospect of choosing between the same two guys who ran for election last time. Now, with some Democrats publicly mulling replacing Joe Biden in the wake of his catastrophic debate performance and Kamala Harris emerging as a possible heir apparent, a key question is whether a Harris-topped ticket would provide them with some much-needed excitement. Continue reading...

The New Maga Deal full of errors and omissions from former Trump adviser convicted of contempt of CongressIn a book due to be published a day before his release from prison this month, the former Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro praises Donald Trump's Maga movement - and claims to list errors and omissions that led to his four-month sentence for criminal contempt of Congress, for refusing to comply with a subpoena from the House January 6 committee.But Navarro makes striking errors and omissions of his own, including jarringly misidentifying Ashli Babbitt - the Trump supporter shot dead at the US Capitol who became a martyr to many on the far right - as a US marine corps veteran. Continue reading...

Actor to face court more than two years after death of cinematographer Halyna HutchinsAlec Baldwin is heading to trial on Tuesday on involuntary manslaughter charges in a case that will be closely watched by the entertainment industry, the news media, tabloids and legal experts.It has been a long road to trial since the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was fatally shot during production of the movie Rust on 21 October 2021, a rare deadly tragedy on set. Prosecutors in Santa Fe will have to overcome numerous hurdles to convince a jury of Baldwin's criminal negligence in the complex and unusual case, but criminal law scholars say the 66-year-old actor's previous comments could come back to haunt him. Continue reading...

The nurse's case shows the dangers of believing that women like her could not possibly commit murderWhy do so many people still think Lucy Letby is innocent? It's worth asking, because last week yet another blow was dealt to the theory. In a retrial of one of the charges against her, Letby was found to have attempted to murder another newborn baby, and handed a 15th life sentence.In the past 10 months, we have heard less about Letby: reporting has been restricted while the trial was going on. In the meantime, she has all but exhausted the appeals process; her second application was denied. In a ruling published last Tuesday, appeal court judges said none of her legal challenges was arguable, and that the criteria for fresh evidence had not been met.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk Continue reading...

As voters decide in the second round of elections today, the far right's shock success last week has left many asking what the future holds for the republicIn the past week, since Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN) stormed into its daunting lead in the first round of the French parliamentary elections, a menacing graffito has appeared in my neighbourhood inParis, on a busy street corner between the boulangerieand the wine shop. Written in black, in a clear and steady hand, it reads Les nerfs sont tendus, lesFachos seront pendus" - Nerves are being stretched, the fascists will be hung".As France has advanced towards the runoff second round of the elections, life has been quietly humming along in the quartier - Euro football matches in the cafes, shopping and commuting have all been as normal. But the graffito has always been there, an ominous backdrop to everyday life, a sinister threat and a warning about the tensions in France right now.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk Continue reading...

Not one senior party figure originally thought he had a prayer of leading them back into government in a single parliament, but now he bestrides a transformed political landscapeDavid Lammy likes to tell a story about sitting at his kitchen table with Sir Keir Starmer shortly after Labour's cataclysmic defeat at the 2019 election. Having ascertained that the other man intended to run for leader, Mr Lammy cautioned him that hauling Labour out of the abyss and back into contention for power would be a 10-year project". No,"came the sharp response from Sir Keir. I'm going to do it in five."Was he truly convinced that he had it in him to pull off what everyone else regarded as mission impossible? Or did he have to tell himself this because he knew he'd probably only get one crack at Number 10? As it turns out, he's taken his party from its most abject defeat since 1935 to a landslide victory, and pulled off that remarkable feat in a bit under five years, to become the 58th prime minister in our history and only the fourth Labour one to secure a parliamentary majority. Continue reading...

Manuel Ugarte scored the winning penalty as ten-man Uruguay eliminated Brazil after a horrible game in Las VegasThere's a lovely pre-match embrace between Uruguay manager Marcelo Bielsa and Brazil winger Raphinha, who worked together so thrillingly at Leeds United.With Vini Junior suspended, the only number 7 on the pitch is Uruguay's Nicolas de la Cruzm," writes Peter Oh. And there's no 77 in sight to slot in for a Vegas-style 777. For what it's worth, Araujo's 20 beats Brazil in blackjack." Continue reading...

