Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Donald and Eric Trump repeat claims of improper behaviour by Joe Biden’s son in sign of how 2020 campaign will be fought
Donald Trump sought to weaponise Democrats’ impeachment inquiry to his electoral advantage on Thursday at a typically crude-but-effective rally in which he declared Joe Biden “was only a good vice president because he understood how to kiss Barack Obama’s ass”.
In his first campaign stop since the inquiry was announced, the US president and a 20,000-capacity crowd staged a formidable show of defiance at a basketball arena in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Trump mesmerised his fans for 102 minutes with a verbal cannon of conspiracy theories, blatant falsehoods, profane insults and anti-refugee bigotry.
‘If cities are invited to be at the table, I believe they will help accelerate the work that needs to be done’ said LA mayor Eric Garcetti
US mayors are seeking to go over President Trump’s head and negotiate directly at next month’s UN climate change conference in Santiago, they said as they met in Copenhagen for the C40 World Mayors Summit.
Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti, who rallied US mayors to commit to the Paris climate agreement after Trump announced his intention to withdraw the country in 2017, said he would ask the UN secretary general, António Guterres, on Thursday to give American cities a new role in UN climate talks.
“I’m going to bring it up with the UN secretary general,” Garcetti said. “If cities are invited to be at the table, I believe they will help accelerate the work that needs to be done. Hopefully, we can do it in concert with our national governments, but [we can do it] even where there is conflict.”
Garcetti, who was announced on Wednesday as the next chair of the C40 group of global cities, said he would use his position to seek “a more formal role in the deliberations” at the conference.
“The United Nations works directly with cities all the time ... so they shouldn’t feel feel scared about jumping down to that local level,” he said.
Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren weighed in on the arrest of two Republican donors connected to Rudy Giuliani, arguing that their campaign-finance charges indicate the depth of corruption in Trump’s political world.
In addition to abusing and manipulating our diplomatic relationships for Trump's political gain, we can add corruption and campaign finance violations to the list. https://t.co/b57uGfVl3l
Here’s a midday summary of today’s news, which is slightly belated given the many developments the blog is tracking:
Donald Trump will meet China’s negotiating team at the White House on Friday for the latest round of talks aimed at ending a 15-month trade battle that is weighing on the global economy.
“Big day of negotiations with China. They want to make a deal, but do I?” the president tweeted. On Wall Street stocks moved higher on hopes that there would be a breakthrough in the dispute.
Russia and Iran have troops in Syria and will see opportunities amid chaos of US impulsiveness
Donald Trump’s decision to give the green light – now seemingly turning amber – for Turkey to enter northern Syria has produced a torrent of criticism from European capitals to Washington Republicans, all pointing out that Ankara’s move will revive Islamic State, cause untold civilian deaths and land the US with an indelible reputation across the Middle East as an unreliable ally.
But the west has been losing traction in Syria over the past two years, and it may be the reaction of Russia and Iran, who have forces on the ground in Syria, that will most concern the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Their reaction may also reveal more about the long-term future of Syria’s eight-year civil war.
US president Donald Trump defends his decision to withdraw support for Kurdish allies in Syria by saying they did not help the US during the second world war, citing Normandy as an example. Kurdish forces did fight alongside the US against Isis for nearly five years before Trump's call to remove US troops from the region
As we noted earlier, when Trump defended his decision abandon Kurdish allies in Syria by saying that they didn’t help the US during World War II.
“They didn’t help us with Normandy as an example,” Trump told reporters.
Trump on the Kurds: "They didn't help us in the Second World War, they didn't help us with Normandy, as an example." He suggests that they battled alongside U.S. forces for "their land," and adds, "With all of that being said, we like the Kurds." pic.twitter.com/4aFGJiQquv
Trump told reporters he’ll cooperate with the House democrats’ impeachment inquiry if “they give us our rights”.
Asked whether he’ll cooperate with the democrats if they hold a vote on the impeachment inquiry, Trump responded: “The Republican Party and president has been treated extremely badly by the Democrats, very unfairly, because they have a tiny margin in the House, they have eviscerated the rules, they don’t give us any fair play, it is the most unfair situation people have seen, no lawyers, you can’t have lawyers, you can’t speak, you can’t do anything.”
The Constitution states clearly that the House of Representatives “shall have the sole Power of Impeachment,” and that “the Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.”
What “impeachment” means in this context is, effectively, indictment — the House has the power to determine whether sufficient evidence exists to spur a trial that would then take place in the Senate.
Protesters gathered outside the White House in Washington to demand Donald Trump reverse his decision to withdraw US troops from north-eastern Syria, warning that Kurds would be targeted in a Turkish offensive. The Turkish government claimed the US president had handed it the lead on the military campaign against Isis, and said its forces would be crossing into Syria 'shortly'
Ankara says military will cross border ‘shortly’, and claims US president gave green light, contradicting US denials
The Turkish government claimed that Donald Trump has handed it the leadership of the military campaign against Isis, and warned its forces would be crossing into Syria “shortly”.
