US news | The Guardian

The team have soared to the top of the Western Conference, scoring seemingly at will. Their success has been aided by a clear visionNo expansion team in Major League Soccer history has been where St Louis City are right now. Never before has a newbie to the league taken 18 points from their first eight fixtures. The sight of Bradley Carnell’s team atop the Western Conference as MLS’s top scorers – they average 2.5 goals a game – is unprecedented.Nobody saw this coming. Most expected St Louis City, who were largely assembled in the space of just 12 months and have few recognisable names, to struggle. Instead, they are early-season frontrunners. Continue reading...

William White and his daughter Kinsley were seriously hurt during shooting in North CarolinaA six-year-old girl and her parents were allegedly shot by a neighbor after a basketball that the child was playing with rolled into the attacker’s yard, according to authorities and local media reporting.The shooting occurred on Wednesday in North Carolina when several young children were playing with a basketball which rolled into the yard of Robert Singletary, the news outlet WSOC-TV reported. Online court records show Singletary was arrested Thursday afternoon near Tampa. He is scheduled to appear in court on Friday. Continue reading...

Self-proclaimed ‘pro-natalists’ don’t go around saying that they only want white babies, but there’s a thin line between their movement and the ‘great replacement theory’Simone and Malcolm Collins are a thirtysomething couple with three kids called Torsten, Octavian, and Titan Invictus. (They refuse to give their girls traditionally feminine names because they think that means they’ll get taken less seriously.) The Pennsylvania-based pair plan on having at least eight children and hope each of their children can have eight children so that, in 11 generations, the world will ooze with their bloodline and there will be more Collinses stalking the Earth than there are people alive today.A bit weird, right? Maybe the sort of fantasy you’d be best off keeping to yourself? The Collinses disagree. They’ve made themselves the poster children of “pro-natalism” and are taking it upon themselves to combat what they describe as “fertility collapse” – not only by having multiple kids themselves but by trying to push for policies that would increase birth rates in the developed world. The media is paying attention to their crusade: Britain’s Telegraph profiled the pair this week, with the headline “Meet the ‘elite’ couples breeding to save mankind”. This followed a long profile on the Collinses last November from Insider and pieces by Entrepreneur and Bloomberg. Continue reading...

Geraldine Dozier-Gimblet had dipped into her savings to help pay for her child’s successful treatmentEarly in November last year, Geraldine Dozier-Gimblet posted a horoscope on her Facebook account that predicted she would receive an answer to her prayers, a solution to one of her “biggest problems”, and “peace in the foreseeable future”.She bought a lottery ticket about eight weeks later that made her a millionaire, helping her recover the life savings that she had sacrificed to pay for her daughter’s successful cancer treatments, as she and officials tell it. Continue reading...

Everything from the gamer leaker to the global spread of potential sources reveals much about the anxiety-making conditions of 21st-century espionageAfter TS (top secret), two other letters repeatedly stand out throughout the leaked Pentagon files: SI. The letters stand for special intelligence, and signify that the information has been derived from signals intelligence work. This encompasses eavesdropping, surveillance and even backdoor access to information systems – all part of a panopticon of global, US-led intelligence collection.Signals intelligence told the 1.25 million Americans with top secret clearance – and sometimes their British allies – that Russia had made marginal battlefield gains in Ukraine, that the Wagner group may be allowed to restart recruiting prisoners, and even that Russian hackers had gained control of a Canadian gas pipeline they hope to explode. Continue reading...

Baldwin was pointing a pistol at cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during a rehearsal in 2021 when the gun went offProsecutors in New Mexico have dropped criminal charges against the actor Alec Baldwin in the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the western movie Rust, officials confirmed on Thursday.Baldwin, 65, was pointing a Colt .45 pistol at Hutchins during a rehearsal on 21 October 2021 when the gun went off, killing Hutchins and wounding the director Joel Souza. Continue reading...

MyPillow CEO’s ‘Prove Mike Wrong Challenge’ promised money to anyone who could disprove data he claimed showed Trump wonMike Lindell must make good on a promise and pay $5m to a software expert who debunked data the conspiracy theorist touted in advancing Donald Trump’s lie that his 2020 election defeat was the result of voting fraud, an arbitration panel decided.In its decision, the panel said: “The data Lindell LLC provided, and represented reflected information from the November 2020 election, unequivocally did not reflect November 2020 election data.” Continue reading...

