Ivanka Trump will testify before the January 6 committee this afternoon.
The Guardian confirmed that former president Donald Trump’s oldest daughter, and former senior White House adviser, will speak to the panel virtually.
Police say they have received more than 100 videos or photos from the scene and have executed three search warrants
Police in the California state capital have made an arrest in connection with Sunday’s mass shooting that left six people dead and at least a dozen others injured. In the hours after the bloodshed, police say they have received more than 100 videos or photos from the scene and executed search warrants on three homes.
They identified a 26-year-old man as one of the individuals arrested in connection to the shooting, in a press release. He has been charged with assault and illegal firearm possession offenses.
Continue reading...The former governor says she will ‘combat the left’s socialist, big-government, America-last agenda’
Sarah Palin has announced her run for Alaska’s only seat in the US House of Representatives, marking her first run for public office in over a decade.
“America is at a tipping point,” Palin said in a statement released on her Twitter account announcing her candidacy. “As I’ve watched the far left destroy the country, I knew I had to step up and join the fight.
Continue reading...Centers for Disease Control and Prevention terminates Title 42 from 23 May, ending policy widely criticized as pretext to keep migrants out
• Senate deal on drastically pared-down Covid aid package may be imminent
US adds 431,000 jobs as hiring spree cuts unemployment rate to 3.6%
• Disney staff stage walkouts over ‘don’t say gay’ bill
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The late supreme court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is to be honoured by having a US navy ship named after her.
The yet-to-be-built fuel tanker will join a fleet of John Lewis-class “replenishment oilers” named for historical figures in human and civil rights. The navy took delivery of the first of the fleet, a tribute to the former Democratic congressman, last summer.
Continue reading...A North Carolina court has blocked a law prohibiting people with felony convictions from voting while they are not incarcerated, a move that could enfranchise an estimated 56,000 people in the state.
A panel of three superior court judges ruled 2-1 to block the law, which plaintiffs said was rooted in an effort to discriminate against Black people at the turn of the 20th century in the state. The panel said the statute violated the state constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under law and free elections.
Rick Scott of Florida grilled on Fox News Sunday about suggested income tax rise and letting social security and Medicare fall
A Republican senator and reputed presidential hopeful found himself in a tough spot when he claimed tax rises contained in his own “11 point plan to rescue America” were “Democratic talking points” instead.
“No, no, it’s in the plan!” his interviewer exclaimed, on Fox News Sunday. “It’s in the plan!”
Continue reading...The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the new sanctions on members of the Russian Duma would punish lawmakers who have “supported the Kremlin’s violations of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
“President Putin’s war continues to inflict horror and widespread suffering on the people of Ukraine,” Blinken said in a statement.
Continue reading...Joe Biden’s ambassador to the United Nations warned on Sunday there was little immediate hope of a negotiated end to the war in Ukraine, as pressure continued to build on the US president ahead of a crucial Nato summit in Europe this week.
Biden, who faces growing dissatisfaction over his approach to the war, will travel to Brussels on Thursday and then on to Poland, it was announced on Sunday night. He will hear a proposal from Poland for Nato to send a peacekeeping force into Ukraine, something Linda Thomas-Greenfield said was unlikely.
Continue reading...Senate judiciary committee chair Dick Durbin says Hawley’s attacks should be ignored in confirmation hearings this week
The Missouri Republican Josh Hawley is wrong to attack Ketanji Brown Jackson, Joe Biden’s supreme court nominee, and should be ignored in confirmation hearings this week, the Senate judiciary chair said.
Hawley, the Illinois Democrat Dick Durbin said, is “part of the fringe within the Republican party … a man who was fist-bumping the murderous mob that descended on the Capitol on 6 January of the last year.
Continue reading...Wisconsin senator says if GOP retakes control it will use committees to move against Democrats and Biden
Hunter Biden and Anthony Fauci will be prime targets of Senate Republicans should the party win control in November, a senior senator said.
Asked by the Hill what he would want to investigate should he control a committee with subpoena power, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said: “Like everything? It’s like a mosquito in a nudist colony, it’s a target-rich environment.”
Continue reading...Congressional Progressive Caucus urges president to bypass legislative logjam and give Democrats record to campaign on
The leftwing Congressional Progressive Caucus unveiled its highly anticipated list of suggested executive orders on Thursday, outlining a strategy for Joe Biden to advance Democrats’ policy priorities in the US while much of his legislative agenda has stalled on Capitol Hill.
