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Merwil Gutierrez sent from New York to El Salvador prison although family says he has no criminal history or gang tiesA 19-year-old Venezuelan in New York City reportedly was apprehended by Trump administration immigration authorities and deported to El Salvador despite agents' realizing he was not whom they meant to arrest in a targeted operation.Merwil Gutierrez, whose family opened an asylum case after arriving in the US, was deported from the Bronx to the notorious Cecot prison in El Salvador despite his relatives' insistence that he has no gang ties or criminal history, according to Documented, a newsroom dedicated to telling the stories of immigrants in New York City. The Gutierrez family says it has been left without information or answers. Continue reading...

Charlotte Young Bowens had an epiphany while competing - and now she helps bigger people feel confident outdoorsCharlotte Young Bowens was 48 years old and 48 miles into a 50-mile ultramarathon when suddenly she slumped to her knees and collapsed to the ground, emotionally and physically exhausted. Curled into the fetal position, she began crying harder than she had in years.She wondered if she could finish. She rolled over on her back, looked up at the sky and thought back to a dark period in her life, when she was clinically depressed and not sure if she wanted to live. She no longer doubted. She knew she could and would finish the race. Continue reading...

The program, set to expire on 24 April, aids migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and VenezuelaA judge has temporarily blocked the Trump administration's attempt to terminate a Biden-era program that granted legal status to migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Haiti.The ruling, in federal district court in Boston, prevents the wholesale shutdown of the program, which was set to expire on 24 April. Continue reading...

Energy watchdog cuts forecast for growth in demand by a third, and says a trade war could mean it falls furtherThe world will use less crude oil than expected this year due the substantial risks" posed by Donald Trump's trade tariffs to the global economy, according to the global energy watchdog.The International Energy Agency slashed its forecasts for global oil demand growth by a third for the year ahead, and warned that it could make further downward revisions depending on whether a trade war develops. Continue reading...

She is tragically mainstream, allergic to serving' on the red carpet and certainly hasn't thrived against the odds. It's the antithesis of gay culture - so why do I love her?As a self-evidently gay man, I've generally been spared the awkwardness of coming out. That was, until I became a Swiftie. In recent years I have become adept at gauging the temperature of a room before revealing my predilection. Is this a safe space? Will I be sidelined or treated as a pervert because of who I choose to love? Should I lie, or just be evasive? I want to live authentically, but at what cost?Taylor Swift is at once the closest thing we have to a monoculture and the most divisive pop star of modern times. As a self-identified Swiftie, I believe her gift lies in the ability to take hyper-specific experiences and render them universal. I've never performed a 149-date world tour while reeling from the heartbreak of having been ghosted by Matty Healy of the 1975, but listening to I Can Do It With a Broken Heart, her song about that indignity, has helped me put on a brave face when faced by life's more quotidian challenges. By writing a 10-minute epic about her three-month fling with Jake Gyllenhaal, Taylor gives fans space to mourn our own failed situationships or private disappointments - however fleeting or insignificant they may appear to others. Continue reading...

The tar-like mineral substance has long been used in Ayurvedic medicine, but the evidence of its efficacy is limited - and some products may contain harmful heavy metalsGender biases embedded in the way social media algorithms serve us content are well documented: algorithms have been found to amplify misogynistic content and unduly objectify women's bodies, and are often cited as a driver of political polarisation between young men and women.If you are online and of the male persuasion, you are more likely than me to have encountered videos extolling the supposed masculine benefits of substances such as shilajit and ashwagandha. Interest in shilajit has taken off in recent years, in no small part thanks to square-jawed men who pose with jars of the stuff in TikToks and Instagram posts, looking like perfect caricatures of virility with their fastidiously groomed facial hair and inexplicable shirtlessness. Continue reading...

The baseball hero grew up in Pasadena in an era of restrictive housing covenants - firm friendships were forgedEveryone from Jackie Robinson's home town has a story about the baseball legend. Stick around long enough in his southern California neighborhood and Jackie's name will bubble up in a story about a distant relative who once struck out the future Hall of Famer on a dusty field that now bears his name. Over the years, these stories gather layers - part memory, part myth - until they sound like hometown folklore.George Ito was one of those storytellers. A second-generation Japanese American who grew up in Pasadena, California, a few doors down from the Robinson family, George loved to remind his children about his friendship with Jackie. On jogs with his son, Steven Ito, he would rattle off tales of all the times he outran his legendary friend. Continue reading...

