Trans congresswoman Sarah McBride responds to Capitol Hill bathroom ban

Following statement from Mike Johnson, McBride says: ‘I’m not here to fight about bathrooms, I’m here to … bring down costs facing families’

Sarah McBride, the incoming congresswoman and first openly transgender person elected to the US House of Representatives, on Wednesday shared a statement on social media in response to the House banning trans people from using single-sex bathrooms on Capitol Hill that match their gender identity.

Earlier in the day, the House speaker, Louisiana Republican Mike Johnson, issued a statement “regarding facilities throughout the US Capitol complex”.

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Outcry over stalemate on Gaetz report; Trump reportedly considering Martin Makary for FDA – US politics live

Democrat Susan Wild says committee chair Michael Guest mischaracterized meeting and committee will reconvene in December; Markary opposed Covid vaccine mandates

The Federal Reserve must not remove Wells Fargo’s $1.95tn asset cap until the bank has fixed its risk management and compliance issues, top Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren told the US central bank on Wednesday, reports Reuters.

In a letter to Fed chair, Jerome Powell, and the central bank’s regulatory chief, Michael Barr, Warren said the Fed must reject Wells Fargo reported appeal to have the punishment imposed in 2018 lifted until it “can show that it can properly manage the risks associated with running a large bank”.

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House ethics committee deadlocked on whether to release Matt Gaetz report

Panel met on Wednesday but didn’t reach a decision on releasing the report on Trump’s controversial AG pick

The House ethics committee deadlocked on releasing a report examining allegations of sexual misconduct against Matt Gaetz, the former Republican representative and Donald Trump’s choice to lead the US justice department, after the panel met behind closed doors on Wednesday.

Emerging from the meeting after roughly two hours, most members of the panel declined to offer details on their discussion, but the Republican chair, Michael Guest, told reporters that there was “not an agreement by the committee to release the report”.

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Biden urged to use clemency powers to tackle ‘crisis’ of US mass incarceration

Members of Congress call on president to pardon or commute sentences before he leaves White House

More than 60 members of Congress have written to Joe Biden calling on him to use his presidential clemency powers to reunite families, address unfair sentencing policies, and begin to tackle the scourge of mass incarceration, which they said was eroding “the soul of America”.

Biden has 61 days left before he leaves the White House in which he could pardon or commute the sentences of incarcerated Americans. The letter, signed by a number of prominent Democratic politicians and spearheaded by the progressive politician Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, urges Biden to act while he still can.

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Trump picks Linda McMahon for education, and says he won’t reconsider Matt Gaetz nomination – live

President-elect picks prominent donor and co-chair of transition team as education secretary; Trump won’t rethink Gaetz for attorney general despite mounting scrutiny

President-elect Donald Trump will join billionaire Elon Musk for a SpaceX launch in Texas later today, as reported by Reuters.

This will be the sixth test flight to space for SpaceX’s Starship rocket. The test launch is planned for 5pm ET.

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Trump selects Fox News contributor Sean Duffy as transport secretary

Former Republican congressman from Wisconsin was also a cast member on MTV’s The Real World: Boston

Donald Trump has named Sean Duffy, a former Republican congressman from Wisconsin,and former cast member of the MTV show The Real World, to serve as the secretary of transportation. He was also a co-host on Fox Business but left that role on Monday, according to Fox News Media.

Duffy served in Congress from 2011 until 2019. Before being elected to public office, he was district attorney for Ashland county, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008 and previously had a reality TV show role. Duffy was a cast member on The Real World: Boston in 1997 where he would meet his wife, Fox news contributor Rachel Campos-Duffy.

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Trump announces Matt Gaetz as attorney general and Tulsi Gabbard for top intelligence post – US politics live

Far-right Florida congressman to get top justice job; former Democrat Gabbard frequently appeared with Trump on the campaign trail

Mehdi Hasan writes for the Guardian today, asking “Is Donald Trump a foreign policy dove?”

You can read it here

Everything about men and women serving together makes the situation more complicated, and complication in combat, that means casualties are worse.