The move reflects pressure from the left of the Democratic party to try to keep Biden pushing an ambitious program of action, despite setbacks and as November’s midterm elections are widely expected to favor a resurgent Republican party.
Continue reading...Ukrainian president receives standing ovation as he urges US to send more military aid and impose further sanctions
Joe Biden has denounced Vladimir Putin as a war criminal, delivering his sharpest rebuke yet of the Russian leader just hours after the Ukrainian president pleaded with Congress to provide more aid to his country.
“I think he is a war criminal,” Biden said of Putin on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, addressed the US Congress seated in a high-backed office chair with a plain white wall behind him and a prominently-displayed Ukrainian flag to his right.
He was neatly turned out with a trimmed beard and wearing what has become his characteristic combat-green tee shirt, since Russia invaded Ukraine last month and he was forced to shelter in a hidden bunker somewhere in Kyiv with his top team.
Continue reading...If spending legislation remains stalled in Congress, the US will soon run out of funding for Covid booster shots, new treatments and testing efforts, a Biden administration official told NBC News.
To recap: the White House requested $22.5bn in Covid relief funding. Democrats negotiated the funding down to $15bn, but still had to take it out of the $1.5tn omnibus package in order for it to pass.
Continue reading...The process to approve Joe Biden’s nominees for Federal Reserve board - including the Federal Reserve chair - have all been stalled over one particular nominee: Sarah Bloom Raskin, wife of Jamie Raskin, a Democratic member of Congress.
Last month, Republicans refused to attend the meeting to move the nomination process forward. They wanted senator Sherrod Brown, chair of the banking committee reviewing the nominations, to separate Raskin from the other four nominees, but Brown refused - a move the White House supported. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said if Republicans disagreed with the nomination, they should vote that way, but that it was irresponsible to not show up and do their jobs.
Continue reading...Leaders prepare to welcome Ukraine president before Wednesday speech amid divisions over question of planes
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, will address Congress on Wednesday in what could prove his most powerful plea yet for the west to take a tougher line against Vladimir Putin.
Zelenskiy is expected to use the virtual address to urge members of the House of Representatives and Senate to intensify pressure on Joe Biden to allow the transfer of MiG-29 fighter jets from Poland.
Continue reading...Tom Rice faces Trumpist challenger because of vote to impeach over the deadly Capitol attack
A Republican congressman attacked by Donald Trump at a rally in South Carolina on Saturday called the former president a “would-be tyrant”.
Tom Rice voted to impeach Trump over the deadly Capitol attack and will face a Trump-endorsed challenger later this year.
Continue reading...The court is set to rule this year on divisive issues including abortion, gun control, the climate crisis and voting rights
The US supreme court could “at some point” become “compromised” by politics, said Clarence Thomas – one of six conservatives on the nine-member court after Republicans denied Barack Obama a nomination then rammed three new justices through during the hard-right presidency of Donald Trump.
“You can cavalierly talk about packing or stacking the court,” said Thomas, whose wife, Ginni Thomas, has come under extensive scrutiny for work for rightwing groups including supporting Trump’s attempts to overturn an election.
Continue reading...Leaders of the Quad grouping of countries - the US, India, Australia and Japan - agreed today that what is happening to Ukraine should not be allowed to happen in the Indo-Pacific, Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida said.
Reuters reports:
A virtual meeting of the four-country grouping was held at a time of increased concern about Taiwan, a self-ruled island claimed by China, which has stepped up its alert level, wary of China taking advantage of a distracted west to move against it.
“We’ve agreed that unilateral changes to the status quo with force like this should not be allowed in the Indo-Pacific region,” Kishida said, referring to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Continue reading...Letter to National Archives requests files found in boxes at Mar-a-Lago that should have been turned over when Trump left office
The investigation into whether Donald Trump broke federal records laws when he took White House documents home after leaving office took another step forward on Friday when a congressional oversight committee requested the materials from the National Archives.
The letter to the archivist, from the House committee on oversight and reform, requests the content of the documents taken by Trump to Mar-a-Lago, his residence in Florida. They also asked for any records that the former US president attempted to destroy, and communications on the issue by Trump’s White House aides.
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