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US midterms campaigns kick into high gear after Labor Day as Senate returns from month-long break

Residents of one of the largest public housing complexes in Manhattan have not had safe drinking water for more than a weekDangerous levels of arsenic were found in a New York City Public Housing Authority (NYCHA) complex, leaving thousands of affected residents without safe tap water.The crisis plays out as people in the predominantly Black city of Jackson, Mississippi, have gone without clean drinking water for more than a month, with residents using bottled water for everyday needs like cooking and brushing teeth. Continue reading...

Prominent Memphis businessman’s granddaughter was forced into a car and kidnapped during an early morning jog on FridayPolice in Tennessee have found the body of a woman who was forced into a car and kidnapped during an early morning jog near the University of Memphis.Memphis police said on Tuesday that investigators identified the body of 34-year-old Eliza Fletcher, a schoolteacher and a prominent Memphis businessman’s granddaughter whose disappearance horrified people across the country.The Associated Press contributed reporting Continue reading...

Dead include local civil rights activist as one body recovered while the other nine remain missing after crash in Washington stateTen people were killed when a floatplane crashed in the waters of Washington state’s Puget Sound over the weekend, including a local civil rights activist and the founder of a winery and his family.The US Coast Guard released the names of the crash victims early on Tuesday. The body of one of the dead was recovered by a good Samaritan after the Sunday afternoon crash. The other nine remain missing. Continue reading...

People were annoyed rather than upset at the Australian’s criticism of Serena Williams. After all, they knew what to expectTennis fans had yet to shed their party clothes from the Serena Williams farewell fest when Margaret Court crashed the party and released a funk that got folks up in arms.In an interview with the Daily Telegraph’s Oliver Brown published on Monday, Court said of Serena, “I’ve admired her as a player … But I don’t think she has ever admired me.” Has Court called Serena to express this admiration? If not, why make up what Serena may or may not feel? In the interview Court – a 24-time grand slam singles champion – also raises her issues with Serena’s sportsmanship, abilities after giving birth and the comforts of life on tour in the modern era. Continue reading...

Intrusive press photographs and official visit to Brazil led to then first lady adopting style of dress that she made famousHillary Clinton decided to start wearing the pantsuits that became her political trademark after “suggestive” photos taken of her during a visit to Brazil were used in a lingerie ad in the mid-1990s, she has revealed.The former US secretary of state and Democratic presidential candidate told CBS News in an interview that aired on Sunday that the choice came after a 1995 trip to Brazil she took with her husband, Bill Clinton, then in the first of two terms as president. Continue reading...

Julie Chin, who works for NBC in Tulsa, did not finish broadcast and was taken to hospital, but says she should be ‘just fine’An Oklahoma TV news anchor suffered a stroke live on air as she read the news about the cancellation of a Nasa rocket launch.Julie Chin, who works for an NBC station in Tulsa, started to stumble over her words as she read from a teleprompter over the weekend. Continue reading...

The slugger turned down a huge contract extension from the Yankees and bet on his own abilities. It looks like he made the right decisionAaron Judge started 2022 by turning down a seven-year, $213.5m contract extension from the New York Yankees. That deal would have given the now 30-year-old one of the largest contracts in MLB history. But Judge thought he was worth more, opting to play out this season and see what he could fetch in free-agency. In an era in which the phrase “bet on yourself” has become ubiquitous, perhaps nobody placed a larger bet than Judge. And that bet is paying dividends.On Monday against the Minnesota Twins, Judge launched his 54th home run of the season, the latest installment in a special campaign from the 6ft 7in, 280lb right fielder. Judge’s effort puts him on track to finish the season with 64 home runs, which would take him past the American League record of 61, set by fellow Yankee Roger Maris in 1961. Beyond that is MLB-record territory, where the murky, steroid-bound legacies of Barry Bonds (73 home runs in 2001), Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa (70 and 66 respectively in 1998) are the subject of endless fan debate. Continue reading...

Federal court accepts ex-president’s call for official to set aside materials potentially subject to privilege protections. Plus, Chris Rock on Will Smith’s apology videoGood morning.A federal judge has granted Donald Trump’s request to have a “special master” appointed to review documents the FBI seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate that could be subject to privilege protections in the investigation into unauthorized retention of government secrets.Will the DoJ appeal? Yes, it would probably appeal against the decision to the US court of appeals for the 11th circuit, officials said, though in the meantime it will almost certainly delay the investigation into potential violations of the Espionage Act and potential obstruction of justice.When was he arrested? Francis was arrested in a San Diego hotel room during a sting in 2013, and pleaded guilty two years later. He has had various health problems, including kidney cancer, and has been held at a private residence since 2018.Why has he made an escape now? It’s unclear, as he had been acting as a cooperating witness for a federal prosecutor, but he was due to be sentenced on 22 September. Continue reading...

