Carolyn Maloney says sorry for broaching the issue in a debate but that she will support Biden if he does seek a second termA senior New York Democrat predicted on Thursday that Joe Biden will not run for re-election in 2024, even as she apologised for saying that previously and also said she would support him if he did stand again.Speaking to CNN, the congresswoman Carolyn Maloney said sorry for broaching the issue in a debate – but then said again she thought Biden would not run. Continue reading...
ACLU says there are nearly 50 cases of Sikhs saying religious headwear was taken as they passed through CBP checks in ArizonaAgents from US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) have been accused of seizing turbans from Sikh asylum seekers at the southern border.In a letter to CBP, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Arizona said there had been nearly 50 documented cases of Sikhs saying religious headwear was taken and never returned as they passed through CBP checks in Yuma, Arizona. Continue reading...
Rusty Bowers, who refused to help overturn Trump election loss, says he has no regrets despite losing bid for state senate seatRusty Bowers, the Arizona Republican who defied Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn his defeat in the state then testified to the House January 6 committee, has no regrets despite losing his bid for a state senate seat.“I would do it again in a heartbeat,” he told the Associated Press. “I’d do it 50 times in a row.” Continue reading...
Spokesman for Wisconsin senator targeted by Democrats in midterms says he is not trying to end spending on key programsA swing-state Republican senator denied threatening social security and Medicare, after Democrats accused him of putting them “on the chopping block”.Ron Johnson, who entered Congress on the Tea Party wave of 2010, is up for re-election in Wisconsin. As they attempt to keep hold of the Senate, Democrats think they have a chance of winning the seat. Continue reading...
by Associated Press in Arlington, Massachusetts on (#6254K)
Officer was pursuing a suspected thief when Donovan Johnson walked by and was pinned down, according to lawsuitA police officer in suburban Boston who was pursuing a white suspect pinned a 20-year-old Black man to the ground and placed a knee on the man’s neck despite having no evidence he was involved in any crime, according to a federal civil rights lawsuit filed on Wednesday.Donovan Johnson was minutes from home after leaving work in February 2021 when the white officer ran up, drew his gun and threw Johnson to the snow-covered ground face first, the lawsuit filed against the town of Arlington, Massachusetts, and three officers alleges. Continue reading...
The maddening impulse to be productive on holiday has given way to having fun – and I’m enjoying every minuteIt has been the same story every summer for the past 20 years: a conflict between the desire to kick back and chill out, and the guilt triggered by taking time off. (When I lived in Britain, I could stretch this period of relaxation out to a fortnight. In the US, where no one takes two weeks off at a time, anxiety kicks in after roughly 10 days.) It’s the most self-defeating dynamic there is – taking leave, only to fret that you’re not “using” it profitably. How am I being improved by this holiday? Am I catching up on my reading? Am I seeing and doing new things? Am I recharging in a way that will sharpen my performance come the first week of September? It would be nice, one day, to stop doing this.This summer, I’ve come the closest I’ve been to silencing this voice. It hasn’t happened by design, but rather, as is often the case with parents of young children, by becoming aware of an unhealthy behaviour because I’m passing it down. In June, I chose a summer camp for my kids that promised to improve them through eight hours of intense activity a day. From nine to five, for six weeks, they would be in a programme with almost no breaks, no fun in the sprinkler, no goofing off. Instead, they would be living (my) dream of having new skills – in this case, ballet, music and voice – drummed into them. After a week, one came home crying and the other looked miserable. I ripped them both out, with no idea how we’d get through a further eight weeks of summer.Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist based in New York Continue reading...
Lawsuit says Texas Department of Public Safety ‘declined to provide any meaningful information’ regarding events of that dayMore than a dozen major US news organizations are banding together to sue the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) for failing to release public records related to the shooting at Robb elementary school in Uvalde that left 19 children and two teachers dead.The lawsuit comes after reporters from these local and national news outlets were denied over 70 requests made to the DPS surrounding the shooting under the Texas Public Information Act, which requires governmental bodies to release information in the interest of the public. Continue reading...
School districts sees success with ‘Transformation Schools’ that offer a socioeconomically mixed student bodyThis story about Transformation Schools was produced by the Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.When Lauren McKinnon heard a new public elementary school was opening close to her home in Dallas, it was good news; but when she learned the school would offer an all-girls education format with a focus on Stem, she was even more excited, knowing inequities often exist for girls – like her daughters – in math and science. Continue reading...
