‘A madman with millions of followers’: what the new Trump books tell us

Books show how close the US came to disaster, and document an unprecedented moment in US history that is not yet over

This week, the Guardian reported that what are assessed to be leaked Kremlin documents describe Donald Trump as an “impulsive, mentally unstable and unbalanced individual”. Vladimir Putin, the documents say, therefore decided to assist Trump’s rise to power in 2016 as a way to weaken America.

Related: Frankly, We Did Win This Election review: a devastating dispatch from Trumpworld

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‘We’re going to get this done’: Biden on Capitol Hill to push infrastructure package – live

  • President to discuss massive $3.5tn plan over lunch with Democrats
  • Senate minority leader McConnell hits back at Biden on voting rights

Joe Biden is meeting with a bipartisan group of mayors and governors to discuss the bipartisan infrastructure framework.

Among the attendees are New Jersey governor Phil Murphy and Illinois governor JB Pritzker, both Democrats, as well as Vermont governor Phil Scott, a Republican.

House speaker Nancy Pelosi announced her appointees to the January 6 select committee earlier this month, after the chamber voted in favor of forming the panel.

In addition to Republican Liz Cheney, Pelosi named Democrats Bennie Thompson, Elaine Luria, Jamie Raskin, Stephanie Murphy, Pete Aguilar, Adam Schiff and Zoe Lofgren to the committee. Thompson, who chairs the House homeland security committee, will serve as chairman.

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Biden condemns Trump’s claim of voter fraud: ‘The big lie is just that, a big lie’ – live

  • President deflects questions over the filibuster in voting rights speech
  • Biden: ‘The 21st century Jim Crow assault is real. It’s unrelenting’
  • Lawmakers arrive in DC to call for legislation to strengthen voting rights
  • Explainer: why did Democratic lawmakers flee Texas?

Texas Democratic lawmakers have fled their state in a desperate attempt to stop the Republican-run legislature from passing laws they say will suppress the vote of people of color.

The extreme move – which saw dozens of Democrats leave via planes and head to Washington DC – is the latest and wildest escalation in a fight over voting rights in the state and in America more broadly.

Related: Why did Democratic lawmakers flee Texas over voter restrictions?

As fires propagate throughout the US west on the heels of record heatwaves, experts are warning that the region is caught in a vicious feedback cycle of extreme heat, drought and fire, all amplified by the climate crisis.

Firefighters are battling blazes from Arizona to Washington state that are burning with a worrying ferocity, while officials say California is already set to outpace last year’s record-breaking fire season.

Related: American west stuck in cycle of ‘heat, drought and fire’, experts warn

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‘Have you no shame?’: Biden decries Republican attacks on voting rights

President condemns Trump’s ‘big lie’ about a stolen election but fails to mention filibuster in 20-minute Philadelphia speech

Joe Biden has made an impassioned attack on racist voting laws sweeping America, warning that “the 21st-century Jim Crow assault is real” and demanding of Republicans: “Have you no shame?”

Related: Biden defends voting rights – but no word on ending the filibuster

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Drunken Giuliani urged Trump to ‘just say we won’ on election night, book says

As key states started to slip away from Trump, Rudy Giuliani repeatedly urged former president to lie, according to new book

A drunken Rudy Giuliani repeatedly urged Donald Trump to “just say we won” on election night last November, according to a new book, even as key states started to slip away from the president and defeat by Joe Biden drew near.

Related: Landslide review: Michael Wolff’s third Trump book is his best – and most alarming

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Texas Republicans advance voting restrictions at special session after Democrat walkout

Texans from across the ideological spectrum flocked to testify in person at public hearings convened by governor Greg Abbott

Hailee Mouch woke up at 2am Saturday morning so she could drive to her state’s capital city of Austin and testify at two competing public hearings on Texas’s restrictive voting bills.

She knew she had to return to the Dallas area to be at work by 6am Sunday. But she was determined to stay as long as possible to tell state lawmakers how their proposals would hurt democracy in the small city where she goes to college.

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Trump told chief of staff Hitler ‘did a lot of good things’, book says

  • Remark shocked John Kelly, author Michael Bender reports
  • Book details former president’s ‘stunning disregard for history’

On a visit to Europe to mark the 100th anniversary of the end of the first world war, Donald Trump insisted to his then chief of staff, John Kelly: “Well, Hitler did a lot of good things.”

