Category Archives: Donald Trump

US electricity bills increased by 11% in Trump’s second term, data shows

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New analysis prompts letter to Trump from Elizabeth Warren: ‘Your administration has no answers for families hit by high energy costs’

Donald Trump promised to slash US electricity bills, but they have increased by 11% since he retook the White House, new data shows.

Democratic lawmakers highlighted the figures in a letter sent to Trump on Friday. “Your administration has no explanations for its failures and no answers for American families that are hit hard by high energy costs, and it continues to actively pursue policies to make this cost crisis worse,” reads the missive, led by Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts senator.

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Gaza risks sliding into deadly limbo of ‘no war, no peace’, top Qatari diplomat warns

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Majed al-Ansari calls for international force to be set up urgently to pave way for Israeli withdrawal

Gaza risks sliding towards a deadly limbo where a ceasefire is nominally in place but killing continues, a top Qatari diplomat has warned, calling for rapid progress in setting up the international security force and administration to pave the way for full Israeli withdrawal.

“We don’t want to reach a situation of no war, no peace,” said Majed al-Ansari, adviser to Qatar’s prime minister and spokesperson for the foreign ministry.

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More than half of Americans disapprove of Trump demolishing East Wing – poll

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Survey, in which one-third respondents voted for the president, found 56% disagree with move

More than half of Americans disapprove of Trump’s demolition of the White House’s East Wing and the construction of a new ballroom, according to a new poll from the Washington Post, ABC News and Ipsos.

The survey was conducted between 24 and 28 October and indicates 56% of the respondents disagree with Trump’s recent move while 28% are in favor of it. Most of the survey’s respondents were white, one-third of them voted for Donald Trump and another third for Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.

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Trump ally Stephen Miller at heart of FBI agent purge, new book reveals

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Miller urged firings of those who had investigated president to satisfy Trump’s desire for revenge, Injustice authors write

Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, was the driving force behind a purge of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents who had investigated Donald Trump, a new book reveals.

Miller trampled the independence of the FBI by demanding firings that would satisfy the US president’s desire for retribution, journalists Carol Leonnig and Aaron Davis write in Injustice: How Politics and Fear Vanquished America’s Justice Department.

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Xi-Trump meeting: America has discovered that bullies can be bullied back

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Outcome appears closer to truce than durable peace but outline of broader diplomatic relationship is visible

When Donald Trump launched his trade war against China in April, threatening tariffs as high as 145%, the Chinese government said it would never bow to blackmail and vowed to “fight to the end”.

The question now is whether the consensus reached between Trump and Xi Jinping in Busan, South Korea, on Thursday means that the fight really has come to an end, and if so on whose terms.

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Donald Trump praises ‘great’ Washington meeting with Anthony Albanese as leaders dine at Apec

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US president tells reporters he and Australian PM ‘working on a lot of things together’

After waiting a long time to meet Donald Trump, Anthony Albanese has now done so twice in 10 days, as his US counterpart talks up cooperation on rare earths and other issues.

Albanese followed last week’s trip to Washington by sitting next to the US president on Wednesday evening at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit dinner in Gyeongju, South Korea.

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Fed cuts interest rates for second time this year amid economic uncertainty

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Central bank sets rates at range between 3.75% and 4% amid turbulence from government shutdown and Trump’s tariffs

The US Federal Reserve cut interest rates on Wednesday, the second rate cut this year amid economic turbulence from the federal government shutdown and Donald Trump’s tariffs.

The decision to cut the Fed’s benchmark interest rate by a quarter point to a range of 3.75% to 4% comes at an extraordinary moment for the central bank. The Fed has been under immense pressure from Donald Trump to cut rates despite persistent inflation.

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Trump and Xi talks could end months of global economic chaos

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High on agenda for the leaders of the US and China will be rare earths and tariffs, with a chance of a relationship reset

Ahead of Thursday’s long-awaited first meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping since the US president’s return to office, officials from both sides have been hammering out the contours of what a trade deal between Washington and Beijing might look like, an agreement that could bring an end to months of global economic chaos caused by the US-China trade war.

The two leaders have not met in person since 2019. Since then, the war in Ukraine and increasing concern in Washington about China’s technological advances, as well as longstanding issues about the imbalanced US-China trade relationship, have strained the bonds between the two superpowers.

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Wole Soyinka, Nigerian Nobel laureate and Trump critic, says US visa revoked

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Soyinka, 91, who recently compared US president to Idi Amin, says ‘I have no visa – I am banned’

The Trump administration has revoked the visa for Wole Soyinka, the acclaimed Nigerian Nobel prize-winning writer who has been critical of Trump since his first presidency, Soyinka revealed on Tuesday.

“I want to assure the consulate … that I’m very content with the revocation of my visa,” Soyinka, who won the 1986 Nobel prize for literature, told a news conference.

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Shutdown stretches into 28th day as Senate again fails to pass spending legislation

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As funding for food aid program is about to be exhausted, Congress fails for 13th time to advance Republican bill

The US government shutdown stretched into its 28th day with no resolution in sight on Tuesday, as the Senate remained deadlocked over spending legislation even as a crucial food aid program teeters on the brink of exhausting its funding.

For the 13th time, Senate Democrats blocked a Republican-backed bill that would have funded federal agencies through 21 November. The minority party has refused to provide the necessary support for the bill to clear the 60-vote threshold for advancement in the Senate because it does not include funding for healthcare programs, or curbs on Donald Trump’s cuts to congressionally approved funding.

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Japanese PM promises golden age in relations with US during Trump visit

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Sanae Takaichi says she will nominate Trump for peace prize as two leaders sign agreement on rare earths

Japan’s new prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, has pledged to realise a “golden age” in relations with the US and to “fundamentally reinforce” her country’s defence posture at the start of a visit by Donald Trump.