Carriers also asked to stop purchases of aircraft-related equipment and parts from US firms, report saysChina has reportedly ordered its airlines not to take any further deliveries of Boeing jets, the latest move in its tit-for-tat trade war with the US.The Chinese government has asked carriers to stop purchases of aircraft-related equipment and parts from American companies, according to a Bloomberg News article, which cited people familiar with the matter. Continue reading...

Email to Massachusetts lawyer warned her to depart the US immediately' even though removing US citizens is illegal

Allison Riggs won in November - but a court ruling has put ballots in North Carolina under threat. The stakes are highAllison Riggs, a Democratic justice on the North Carolina supreme court, is battling to keep her seat after a recent court ruling paved the way to overturn her election victory, telling the Guardian in an interview: This is not just a North Carolina problem. This is an existential threat to democracy."In November, Riggs won an election for the state supreme court by a razor-thin 734 votes. But on Friday, the North Carolina supreme court ordered the state board of elections to give certain overseas voters 30 days to prove their eligibility in order to have the votes they cast more than five months ago count. Continue reading...

Warnings emerge even as effect of economic and political turbulence on the foreign visitors to the US is hard to defineBatman said business was so-so, and King Kong beat his chest in agreement. But neither could predict that it would improve. Gotham's caped crusader and his muscular ape neighbour could only hope. As with Times Square's superhero-themed visitor-photography business last week, so it is with the US tourism business at large.The effect of economic and political turbulence on the number of foreign visitors coming to the US is for now hard to define. But both - whether through tariffs, currency exchange chaos, or fears over political ill-winds - are sending chills through the $2.36tn business, the world's most powerful travel and tourism market. Continue reading...

The method is a vivid reminder of the brutality of state killing. That undermines the pro-capital-punishment narrativeSouth Carolina executed Mikal Mahdi by firing squad on 11 April. Mahdi had been convicted and sentenced for the 2004 killing of an off-duty law enforcement officer.One month before his execution, South Carolina put Brad Sigmon to death using the same method. He was the first person since 2010 to be killed by the firing squad. Both Mahdi and Sigmon chose the firing squad from a menu of three ways to die, the others being lethal injection and the electric chair. Continue reading...

The CEO of JPMorgan Chase says young people needn't worry - the future is bright and AI-enhanced. So why does the world feel so precarious?Chin up, everyone. Things may seem grim at the moment but a billionaire has swooped in to reassure everyone - particularly impecunious young people - that everything is going to be OK. Better than OK, in fact. According to JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, despite the current economic and political instability, gen Z should be grateful for what will be a very bright and AI-enhanced future.These kids, anyone who's depressed - as long as we don't have nuclear war - they're going to have an unbelievable life," Dimon said in a recent interview with Fox News. People say the next generation's in bad shape," he added. Really? They're going to inherit a country that's worth two [or] three hundred trillion dollars. They're probably going to live to 120; AI is going to cure some cancers ... They shouldn't be bemoaning their situation." Continue reading...

Firms pushed back against proposed regulations after surge in online gambling since 2018 supreme court ruling on sports bettingGambling firms have fanned out across the US, lobbying an array of state capitals against consumer protections that experts say could help reduce addiction-related harms, according to a non-profit watchdog.A new report by the Campaign for Accountability, shared with the Guardian, lists a string of proposed regulations - from restrictions on advertising and promotions to deposit limits - against which firms pushed back. Continue reading...

Ethical doubts over role of campaign backers and investors with financial ties to president worth hundreds of millionsSome of Donald Trump's biggest campaign donors and investors, who collectively have hundreds of millions of dollars in financial ties to the US president, are positioned to potentially profit from any American takeover of Greenland, raising even more ethical questions around Trump's controversial pursuit of the Arctic territory.The administration is in part aiming to secure rare minerals that are essential for the US tech industry and national security, and to potentially reopen oil and gas exploration: This is about critical minerals, this is about natural resources," Trump's national security adviser, Mike Waltz, recently said. Continue reading...

Former president says move is an attempt to stifle academic freedom'. Plus, the people forming relationships with AI chatbots

Republican-controlled state house poised to pass legislation that imposes regulatory hurdles on data centersDonald Trump's plans to expand infrastructure to produce artificial intelligence in the US could face years of delays with the Republican-controlled Texas statehouse poised to pass legislation that imposes regulatory hurdles on data centers.The Trump administration earlier this year announced that a joint venture called Stargate would construct a total of 20 data centers to provide computing power for AI as part of an effort to help the US compete against China for leadership of the technology and spur investors to pursue AI projects. Continue reading...