No gunpowder residue found on Manuel Paez Terán, who was alleged to have fired first in fatal confrontation with Georgia policeOfficial autopsy results for Manuel Paez Terán, an environmental activist police shot and killed three months ago during a raid in a Georgia public park near the planned site of a police and fire department training center, do little to advance the state’s version of events, including the notion that the activist shot first, wounding an officer.Paez Terán, or “Tortuguita”, was one of the “forest defenders” camped throughout the public park less than a mile away from the planned center, known as “Cop City”, when dozens of officers entered the South River Forest south-east of Atlanta, Georgia, on 18 January. Continue reading...

Judge rejects lawyers’ request that jurors be told ‘logistical burdens on New York City’ the reason for possible Trump no-showDonald Trump on Thursday was rebuked by the judge in his looming civil rape trial over a request for jurors to be told that if the former president did not testify, it would be out of concern that his presence would adversely affect New York City.This week, a lawyer for Trump, Joe Tacopina, first tried to delay the trial then requested the jury instruction. Continue reading...

Policy opposed by Democrats, who say it will ‘incite fear and hatred’, applies to school teams that receive public fundingHouse Republicans are escalating attacks on transgender athletes under the guise of protecting women’s sports, according to the passage of a new bill.During a Thursday press conference the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, and other legislators announced the passage of the so-called “Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act” in a party-line vote. Continue reading...

Nearly 50% of commercial airline workforce will retire in next 15 years, which could mean fewer travel options and price increasesAviation experts are warning that the US airline industry is going to be hit by a “tsunami of pilot retirements” in the coming years, which could mean fewer travel options and price increases.On Wednesday the CEO of the Regional Airline Association, Faye Malarkey Black, told the US House transportation and infrastructure committee that over the next 15 years, nearly 50% of the commercial airline workforce will be forced to retire because they will reach the age of 65. Continue reading...

Retailer’s fortunes bounce back after expansion abroad and pivot towards electronics and premium food rangesLess than three years ago WH Smith, the chain once known for its chocolate promotions, magazines and stationery, had lost almost two-thirds of its stock market value as the pandemic damaged its UK high street business.But now the retailer is reaping dividends from a transformation that means its typical customer is more likely to be picking up high-end headphones, a smartphone charger or some sushi – and may well be American. Continue reading...

Writers organisation denounces ‘relentless’ Republican crusade as 1,477 books banned in first half of 2022-23 school yearBook bans in US public schools increased by 28% in the first half of the 2022-23 academic year, the writers’ organisation Pen America said on Thursday, describing a “relentless” conservative “crusade to constrict children’s freedom to read”.Releasing a new report, Banned in the USA: State Laws Supercharge Book Suppression in Schools, Pen said the increase was over figures for the previous six months. Continue reading...

New board of directors hand-picked by Florida governor propose low-income housing next to park and increase in taxesThe Republican-dominated legislature in Florida has moved quickly to amplify Governor Ron DeSantis’s feud with Disney over LGBTQ+ rights, advancing a proposal to overcome the company’s thwarting of his earlier plan to seize control of the theme park giant.DeSantis, a likely candidate for the Republicans’ 2024 presidential nomination, was outfoxed by Disney after installing a hand-picked board of directors with oversight of the state’s biggest private employer. At its first meeting, the board discovered a last-minute deal between Disney and outgoing directors had rendered it in effect impotent. Continue reading...

Black women are four times more likely than white women to die giving birth. Fixing that requires change that goes way beyond healthcareIn 2018, we learned that Black women were five times more likely to die in childbirth than their white counterparts. Five years on, the data hasn’t changed much. Now, we are almost four times more likely to die, according to the findings of a new report by the women and equalities committee.Ministers had failed to tackle “appalling” and “glaring” racial disparities in maternal health over a number of years, the authors found. This comes as little surprise to me. Every year, I and other Black commentators who feel passionately about these disgusting racial disparities in maternal outcomes are rolled out to condemn the latest figures that point to Black women dying at disproportionate rates. I wish I could still feel shocked. But, if I can be frank, I’m just bored.Candice Brathwaite is a journalist and author of I Am Not Your Baby Mother, Sister Sista and Cuts Both Ways. As told to Lucy Pasha-RobinsonDo 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...