Angie Craig of Minnesota asks Biden to step aside', as California governor stumps for president in Pennsylvania. This blog is now closed

Police say people had gathered at home in Florence for birthday party of 21-year-old son of homeownerFour people were killed and three others were wounded in an early Saturday shooting at a home in northern Kentucky, police said.The shooting suspect later died after fleeing the home and leading police on a vehicle pursuit that ended with the suspect's car falling into a ditch, police said. Continue reading...

Challenges include two wars and global inertia on the climate crisis as hard-right populists from France to the US flex their muscles David Lammy: Britain has to start reconnecting with a dangerous, divided world'More than two years after Russia invaded Ukraine, the conflict drags on. Ukrainian forces are depleted and they need foreign weapons. Support for Ukraine crosses most party lines in Europe, but if Donald Trump wins the US election and cuts or limits the flow of arms, Europe may struggle to fill the gap. Lammy will want to shore up public support, bolster European collaboration, and map out what resources the continent can collectively offer Ukraine if the US steps back. Continue reading...

Parkinson's expert at Walter Reed medical center has visited White House eight times since August 2023 - report

With a new government will come grown-up conversations about our colonial history's part in the acquiring of artefactsIt's liberating to sense how a government whose primary concern is not fighting culture wars might return a grown-up freedom to public debate. Adiscussion at the British Museum last week, Who owns the past?", could not, in this sense, have been more timely. The debate, which marked the arrival at the museum of Nicholas Cullinan, its new director, featured contributions from Mary Beard, David Olusoga, Rory Stewart and Munira Mirza about the issues faced by museums as they incorporate discussion of colonial history into their collections, and examine questions of ownership. Continue reading...

House Democratic leader reportedly schedules virtual meeting for Sunday as several members call for withdrawal

Yes, Biden had a bad debate - but so did Trump. The media is once again repeating the mistakes of 2016I am not usually one to offer diagnoses of people I've never met, but it does seem like the pundit class of the American media is suffering from severe memory loss. Because they're doing exactly what they did in the 2016 presidential race - providing wildly asymmetrical and inflammatory coverage of the one candidate running against Donald J Trump.They have become a stampeding herd producing an avalanche of stories suggesting Biden is unfit, will lose, and should go away, at a point in the campaign in which replacing him would likely be somewhere between extremely difficult and utterly catastrophic. They do this while ignoring something every scholar and critic of journalism knows well and every journalist should. As Nikole Hannah-Jones put it: As media we consistently proclaim that we are just reporting the news when in fact we are driving it. What we cover, how we cover it, determines often what Americans think is important and how they perceive these issues yet we keep pretending it's not so." They are not reporting that he is a loser; they are making him one. Continue reading...

The city just had its hottest June on record, with 175 possible heat deaths so far this year - an 84% increaseHeat-related deaths in hottest major US city have almost doubled compared with the same period last year, after Phoenix experienced its hottest ever June on record.The number of possible heat deaths reported by the Maricopa county medical examiner was 175 as of 29 June - a staggering 84% increase over the same period last year. Continue reading...

Witnesses say two young women, aged 17 and 18, went into rough seas during a stormTwo teenagers died while swimming at Coney Island beach in New York, police said.Police received an emergency call for a water rescue in the area of Stillwell Avenue and Boardwalk West at 8.10pm on Friday, the New York police department said. Continue reading...

With democracy at a moment of maximum peril, millions were pinning their hopes on the Democratic party as a last wall of defence - but the debate changed thatWith fear for our democracy, I dissent." So wrote supreme court justice Sonia Sotomayor in a minority opinion this week. She was far from alone in the view that, with Donald Trump threatening an imperial presidency", American democracy is at a moment of maximum peril.Millions are pinning their hopes on the Democratic party as the last wall of defence. Surely, they believed, Democrats would field their best and brightest led by a dynamic presidential candidate and demagogue slayer. Instead the party is offering 81-year-old Joe Biden and an internal civil war. Continue reading...