Elon Musk is obsessed with falling birth rates, as is the Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban. Why would leftwingers want to buy into their pronatalist' agenda?Perpetuating humanity should be a cross-politics consensus," read an article in the Atlantic last week, but the left was mostly absent at a recent pronatalism conference." It's such a simple proposition - everyone loves babies and wants the species to perpetuate, right? - but pronatalism has provoked a ferocious battle on the American left. Should they be trying to engage meaningfully at a preposterous far-right conference? Or should the left stop self-flagellating and start organising?But what is pronatalism - and is it really borderline fascist? I don't want to think about slippery, bad-faith, rightwing claptrap any more than you do, but in an era in which US politics can sneeze and the world catches encephalitis, we do, regrettably, have to think about bad-faith everything, all the time. Continue reading...

Chris Columbus calls cameo an albatross' but worries he'd have to go back to Italy or something'Film-maker Chris Columbus says he has come to regard Donald Trump's cameo in his movie Home Alone 2: Lost in New York as an albatross" that he wishes to remove.But, Columbus added, he fears the president's administration would deport him if he followed through with nixing the scene from more than 30 years ago. Continue reading...

Vice-president says Donald Trump loves' the UK and there is good chance of reaching mutually beneficial agreementThe US is optimistic it can negotiate a great" trade deal with the UK, JD Vance has said.Donald Trump imposed sweeping tariffs on imports to the US several weeks ago, sending the global economy into turmoil as stock prices tumbled and fears of a global recession mounted. Continue reading...

Reese and Desiree Mistretta are the first mother-son pair to win New York's prestigious Golden Gloves, but their deeper bond is how boxing helped them survive life's hardest hitsReese Mistretta wasn't thinking about history after he climbed through the ropes on Saturday night. He was thinking about his legs, which felt like cement. About his lungs, which wouldn't quite fill. And about the man across from him: Ali Conde, a sinewy technician from El Maestro's Gym in the Bronx who has made his mark by waiting for opponents to strike first, then exploiting their openings.Two nights earlier, Mistretta had narrowly beaten Conde under the lights of Madison Square Garden in the elite 176lb final of the Ring Masters Championships, New York's premier amateur boxing competition. But the finals are double elimination. If Mistretta wanted to bring home the title, he'd have to beat Conde a second time at a sweaty gym in the Gravesend neighborhood of Brooklyn. He definitely came back, re-corrected, he put it on me a little bit more," Mistretta said. So I had to be a little busier, not get countered at the same time. He's a good counterpuncher." Continue reading...

Education department says $2.3bn in funds to be frozen after university rejects slew of demands as political ployThe US education department is freezing about $2.3bn in federal funds to Harvard University, the agency said on Monday.The announcement comes as the Ivy League school has decided to fight the White House's demands that it crack down on antisemitism and alleged civil rights violations, including shutting down diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Continue reading...

This live blog is now closed.Donald Trump will meet this morning with El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, at 11am ET at the White House.Referring to the cost of imprisoning the detainees in El Salvador, Trump told reporters on Sunday about Bukele:I think he's doing a fantastic job, and he's taking care of a lot of problems that we have that we really wouldn't be able to take care of from a cost standpoint.He's been amazing. We have some very bad people in that prison. People that should have never have been allowed into our country. People that murdered, drug dealers, some of the worst people on earth are in that prison. And he's able to do that. Continue reading...

Do they think it's just too hard to speak out?

El Salvador president says it is preposterous' to send Kilmar Abrego Garcia back to US after he was wrongly deported - key US politics stories from Monday 14 April at a glanceThe president of El Salvador said in a meeting with Donald Trump in the White House on Monday that he would not order the return of a Maryland man who was deported in error to a Salvadorian mega-prison.The question is preposterous," Nayib Bukele said in the Oval Office on Monday. How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? I'm not going to do it." Continue reading...

Administration advances new misrepresentations of US supreme court order in case of Kilmar Abrego GarciaThe Trump administration on Monday misrepresented a US supreme court decision that compelled it to return a man wrongly deported to El Salvador, using tortured readings of the order to justify taking no actions to secure his release.The supreme court last week unanimously ordered the administration to facilitate" the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was supposed to have been protected from deportation to El Salvador regardless of whether he was a member of the MS-13 gang. Continue reading...

Two students traveling on spring break were arrested and charged with assault in Copenhagen, police sayTwo American college students traveling for spring break were arrested in Copenhagen, charged with assault, and held in a Danish prison for two weeks following an alleged dispute with an Uber driver, Danish police said.The family of Owen Ray, a 19-year-old studying at Miami University in Ohio, said he and an unnamed friend have been forced to forfeit their passports and remain in the country. Continue reading...