Intensive fighting has pushed the country to breaking point. The UK has a duty to lead a campaign of international pressureEvery phone call I make home to Sudan is interrupted by the crackle of gunshots or an explosion in the background. This is followed by an eerie pause from the person on the other end, before one of us carries on with the conversation. Several days after the outbreak of fighting in Sudan, some people may already be treating the situation as normal. But it isn’t.The fighting between the Sudanese armed forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – Sudan’s two main military organisations – that broke out in the capital, Khartoum, on 15 April is unprecedented even given Sudan’s turbulent and violent history. While Khartoum has not escaped violence in its modern history, including an attack by a rebel group in 2008 and decades of brutal dispersals of protesters, the scale and intensity of the current fighting is previously unknown for the capital. The violence has rapidly spread across Khartoum and to other cities and regions more familiar with the horrors of war, including the restless Darfur region. Continue reading...

Allies say Trump believes states should rule on reproductive rights and that support for federal ban could cost him 2024 electionDonald Trump considers a federal abortion ban a losing proposal for Republicans as the party prepares to enter the first presidential election since the supreme court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade – and is unlikely to support such a policy, according to people close to him.The former president has told allies in recent days that his gut feeling remains leaving the matter of reproductive rights to the states – following the court’s reasoning in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization that ended 50 years of federal abortion protections. Continue reading...

Governor’s office confirms resignation of one of several officials to discuss killing reporters and lynching Black peopleA county commissioner in far south-east Oklahoma who was identified by a local newspaper as one of several officials caught on tape discussing killing reporters and lynching Black people has resigned from office, the state’s governor confirmed on Wednesday.A spokesperson for Governor Kevin Stitt, Carly Atchison, said their office received a handwritten resignation letter from the McCurtain county commissioner Mark Jennings. In it, Jennings says he is resigning immediately and that he plans to release a formal statement “in the near future regarding the recent events in our county”. Continue reading...

Brady ad features US navy veteran’s shocking account of Vietnam gunfire and comes on heels of several devastating mass shootingsA gun safety group has created a provocative new ad campaign calling for the renewal of a federal assault weapons ban, in the wake of several devastating mass shootings across the US that involved the use of military-style rifles.The ad, released on Thursday by the gun safety group Brady and shared exclusively with the Guardian, features a US navy veteran of the Vietnam war reading a chilling account of coming under gunfire and being struck by a bullet. Continue reading...

Messages showing Antioch officers using racist slurs, and bragging about making up evidence and beating suspects have sparked outrage. Plus, supreme court delays decision on abortion pill restrictions

In this pragmatic Rishi Sunak era, a fresh start with China – and an end to bullish Tory sabre-rattlers – is on the cardsCleverly by name. And perhaps even Cleverly by nature, too? Judging by his Guardian interview this week, and by his step-by-step rebuilding of Britain’s relations with Europe, James Cleverly seems to be quietly cajoling Conservative foreign policy down off the post-Brexit battlements and towards a more recognisably practical and stable place in world affairs. If so, two important questions follow. Where exactly is that new place for Britain? And will the Tory party let him do it?The foreign secretary’s interview in Tokyo exemplifies Rishi Sunak-era pragmatism. The interview’s tone is less brazen towards China than anything that any of Cleverly’s recent predecessors would have either wanted or felt able to say. But it is also stronger on mood music than on measurable stuff. It reads in part like an attempt to soothe the ill-feeling provoked by Emmanuel Macron’s comment that America’s allies should not become its “vassals” in any confrontation with China. Continue reading...

The Florida star is a gifted but flawed NFL prospect. But teams are more willing to overlook negatives as they search for the next big thingWe are a week away from the NFL draft and Anthony Richardson fever shows no sign of letting up.When the quarterback announced he was leaving Florida for the pros after a single season as the Gators starter, observers of the college game scoffed. Sure, he was fun and exciting; he could do things few, if any, college quarterbacks could dream of. But Richardson was horribly inaccurate. Another season in the SEC oven, and he may just round into the kind of polished passer the league would prize. This current version though? Maybe a team would take a flyer at the foot of the first round. Continue reading...

Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow was linked to a conservative group that had court business while Thomas was on the benchEarlier this month, the supreme court justice Clarence Thomas put out a statement in which he addressed the storm of criticism that has engulfed him following the blockbuster ProPublica report that revealed his failure to disclose lavish gifts of luxury vacations and private-jet travel from a Texan real estate magnate.Thomas confirmed that the Dallas billionaire and Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow and his wife Kathy were “among our dearest friends”. Thomas admitted, too, that he and his wife Ginni had “joined them on a number of family trips during the more-than-a-quarter-century we have known them”. Continue reading...