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Trump meets with Biden and promises ‘smooth as it can get’ transfer of power

Trump also suggests to House Republicans he might seek a third term in office, which is prohibited by US constitution

Donald Trump met with Joe Biden on Wednesday and promised a transfer of power that is “as smooth as it can get”, as the outgoing US president pledged his administration’s every possible resource to pave the way for his successor.

The two men, longtime political rivals who must now work together again to pass the reins of power, shook hands as they met in the Oval Office. Introducing Trump as both a former president and now president-elect, Biden congratulated him on his victory.

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Trump nominates Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to lead new efficiency department to ‘restructure federal agencies’ – live

Tesla CEO and onetime Republican presidential hopeful put forward to lead department to ‘dismantle government bureaucracy’

Joe Biden is meeting with two foreign leaders at the White House today.

At 11.15am, he will speak with Israel’s president Isaac Herzog, then with Indonesia’s president, Prabowo Subianto, at 2pm.

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Trump flips Nevada as Democrat Jacky Rosen holds on to state’s Senate seat

Trump’s win in the state gives him 301 electoral votes, even as Democratic incumbent is re-elected to Senate

Donald Trump has won his sixth battleground state of the 2024 election, flipping the state for the Republicans early on Saturday, by beating Kamala Harris in Nevada.

The president-elect has 301 electoral college votes so far, well beyond the 270 point he surpassed early on Wednesday to take the White House, over Democratic rival Kamala Harris, and the Republican has now won six of the seven battleground states. On Saturday morning only Arizona remained to be called.

Trump wins the presidency – how did it happen?

With Trump re-elected, this is what’s at stake

Abortion ballot measure results by state

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Iranian man charged in plot to kill Trump; judge grants special counsel’s request to pause Trump’s 2020 case – live

Unnamed official of Iranian guard told a contact in September to create a plan to kill Trump, complaint says; judge grants Jack Smith’s ask to pause proceedings after election result

A federal judge has struck down a Biden administration policy that aimed to ease a path to citizenship for some undocumented immigrants who are married to US citizens.

The program, lauded as one of the biggest presidential actions to help immigrant families in years, allowed undocumented spouses and stepchildren of US citizens to apply for a green card without first having to leave the country.

The temporary relief from deportation brought a brief sense of security to some 500,000 immigrants estimated to benefit from the program before Texas-based U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker put it on hold in August, days after applicants filed their paperwork.

Barker ruled yesterday that the Biden administration had overstepped its authority by implementing the program and had stretched the legal interpretation of relevant immigration law “past its breaking point.”

The short-lived Biden administration initiative known as “Keeping Families Together” would have been unlikely to remain in place after Donald Trump took office in January. But its early termination creates greater uncertainty for immigrant families as many are bracing for Trump’s return to the White House.

CNN’s latest projection of the crucial races to gain control of the House has Republicans ahead in ten of the contests, with, according to their projections, only six victories needed to tip them over the magic 218 for control.

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Republican Dave McCormick wins Pennsylvania Senate seat in key race

McCormick ousts incumbent Democratic Bob Casey after contentious and expensive race, widening party’s majority

The Republican Dave McCormick won the Senate race in the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Thursday, denying the Democratic incumbent, Bob Casey, a fourth term and expanding his party’s majority in the upper chamber. Despite the call from the Associated Press, Casey has refused to concede the race, as the top state election official reported that tens of thousands of ballots remained uncounted.

When the AP called the race at 4.09pm ET on Thursday, two days after polls closed in Pennsylvania, McCormick led by 0.5 points. The narrow margin raised the possibility of a recount, although Casey faces an uphill climb in overcoming McCormick’s lead of roughly 30,000 votes.

Trump wins the presidency – how did it happen?

Full presidential election results and map

Abortion ballot measure results by state

Republicans retake control of the Senate

Senate, House and governor results

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Trump picks Susie Wiles as chief of staff in first major appointment; Putin commends Trump victory – US election live

Trump says his re-election campaign manager ‘is tough, smart, innovative, and is universally admired and respected’; Russian leader congratulates Trump and says he is ready to talk

Rudy Giuliani will appear in a New York City courtroom on Thursday to explain to a federal judge why he hasn’t surrendered his valuables as part of a $148m defamation judgment, the Associated Press reports.

