Category Archives: US Politics

Ex-Trump aide Peter Navarro found guilty of contempt of Congress – as it happened

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The latest poll, which shows Donald Trump and Joe Biden virtually tied in a hypothetical 2024 rematch, paints a picture of a pessimistic and divided nation ahead of the most unprecedented election in modern times, according to a CNN report.

The survey’s findings pose the question of whether an 80-year-old Biden with a 39% approval rating is really the Democratic party’s strongest bet for next year’s election, the report says. But the president’s grip on his own party remains unshaken.

By definition in a 50-50 nation, a president facing majority disapproval across a slate of issues must be alienating independents. Those voters break for Biden over Trump, but the president gets poor marks from the cohort. Such vulnerability might encourage anyone mulling a third-party bid for the presidency – like strategists with No Labels, who held an event featuring West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin over the summer. The group says it will only field a candidate if there’s a chance of victory. But analysts warn that a third-party candidate could doom a weakened Biden and help Trump win a non-consecutive second term if he is the Republican nominee.

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White House set for Hunter Biden battle as Republicans look to pounce

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Republicans energized after special counsel seeks indictment of president’s son by end of September on gun possession charge

The White House is bracing for political trench warfare after prosecutors pursuing Joe Biden’s son on a gun possession charge said they would seek a criminal indictment by the end of September.

The prospect of Hunter Biden standing trial is likely to energise Republicans preparing to launch an impeachment inquiry into the president even as Congress tries to avert a government shutdown.

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Federal prosecutors seek new indictment against Hunter Biden

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Exact charges president’s son would face were not immediately clear but indictment to come by 29 September at earliest

Federal prosecutors are seeking to bring a new indictment against Joe Biden’s son Hunter by the end of September, according to court documents filed on Wednesday.

The exact charges the president’s son would face were not immediately clear, but he has been under investigation in Delaware on gun and tax charges.

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Federal prosecutors to seek Hunter Biden indictment by 29 September – as it happened

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Unclear what charges president’s son will face but he has been under investigation for potential tax and gun law violations. This blog is now closed

Obsequiousness to Donald Trump has its consequences. Yesterday, former leader of the Proud Boys militia group Enrique Tarrio was given the longest sentence yet handed out for the January 6 insurrection, the Guardian’s Martin Pengelly reports:

The former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison on Tuesday for his part in the failed plot to keep Donald Trump in power after the 2020 election.

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Russian strike on crowded Ukraine market leaves at least 17 dead

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Moscow targets cities with missiles as US secretary of state Antony Blinken makes surprise visit to Kyiv

A Russian strike has hit a crowded market in the Ukrainian city of Kostiantynivka, killing at least 17 people, as the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, was in Kyiv for an unannounced visit, his first for a year to the Ukrainian capital.

Ukrainian officials said a further 32 people were wounded in the attack, one of Russia’s deadliest attacks in months, 12 miles (20km) from the frontlines in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.

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Mitch McConnell rejects speculation about future amid concerns over health

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Republican Senate leader, 81, says he will finish term as signs emerge of uncertainty over his future in GOP ranks

Mitch McConnell rejected speculation about his future as Republican leader in the US Senate, telling reporters: “I’m going to finish my term as leader and I’m going to finish my Senate term.”

The remarks on Wednesday came amid intense speculation about the 81-year-old Kentucky senator’s health, after two recent freezes in front of reporters, one on Capitol Hill in July and another in McConnell’s home state last week.

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Proud Boys former leader Enrique Tarrio in court for January 6 sentencing – live

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Prosecutors are seeking a 33-year prison term for seditious conspiracy

There is “no evidence” that Mitch McConnell experienced a seizure or stroke when he froze up last week, the Capitol’s physician Brian Monahan told the top Senate Republican in a letter today:

McConnell last week appeared suddenly unable to speak when taking questions reporters, the second such occurrence in as many months following a fall earlier this year that sidelined him from work for several weeks. The episodes have raised concerns about the health of 81-year-old McConnell, a fixture in Republican politics.

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Mitch McConnell did not have stroke or seizure, Capitol doctor says

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Brian Monahan suggests Republican leader in US Senate, 81, may be suffering effects of concussion sustained during fall in March

Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the US Senate, is not evidently suffering from “a seizure disorder”, a stroke or a “movement disorder such as Parkinson’s disease”, the congressional physician said on Tuesday.

The doctor’s remarks came a little less than a week after the 81-year-old senator suffered a second worrying freeze in front of reporters.

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Cop City protesters charged with racketeering as Georgia takes hard line

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Some of 61 defendants charged also face money laundering and domestic terrorism charges for environmental protests

Dozens of activists who oppose a controversial police and fire training facility in Georgia known as Cop City have been charged with racketeering, appearing to confirm fears from civil rights groups that prosecutors are stepping up an aggressive pursuit of environmental protesters.

A total of 61 people – most not from Georgia – were indicted for violating the state’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act last week, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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Florida judge strikes down DeSantis-backed voting map as unconstitutional

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Circuit court judge rules proposal ‘results in the diminishment of Black voters’ ability to elect their candidate of choice’

A judge in Florida has ruled in favor of voting rights groups that filed a lawsuit against a congressional redistricting map approved by Ron DeSantis in 2022. Voting rights groups had criticized the map for diluting political power in Black communities.