Decision that overturned convention of deference to federal agencies could upend regulations on tobacco, drugs and medical billsA supreme court decision that overturned the Chevron doctrine" could upend regulations on everything from tobacco to pharmaceuticals to surprise medical bills, experts told the Guardian.The 40-year-old legal framework, the Chevron doctrine, once directed courts to defer to the expertise of federal agencies, such as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Continue reading...

The presumptive Republican nominee has promised to give rightwing evangelical Christians what they want - and moreProject 2025" is nothing short of a 900-page blueprint for guiding Donald Trump's second term of office if he's re-elected.After the Heritage Foundation unveiled Project 2025 in April last year, when Trump was seeking the Republican nomination, he had no problem with it.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...

We implore voters not to turn their backs on our nation's history. Go out and defeat the far right in Sunday's voteFor the first time since the second world war, the far right is at the gates of power in France. As historians from differing political backgrounds who share an attachment to democratic values and the rule of law, we cannot remain silent in the face of an alarming prospect that we still have the capacity to resist.Despite a superficial makeover, the National Rally (RN) remains fundamentally the successor and heir of the National Front, founded in 1972 by people nostalgic for Vichy and French Algeria.This article first appeared in French in Le MondeDo 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...

Canada claimed a 4-3 penalty shootout win over Venezuela on Friday to reach the Copa America semi-finals for the first time after an absorbing contest finished 1-1.With the teams all square after five attempts each, Wilker Angel had his spot-kick saved by Maxime Crepeau in the shootout and Ismael Kone buried the winning penalty to send Canada through. Continue reading...

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The president blamed his debate performance on a bad cold, said he was in fine cognitive shape, and doubled down on staying in the race

In appearance aimed at quelling nascent rebellion among Democrats, Biden made no big gaffes, but reviews are mixed

Trump lawyer Will Scharf's claims of prosecuting violent criminals conflicts with his record of mundane actionsA lawyer on the legal team that argued in favor of a US supreme court ruling granting Donald Trump broad criminal immunity has inflated his credentials as a violent crime prosecutor in a political beauty contest aimed at wooing the former president's Maga supporters and becoming Missouri's attorney general.Will Scharf, who sat on the former's president's appellate team fighting charges of subversion brought by the special prosecutor Jack Smith, has burnished his crime-fighting credentials on his campaign literature as he seeks to unseat Missouri's sitting attorney general, Andrew Bailey, in a GOP primary next month. Continue reading...

Signs were hiding in plain sight well before the US presidential debate against Donald TrumpWarning signs of Joe Biden's decline were hiding in plain sight well before last month's calamitous US presidential debate performance against Donald Trump.But Biden had the perfect cover: a long history of verbal slips and other blunders that made it hard to blame his age alone. I am a gaffe machine," he admitted in December 2018 when asked about potential liabilities of his election campaign. Continue reading...

Filing asks Aileen Cannon to take scalpel to any charges considered official' acts that could not be prosecutedDonald Trump moved on Friday to capitalize on the US supreme court's decision to confer broad immunity to former presidents, asking the federal judge overseeing his criminal case for retaining classified documents to take a scalpel to any charges that were official" acts that could not be prosecuted.The supreme court this week held that former presidents enjoyed some immunity from criminal prosecution for certain conduct they undertook in office, which also meant evidence of immune acts could not be introduced as evidence at any trial even if they did not form part of the charges. Continue reading...

