Ex-president also testifies that thrown tomatoes can be lethal, after activist sues over his treatment by Trump securityDonald Trump has revealed in sworn testimony that he hired Matthew Calamari, a senior executive in the Trump Organization at the time an activist alleges he was roughed up by Trump’s security team, as a bodyguard after seeing him demonstrate “bravery” in a fight at a tennis competition.Trump discussed Calamari in a deposition for a civil lawsuit brought by Efrain Galicia, the activist who alleged the incident occurred while he was protesting outside Trump Tower in 2015. Continue reading...
Ex-president found to be in contempt after failure to comply with subpoena in New York state attorney general’s fraud investigationDonald Trump is appealing the contempt of court order he received from a Manhattan judge that fines him $10,000 a day for failing to comply with a subpoena, according to documents filed Wednesday.The contempt order was issued in the civil investigation by New York state attorney Letitia James into the former president’s business practices. On 7 April, James asked Judge Arthur Engoron to hold Trump in contempt of court for not turning over documents and information she had subpoenaed as part of the investigation. Continue reading...
Vladimir Putin’s frustration is leading him to escalate Russia’s confrontation with the westSteadily, ominously, the stakes are rising in the confrontation that Vladimir Putin’s brutal invasion of Ukraine has provoked with the west. Russia’s state energy company Gazprom halted gas supplies to two EU member states – Poland and Bulgaria – on Wednesday and warned that more countries could be similarly targeted. Poland, with good reason, described this as a “direct attack”. Moscow is also talking darkly of delivering a “proportionate response” to the demonisation of Russia by western governments. On Tuesday, Mr Putin’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, accused Nato of “engaging in a war with Russia through a proxy”. The risk of nuclear escalation, he said, was becoming “considerable”.Economic warfare and apocalyptic threats can be read as signs of Russia’s bitter frustration at the way events have unfolded since February. The scale and practical value of western solidarity with Ukraine – in the form of sanctions, financial aid and military assistance – have come as an unpleasant surprise to the Kremlin. The humiliating failure of Mr Putin’s initial plan to capture Kyiv and topple the Ukrainian government was down to the bravery and skill of those who fought to defend their country. But external military assistance was crucial in giving the country’s armed forces sufficient means to resist. Continue reading...
Judge says he needs more time to determine a punishment and orders Alexander Jerich to write 25-page essay on 2016 massacreA Florida judge has ordered a man who defaced an LGBTQ+ Pride mural to write a 25-page essay about the 2016 Pulse gay nightclub shooting.Last June, the city of Delray Beach in south Florida unveiled a rainbow mural at an intersection on the fifth anniversary of the attack, in which a gunman killed 49 people at the club in Orlando. Continue reading...
State lawmaker claims it’s his nickname – but he struggles to spell it and opponent says he doesn’t use itA state Republican lawmaker who wanted to refer to himself as “The Patriot” on the ballot can’t use that nickname, the Oklahoma Election Board has ruled.Sean Roberts can still run for Oklahoma labor commissioner, but he can’t refer to himself using that nickname on the ballot, the board decided Monday. Continue reading...
Boxers Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano faced off on top of the Empire State Building to launch an historic fight week. Seven-division world champion Serrano, will go head to head with undisputed lightweight champion Taylor on Saturday night at the iconic Madison Square Garden.This fight is already making history as 'the biggest female fight of all time', as it looks to put female boxing more firmly on the map.
Bill Hwang and Patrick Halligan accused of 11 criminal counts in case likely to trigger one of biggest recent Wall Street prosecutionsUS prosecutors charged the founder and chief financial officer of collapsed investor Archegos Capital Management with fraud on Wednesday morning in a move that is likely to start one of the biggest Wall Street white-collar prosecutions in years.Archegos founder Bill Hwang and his former top lieutenant, Patrick Halligan, were arrested at their homes and are expected to appear in court later today. Continue reading...
The Puerto Rican lightweight who headlines Madison Square Garden with Katie Taylor on Saturday hopes this is just the startAmanda Serrano is on top of the world – that’s how it feels, anyway, standing on the 86th-floor observation deck of the Empire State Building on a misty Tuesday afternoon. As the seven-division champion from Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighbourhood poses for photographs, the city unspools behind her, offering an evocative glimpse of Madison Square Garden. In the storied venue’s 140 years of hosting boxing, a women’s fight has never headlined a card – until Saturday night, when Serrano will climb through the ropes to challenge Ireland’s Katie Taylor for the undisputed lightweight championship.The fight has been billed as the biggest in women’s boxing history – perhaps in recent boxing history, period. Serrano and Taylor are the world’s top two female boxers regardless of weight. The last time the pound-for-pound No 1 and No 2 squared off was more than a decade ago when Manny Pacquiao defeated Juan Manuel Márquez by split decision in 2008. Continue reading...