In the ruling, Leon county circuit judge J Lee Marsh sent the map back to the Florida legislature to be redrawn in a way that complies with the state’s constitution.

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Two Proud Boys members get lengthy prison terms for Capitol attack

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Dominic Pezzola sentenced to 10 years while Ethan Nordean received an 18-year sentence for roles in 2021 insurrection

Two members of the far-right Proud Boys militia group who took part in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol with the intention of keeping Donald Trump in the White House were sentenced to lengthy prison terms on Friday.

Ethan Nordean, described by prosecutors as a leader of the extremist group, received an 18-year sentence for crimes that included seditious conspiracy, committed when thousands of Trump supporters overran the Capitol building.

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Proud Boys member receives 10-year prison sentence for US Capitol attack – as it happened

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Dominic Pezzola’s sentence is less than 20-year term prosecutors proposed while Ethan Nordean will also be sentenced. This blog is now closed

We’re expecting Joe Biden to soon speak about the government’s August employment report that came out a few hours ago, which shows employment growth remaining steady in the world’s largest economy, despite the sting of high interest rates, as the Guardian’s Lauren Aratani reports:

The US jobs market is holding steady as interest rates sit at a 22-year high, with US employers adding 187,000 jobs in August, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

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US pro-Israel groups in bitter feud over Netanyahu’s far-right government

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Hardline Aipac – condemned for unquestioning support of PM – calls liberal rival J Street ‘grave threat’ to Israel’s security

A public feud has broken out between the US’s leading pro-Israel lobby groups over who represents the true interests of the Jewish state in Washington under the most rightwing government in its history.

The hardline American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) has called its smaller and more liberal rival, J Street, a “grave threat” to Israel’s security and accused it of endorsing the country’s “most virulent critics” in Congress.

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Texas law aims to punish prosecutors who refuse to pursue abortion cases

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New law says prosecutors who adopt policy of refusing to go after people for violating abortion bans constitutes ‘official misconduct’

After the supreme court overturned Roe v Wade last year, district attorneys from major counties in Texas vowed not to vigorously prosecute people under the state’s anti-abortion laws.

Now, Texas has a plan to punish them if they don’t fall in line.

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Former Proud Boys leaders sentenced to 17 and 15 years for US Capitol attack

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Joseph Biggs, who played leading role on January 6, gets 17 years in prison and former chapter leader Zachary Rehl 15 years

Two former leaders of the far-right Proud Boys extremist group have each been sentenced to more than a decade in prison for spearheading an attack on the US Capitol to try to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden after the 2020 presidential election.

The 17-year prison term for Joseph Biggs, a Proud Boys organizer, and 15-year sentence for Zachary Rehl, a leader of the group, were the second and third longest sentences handed down yet over the 6 January 2021 attack.

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‘I wouldn’t give him a nickel’: one-time Giuliani donors rule out legal aid

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Billionaire Leon Cooperman, who backed Giuliani’s 2008 White House bid, says he won’t help with legal fees – and he’s not alone

As he attempts to meet mounting legal fees incurred in large part through his work for Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani will reportedly not get “a nickel” from one billionaire who backed his campaign for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination – or, apparently, much from many others previously big donors.

“I wouldn’t give him a nickel,” the investor Leon Cooperman told CNBC. “I’m very negative on Donald Trump. It’s an American tragedy. [Rudy] was ‘America’s mayor’. He did a great job. And like everybody else who gets involved with Trump, it turns to shit.”

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Clarence Thomas discloses trips paid for by Republican mega-donor – live

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Supreme court justice acknowledges luxury travel provided by billionaire Harlan Crow in disclosure released after delay

Conservative supreme court justice Clarence Thomas has acknowledged trips paid for by Republican megadonor Harlan Crow in a disclosure released today after a delay, CNN reports.

Reports from ProPublica and other media outlets including the Guardian released earlier this year found Thomas, the court’s longest-serving conservative justice, had questionable entanglements with parties interested in its cases, including by taking luxury vacations with Crow.

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Hurricane Idalia: Georgia declares state of emergency as severe flooding and storm surges hit south-eastern US – live

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The eye of Hurricane Idalia made landfall along the coast of the Florida Big Bend near Keaton Beach around 7.45am Eastern time, the National Hurricane Center said.

The storm’s maximum sustained winds were near 125 mph.

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Judge rules against Rudy Giuliani in Georgia election workers’ defamation suit – as it happened

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Trump’s former attorney ordered to pay attorneys’ fees of $89,172.50 for Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss

Jury selection will begin on 5 September in the contempt of Congress trial of Peter Navarro, a former White House aide to Donald Trump.

Navarro was indicted last year after failing to comply with two subpoenas from the bipartisan congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack. He attempted to argue that executive privilege concerns prevented him from cooperating with the panel, but a federal judge ruled against that defense today.

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Mitch McConnell appears to freeze again for more than 30 seconds

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Republican Senate minority leader, 81, had a similar but shorter incident several weeks ago

The Republican leader in the US Senate, Mitch McConnell, experienced another public health scare on Wednesday when he appeared to freeze for more than 30 seconds while speaking to reporters in his home state, Kentucky.

McConnell, 81, was eventually escorted away by staff, footage from an NBC News affiliate showed.

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