The US president, who is in Japan on the second leg of a week-long tour of Asia, and Takaichi quickly signed an agreement laying out a framework to secure the mining and processing of rare earths and other minerals.

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Trump’s bailout threat may have been key to Milei’s electoral triumph in Argentina

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Voters appear to have responded to idea that US president’s ‘generosity’ would evaporate if Milei failed to win

“The dollar always talks in the end,” Donald Trump wrote in his 1987 bestseller The Art of the Deal.

Javier Milei’s surprise triumph in Argentina’s midterm elections – after Trump bailed him out with 40bn of them – suggests there may be some truth to that assertion.

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Republican senator calls Trump’s military airstrikes ‘extrajudicial killings’

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Rand Paul’s comments come days after president claimed US lawmakers wouldn’t take issue with Venezuelan strikes

The Trump administration’s military airtrikes against boats off Venezuela’s coast that the White House claims were being used for drug trafficking are “extrajudicial killings”, said Rand Paul, the president’s fellow Republican and US senator from Kentucky.

Paul’s strong comments on the topic came on Sunday during an interview on Republican-friendly Fox News, three days after Donald Trump publicly claimed he “can’t imagine” federal lawmakers would have “any problem” with the strikes when asked about seeking congressional approval for them.

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Japan’s new PM will hope the Abe effect endears Trump to her at crucial talks

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Sanae Takaichi leads a minority government and needs a successful meeting with the US president on Tuesday. Thankfully her mentor, Shinzo Abe, is one of Trump’s ‘favourites’

Japan’s new prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, faces the first real test of her diplomatic and personal skills when she meets Donald Trump for talks in Tokyo that are expected to focus on trade and security.

Takaichi, who this month became Japan’s first female leader after winning a vote to lead the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP), made her international debut at this weekend’s Asean summit.

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Gavin Newsom confirms he is considering 2028 presidential run

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Democratic California governor and high-profile Trump critic plans to make decision after 2026 midterms

Gavin Newsom, California’s Democratic governor, told CBS News Sunday Morning he plans to make a decision on whether to run for president in 2028 once the 2026 midterm elections are over.

“Yeah, I’d be lying otherwise,” Newsom said in response to a question on whether he would give serious thought to a White House bid after the 2026 elections. “I’d just be lying. And I’m not – I can’t do that.”

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US and China reach ‘final deal’ on TikTok sale, treasury secretary says

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Scott Bessent said plan was part of framework for trade deal but did not share details on transferring app’s ownership

US treasury secretary Scott Bessent claimed on Sunday that the US and China have finalized the details of a deal transferring TikTok’s US version to new owners.

“We reached a final deal on TikTok,” Bessent said on Sunday on CBS’s Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan. Alluding to Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, Bessent continued: “We reached [a deal] in Madrid, and I believe that as of today, all the details are ironed out, and that will be for the two leaders to consummate that transaction” during a meeting scheduled for Thursday in Korea.

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Trump told Pence ‘you’ll go down as a wimp’ in January 6 phone call, book says

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Book cites Pence’s notes from call with Trump, who called vice-president a ‘wimp’ if he certified Biden’s 2020 victory

On the day that his supporters attacked the US Capitol because his 2020 re-election run ended in defeat, Donald Trump called his vice-president at the time, Mike Pence, and told him he would go down in history as a “wimp” if he certified the election result, a new book says.

Those details were revealed on Sunday when ABC News published a preview excerpt of an upcoming book by its political correspondent Jonathan Karl. The book, titled Retribution, cites Pence’s notes from the 6 January 2021 phone call with Trump, who was purportedly trying to shame his vice-president into refusing to certify Joe Biden’s victory weeks earlier in the White House.

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Trump oversees Thailand-Cambodia ceasefire signing as Asia tour gets under way

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Trump has begun a five-day trip to Malaysia, Japan and South Korea, his first visit to the region since taking office in January

Donald Trump has overseen the signing of a ceasefire agreement between Thailand and Cambodia on the first day of an Asia tour where he will seal new trade agreements and hold a crucial meeting with Xi Jinping.

The US president arrived in Malaysia on Sunday before the Asean summit in the capital, Kuala Lumpur. At a ceasefire ceremony in front of a sign that read “Delivering Peace”, the Thai prime minister, Anutin Charnvirakul, and his Cambodian counterpart, Hun Manet, signed an expanded ceasefire deal related to a deadly five-day conflict in July.

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Do populists always crash the economy?

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Argentina is counting the cost of its turn to Javier Milei. Politicians from Donald Trump to Giorgia Meloni and Nigel Farage will be closely watching what happens next

“Cambio, cambio.” Under the blazing sun, dozens of money changers are hawking US dollars along Florida Street, a bustling pedestrian strip in Buenos Aires. Known as arbolitos (“little trees”), they are thriving ahead of the 26 October midterm elections in a country long used to saving in the greenback.

“The best time to buy is now,” says one arbolito, declining to give her name. “[The dollar] went down a little but it is a fake-out – it’ll rise again.”

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Trump raises tariffs on Canada by 10% in retaliation for anti-tariff TV ad

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Move is response to ad sponsored by Ontario that referenced Ronald Reagan’s support for free trade

Donald Trump announced on Saturday that he will raise US tariffs on Canada by 10% in retaliation for an anti-tariff advertisement sponsored by the Ontario government, which has further strained one of the world’s largest trade partnerships.

The statement, posted on Trump’s Truth Social account, came after several days of public disputes over the ad, which referenced Ronald Reagan’s support for free trade and provoked the US president’s anger.

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