Kurdish military leaders inside Syria said they were braced for the invasion and claimed there had been an Isis attack on its former stronghold of Raqqa. But reports from the city suggested the attack had been small scale.
Eight-page letter to Democratic leaders sets stage for constitutional crisis, as legislative and executive branches clash
Donald Trump pushed the United States towards a constitutional crisis on Tuesday when his legal counsel said the White House would refuse to cooperate with Congress’s impeachment inquiry.
“Given that your inquiry lacks any legitimate constitutional foundation, any pretense of fairness, or even the most elementary due process protections, the Executive Branch cannot be expected to participate in it,” the counsel Pat Cipollone said in a letter to Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives.
Secretary of state Mike Pompeo has announced visa restrictions on Chinese officials suspected of being involved in “a highly repressive campaign against Uighurs, ethnic Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other members of Muslim minority groups in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (Xinjiang).”
Earlier today, the US commerce department issued a list of 28 state security bureaus and tech companies in China that it said are being used to suppress muslims and other ethnic minorities.
The US state department is withholding messages from the ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, that are relevant to the Donald Trump impeachment inquiry, says the chair of the US House intelligence committee, Adam Shiff
The secretary of defense for public affairs, Jonathan Hoffman, said in a statement it does not support a Turkish operation in northern Syria.
Despite the president giving a green light for that to occur, the defense department’s statement claims that their position is in tune with the presidents.
The Department of Defense made clear to Turkey - as did the President - that we do not endorse a Turkish operation in Northern Syria. The US Armed Forces will not support, or be involved in any such operation.
In conversations between the Department and the Turkish military we have consistently stressed that coordination and cooperation were the best path toward security in the area. Secretary Esper and Chairman Milley reiterated to their respective Turkish counterparts that unilateral action creates risks for Turkey. As the President has stated, Turkey would be responsible, along with European nations and others, for thousands of ISIS fighters who had been captured and defeated in the campaign lead by the United States.
The homeland security department released a statement in response to the department’s acting secretary, Kevin McAleenan, deciding not to speak after protestors interrupted his remarks at an immigration conference this morning.
The department said McAleenan’s right to free speech and assembly were “robbed.”
White House reveals policy shift following conversation between Trump and Erdoğan
The White House has given the green light to a Turkish offensive into northern Syria, moving US forces out of the area in an abrupt foreign policy change that will in effect abandon the Kurds, Washington’s longtime military partner.
Kurdish forces have spearheaded the campaign against Islamic State in the region, but the policy swerve, after a phone conversation between Donald Trump and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Sunday, means Turkey would take custody of captured Isis fighters, the White House said.
Hate crimes have risen steadily since 2016, and Latinos say they feel vulnerable: ‘It rattles you at your core’
The first time someone called Lidia Carrillo a “wetback” she had to ask her teacher what the slur meant. She was only 13, and had recently moved to California from Jalisco, Mexico, with her parents and six siblings.
Carrillo had tried to explain that her family hadn’t crossed any river, but it didn’t matter. “They looked at us differently,” she recalled.
Republican defenders mostly silent, with two vivid exceptions, as at least one additional whistleblower steps forward
As Donald Trump strived to enforce message discipline among Republicans in the face of a building threat that he will be impeached, new forces beyond the US president’s control appeared likely to accelerate the congressional impeachment inquiry further in the coming week.
At least one additional whistleblower has stepped forward to describe an alleged scheme by Trump to extort Ukraine for dirt on Democratic 2020 presidential rival Joe Biden, the individual’s lawyer announced.
The only tool he has to placate US consumers is successive interest rate cuts – but the whole world is playing at that game
Donald Trump’s cunning plan to make America great again by launching a trade war with China has officially backfired. Last week, a keenly watched measure of US manufacturing showed firms cutting back on production and jobs at a rate not seen since 2009. Recession warning lights are flashing and the outlook seems a world away from the cheery one presented by the president when he entered the White House in 2017.
It is quite something for a president to impose a trade policy that weighs heavily on parts of a crucial sector for the US economy – and it’s a bizarre tactic given that the votes of manufacturing workers delivered him his first term in office.
As the walls of an impeachment inquiry closed in, Trump’s incoherent statements renewed fears about his fitness for office
The eye of a storm is deceptively calm. At the White House this week the sun was shining, a bust of Ronald Reagan reposed outside the West Wing office of the press secretary, a US marine saluted the president as he boarded Marine One and scores of African American millennials cheered him in the east room.
But inside Donald Trump’s head, there was no calm. The storm was a firestorm.