Liberty Justice Center filed lawsuit on behalf of five US businesses declaring that Trump's tariffs overstep authority

Mahdawi was at a naturalization interview in Vermont when he was taken in move his lawyers say is retaliation'Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian green card holder and student at Columbia University, was apprehended by US immigration authorities in Vermont on Monday, according to his lawyers and a video of the incident.Mahdawi, who was a leader of the pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia last spring, was arrested by Ice on Monday morning in Colchester, Vermont, while he was attending a naturalization interview, his lawyer said in a statement to the Guardian. Continue reading...

In a message, the university's president said it will not surrender its independence' amid crackdown on educationHarvard University said on Monday that it will not comply with a new list of demands from the Trump administration issued last week that the government says are designed to crack down on antisemitism and alleged civil rights violations at elite academic institutions.In a message to the Harvard community, the university president, Alan Garber, vowed that the school would not yield to the government's pressure campaign. The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights," Garber said. Continue reading...

Cuts would mean dramatic decreases in funding for humanitarian aid, global health and international groupsThe Trump administration is reportedly proposing to slash the state department budget by nearly half in a move that could drastically reduce US international spending and end its funding for Nato and the United Nations, according to an internal memorandum.The memo based on spending cuts devised by the White House office of management and budget envisions the total budget of the state department and USAID, the main foreign assistance body which has been largely dismantled by Elon Musk's department of government efficiency", or Doge, being reduced to $28.4bn, a reduction of $27bn or 48% from what Congress approved for 2025. Continue reading...

Nick Faldo has more majors and Seve Ballesteros was a majestic shotmaker but the career grand slam is pricelessIn Northern Ireland, debate is already raging as to whether Rory McIlroy has presented himself as the country's greatest ever sportsperson.The answer is surely obvious. Step aside, George Best. McIlroy's Masters triumph may even force Sports Personality of the Year to afford due recognition to golf. It is only April but it feels highly unlikely the scene immediately after McIlroy claimed the Masters on Sunday will be matched. His pounding of the turf; his tears absorbed more than a decade of such deep frustration. The moment reverberated beyond sport; Rory had done it. Grown men, lots of them, shed tears on his behalf as hebroke his Augusta hoodoo. Continue reading...

Title X, with services like STI tests and cancer screenings, in limbo after Trump administration pauses $66m in fundsMore than 10 days after the Trump administration froze roughly $66m of federal funds that had been earmarked for no- and low-cost family planning services, the providers that had been scheduled to receive that money are staring down the possibility of financial collapse.Title X, the country's largest federal family planning program, provides clinics across the country with more than $200m each year for services such as contraception, STI tests and cancer screenings. In 2023, more than 2 million people received healthcare through Title X, which helps people regardless of income, age or citizenship status. For many, Title X is their only source of healthcare. Continue reading...

Miles Harford, accused of leaving body in back of hearse and improperly keeping cremated remains, reaches plea dealThe Colorado funeral home owner accused of leaving a woman's corpse in the back of a hearse for over a year and improperly stashing the cremated remains of at least 30 people pleaded guilty in court on Monday to one count of corpse abuse and one count of theft.Miles Harford's guilty plea in Denver follows years of other gruesome funeral home cases in Colorado, including one where the owners were accused of storing nearly 200 bodies in a decrepit building and giving families fake cremated remains. Continue reading...

Alerts rang out as residents felt large earthquake in areas around San Diego, with epicenter in rural enclave of JulianSouthern Californians were rattled on Monday morning when a strong earthquake shook the areas around San Diego just after 10am local time.Initial measurements from the United States Geological Survey rated the temblor as a magnitude 5.2, with an epicenter in Julian, a mountain town in San Diego county with roughly 2,000 residents known for it's apple pie, located roughly 35 miles north-east of San Diego and 120 miles south of Los Angeles. Continue reading...

Andrew Buen was found guilty of criminally negligent homicide in death of Christian Glass, who called 911 for helpA former Colorado sheriff's deputy convicted of killing a 22-year-old man in distress who called 911 for help was sentenced on Monday to three years in prison, the maximum sentence allowed, by a judge who said the shooting was about power.In February, jurors found Andrew Buen guilty of criminally negligent homicide in the 2022 death of Christian Glass. Prosecutors alleged that Buen needlessly escalated a standoff with Glass, who showed signs of a mental health crisis and refused orders to get out of his SUV near Silver Plume, a small, former mining town along Interstate 70 in the Rocky Mountains west of Denver. Continue reading...