Related: Nightmare Scenario review: Trump, Covid and a lasting national trauma

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Republicans revive soft-on-crime rhetoric amid rise in US homicides

Biden rolls out fresh policy proposals to try to counter rising crime as Democrats look to bat away Republican attacks

Rising crime rates in the US and efforts from the White House and in Congress to pass sweeping police reform legislation have thrust crime policy into the center of the national political debate.

In early mayoral, congressional and senatorial campaigns, attacks are flying back and forth over whether candidates are tough on crime or want to defund the police, often using blunt language that masks the nuances of a complicated issue.

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Joe and Jill Biden travel to Miami to meet with families of condo collapse victims – live

Attorneys for Allen Weisselberg said the Trump Organization executive planned to plead “not guilty” to the charges he faces, per CNN.

Weisselberg’s lawyers also said he “will fight these charges in court.” The charges are likely linked to allegations that he failed to properly report company perks.

Weisselberg’s attorneys, Mary Mulligan and Bryan Skarlatos, said he plans to plead not guilty and “will fight these charges in court.”

The Guardian’s Dominic Rushe and agency report:

The Trump Organization’s chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, surrendered to the Manhattan district attorney’s office early on Thursday as he and the Trump family business prepare to face criminal charges in a tax-related investigation.

Related: Trump Organization executive surrenders to face charges in tax investigation

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House votes to set up select committee into 6 January storming of Capitol – as it happened

Two Republicans – Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger – join Democrats in voting for panel to investigate attack – follow live

– Joan E Greve and Maanvi Singh

Sarah Betancourt reports:

South Dakota’s Republican governor, Kristi Noem, is deploying up to 50 national guard troops to the southern US border, responding to a call from the Texas governor, Greg Abbott, for help dealing with a rise in border crossing, although the majority of migrants have been sent back to Mexico.

Related: South Dakota governor uses private funds to send troops to Mexico border

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Biden to visit Miami on Thursday as 150 still missing after condo collapse – live

Here’s where the day stands so far:

The mayor of Miami-Dade county said there were no new fatalities confirmed today, as search-and-rescue efforts continue at the site of the Surfside condo collapse.

The mayor, Daniella Levine Cava, added that each of the families of the 11 confirmed victims have been notified.

Miami-Dade County mayor updates on building collapse:

- No new fatalities confirmed since last briefing
- Families of all 11 deceased victims have been notified
- 210 people working on mound
- Pres. Biden to meet with families, first respondershttps://t.co/lHgwAdKz7Z pic.twitter.com/qC3naJmNti

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‘He’s phoning it in’: why Biden is losing the voting rights fight

Activist say the president and Democrats have failed to stop Republican efforts to curtail the vote

For months, Biden and other Democrats have raised alarm about efforts to restrict the vote. Republicans have succeeded nonetheless.

Since January, Republican lawmakers in Georgia, Florida, Iowa, Arkansas and Montana have all enacted new legislation that impose new barriers to voting. The successful Republican filibuster this week – which stalled the sweeping voting rights legislation, the For the People Act – only underscored how Democrats have failed to stop GOP efforts to curtail the vote.

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‘Republicans are defunding the police’: Fox News anchor stumps congressman

The Fox News anchor Chris Wallace made headlines of his own on Sunday, by pointing out to a senior Republican that he and the rest of his party recently voted against $350bn in funding for law enforcement.

Related: Keith Ellison urges Congress to act on stalled police reform after Chauvin sentencing

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Republicans will ‘move forward’ on infrastructure after Biden veto threat

A lead Republican negotiator has welcomed Joe Biden’s withdrawal of his threat to veto a $1.2tn bipartisan infrastructure bill unless a separate Democratic spending plan also passes Congress.

Related: White House seeks to put infrastructure deal back on track after Biden blunder

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‘He’s not a quitter’: faithful out in force as Trump gets back to the campaign trail

Thousands of adoring fans turned out in Ohio to remind America that Trump’s cult of personality never went away

There were raucous cheers and boos. There were Secret Service agents and metal detectors, food trailers in long grass and loudspeakers booming songs by Elton John and Dolly Parton. There were flags, hats, and T-shirts proclaiming Donald Trump the true winner of the 2020 election – or the man to beat in 2024.