US District Judge Lewis Liman ordered the former New York City mayor to report to court after lawyers for the two former Georgia election workers who were awarded the massive judgment visited Giuliani’s Manhattan apartment last week only to discover it had been cleared out weeks earlier.

The judge had set an 29 October deadline for the longtime ally of once-and-future President Donald Trump to surrender many of his possessions to lawyers for Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss.

Representatives for Giuliani did not respond to an email from Reuters on Wednesday seeking comment.

While Kemi Badenoch was the first politician since the US presidential election result to publicly challenge Keir Starmer over Labour’s previously tense relationship with Donald Trump, she is unlikely to be the last.

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US elections 2024: control of House remains unclear

Republicans make progress as results are returned, but US may have to wait days to learn chamber’s composition

Republicans have won a majority in the US Senate but control of the US House of Representatives remains unclear on Wednesday evening, with many of the most competitive races still uncalled.

With Donald Trump having won the White House, the stakes for control of the House have grown, since it could serve as either the sole Democratic check on the upcoming Trump presidency, or as the final Republican win that delivers a united pro-Trump government.

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Republicans outline ‘first 100 days’ of Trump presidency – as it happened

This blog is closed, you can continue to follow updates on our US politics live blog here

Donald Trump has been elected the 47th president of the United States in a stunning political resurrection that sent shock waves through the country and around the world.

Trump becomes the first convicted criminal to win the White House. At 78 he is also the oldest person ever elected to the office.

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US elections live: Harris makes unexpected stop at DNC headquarters as millions of Americans cast their votes

Harris thanks Democratic staffers in Washington DC and says ‘we have so much work to do’ during phone-banking session

Dispatch from Grand Rapids, Michigan: They just showed a video here of Donald Trump shaving the head of Vince McMahon, the former CEO of WWE, during a wrestling event. It happened in 2007.

Needless to say, Trump hasn’t arrived yet.

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Donald Trump says ‘we made history’ as he closes in on victory with win in Pennsylvania – as it happened

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The state of American democracy and the economy were the top issues on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots in the 2024 presidential election, according to an NBC News exit poll.

The poll’s preliminary results show 35% of voters said democracy mattered most to their vote, while 31% said the economy.

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US elections live updates: Harris and Trump make final pitches in crucial state of Pennsylvania

Judge rejects legal challenge against Musk’s $1m giveaways; Harris vows to be ‘a president for all Americans’

Here is a look back at some of the more memorable pictures of the 2024 US presidential campaign:

In an interview with NBC News, Donald Trump did not rule out banning certain vaccines if he was elected to a second presidential term.

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US election live: outcry grows over ‘hateful’ Trump rally remarks; Harris says Puerto Ricans ‘deserve better’

Congressional Hispanic caucus hits out at ‘shameful’ rhetoric; vice-president releases ad condemning Trump and comedian’s remarks

Here’s our story of the resignation of Washington Post columnist Michele Norris, the latest high profile writer to leave the newspaper in protest at its decision not to endorse a candidate in next week’s presidential election.

Norris says the Post’s non-call was a “terrible mistake & an insult to the paper’s own longstanding standard of regularly endorsing candidates since 1976”.

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White House blasts false claims about Hurricane Helene and relief aid

Statement comes as president urges Congress to pass disaster-relief package as costs soar amid devastation

The White House moved Saturday to quash claims that government officials control the weather, including a far-fetched rumor circulating on social media that Hurricane Helene was an engineered storm to allow corporations to mine regional lithium deposits.

“We have seen a large increase in false information circulating online related to the federal response to Hurricane Helene,” a statement said, pointing to a “number of scam artists, bad-faith actors, and others who want to sow chaos because they think it helps their political interests are promoting disinformation about the recovery effort.”

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