The good news is, we know how to fix that malaise – because many, many people have been right there with you beforeAs a connoisseur of the journalistic art of spinning out fake trends that exist solely to spark heated reactions from readers on the internet, I appreciate the invention of “quiet quitting”.The term, which can be loosely defined as “people half-assing it at work”, may provoke in you the irrepressible urge to shout: “That’s not new!” Which means it is doing its job as a trend piece. As a piece of social analysis, though, it is most useful for its flaws: it’s just more evidence that the working people of today have all of the frustrations that working people have always had – but they’ve forgotten what we’re actually supposed to do about it.Hamilton Nolan is a writer based in New York Continue reading...

A new PM with the support of less than half her MPs needs to sort out a country facing calamity. What could go wrong?Well, there it is. The UK’s third prime minister in just over three years is Liz Truss, the troubling result of a lab accident in which a community centre asset stripper was crossbred with a Live-Laugh-Love decal.Her predecessor, Boris Johnson, left Downing Street this morning after an arrogant, lie-heavy speech, in which he displayed his character development after three years in office – precisely zero. None of his children was there (it’s actually quite a small street). He remains a short king over the water for any number of Conservatives who somehow still yearn to be shackled to a wildly underachieving narcissist who openly despises them. There’s being psychologically beaten, and then there’s … that. Continue reading...

The border policy violated international law – and prosecuting those responsible may be the best way to prevent it from happening againIn the Trump administration’s four years of undermining America’s image of decency, perhaps no policy did so as effectively, or as viciously, as his family separation policy – which separated 5,000 children, some as young as four months old, from their mothers and fathers.The theory behind the policy was that inflicting excruciating pain on thousands of parents and children separated at the border would deter migration to the US. It was another example of the Trump administration’s calculated cruelty.Austin Sarat is a professor of jurisprudence and political science at Amherst College and the author of Lethal Injection and the False Promise of Humane ExecutionDennis Aftergut, a former federal prosecutor, is of counsel to Lawyers Defending American Democracy Continue reading...

The supreme court’s abortion decision, a drop in gas prices, and Trump’s legal dramas have all helped strengthen Biden’s ratings – and Democrats’ chances this fallCan the Democrats make the formerly Republican slogan “jobs, not mobs” their midterm mantra?They just might get away with it. In politics, jiujitsu is fair play – and these days Republicans are less the party of “law and order” and more the party that denies the outcomes of democratic elections and attacks the US Capitol. Continue reading...

Amid investigations, heartbreak and anger, students and teachers are returning to classes – though Robb elementary won’t reopenElsa Avila slid to her phone, terrified as she held the bleeding side of her abdomen and tried to stay calm for her students.In a text to her family that she meant to send to fellow Uvalde teachers, she wrote: “I’m shot.” Continue reading...

Raven Hernandez, founder of Earth Rides, wants to boost green technology and workers’ financial healthRaven Hernandez conceived her idea for a green transportation startup as a student at Pepperdine Law School in Malibu, California.A Nashville native, Hernandez, 26, said the move to Los Angeles opened her eyes to the world of organic food and sustainable clothing. Yet this emerging health and environmental consciousness didn’t sit well with the school’s proximity to Los Angeles international airport, and the dense, gray air she breathed in every day – pollution that’s largely due to all the cars driving around the city. Continue reading...

Maxwell Frost, at just 25 years old, has won a competitive primary in Florida’s heavily Democratic 10th congressional district. That gives him a strong chance of becoming a member of the US House of Representatives – and the first generation Z candidate to do so. Before his victory, the Guardian's Oliver Laughland met him during his campaign to talk about why he decided to enter the race and what he hopes to achieve as in Congress

Maxwell Alejandro Frost has been endorsed by Bernie Sanders and the gun-control activist has won a Democratic primary in Florida – but he still drives a taxi to make ends meet. Can he now make history?It’s been a decade since Maxwell Alejandro Frost launched his first big campaign. He was 15 years old, coming off a stint volunteering on Barack Obama’s reelection bid and desperate to attend the president’s second inauguration. In an online search for tickets, Frost stumbled across a page soliciting applications to perform in the inaugural parade. So he submitted what he thought was the perfect act to represent central Florida, the region he calls home: his nine-piece high-school salsa band, Seguro Que Sí (translation: “of course”). “I got some videos together, wrote about our band and how we would love to represent Florida and specifically the growing Latino population,” says Frost.Weeks later, he received a call while in class from the inaugural committee inviting his band to play if they could get a US senator to vouch for them and fund the trip to Washington DC themselves. When Frost totted up the costs of transport, lodging, food and the band’s float, he arrived at a figure of $13,000. His headteacher told him the school did not have the funds or the pull to make the trip happen and suggested backing out. But Frost was undaunted. Continue reading...

