Move further unwinds initiative to crack down on anti-competitive practices in agriculture, drugs and labor
Donald Trump on Wednesday revoked a 2021 executive order on promoting competition in the US economy issued by Joe Biden, the White House said.
The move by the Republican US president further unwinds a signature initiative by his predecessor, a Democrat, to crack down on anti-competitive practices in sectors from agriculture to drugs and labor.
Continue reading...Brazilian president’s comments come amid US attempts to pressure judges in coup trial against Trump ally Bolsonaro
The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has hit back at Donald Trump’s campaign against the South American country’s judiciary, claiming the US president would be put on trial in Brazil had the January 6 US Capitol attacks taken place there.
Trump has triggered what some experts call the greatest ever diplomatic rupture between the US and Brazil by slapping 50% tariffs on Brazilian imports and sanctioning a supreme court judge in an attempt to help his far-right ally, ex-president Jair Bolsonaro, avoid prison for allegedly trying to stage a coup after he lost the 2022 election to Lula.
Continue reading...Mendenhall Glacier outburst threatens homes, with scientists warning events are intensifying
Alaska’s capital city of Juneau is urging many residents to evacuate, bracing for the arrival of what could be record floodwaters flowing downstream from a basin dammed by the area’s Mendenhall Glacier, with the event being driven by climate change amid glacial retreat, according to a federal agency.
Summer glacial flooding, known as a glacial lake outburst flood, or GLOF, threatens parts of the city due to a combination of rainwater and snowmelt.
Continue reading...Officials in Mason voted to convert prison to Ice facility run by CoreCivic, US’s second-largest private prison operator
Officials in a rural Tennessee town voted on Tuesday to approve agreements to turn a former prison into an immigration detention facility operated by a private company, despite loud objections from upset residents and activists during a contentious public meeting.
The five-member board of aldermen in Mason, along with the mayor, Eddie Noeman, and vice-mayor, Reynaldo Givhan, met in a fire station garage to discuss converting the closed West Tennessee detention facility into a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) detention center run by CoreCivic Inc, America’s second-largest private prison operator.
Continue reading...City’s mayor has hardened her stance on Trump’s ‘authoritarian’ actions. Plus, Israel intensifies bombing of Gaza killing 89 Palestinians in 24 hours
Good morning.
The Washington DC national guard began deploying on the city’s streets on Tuesday night, as the city’s mayor toughened her response to Donald Trump taking control of the city’s police force.
What did Washington’s mayor say? Muriel Bowser, the Democratic mayor of Washington, hardened her stance after treading a more diplomatic line earlier in the day. During a live event on social media on Tuesday night, she described the arrival of federalized national guard members as an authoritarian push. Other critics have said the move seeks to distract attention from political problems such as the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Continue reading...Justice department accuses Joshua Schroeder of ‘reckless misrepresentations’ and seeks financial penalties
The US Department of Justice is seeking sanctions against a lawyer who sought to block the deportation of his client, in another sign the Trump administration is ramping up its efforts to enact mass deportations.
Earlier this year, Joshua Schroeder, a California-based attorney, was able to briefly delay the deportation of his client, a Hmong man from Laos, through several court filings.
Continue reading...The US president deployed troops after taking control of DC police, sparking fears of similar moves elsewhere
Muriel Bowser, the mayor of Washington DC, has pledged to work “side by side” with the federal government as national guard troops arrive at their headquarters in the capital.
The show of force came after Donald Trump announced that he was sending the national guard into the capital and putting city police under federal control, even though the violent crime rate is at a 30-year low.
Continue reading...Statement on Ukrainian sovereignty signed by all EU leaders except for Viktor Orbán before call with Trump
European Union leaders made a rallying call to defend Ukraine’s freedom to decide its own future in advance of their virtual summit with Donald Trump – convened to discuss US strategy before the president’s talks with Vladimir Putin on Friday.
With the exception of Hungary, all EU leaders signed a joint statement, with Kaja Kallas, the EU foreign policy chief, also calling for the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to attend the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska on Friday.
Continue reading...As mayor calls US president ‘hyperbolic’, experts say portrayal of crime rooted in false and misleading claims
Donald Trump is deploying the national guard in Washington DC and seizing control of its police force, claiming that the nation’s capital has become “lawless” and is “one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world”.
The president portrayed himself as DC’s savior, vowing to rid it of “crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor and worse”.
Continue reading...Danish company blames Donald Trump for derailing its business model after market value drops by a third
Europe’s largest wind power company has blamed Donald Trump for derailing its business model, after it unveiled a $9bn (£6.7bn) fundraising and its market value plunged by almost a third.
The share price for Denmark’s Ørsted tumbled to an all-time low after it told investors on Monday that the “extraordinary situation” facing the industry meant it would need to tap shareholders to cover the costs of its plans.