Leaked recording shows senior House Republican said Florida congressman Matt Gaetz and others put Americans at riskKevin McCarthy, the senior Republican in the House of Representatives, privately accused one of his colleagues of “putting people in jeopardy” in the wake of the January 6 insurrection, according to a leaked audio recording.In a phone call with Republican leaders on 10 January 2021, McCarthy said that Matt Gaetz, a Florida congressman and ardent Trump supporter, was putting Americans at risk with his comments after the assault on the US Capitol that left five people dead. Continue reading...
There’s a strong risk that the case will spark anger and violence – whether the court overturns Roe v Wade or notCivil wars don’t always begin with gunfire. Sometimes civil wars begin with learned arguments. In April 1861, Confederate forces shot on Fort Sumter, but at the time even Jefferson Davis, the Confederate president, had doubts about whether the event mattered all that much. It was, he claimed, “either the beginning of a fearful war, or the end of a political contest”; he could not say which. During the decades that preceded the assault on Fort Sumter, complex legal and political fissures had been working their way through the United States, slowly rendering the country ungovernable and opening the path to mass violence.The US is the middle of another such legal crackup, this time over the question of abortion. The courts today face the crisis American courts faced in the 1850s: is there any way to make laws for a country with furious and widening differences in fundamental values?Stephen Marche is the author, most recently, of The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future Continue reading...
Resolutions to be voted on at shareholder meeting including stopping global sales of product and racial justice auditWomen’s health groups are calling on Johnson & Johnson’s largest shareholders to force the company to end all sales of its controversial talc-based baby powder and hire an independent firm to conduct a racial justice audit.The pressure comes after decades of independent science suggested a link between ovarian cancer and baby powder, and the Food and Drug Administration detected cancer-causing asbestos in one lot of the product. Internal company memos show Johnson & Johnson for years marketed it to African American and overweight women and, the groups charge, knew of the asbestos contamination. Continue reading...
Freed from debating in bad faith, former Twitter users could finally unclench, go outside, and touch some grassWell, it’s happening then: Elon Musk, one of history’s least inspiring Saturday Night Live hosts, has agreed to buy Twitter for approximately $44bn. I cannot in any realm understand why he has decided to buy the website I go to every day to embarrass myself on, but this is less about the deal and more about Musk himself: not uncool, exactly (although it is impossible to be cool and be a billionaire, and yes this does include Rihanna), but a man who creaks and vibrates with a desperate-to-be-liked-by-the-cool-kids energy that most of us shook off towards the end of secondary school. I should not be able to so palpably see that a billionaire wants me to like him. I should just be living in a constant terror that he is going to explode the moon, like every good billionaire should always be threatening to do.Anyway, now is as good a time as any to assess the state of Twitter: it is not dead but definitely dying, and not because Musk has bought it (though the fact that Twitter was willing to effectively sell Twitter is frankly a red flag). The thing with social media platforms is that every one of them eventually dwindles down to something removed from the original bright kernel of the idea that made them – it is such a shame that David Fincher made such a cool film about the founding of Facebook, which is now just essentially a car boot sale that Candy Crush mums and dads “who remember proper bin men” get radicalised on – and Twitter is no different: the bizarre way the timeline never loads in sequential order; that doomed experiment with “fleets”; the fact that every viral tweet eventually sours – the user who tweeted it choosing like clockwork to sell galaxy projectors in a sponsored follow-up post.Joel Golby is a writer for the Guardian and Vice, and the author of Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant Continue reading...
The draft is supposed to ensure parity across the league. But it also helps teams retain power over players as they turn professionalThe NFL draft sells hope. In fans’ imagination draft prospects are anything they want them to be. When the draft starts in Las Vegas on Thursday, fans can dream that their team is one pick, one draft class away from becoming a Super Bowl contender.That is the kindest reading, the one that views the draft as a way to ensure competitive balance, of the league legislating parity. Another reading: it’s an exercise in wage suppression, giving as much money as possible to veterans at the expense of the young pups coming into the league. Some may say that it also serves as a way for the league and its franchises to exert control over new employees from the outset: they don’t get to choose where they’ll work or live; they’re sent to whatever outpost is dictated to them, their income decided by the rookie wage scale. Continue reading...