Even in conservative Kansas, abortion rights are popular. The Democrats need to stop shying away from abortion and make it a campaign issueIt wasn’t even close; it was a blowout. With an unexpectedly large turnout and a huge margin, Kansas voters on Tuesday rejected a measure that would have removed the right to an abortion from their state’s constitution. Nearly 60% of voters in the deeply conservative state rejected the anti-abortion measure. Only about 40% supported it.The so-called Value Them Both Act would have dramatically devalued women in Kansas. The bill was designed to amend the state’s constitution in response to a 2019 ruling by the state supreme court, which found that abortion was protected in the state charter’s guarantee of “equal and inalienable rights” to all citizens. In contrast to the US supreme court, the Kansas court rejected the idea that civil rights were frozen in time at the time of the document’s ratification; instead, they extended those equal rights to women. “We are now asked: is this declaration of rights more than an idealized aspiration?” the court wrote. “And, if so, do the substantive rights include a woman’s right to make decisions about her body, including the decision whether to continue her pregnancy? We answer these questions, ‘Yes.’” Overwhelmingly, by a margin of roughly 20 points, Kansan voters agreed with them.Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading...
by Laurence H Tribe and Dennis Aftergut on (#6252C)
If Trump or any of the likely Republican nominees win in 2024, they will immediately move to protect those who attempted to overturn the 2020 electionOn Tuesday CNN reported that key January 6 texts have been erased by officials of Donald Trump’s defense department in addition to homeland security and the Secret Service. Not even a clueless Hamlet could avoid smelling “something rotten in the state of Denmark”.With the growing list of deletions, there is a whole new criminal conspiracy to investigate: one to destroy evidence of the grave federal crimes already under investigation. Nothing so focuses the prosecutorial mind or underscores the need to accelerate a criminal investigation as evidence that the investigation’s target may have plotted to erase the proof of his wrongdoing that is needed to hold him accountable. Continue reading...
Republican nominees in Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania are on the verge of claiming offices where they would have enormous power over electionsHello, and Happy Thursday,I’m writing this as we’re still digesting the results of Tuesday’s primary elections in several states, the latest test of whether Republican candidates who have embraced lies about the 2020 election can get the backing of GOP voters. So far, the results only add to the considerable evidence showing election denialism remains remarkably powerful in Republican politics.Arizona’s attorney general debunked a claim from Cyber Ninjas that nearly 300 dead people could have voted in the 2020 election in ArizonaSome voters were stealing pens from voting sites in Arizona, egged on by a conspiracy theoryA retired supreme court justice hired by Wisconsin Republicans to review the 2020 race publicly said in March lawmakers should consider decertifying the race. Privately, he said doing so was “a practical impossibility”. Continue reading...
Vin Scully, the LA Dodgers broadcaster of nearly seven decades who died on Tuesday at 94, leaves behind a towering legacy as a paragon of joy in a world of anger and calm in a time of chaos“Hi everybody! And a very pleasant good evening to you, wherever you may be.”Whether they were navigating Los Angeles traffic, retreating to their couch after work, preparing their dinner or eating it, millions of Angelenos turned on their televisions or radios at 7pm to join their nightly summer appointment with Vin Scully. Continue reading...
Revelation contradicts claims Jones had nothing on his phone pertaining to 2012 shooting he long called a hoaxAttorneys for Alex Jones “messed up” and sent to his legal adversaries “every text message” he had written in the past two years – contradicting claims Jones had nothing on his phone pertaining to the deadly Sandy Hook school shooting, which he long maintained was a hoax, it was revealed at his defamation trial on Wednesday.The revelation surfaced during an exchange in an Austin, Texas, courtroom between Jones and Mark Bankston, a lawyer representing the parents of a six-year-old boy killed in the 2012 attack. Continue reading...
Mike Lindell says he has poured up to $40m into wave of lawsuits and a new movie as US experts warn of threat to democracyMyPillow chief executive Mike Lindell, a fervent Donald Trump ally, says he has poured $35-40m into a wide crusade – a wave of lawsuits to get rid of voting machines that he faults for Trump’s defeat, a new movie about voting fraud, and a hefty legal stable – to promote charges that the 2020 election was riddled with fraud, despite a flood of contrary evidence.In his frenetic quest to dispense with electronic voting equipment that he has often charged are defective, Lindell is hosting a two-day “Moment of Truth” summit on 20 and 21 August in Missouri, that he expects will draw 200 federal and state officials and staff, as well as hundreds of representatives from groups nationwide who have investigated election fraud this year and in 2020. Continue reading...
Groups accused of using Republican mega-donors to hijack Democratic primaries following the defeat of Jewish congressmanHawkish pro-Israel lobby groups have been accused of using Republican mega-donors to hijack Democratic primaries following the “alarming” defeat of a prominent Jewish congressman because he criticised Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians.The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) spent more than $4m to defeat Andy Levin in Tuesday’s Democratic primary for a congressional seat in north-western Detroit. Continue reading...