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David Solomon warns that escalating trade war poses material risks' for US and global growthThe chief executive of Goldman Sachs, David Solomon, has warned that the chances of a US recession have increased" in the wake of Donald Trump's tariffs and that an escalating trade war poses material risks" for US and global growth.The Wall Street boss said the growing uncertainty over the fallout of US tariffs could spell trouble for companies and consumers and wreak havoc on the economy. Continue reading...

Trump officials claim they're not legally bound to bring Kilmar Abrego Garcia back despite supreme court rulingThe president of El Salvador said in a meeting with Donald Trump in the White House on Monday that he would not order the return of a Maryland man who was deported in error to a Salvadoran mega-prison.The question is preposterous," Nayib Bukele said in the Oval Office on Monday, where he was welcomed by Trump and spoke with the president and members of his cabinet. How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? I'm not going to do it." Continue reading...

Lawmakers use Kremlin's deadly attacks as latest evidence to convince president he must increase pressure on PutinRepublican supporters of Ukraine are using the Kremlin's deadly missile strikes as their latest evidence to convince Donald Trump that he must increase pressure on Vladimir Putin if he wants to reach a ceasefire deal.Pro-Ukraine lawmakers and aides in the Republican party have carefully navigated Trump's apparent affinity for Putin and avoided direct intervention in their efforts to shift his support toward Kyiv. But following the Russian strikes during Palm Sunday celebrations in the city of Sumy, advisers and allies have been highly vocal in condemning the attack using language meant to resonate with the US president's conservative, religious base. Continue reading...

Ex-Alaska governor claims paper defamed her with editorial falsely linking her campaign rhetoric to a mass shootingA jury was selected on Monday to hear a retrial of Sarah Palin's claims that the New York Times libeled her in an editorial eight years ago.Opening statements were scheduled for Tuesday as the one-time Republican vice-presidential candidate and ex-governor of Alaska gets another chance to prove to a federal jury that the newspaper defamed her with the 2017 editorial falsely linking her campaign rhetoric to a mass shooting. Palin said it damaged her reputation and career. Continue reading...

There's funny, there's mean, and there's mean and funny. But unfunny and mean will always die a deathIn these partisan times, when all is binary and everyone must pick a side, I have chosen mine. Aimee Lou Wood, she of The White Lotus and thus now instantly recognisable worldwide, is absolutely right to call out Saturday Night Live, the legendary US entertainment and satire show, for making jokes about her teeth. The special relationship is under enough strain without having to lean into old stereotypes about British gnashers. I am still reeling from the Big Book of British Smiles gag in The Simpsons and I continue to floss every day because of it.The SNL joke, if you are yet to see it, is part of a wider sketch making fun of the Trump administration. (Because if one thing has been proven to quell the march of the right, it's parody.) A White Lotus character is mashed up with someone adjacent to Robert F Kennedy, he mentions fluoride, and a Wood-esque character says What's that?"Athena Kugblenu is a writer and comedianDo 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...

The reigning champions appear to have corrected the worst of their problems but the days when they conquered all before them are probably over

FAA said New York Helicopter Tours will be shuttering immediately' after accident that killed all six on boardThe company that operated the helicopter that crashed into New York City's Hudson River on Thursday - killing all six people on board - has been shuttered with immediate effect, the US's Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said late on Sunday.New York Helicopter Tours is shutting down their operations immediately", the FAA said in a statement on X. The agency added that it would launch a review of the company's license and safety records in the meantime. Continue reading...

The progressive icon, 78, may be the frontrunner, but a more moderate contender may represent much-needed changeBarbara Lee represented Oakland in Congress for a quarter-century. Now, in what would probably be the capstone of her storied political career, the 78-year-old progressive icon is vying for the chance to lift the city I love" out of crisis.I'm always ready to fight for Oakland," Lee said, announcing her bid to lead the city of roughly 440,000 residents, known for its liberal politics and deep legacy of civil rights activism. When she entered the mayoral race in January, she was widely seen as the presumptive frontrunner. Continue reading...

President says he will lay out new levies on Monday and relief on electronics will be short-lived. Plus, the rise of end times fascism and how to defeat it

Authorities say suspect told them he would have beaten Josh Shapiro with sledgehammer if he had found himA man who authorities said scaled an iron security fence in the middle of the night, eluded police and broke into the Pennsylvania governor's mansion - where he set a fire - had planned to beat the governor, Josh Shapiro, with a hammer if he found him because he hates the politician, according to court documents released on Monday.The fire left significant damage and forced Shapiro, his family and guests to evacuate the building early on Sunday. The man, arrested later in the day, faces charges including attempted homicide, terrorism, aggravated arson and aggravated assault, authorities said. Continue reading...