The bearded city council member in North Pole, Alaska, backs Bernie and champions child welfare. Could his new workshop be in Washington?Sarah Palin announced her candidacy for Alaska’s only congressional seat this month, entering a race with dozens of candidates. She certainly brings name recognition to the contest – but another contender may have her beat in that department.His name is Santa Claus. Continue reading...
Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren have an unpleasant amount in common with Angela Rayner. Female politicians are routinely belittled on both sides of the AtlanticYou have to be careful about letting women into politics, you really do. You give them a few rights and then they start clamouring for more. Worse still, they start using their womanly wiles to get their way, crossing their legs in parliament and distracting great Oxbridge-educated statesmen from their trains of thought.I speak, of course, of Angela Rayner. Labour’s deputy leader was accused by the Mail on Sunday (MoS) last week of a “Basic Instinct ploy to distract Boris” by … moving her legs at work. Continue reading...
EU commissioner raises hate speech concerns as UK draws attention to penalties in online safety billThe UK and EU have warned that Twitter must comply with new content rules or face sanctions that range from fines to a total ban, as concerns were raised that hate speech will increase on the platform under the ownership of Elon Musk.The world’s richest man has agreed a $44bn (£34bn) deal to buy the social media network, which will hand control of a platform with 217 million users to a self-confessed “free speech absolutist”. Continue reading...
Police say baby Brandon Cuellar, who has since been found, was taken from home at about 1pm on MondayA 3-month-old baby who was kidnapped from his San Francisco Bay Area home was found Tuesday and three suspects were detained, police said.The baby, Brandon Cuellar, was taken to a hospital as a precaution, the San Jose police department announced on Twitter, without saying where the boy was located. Continue reading...
North Carolina congressman faces misdemeanor criminal charge after gun spotted at security screening checkpointThe far-right North Carolina Republican congressman Madison Cawthorn is facing a misdemeanor criminal charge after police at an airport in his home state said they found a gun in his bag Tuesday.Police at Charlotte Douglas international airport handed Cawthorn, 26, a municipal citation accusing him of possessing a dangerous weapon on city property, officers said in a statement. Continue reading...
The US 'has seen no sign to date' that Russia’s president Vladimir Putin wants to end the Ukraine conflict through diplomacy, US secretary of state Antony Blinken has said.Confronted by the Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, who wanted to know why the Biden administration was 'agitating' for Ukraine to join Nato, Blinken said it would be a decision for Ukraine to make if they remained independent. He added the US government was 'broadly aligned' with Ukraine's needs
The vice-president’s case is considered a ‘breakthrough’ infection, as she is fully vaccinated and received a booster shot last OctoberUS vice-president Kamala Harris has tested positive for Covid-19, her office announced on Tuesday.Harris has not displayed any symptoms and will isolate and work from her vice-president’s residence in Washington DC, her office said, adding that she has also not been in close contact with Joe Biden or the first lady, Jill Biden. Continue reading...
President will pardon three people, including a former Secret Service agent, and reduce the sentences of 75 othersJoe Biden will issue the first pardons of his presidential term on Tuesday, in addition to reducing dozens of prison sentences and launching criminal justice reform initiatives.The president will pardon three people and will reduce the sentences of 75 additional people, many of whom have been convicted of non-violent drug crimes. Continue reading...
Administration appeals lower-court rulings that required controversial border asylum program to be reinstatedThe Biden administration is seeking the US supreme court’s go-ahead to end a controversial Trump-era immigration program that forces many seeking asylum in the US to wait in Mexico for their hearings.The justices are hearing arguments on Tuesday in the administration’s appeal of lower-court rulings that required immigration officials to reinstate the “Remain in Mexico” policy that the administration “has twice determined is not in the interests of the United States,” according to court filings. Continue reading...
Military judge rules Cooley must forfeit $54,550 in pay and face a public reprimand for forcibly kissing his sister-in-law in 2018A two-star general in the US air force who was convicted over the weekend of abusive sexual contact for forcibly kissing his sister-in-law after a family cookout in 2018 must forfeit $54,550 in pay and face a public reprimand, a military judge ruled Tuesday.Gen William Cooley received that sentence, military officials confirmed in a statement, after becoming the first-ever general to face a military trial in the American air force’s 75-year history. Continue reading...