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi has described US house speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan as a 'complete farce' at meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in Cambodia. 'The irreversible historical trend of Taiwan’s return to the motherland cannot be changed. Those who offend China will surely be punished.' The United States was violating China’s sovereignty under the guise of democracy, he said
Woman faces misdemeanor charges after truck driver used own vehicle to steer golf cart to shoulderA woman with an open bottle of Jack Daniel’s whiskey in a bag was arrested for driving a golf cart on Florida’s busiest interstate while drunk, according to an arrest report.The 58-year-old woman was arrested on Saturday night on the shoulder of Interstate 95. She is now facing misdemeanor charges of disorderly intoxication in a public place and resisting an officer without violence. Continue reading...
Watchdog group calls on Merrick Garland asked to investigate deleted phone messages from senior Trump officialsThe US attorney general, Merrick Garland, has been asked to investigate yet another deletion of text messages and other communications by senior officials on 6 January 2021, this time by the Pentagon.American Oversight, a non-partisan watchdog group, revealed the shock deletion on Tuesday, having discovered it through freedom of information requests to the Department of Defense. Continue reading...
In 95-1 vote, body supports ‘slam-dunk for national security’ after Russia’s invasion of UkraineThe US Senate delivered near-unanimous bipartisan approval to Nato membership for Finland and Sweden on Wednesday, calling expansion of the western defensive bloc a “slam-dunk” for US national security and a day of reckoning for Vladimir Putin.The 95-1 vote for the candidacy of two European countries that, until Russia’s war against Ukraine, had long avoided military alliances took a crucial step toward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its 73-year-old pact of mutual defense among the United States and democratic allies in Europe. Continue reading...
Republican, 58, elected to Congress in 2012, killed along with two members of her staff in head-on collision in Indiana, police sayThe US congresswoman Jackie Walorski and two members of her staff were killed in a head-on vehicle collision in Indiana on Wednesday, her office and local police said.Walorski, a Republican who represented Indiana’s second congressional district in the US House of Representatives, was traveling in a vehicle with the two others when another car veered into their lane, the Elkhart county sheriff’s office said. Continue reading...
Several thousand people are under evacuation orders and at least four bodies have been found due to the McKinney fireA huge wildfire raging in northern California continues to burn out of control as residents of a scenic river town razed by the fire return to scenes of destruction.In the hamlet of Klamath River, home to about 200 people, most homes and businesses have turned to ash. Several thousand people in the region remain under evacuation orders, and at least four have been killed. Continue reading...
Nearly half of state’s registered voters turned out in first electoral test of US abortion rightsMost primary elections only turn out a small portion of the electorate – but this year’s Kansas primary was unlike any other in the state.This year’s primary ballot included a question to decide whether to stop the state’s constitution from protecting abortion rights, which could have paved the way for the state legislature to completely ban abortion. Continue reading...
The directive equips the Heath and Human Services department to expand coverage for patients seeking out of state careJoe Biden signed a second executive order on Wednesday that aims to protect access to reproductive healthcare after the US supreme court struck down the constitutional right to abortion.Most significantly, the order directs the health and human services department to consider ways to expand coverage for patients traveling out of state for reproductive healthcare. Biden’s order does not detail how this could be achieved; currently, government-subsidized Medicaid health insurance plans cover medically necessary abortions in only 16 states and do not reimburse patients who leave their state to seek an abortion. Continue reading...
by Helen Davidson in Taipei and Vincent Ni on (#624CE)
Island accuses Beijing of planning to breach sovereign territory in wake of controversial visit by Nancy PelosiChina is to begin a series of unprecedented live-fire drills that would effectively blockade the island of Taiwan, just hours after the departure of US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, whose controversial visit this week has sparked fears of a crisis in the Taiwan strait.Taiwan has characterised the drills, which will last until Sunday afternoon – and will include missile tests and other “military operations” as close as nine miles to Taiwan’s coastline – as a violation of international law. Continue reading...