President tells audience I wasn't too old to create over 50m new jobs' as worries mount following debate performance

A single shark is believed to be responsible for biting two people and making contact with two others during Fourth of July celebrations at South Padre Island in Texas. Two people were taken to the hospital with bites, at least one of them severe, authorities said. The last reported shark attack in the area was five years ago, according to authorities

Raducanu powered past Sakkari to reach the last 16, while Alcaraz saw off Tiafoe in five sets, Gauff defeated Britain's Kartal and Sinner also wonSome lovely stuff around the net from Paolini. She anticipates the drop-shot well and then shows a delicate touch with the volley to see out the point. And then, in the next point, she unfurls a fantastic volley on the stretch.Andreescu's early momentum seems to have already been halted. Ah, but at 15-40 and under pressure, goes bang, bang - successive aces. Continue reading...

Days after saying I am who I am' in response to sexual assault allegation, long-shot independent presidential candidate revives his 9/11 skepticismRobert F Kennedy Jr has made a startling pledge to not take sides" with respect to the September 11 terrorist attacks if his long-shot presidential campaign vaults him to the White House.My take on 9/11: It's hard to tell what is a conspiracy theory and what isn't. But conspiracy theories flourish when the government routinely lies to the public," Kennedy wrote on Friday in a post on X in reference to the deadliest terrorist attack ever aimed at the US. As president I won't take sides on 9/11 or any of the other debates. Continue reading...

Amid wide speculation about president's health, Sanjay Gupta says he believes cognitive exam is warranted

The president left viewers and supporters startled with his debate performance - and in the days since, has tried to calm worried donors and Democrats

Aware of apathy for Labour, prime minister must deliver growth as he balances a tricky coalition of interests

Joe Biden accidentally said he is the 'first Black woman' to serve as vice-president 'with a Black president', during an interview with Philadelphia's WURD radio station. The US president was referring to his vice-president, Kamala Harris, and former president Barack Obama when he made the comments. The slip-up came amid a political fallout following a disappointing debate performance last week that sent Democrats scrambling

Abigail Disney, Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg are among the big names withholding funds till Biden steps aside

Sir Keir Starmer has the Commons strength to be daring. That means fulfilling hopes he did little to exciteWe ran as a changed Labour party," declared Sir Keir Starmer on Friday morning, shortly after Rishi Sunak publicly conceded defeat, and we will govern as a changed Labour party." He has yet to elucidate what this change might be. But Labour's leader presented himself as a prime minister ready and able to alter the current alarming state of affairs. Sir Keir did not sweep his party - or the nation - off its feet. But voters handed him a resounding electoral victory. By presenting itself as an improvement without upheaval, Labour was preferred to the alternative of a chaotic and ruinous Conservative administration.Sir Keir now towers over the British parliament like no politician since Tony Blair. Labour governments only come once in a generation. The party won a landslide, with a 170-plus majority. The victory was built on a collapse in Conservative support. Gone from parliament are some of the biggest Tory names, including 12 cabinet-attending ministers and the former prime minister Liz Truss. Labour deserves the nation's gratitude for ending a dalliance with cronyism and charlatanry. Continue reading...

Ford F-150 came down a street at a high rate of speed', went past a stop sign, on to the sidewalk and into a parkThree people were killed and at least nine others injured, four critically, when a pickup truck drove into a group celebrating the Fourth of July holiday in New York City, authorities said.Police have identified 44-year-old Daniel Hyden, of New Jersey, as the driver behind the deadly collision. Hyden was allegedly driving a gray Ford F-150 that came down a street at a high rate of speed" shortly before 9pm on Thursday. The truck went through an intersection and past a stop sign, drove on to the sidewalk and into Corlears Hook Park on Manhattan's Lower East Side, Jeffrey Maddrey, the New York police department chief, said during a news conference. Continue reading...

An interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos will air on Friday night as worries grow over president's competency

Encounters disrupted Fourth of July at South Padre Island, as two were taken to the hospitalA single shark is believed to be terrorizing swimmers near a Texas beach, responsible for biting two people and making contact with two others during Fourth of July celebrations, including injuring one who went to help.The encounters disrupted locals and vacationers relaxing on Thursday at South Padre Island, as two people were taken to the hospital with bites, at least one of them severe, authorities said. Continue reading...