Anti-Defamation League counts 2,717 incidents of harassment, assault and vandalism in 2021 – highest since it began countingA Jewish civil rights organization’s annual tally of antisemitic incidents in the US reached a record high last year, with a surge that coincided with an 11-day war between Israel and the Hamas militant group, according to a report released Tuesday.The Anti-Defamation League counted 2,717 antisemitic incidents of assault, harassment and vandalism in 2021, a 34% increase over the previous year and the highest number since the New York City-based group began tracking such incidents in 1979. Continue reading...
Brooklyn began the season with a core of Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and James Harden. They ended it with zero playoff wins and a crushing loss to the CelticsThe Brooklyn Nets began this season as many experts’ favorites to reach the NBA finals from the Eastern Conference. Instead, they were swept by the Boston Celtics in the first-round of the playoffs. All that’s left now is to try to figure out what went wrong in Brooklyn. Continue reading...
New York Times reporters show how Senate leader’s opposition to Trump dwindled in face of hard political realityHours after the deadly Capitol attack on 6 January 2021, the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, told a reporter he was “exhilarated” because he thought Donald Trump had finally lost his grip on the party.Close to a year and a half later, however, with midterm elections looming, Trump retains control over the GOP and is set to be its presidential candidate in 2024. Continue reading...
Do not weep for Twitter, its users, or its investors. Weep for the entire chain of bad political decisions that allowed us to get to this pointThe loudest reaction to Elon Musk buying Twitter, for some reason, has been concern about “free speech”. The second loudest reaction has been dismay about the fact that Elon Musk is a bad guy, and now he owns Twitter. I regret to inform you that both of these reactions are missing the point here – and the point is much, much scarier.Will Elon Musk do anything meaningful to transform Twitter into a valuable and flourishing public square, a shining beacon of the power of untrammelled free speech to ennoble society, rather than the cesspool of neuroses, conspiracy theories and media feuds that it is now? Probably not. On the other hand, it’s already a cesspool. Can’t get too much worse.Hamilton Nolan is a labor reporter at In These Times Continue reading...
I am hopelessly addicted to Twitter, despite its many faults. Musk’s takeover, and the likely return of Donald Trump, fills me with dreadHow does he do it all? Elon Musk is a father of seven, a busy businessman, a would-be coloniser of Mars and a full-time internet troll. As if he didn’t have enough on his plate, the world’s richest and most attention-seeking man has also just reached a deal to buy Twitter for $44bn. Not content with simply spending an inordinate amount of time posting puerile jokes on the platform, he is now seizing the memes of production.But don’t worry: it is not just a vanity project, it’s “philanthropy”. Musk has explained that he is buying Twitter to protect free speech and civil liberties. “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” Musk said in a statement posted to his new toy.Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
Comments come as diplomats gather in Germany for US-hosted talks to navigate ‘critical’ phase. Plus, Bennifer and the other couples who get back together
The tiny New Jersey university shocked some of the biggest teams at this year’s NCAA tournament. The effects are still being felt a month laterTake it from the president at Saint Peter’s himself: Life has not quite returned to normal at the tiny Jersey City university, whose basketball team stunned the sports world in March by becoming the first No 15 seed in history to reach the NCAA tournament’s Elite Eight.“This may sound crazy,” Eugene J Cornacchia tells the Guardian, referring to the student body, “but they seem to be walking with more confidence, more spring in their step.” Continue reading...
The UN’s annual report on mitigating calamities shows that a radical rethink is needed to protect those who suffer mostIf the world seems beset by constant disasters, from the pandemic to drought, we only have ourselves to blame.Over the past two decades, we have experienced up to 500 disasters a year as a result of human activity. By 2030, this could rise to 560 a year – or 10.7 a week. Continue reading...
Records Mark Meadows released to January 6 committee are missing texts from from critical 12-day periodDays before Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration, Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene appeared in a text to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to press for Donald Trump to overturn his 2020 election defeat by invoking martial law, new messages show.The message – one of more than 2,000 texts turned over by Meadows to the House select committee investigating January 6 and first reported by CNN – shows that some of Trump’s most ardent allies on Capitol Hill were pressing for Trump to return himself to office even after the Capitol attack. Continue reading...