Party aims to reframe narrative that Republicans are natural custodians of economy and alleviate voters’ inflation concernsRepublicans have long presented themselves as the best guardians of the US economy. Demanding lower taxes and lauding themselves as champions of small businesses, Republicans have for decades generally enjoyed an advantage with American voters when it comes to economic issues.That advantage could prove hugely consequential this year, as Democrats attempt to hold on to their narrow House and Senate majorities in the midterm elections. Continue reading...

Cooperation from Ken Klukowski could spur charges against Clark, who schemed with Trump to overturn election results in GeorgiaLegal pressure on Jeffrey Clark, the former justice department lawyer who schemed with Donald Trump and others to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia and other states, is expected to rise with the cooperation of another ex-DoJ lawyer who worked with him, say former prosecutors.The cooperation from the ex-lawyer, in tandem with other evidence obtained by prosecutors, could help spur charges against Clark – a close ally of then president Trump – and benefit prosecutors as they go after bigger targets. Continue reading...

Michael Kirk’s documentary Lies, Politics and Democracy is a chilling study in how Trump subdued the Republican partyMichael Kirk has been making documentary films for more than half a century. He has chronicled the peaks and troughs of US politics, winning every significant broadcast journalism award along the way. But nothing prepared him for the scale of the threat now facing American democracy.“There’s never been a film I made where I was more anxious, unhappy to make it, unwilling to discover the things we were discovering,” Kirk, 74, says of his latest project for PBS’s investigative series Frontline. “‘Worried’ is not a strong enough word for how I feel about where we are as a country and I don’t think I’m alone.” Continue reading...

Ex-president said to have wanted ‘someone a bit more bombastic’, writes New York Times reporter David EnrichDonald Trump considered but rejected hiring the law firm Jones Day to represent him during the Russia investigation, a new book says.The news that Trump could have hired a heavyweight firm for his personal defence but chose not to – preferring “someone a bit more bombastic”, according to senior partners – comes after the former president appointed a new lawyer in his battle with the Department of Justice over the FBI search of his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida for classified White House documents. Continue reading...

Leonard Francis pleaded guilty in 2015 to offering $500,000 in bribes to navy officers to steer work to his shipyardsA Malaysian businessman who pleaded guilty in the US navy’s worst corruption scandal has escaped house arrest in San Diego after cutting off his monitoring bracelet, federal authorities have said.Leonard Glenn Francis, known as Fat Leonard, who pleaded guilty in 2015 to offering $500,000 in bribes to navy officers, was due to be sentenced in a few weeks. Continue reading...

President again pledges to be ‘most pro-union president’ in history during speech in MilwaukeeJoe Biden used a Labor Day speech in the battleground state of Wisconsin to endorse the expansion of unions, reiterating his election promises to be the “most pro-union president” in American history.The US president argued in Milwaukee that a skilled, unionised workforce would help the US regain its place as a world leader in infrastructure and manufacturing. Continue reading...

Frances Tiafoe produced the performance of his life to beat Rafael Nadal in four sets, while Cam Norrie was beaten by Andrey RublevRublev enjoyed himself before the tournament started. “I went Monday and Friday to Harry Styles,” he confessed, “and Tuesday to Twenty One Pilots”. But did he get to meet anyone good? “They don’t do those things for me. I don’t know how all the players met all the stars. I asked once to go to an NBA game in Miami and they gave me the last row at the top. And I think I was top 10 at the time.”Or, in other words, there’s not loads going on here, and Norrie holds to 15 for 4-3. Continue reading...

Federal court accepts ex-president’s call for official to set aside materials potentially subject to privilege protectionsA federal judge has granted Donald Trump’s request to have a “special master” appointed to review documents the FBI seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate that could be subject to privilege protections in the investigation into unauthorized retention of government secrets.The order from the US district court judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, also temporarily barred the justice department from reviewing the documents for its criminal inquiry until the special master completes its work, in a decision that marked a procedural victory for the former president. Continue reading...