A representative said filming likely to restart in Montana on Thursday while a number of legal issues remain unresolvedFilming on the western movie Rust could resume this week in Montana, the production company said, 18 months after the fatal shooting of a cinematographer during a rehearsal with actor Alec Baldwin on the original production in New Mexico.Baldwin is set to continue his involvement with the project as both actor and co-producer. Rust Move Productions attorney Melina Spadone said via a representative that filming will restart on Thursday at the Yellowstone Film Ranch. Continue reading...

Company accused of ‘gaslighting’ public on surveillance concerns during Senate inquiry into foreign influence through social mediaTikTok will either need to divest itself from Chinese ownership or face a ban in the United States, according to the commissioner of the US federal communications commission, Brendan Carr, who accused the company of “gaslighting” the public on surveillance concerns.Appearing before the Australian Senate inquiry into foreign influence through social media, the Trump appointee said concern about TikTok in the US was “broad and deep”, and crossed party lines. Continue reading...

Blake Walsh, who dated Kaylin Gillis for more than four years, says he wants ‘the world to know how good of a person she really was’A man whose girlfriend was shot dead after they pulled into the wrong driveway in upstate New York said their “high hopes and plans” were shattered in a single, brutal moment.“I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her,” Blake Walsh, 19, told NBC of his girlfriend, Kaylin Gillis. “My world was taken from me.” Continue reading...

Shocking messages about beating suspects and making up evidence were found when Antioch officers were investigatedAmid outrage over text messages showing police officers in northern California using racist slurs and bragging about making up evidence and beating suspects, city officials voted to audit the troubled department.The FBI and the Contra Costa district attorney’s office discovered the shocking messages while investigating officers within the Antioch police department suspected of crimes. Officials have named 17 officers who sent texts, including the president of the Antioch police union, but nearly half the department was included in the messages. Continue reading...

On Broadway, there wasn’t an empty seat in the house – and we finally saw how compelling stories of victimhood can beIt comes around intermittently every few years; a show on Broadway that reminds us why theatre beats every other medium hands down and almost justifies the cost of the tickets. So it was last night, walking down 45th Street in New York past foyers sparse with patrons, to something as close to a mob scene as a person with one eye on their phone for the babysitter can get.Beneath the marquee, which featured a blown-up image of the actor Jodie Comer, women posed with each other for photos. It was like a revival tent meeting for affluent middle-age lesbians, young women attending alone, a handful of gay men and, I would hazard, approximately 27 enlightened straight ones. “Our people have gone mad for this,” said the friend I was with, and we repaired to our seats feeling vaguely hysterical. Continue reading...

California authorities arrested Austin Eis, 24, for murder and other crimes, including an earlier stabbing of a Walmart employeeThe driver of a car that crashed into a group of southern California high school students, killing one and injuring three, was arrested for investigation of murder and other crimes, including an earlier stabbing, authorities said Wednesday.The students were struck while on a sidewalk Tuesday afternoon near Westlake high school in the city of Thousand Oaks, west of Los Angeles. The car overturned. Continue reading...

Investigators make announcement following deadly shooting at 16th birthday party in small town of Dadeville on SaturdayTwo teenagers and a 20-year-old man have been arrested and charged withmurder in connection with a shooting that killed four people at a Sweet 16 birthday party in Alabama, investigators announced Wednesday.Tallapoosa county district attorney Mike Segrest said two teens – Tyreese “Ty Reik” McCullough, 17, and Travis McCullough, 16, both of Tuskegee – would be tried as adults. That’s automatically required in Alabama for anyone 16 or older charged with murder. Investigators said Wednesday that Wilson LaMar Hill Jr, 20, of Auburn was also arrested on the same charge. Continue reading...

Talks between Boris Epshteyn and DoJ prosecutors investigating Mar-a-Lago and January 6 cases represent possible peril for TrumpDonald Trump’s senior adviser and legal counsel Boris Epshteyn is scheduled to be interviewed on Thursday by special counsel prosecutors investigating the former president’s retention of classified-marked documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort and his role in the January 6 Capitol attack.The investigation Epshteyn is being asked to talk about – potentially both – remains unclear, according to a person familiar with the matter who confirmed the meeting on the condition of anonymity. His lawyer could not immediately be reached for comment. Continue reading...

Approval of bill prohibiting discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity comes at the request of Governor Ron DeSantisFlorida’s board of education has approved the expansion of the state’s so-called “don’t say gay” bill, which now prohibits discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity at school across all grade levels.Wednesday’s approval came at the request of the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, who in the past two years has waged what critics call a “culture war” across the state through his bans on gender-affirming care, Covid-19 precautionary measures and abortion rights, among other facets. Continue reading...