And flying overhead was a small plane trailing a banner that proclaimed: “Ohio is Trump country.”

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Donald Trump returns to campaign trail with rally targeting Ohio Republican

As New York legal troubles mount, ex-president hints at 2024 run and targets those who voted for impeachment

Donald Trump was set to return to the campaign trail with a rally in Ohio on Saturday night, campaigning against a Republican who voted for his impeachment and trailing his own candidacy for president in 2024.

Related: Trump Organization could face criminal charges in New York next week

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Kamala Harris takes heat from both sides in daunting border visit

Vice-president faced with colossal task as migrants live with brutal reality of arduous journey and border restrictions

The sun beat down on the 30ft border fence that separates El Paso, Texas from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, as temperatures headed towards 100F on the southern border that stands as a symbol for so much in American politics.

Related: Kamala Harris says US-Mexico border situation is ‘tough’ but claims progress

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How Mitch McConnell has unified Republicans as a red wall against Biden’s agenda

The Senate minority leader has filibustered voting rights legislation, halted a pay gap measure and threatened to block a supreme court nominee

It was a glimpse of Washington past. Beneath the vaulted ceiling and stained glass windows of the national cathedral, Joe Biden greeted Mitch McConnell and other senators in the pews, then offered a hymn to bipartisanship.

“Empathy is the fuel of democracy,” the US president told mourners on Wednesday at the funeral of John Warner, a Republican senator he praised for working across the aisle. “The willingness to see each other as opponents, not as enemies. Above all, to see each other as fellow Americans even when we disagree.”

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Pence breaks from Trump and calls bid to reverse election result ‘un-American’ – live

Vice-president Kamala Harris is visiting the Southern border today amid ongoing criticism from Republicans about Harris’s absence from traveling there yet.

VP Kamala Harris boards AF2 to El Paso for her first visit to the border as VP. She was greeted by Sec. Mayorkas, Sen. Durbin and Rep. Escobar, all of whom are joining her on her trip. pic.twitter.com/GFr44Lw62Y

Vice President Kamala Harris will be in El Paso on Friday, where she will tour a Customs and Border Protection processing facility, meeting with advocates and NGOs. She will also be delivering remarks on her visit.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who has been helping with negotiations on immigration legislation on Capitol Hill, and Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso, will be accompanying Harris and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on the trip.

Excerpts from a new book about Donald Trump’s presidency includes details about the 45th president’s increasingly violent language in the oval office.

CNN reports:

...the book reveals new details about how Trump’s language became increasingly violent during Oval Office meetings as protests in Seattle and Portland began to receive attention from cable new outlets. The President would highlight videos that showed law enforcement getting physical with protesters and tell his administration he wanted to see more of that behavior, the excerpts show.

“That’s how you’re supposed to handle these people,” Trump told his top law enforcement and military officials, according to Bender. “Crack their skulls!”

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‘We’ve struck a deal’: Biden says agreement reached on infrastructure plan – live

  • Republican and Democratic senators have reached deal – president
  • Speaker: ‘It is imperative that we seek the truth as to what happened’
  • Giuliani’s New York law license suspended ‘effectively immediately’
  • Biden urges unvaccinated to get shots as ‘deadlier’ Delta strain spreads

Here’s some more on Rudy Giuliani losing (potentially temporarily) his law licence in New York today, from my colleague Sarah Betancourt:

Giuliani, 77, helped lead Trump’s legal challenge of his election loss as his personal attorney. He argued without evidence that voter fraud was rampant in Georgia, and that voting machines in the state and others were rigged. He urged Georgia’s Republican electors to vote for Trump, despite the state’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, and secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, countering there was no evidence of fraud.

Related: Rudy Giuliani barred from practicing law in New York over election lies

Biden has pumped the brakes just a little on the infrastructure bill, saying it must be paired with a larger spending bill, which will likely only be supported by Democrats, if he is to sign it.

“If they don’t [both] come, I’m not signing it. Real simple,” Biden said.

Biden says bipartisan infrastructure deal has to be paired with D-only reconciliation bill.

"If this is the only thing that comes to me I'm not signing. It's in tandem."

Asked about Pelosi plan to hold first bill in House until second bill arrives, says he supports it.

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