Tory MPs’ hopes of Truss’s transformation into a plausible leader were dashed by her robotic acceptance speechO brave new world, that has such people in’t. Or not. William Shakespeare clearly had never imagined a clusterfuck on this scale. Given the state of the country right now, he would be in need of a long lie down. It would take more than a few prayerful tweets from Justin Welby to sort this one out.On the road outside the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre, a few environmental protesters glued themselves together while Steve Bray competed with a group of evangelists to provide a backing track. Some things never change. Just inside the main entrance, James Cleverly held court. The meeter and greeter with a smile for everyone. A man at peace with himself. Someone who knew he had backed the right horse. Continue reading...

I’m not an expert and I don’t want to be. But I’m enjoying the learning and the journey

The monarch has been inviting prime ministers to form a government for 70 years. She must be thinking, ‘how did it come to this?’They call it “kissing hands”, even though hands are no longer kissed: the incoming prime minister goes to see the Queen, who invites them to form a government, even though it’s not her call, and they say yes, even though they know it’s not a question. When someone first explains this elaborate performance of pointlessness, the only reasonable response is, surely the monarchy should be abolished? This is just silly. But then, you were probably a teenager when you found that out, and wanted to abolish most things.It wasn’t until today that I ever spared a thought for the Queen herself. Her first hand-kissing was with Winston Churchill, after her father’s death in 1952, and now she is about to go through it with Liz Truss. Royal-watchers are carefully skirting the fact that she is doing this in Balmoral, rather than coming to London as she normally would. It could be any reason, really. Maybe she has decided to live off-grid; which of us wouldn’t, given the chance?Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Non-profit Voto Latino aims to challenge Republican ‘disinformation’ in key battleground statesWith midterm elections on the horizon, Americans are subject to a flurry of Democratic and Republican ads. As the second-largest voting bloc in 2020, Latino voters are expected to play a significant role in the 2022 elections. They are therefore a key target group.One non-profit, Voto Latino, aims to fight political disinformation and communicate with self-identified moderate Latino voters through a series of ads. Continue reading...

Rarely in modern history have we seen a company that so exquisitely cultivates an image as a caring, progressive employer while actually acting like a bullying, union-busting gangsterCorporate hypocrisy is as old as corporations themselves. But there are levels. It is important to recognize astounding achievements in business insincerity. So let us send a note of congratulations today to Starbucks: rarely in modern history have we witnessed a company that so exquisitely combines a cultivated image as a caring, progressive employer with the well-documented, large-scale behavior of a gangster who expects to rule employees through bullying and fear.The $100bn coffee-and-flavored-syrup chain meticulously refers to its employees as “partners”. What does it mean to be a partner to someone? Reasonable people might say that a partnership is a relationship in which you treat the other person as an equal, zealously uphold their basic rights, and deal with them in all cases as fully formed human beings deserving of respect. Luckily for Starbucks, they’ve had a great chance to exhibit these values over the past year, as thousands of employees at more than 230 of their stores across the country have voted to unionize. The historic union wave has offered the company an unprecedented opportunity to respect their “partners’” right to organize; to listen to their concerns and requests for change; and to bargain contracts with them in good faith, as partners, of course, should.Hamilton Nolan is a writer based in New York Continue reading...

Act Up employed a multiplicity of tactics and responses while maintaining a laser-focused singleness of purposeIt was already chaos, and now, it was going to get worse. The US supreme court’s decision wasn’t exactly a surprise – everyone knew it was coming – but the rage in the room felt palpable. The language of the opinion had been taunting and cruel; the punishment from the court felt vindictive, personal. People were already dying for lack of access to healthcare; the ruling would push people in need even further to the margins. Now, the most vulnerable faced criminalization, harassment and even death, and for what? For the conservative Christian values that none of them had voted for? For a regressive, punitive, and cruel vision of gender and sexuality that most of the world had long since left behind?The ruling was Bowers v Hardwick, and the year was 1987. The supreme court, in a virulently homophobic opinion, had upheld a Georgia law criminalizing gay sex between consenting adults. At the time, the Aids crisis was gripping gay America. Out of bigotry and indifference, both the federal government and the pharmaceutical sector were dragging their feet. Meanwhile, thousands of people, mostly gay men and IV drug users, were dying slow, painful, premature deaths, at the margins of a society that hated them and feared their disease.Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading...