Continue reading...Chipmakers agree to deal amid Trump trade war as condition for obtaining export licences for Chinese market
The chipmakers Nvidia and AMD have agreed to give the US government 15% of their revenue from advanced chips sold to China in return for export licences to the key market, in an unprecedented move amid Donald Trump’s trade war with China.
The move, an apparent reversal of US national security restrictions on the chip sales, signalled an easing in the US-China trade war.
Continue reading...White House denies suggestions resort in Vietnam presents conflict of interest amid row over compensation rates
Villagers whose farms in Vietnam will be bulldozed to make way for a $1.5bn golf resort backed by the Trump family have reportedly been offered rice provisions and cash compensation of as little as $12 for a square metre of land by state authorities.
Thousands of villagers will be offered compensation based on land size and location, according to a report by Reuters. The agency spoke to elderly farmers who said they feared they would struggle to find a stable livelihood.
Continue reading...Move comes as Germany warns White House against any deal hatched ‘over heads of Europeans and Ukrainians’
Europe’s leaders have raised the pressure on Donald Trump to involve Ukraine in a planned summit with Vladimir Putin, as Germany warned the White House against any deal hatched “over the heads of Europeans and Ukrainians”.
Speaking before a bilateral meeting expected to take place between the US and Russian leaders on Friday in Alaska, the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, said he hoped and assumed that Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, would also be involved.
Continue reading...Donald Trump rewarding the Kremlin’s hardline attitude shows Russia can still sideline Ukraine from deal to end war
In the five months since Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy met at the Oval Office in late February, Ukrainian officials have worked hard to repair the damage of that day, which ended with the Ukrainian president being kicked out of the White House.
With advice from European allies, Zelenskyy recalibrated his strategy for dealing with the Trump administration, and there was a feeling it was broadly going well. “We managed to reset communications, to find a new language to work with Trump,” said one senior official in Kyiv a week ago.
Continue reading...White House escalates offensive on Ivy League university by calling for review of federally funded research
The latest phase of the Trump administration’s offensive against Harvard University is a comprehensive review of the university’s federally funded research programs, and the threat to strip the school’s lucrative portfolio of patents.
In a letter to the Harvard president, Alan Garber, posted online on Friday, Donald Trump’s commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, accused Harvard of breaching its legal and contractual requirements tied to federally funded research programs and patents.
Continue reading...Prasad left the agency after far-right influencer released edited audio misleadingly suggesting he was anti-Trump
Vinay Prasad is returning to his role overseeing vaccine, gene therapy and blood product regulation at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) a little more than a week after he left the agency.
“At the FDA’s request, Dr Vinay Prasad is resuming leadership of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research,” Department Health and Human Services spokesperson Andrew Nixon said in a statement to Reuters.
Continue reading...Co-founded by president’s eldest sons, Eric and Don Jr, World Liberty has earned the family $500m since its launch
World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture backed by Donald Trump and the US president’s family, is sounding out investors for a $1.5bn fundraising round meant to set up a public company that will hold its WLFI tokens, Bloomberg News reported on Friday.
The structure of the deal is yet to be finalized, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter, adding that large investors in the crypto and tech space had been approached for the venture.
Continue reading...US president said end to war will involve ‘some swapping of territories’ before announcing meeting
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said early on Saturday that “Ukrainians will not give their land to occupiers” after Donald Trump said he would meet Vladimir Putin next week and that an end to the war must involve “some swapping of territories”.
The Ukrainian president said Kyiv was ready for real solutions that could bring peace but that any solutions without Ukraine would be against peace. “Any decisions against us, any decisions without Ukraine, are also decisions against peace. They will achieve nothing,” he said, adding that the war “cannot be ended without us, without Ukraine”.
Continue reading...Roland Beainy from Lebanon, who opened chain of restaurants in support of president, says charges ‘not true’
The owner of a Donald Trump-themed hamburger restaurant chain in Texas is facing deportation after immigration authorities under the command of the president detained him.
Roland Mehrez Beainy, 28, entered the US as “a non-immigrant visitor” from Lebanon in 2019 and was supposed to have left the country by 12 February 2024, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) spokesperson told the Guardian.
Continue reading...Deal to end four-decade conflict includes creation of transit corridor named ‘Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity’
The leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan signed a peace agreement at the White House on Friday, in a deal brokered by the US that brings decades of conflict to an end.
The two countries in the South Caucasus signed agreements with each other, as well as the US, that will reopen key transportation routes while allowing the US to seize on Russia’s declining influence in the region. The deal includes an agreement that will create a major transit corridor linking Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhchivan, with the United States owning development rights to the corridor. It was to be named the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, the White House said.
Continue reading...