American conspiracy theorist and Infowars host Alex Jones has admitted the shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012 was not a hoax during a defamation trial brought against him by parents of the victims. 'It’s 100% real,' Alex Jones repeated as lawyers pressed him. Asked by his lawyer whether he now understood it was 'absolutely irresponsible' to push the false claim that the Sandy Hook shooting did not happen, Jones said he did, but added: 'They [the media] won’t let me take it back'
Drivers post pictures of thermometers reaching 116F, 117F and 121F inside vehicles amid record-breaking heatUPS delivery truck drivers have begun sharing pictures showing the sweltering temperatures recorded inside their vans as communities across the US continue to experience record-breaking temperatures.In a viral tweet shared by Teamsters for a Democratic Union drivers posted pictures of thermometers inside trucks reaching 116F (47C), 117F and 121F – temperatures far above what is considered safe. UPS trucks do not have air conditioning. Continue reading...
by Lauren Gambino in Washington and Martin Pengelly i on (#623TA)
Trump-backed challenger John Gibbs triumphs, while Democrats hopeful Kansas abortion vote will energize voters in NovemberOn one of the most consequential nights of the US primary season, amplifiers of Donald Trump’s stolen-election myth won in Arizona and Michigan – in the latter state defeating a Republican who voted for Trump’s impeachment – while voters in Kansas decisively rejected an attempt to remove abortion protections from the state constitution.With fewer than 100 days left before the November midterm elections, the results confirmed Trump’s grip on Republican voters and advanced his efforts to purge critics and elevate loyalist standard-bearers. Continue reading...
Victories underscore the continued political potency of the stolen election myth, with most significant win in ArizonaCandidates who question the 2020 election results won a handful of key primaries on Tuesday, underscoring the continued political potency of the myth of a stolen election in US politics.The most significant victory was in Arizona, where Mark Finchem, who was endorsed by Donald Trump, easily won the GOP nomination for secretary of state, placing him one step closer to overseeing elections in a key battleground state. Continue reading...
Democrats celebrated the Kansas vote as a testament to the desire for abortion rights nationwide, even in Republican-held statesDemocrats including Joe Biden hailed the outcome of an abortion rights ballot question in Kansas, after a majority voted to protect the right in the state constitution.In a statement, the president said: “Voters in Kansas turned out in record numbers to reject extreme efforts to amend the state constitution to take away a woman’s right to choose and open the door for a statewide ban. Continue reading...
It’s one thing to declare yourself ‘rather dead than red’, quite another to inflict that decision on the rest of usArguments in the foothills of war are always the same. Those for war shout loudest and beat their chests, eager for tanks to rumble and jets to roar. Those against are dismissed as wimps, appeasers and defeatists. When the trumpets sound and the drums beat, reason runs for cover.The visit to Taiwan of the US congressional speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has been so blatantly provocative it seems little more than a midterm election stunt. She declares it “essential that America and her allies make clear that we never give in to autocrats”. China’s gross overreaction is a classic example of precipitate escalation. Yet when Joe Biden asserted that the US would defend Taiwan militarily, the president’s office instantly backtracked, reasserting a policy of “strategic ambiguity”. It remains the case that no one quite believes the US will go to war over Taiwan – so far.Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnistDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 300 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at guardian.letters@theguardian.com Continue reading...
Kansas voters affirmed a women’s right to choose. Meanwhile, Republicans across the US elevated extremist candidates who may be unpopular in general electionsRepublican candidates from Arizona to Pennsylvania ought to worry. On Tuesday, voters in Kansas rejected efforts to gut a woman’s right to choose. In 2020, Donald Trump trounced Joe Biden there 56-42. Two years later, an anti-choice referendum went down in defeat 59-41. Suburban moms and dads had thundered; turnout soared. The supreme court’s wholesale attack on Roe backfired.The competing opinions authored by Justices Alito, Thomas and Kavanaugh may gift the Democrats a two-seat gain in the Senate, and doom Republican pick-ups of governorships in Michigan and Pennsylvania. Grasp more than you can hold, and you will be left with nothing, the Talmud says. On primary day, the high court’s decision in Dobbs seems to have energized plenty of otherwise loyal Republicans. By the numbers, 65% of Americans believe the constitution enshrines a right of privacy even as they hold doubts about abortion.Lloyd Green is a regular contributor and served in the Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992 Continue reading...
Increase in production by 100,000 barrels a day described as ‘so little as to be meaningless’The Opec cartel and its allies have agreed to increase the production of crude by just 100,000 barrels a day, in what analysts have described as an insult directed at the US president, Joe Biden.Ministers from the 13-member group and its allies, led by Russia and known as Opec+, met on Thursday at a closed-door video meeting and rubber-stamped an increase in output that is the equivalent of 86 seconds, or 0.1%, of global oil demand. Continue reading...
Bill passed with an 86-11 vote after weeks of criticism from veterans groups and advocates including Jon StewartAfter a week of anger and criticism from veterans groups and advocates, including the comedian Jon Stewart, Senate Republicans finally agreed to pass a bill that expands healthcare and benefits to veterans exposed to toxins.“I’m not sure I’ve ever seen this situation where people who have already given so much had to fight so hard to get so little,” said Stewart, who joined veterans to push for the bill. “I hope we learned a lesson.” Continue reading...