Officers extend search for two suspects over multiple provinces after attacks at various locations. Plus, Trump once tried to pay a lawyer with a horse

Detroit’s last playoff win came in the 1991 season. While that record looks unlikely to end this time around there are encouraging signs of progress Continue reading...

Patriot Mobile, a ‘Christian conservative wireless provider’, is targeting school board elections to push its far-right agendaA conservative Texas-based phone company is planning a takeover of political offices in the US state, starting with public schools.Patriot Mobile, which calls itself “America’s only Christian conservative wireless provider”, has been fueling an extremist conservative movement taking over curriculum in public schools across Texas. Continue reading...

Employees are pushing for better overtime protections, improved pay for part-time employees and heat protectionsFor eight years, Rob Becker worked as a delivery driver for UPS in Queens, New York. About five years ago, he was terminated. He got involved in his local union, Teamsters Local 804, and fought, successfully, to get reinstated.While pushing for changes and collecting signatures in recent months at UPS as the Teamsters prepare for a new union contract fight across at the company in 2023, Becker, an alternate union steward, was again fired from his job. Continue reading...

The Texan was a hothead who beat up his own manager, pursued an off-season fighting career and was implicated in the deaths of two peopleBearing in mind that everyone has easy access to baseball bats, serious violence is rare in Major League Baseball. Breaches of the peace such as 23 August’s cleared benches at Minute Maid Park are usually theatrical, the emphasis more on posturing than punching.Still, there are exceptions, the kind of confrontations that might interest the police, rather than the compilers of SportsCenter highlights, if they happened anywhere else but a sports field. Rougned Odor lamping José Bautista in 2016, for example, and the infamous Giants-Dodgers fracas in 1965 that led to John Roseboro suing Juan Marichal for injuries sustained when he was whacked above the left eye. Continue reading...

Rahim Mohamed, AKA General Ock, has turned his bodega into a tourist hotspot with creations like pancake-wrapped bacon sandwichesThe deli on 603 Clinton Street in New York City is fairly unassuming. Nestled between a Baptist church and a few auto repair shops, it operates seven days a week on the edge of Red Hook, a neighborhood in Brooklyn surrounded by shipping yards and civil war-era warehouses.For most customers, new and old, there are two ways to identify the deli. One is by the large white banner that hangs above windows plastered with cigarette ads and flyers featuring neighborhood events. “Red Hook Food Corp”, the banner says in bold red and black letters. Continue reading...

Nine died while swimming the Rio Grande on Friday as deaths became commonplace this year after a migration shift pushed thousands hereTwo small inflatable floats with printed aquatic animals in bright colors lay by the river under the Eagle Pass port of entry in Texas on Saturday, a day after nine migrants died while swimming the Rio Grande.A parent had placed their child in the floats and jumped in a river that looked deceptively calm. National guardsmen tasked with watching that section of Eagle Pass saw it for what it was: a treacherous, deep body of water with whirlpools between pillars holding up the international bridge. Continue reading...

A string of favorable outcomes for the party, coupled with backlash from supreme court’s abortion ban, could galvanize Biden supportersJoe Biden travels to the battleground states of Wisconsin and Pennsylvania on Monday, determined to reframe America’s midterm elections as a defining choice between democracy and the extremism of Donald Trump.Fighting for every vote, the US president will mark Labor Day with growing confidence as opinion polls suggest that, while Republicans still have the lead, Democrats now have the momentum heading into the home stretch. Continue reading...

Meet the woman leading a rural Californian school district through climate disasterIn this new series, published in collaboration with High Country News, we look at the future of jobs out westIt was the second day of school for Greenville elementary school, and students were scattered across the playground, soaking in the late August sun. On the swings, some kicked their way closer to the cloudless sky; others scampered around on the multicolored jungle gym. There were shrieks and snacks and one skinned elbow, and the air was fragrant with the freshly laid woodchips that cushioned the students’ rapid descent from the slide.It’s the kind of scene Kristy Warren has witnessed countless times. She first came here as a student herself, then returned about 20 years later as a school principal. Since then, in the course of her seven years as the Plumas county assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, she’s made regular visits to the stretch of road where this small northern California town’s elementary school and junior-senior high school stand side-by-side. Continue reading...

New York Times reporter David Enrich also says White House counsel Donald McGahn once called senior Trump aides ‘morons’Donald Trump once tried to pay a lawyer he owed $2m with a deed to a horse.The bizarre scene is described in Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald Trump and the Corruption of Justice, a book by David Enrich of the New York Times that will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy. Continue reading...