Viktoria Nasyrova, 47, was convicted of attempted murder in New York after stealing identity documents and valuables from victimA Russian-born woman has was sentenced to 21 years in a US prison for trying to kill her American lookalike with poisoned cheesecake and then stealing her identity.Viktoria Nasyrova, 47, was found guilty of attempted murder by a New York jury in February. Continue reading...

Justices will decide by end of week on whether to allow ruling reversing drug’s authorization from taking effect

Nichols died after beating by police, who said he was suspected of reckless driving but no evidence of traffic violation has emergedThe family of Tyre Nichols, a Black Tennessee man who died after been beaten by five police officers, has sued the city of Memphis, individual officers and emergency medical personnel involved in his case.Lawyers for Nichols’s mother, RowVaughn Wells, filed the lawsuit on Wednesday in federal court in Memphis. Continue reading...

Prosecutors recommend that Willard Miller, 17, receive 30 years to life and Jeremy Goodale, 18, 25 years to life for 2021 killingTwo teenagers in Iowa charged with beating their high school Spanish teacher to death over a poor grade have pleaded guilty to first-degree murder.On Tuesday, Willard Miller and Jeremy Goodale admitted killing Nohema Graber, 66, at Fairfield high school. Continue reading...

Lawyers were going to call media mogul this week, forcing him to appear in person for cross-examinationLawyers for Dominion Voting Systems had planned to put media mogul Rupert Murdoch on the stand to testify this week before it reached a $787.5m settlement with Fox for its broadcasting of false claims about the company’s voting equipment after the 2020 election, according to a person familiar with the matter.Dominion was going to call the 92-year-old Murdoch as its second witness, forcing him to appear in person for cross-examination before the end of the week. He would have followed Tony Fratto, a crisis communications consultant who represented Dominion after the 2020 election and contacted Fox many times to inform them they were making false claims. Continue reading...

The network has agreed to pay $787.5m for promoting election lies, but mentions of the case were few and far betweenFox’s agreement to pay $787.5m in damages to Dominion Voting Systems is the largest publicly known defamation settlement in history, and included an acknowledgment that a news network that has always claimed to be “fair and balanced” had spread baseless conspiracy theories.Not that you’d know about it from actually watching Fox News. Continue reading...

A defamation settlement over electoral fraud ‘stories’ means nothing if the channel goes on spreading liesPut away the popcorn. The decision by Rupert Murdoch to spend $787.5m (£633m) to settle the defamation lawsuit brought against Fox News has allowed the media mogul to avoid having to take the stand and defend lies told on his television channel about the last US election. It’s an escape hatch. It’s also a massive humiliation.As drama, Fox v Dominion would have been box office: a tale of truth and lies and almost limitless money and power that would have trumped any trial involving footballers’ wives, if not the fictional series about a powerful media mogul currently airing on a UK television channel once owned by Murdoch. Just to underline the entertainment value, one of the top Google search terms for “Fox and Dominion” just before the settlement was announced was, “Can I watch the trial for free?”Jane Martinson is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Homeowner, 84, already faces two felonies for shooting Black teen who knocked on wrong door to pick up siblingsA lawyer for the family of Ralph Yarl, the Black 16-year-old who was shot by a white man in Kansas City, Missouri, after ringing his doorbell by mistake, said the case should qualify as a hate crime.“Ralph Yarl was shot because he was armed with nothing but other than his Black skin,” Lee Merrit told the Associated Press. Continue reading...

Suspect in custody and charged with deadly conduct after shootings of Payton Washington and teammate Heather RothA man in Texas shot and wounded two cheerleaders when one almost got into his car by mistake, according to officials and local media reports.The shootings of Payton Washington and her Woodlands Elite Cheer Company teammate Heather Roth came three days after 20-year-old Kaylin Gillis was shot dead in New York when the car she was riding in pulled into the driveway of a wrong address. Two days before that, 16-year-old Ralph Yarl was shot and injured in Kansas City, Missouri, by a man whose doorbell he rang after going to the wrong address to pick up siblings. Continue reading...

Jared Smith, who was ousted for decision, will be interviewed before Ron DeSantis picks new supreme court memberA Florida judge rejected by voters after denying a teenage girl an abortion citing her poor school grades is in line for a seat on the state supreme court as the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, continues to turn the bench to the right.Jared Smith will be interviewed alongside 14 others next month by a nominating commission that will make recommendations to DeSantis, who last week signed a six-week abortion ban into law. Continue reading...