Organizers said treating reproductive rights as a non-partisan issue was key to success in a Republican-leaning stateIn a conference room at the Sheraton in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, people screamed, whooped, cheered and cried as a vote to protect abortion rights in Kansas’s state constitution came down late on Tuesday night.And it wasn’t just Democrats. Continue reading...
Nancy Pelosi concluded her controversial trip to Taiwan on Wednesday. The US House speaker arrived in Taipei late on Tuesday on an unannounced but closely watched trip, which has drawn condemnation and vows of retaliation from China, which claims Taiwan as its province. Beijing demonstrated its anger by launching live fire 'targeted military operations' in six locations surrounding the self-ruled island, while the Chinese foreign minister called the visit 'an outright farce'
Kansans delivered a win for abortion rights in the US on Tuesday night when they voted to continue to protect abortion in the state constitution. A deeply conservative and usually reliably Republican state, Kansas was the first in the US to put abortion rights to a vote since the US supreme court ruled to overturn Roe v Wade in late June
Beijing reacts to House speaker’s visit with outrage as Chinese military begin drills close to Taiwan. Plus, Batgirl gets cancelledGood morning.The US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has pledged America’s “crucial” solidarity with Taiwan, in a historic meeting with Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, who vowed not to back down in the face of military threats from China.Why did she decide to visit? “Our delegation came to Taiwan to make unequivocally clear we will not abandon Taiwan, and we are proud of our enduring friendship,” Pelosi said.What do Taiwanese Americans think of the media covering of her visit? To Taiwanese Americans, the hyperbolic tenor of the debate over Pelosi’s visit is indicative of how little most Americans know or care about the people of Taiwan, with one calling it “hoopla and yellow journalism”.What is the Order of Propitious Clouds? Pelosi was given Taiwan’s highest civilian order during her visit to Taiwan, a “symbol of America’s strong and enduring friendship”.Will the abortion access issue affect the midterm elections? Possibly. The resounding win in Kansas came as a surprise in the deeply conservative state. The vote is viewed as a litmus test for the future of abortion access across the US. Continue reading...
Global management consultancy’s three-year ban follows pressure by ex- Labour minister Peter HainThe global management consultancy Bain & Company has been barred from tendering for UK government contracts for three years after its “grave professional misconduct” in state corruption in South Africa, the Cabinet Office said.Britain became the first western country to take this step, after pressure from the former Labour minister and anti-apartheid campaigner Peter Hain. Continue reading...
If there’s one thing the two supposedly Democratic senators love, it’s media attentionThis week, the spotlight once again will be on Democratic senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema (dubbed “Manchinema” by the Washington press corps when the two blocked much of Biden’s agenda).Which is exactly where both of these politicians want it.Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new 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...
Nancy Pelosi’s visit to our island has put the world on edge. But for ordinary Taiwanese people, life has to carry onIt’s no secret why Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan has been such big news. As speaker of the US House of Representatives, she is in direct succession to the presidency after the vice-president. No comparable visit by a US official has taken place for 25 years. On the eve of the visit, there was talk of a possible fourth crisis in the Taiwan Strait; Xi Jinping warned the US that it was “play[ing] with fire”. Some commentators have been hyperbolic enough to invoke the prospect of world war.But for people in Taiwan, for now at least, life carries on as usual. Such is the nature of living in a nation that has long been seen as a geopolitical pawn. What the Taiwanese actually want, or how we feel, is eclipsed by the “great power” showdown on our doorstep.Brian Hioe is one of the founding editors of New Bloom Magazine, an online magazine covering activism and youth politics in Taiwan and Asia Pacific Continue reading...
Workers say they just want a fair deal on pay, conditions and schedules at an airline has long resisted union effortsFlight attendants at Delta are currently pushing to form a union at the only major airline in the US where flight attendants are not unionized.Workers are racing to gather union authorization cards signed by a supermajority at Delta to trigger a union election over the next few months, as signatures are only valid for one year. Continue reading...
The cost of reproductive care and the discrimination we face leaves my community effectively excluded from any gains madeSitting in my second-year law class as Roe v Wade was overturned, I watched young women hail India’s abortion legislation. My heart broke a little more each time my “feminist” classmates flattered the law protecting their reproductive rights.For a movement claiming to represent all women, Indian feminism is a colossal failure. It persistently overlooks the women of my community. Can they afford safe abortion? Are they able to choose birth control measures? Do they have access to reproductive healthcare at all? Continue reading...
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