Sheena Gullett was stranded in a broken down car after it became stuck in the snow in California and her friend went for helpA woman stranded for six days in a broken-down car in a remote northern California forest survived by rationing yogurt and eating snow, authorities said.The ordeal of Sheena Gullett, 52, was detailed in a Facebook post by the Lassen county sheriff’s office. Gullett and friend Justin Lonich, 48, were driving to Little Valley, a small incorporated community, on dirt roads off Highway 44 on 14 April when their vehicle became stuck in snow. They spent the night in the vehicle and in the morning its battery was dead. Continue reading...
The people’s convoy had gathered outside lawmaker Buffy Wicks’s house to protest her support of an abortion rights billA convoy of trucks that had gathered outside a California lawmaker’s house over the weekend to protest her support of an abortion rights bill was forced to leave the area after crossing paths with a group of young people armed with eggs.The people’s convoy, inspired by Canadian truckers who shut down roads to protest vaccine mandates, arrived in the Bay Area last week after weeks of demonstrations in Washington DC. Continue reading...
Bishop Evans jumped into the Rio Grande on Friday to save two people he thought were struggling to swim acrossSearch crews on Monday recovered the body of a Texas national guard soldier who apparently drowned three days earlier while trying to save two people he believed were struggling to swim across the Rio Grande near the US southern border.The 22-year-old soldier, Bishop E Evans, was working in Eagle Pass as part of a border security operation under the direction of the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott. Evans’ superiors hailed him as “selfless” and condemned the people he was trying to save as suspected drug traffickers attempting to enter the country without permission. Continue reading...
Republican governor embraces top priority of his party, following Donald Trump’s false claims that his 2020 re-election was stolenFlorida governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill Monday to create a police force dedicated to pursuing voter fraud and other election crimes, embracing a top priority of Republicans after Donald Trump’s false claims that his reelection was stolen.DeSantis, who is running for reelection and considered a potential 2024 Republican presidential candidate, made voting legislation a focus this year, pushing the Republican-controlled Legislature to create the policing unit in a speech where he referenced unspecified cases of voter fraud, which have become popular talking points in his party. Continue reading...
Mexican American woman, 52, who was due to be put to death on Wednesday, wins time for court to consider new evidenceThe Texas court of criminal appeals has issued a stay of execution for Melissa Lucio, the Mexican-American woman who was set to be judicially killed within 48 hours, ordering a lower court to consider new evidence of her innocence in the death of her two-year-old daughter Mariah.The court issued its order on Monday as the final clock was ticking on Lucio’s transfer to the death chamber. She would have been the first Hispanic woman executed by Texas. Continue reading...
by Adam Gabbatt in New York and agencies on (#5YHFQ)
New York judge holds former president in contempt of court for failing to comply with a subpoena for documentsA New York judge has held Donald Trump in contempt and fined him $10,000 a day, following the former president’s failure to hand over documents to prosecutors investigating his business practices.Letitia James, the New York state attorney general, had asked for the contempt finding this month stating that Trump had not complied with a subpoena requiring him to produce documents and information. Continue reading...
Jeff Leach, leading push to stop possibly innocent woman being ‘murdered by the state’, calls case ‘most troubling I’ve ever seen’The Texas Republican spearheading an extraordinary bipartisan effort to delay Wednesday’s execution of a Mexican American woman amid mounting evidence of her innocence has described the case as “the most troubling I’ve ever seen, possibly the most troubling in the history of our state”.In an interview with the Guardian, Jeff Leach, a Republican member of the Texas House of Representatives, said that even strong supporters of the death penalty – as he once considered himself – had great concern about the rapidly approaching execution. Melissa Lucio, 52, is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection for killing her two-year-old daughter Mariah, but new scientific evidence suggests the toddler died accidentally after a fall. Continue reading...
White House pandemic coordinator says press conference was lamentable but does not regret taking position on Trump’s teamThe former White House Covid response coordinator, Deborah Birx, has decried the press conference in 2020 during which, in her presence, Donald Trump floated the idea of the injection of disinfectant to treat coronavirus – calling the episode a “tragedy on many levels”.In an interview with Good Morning America, Birx said she does not regret taking on the role in Trump’s team, even though she received criticism for not standing up to his misinformed comments more forcefully at the time. Continue reading...
US news | The Guardian