Arkansas Republican admits abortion trigger law would cause ‘heartbreak’ if Roe is reversed

Governor Asa Hutchinson signed near-total abortion ban bill, even though he disagreed with the lack of exceptions for incest and rape

The Republican governor of Arkansas, Asa Hutchinson, has admitted that an anti-abortion trigger law that he signed on to the books would lead to “heartbreaking circumstances” if Roe v Wade is overturned, in which girls as young as 11 who became pregnant through rape or incest would be forced to give birth.

Hutchinson’s remarks give a revealing insight into the twisted human and political quandaries that are certain to arise should the US supreme court, as expected, destroy the constitutional right to an abortion enshrined in Roe v Wade when it issues its ruling next month. The governor told CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday that in 2019 he had signed the Arkansas trigger law, Senate Bill 6, which would ban almost all abortions the instant Roe were reversed, even though he disagreed with its lack of exceptions for incest and rape.

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Baby formula shipment arrives from Europe, providing ‘some relief’ for US families

Biden economic adviser says US to see more baby formula on shelves as 70,000lb of product lands in Indianapolis on Sunday

A top White House economic adviser on Sunday said he was hopeful there would be more baby formula on American store shelves this upcoming week, especially after a plane full of the product arrived from an airbase in Germany.

Brian Deese, the director of the National Economic Council, told CNN State of the Union host Dana Bash that the plane carrying 70,000lb of baby formula – enough for half a million bottles – from Ramstein airbase in Germany which landed in Indianapolis on Sunday morning should cover about 15% of the product’s nationwide shortage. About 45% of baby formula products were out of stock across the US last week, according to figures that Bash cited during her interview of Deese, who didn’t dispute them.

“We’re going to see more formula … in stores starting as early as this week,” said Deese, adding that the incoming Nestlé product was “a specialty medical grade formula, the type that we most need in this market”.

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Russia bans 963 Americans from entering country

List includes Biden and other senior officials, but not Trump, as country says it is retaliating against what it calls hostile US actions

Russia on Saturday released a list of 963 Americans it said were banned from entering the country, a punctuation of previously announced moves against president Joe Biden and other senior US officials.

The country, which has received global condemnation for its 24 February invasion of Ukraine, said it would continue to retaliate against what it called hostile US actions, Reuters reported.

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Ginni Thomas reportedly urged Arizona Republicans to overturn 2020 result

Wife of supreme court justice Clarence Thomas emailed six days after election already called for Joe Biden

Ginni Thomas, the wife of the US supreme court justice Clarence Thomas, pressed Republicans in Arizona to overturn Joe Biden’s victory there in 2020, the Washington Post reported.

Repeating Donald Trump’s lie that the vote had been marred by fraud, Thomas wrote: “Please stand strong in the face of political and media pressure. Please reflect on the awesome authority granted to you by our constitution. And then please take action to ensure that a clean slate of electors is chosen for our state.”

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Trump pays $110,000 in fines after being held in contempt of court – live

The Washington Post said Friday it had obtained emails showing that Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, the conservative activist and wife of supreme court justice Clarence Thomas, pressed Arizona lawmakers to set aside Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in the state and choose “a clean slate of electors”.

Thomas wrote to two unidentified lawmakers on 9 November 2020, the newspaper says, six days after the general election, arguing they needed to intervene because the vote had been marred by fraud.

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Tucker Carlson tried to use Hunter Biden to get his son into Georgetown

Emails reveal the ‘extent’ which Carlson was willing to turn on Biden’s son since the 2020 election, Washington Post says

As Tucker Carlson asked Hunter Biden for help getting his son into an elite Washington university in 2014, the Fox News host’s wife, Susie, reportedly wrote in an email: “Tucker and I have the greatest respect and admiration for you. Always!”

Since the 2020 election, however, Carlson has fueled rightwing attacks on Joe Biden’s son, particularly over business affairs in which he allegedly benefited from his father’s position.

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Senate bill will help food aid recipients find baby formula amid shortage

Wic voucher requirements are being waived to allow holders to purchase any brand of infant formula as it becomes available

The Senate approved a bill Thursday aimed at easing the baby formula shortage for families participating in a government assistance program that accounts for about half of all formula purchased in the US.

The House passed the bill the day before, so it now goes to Joe Biden to be signed into law.

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gets engaged to longtime partner Riley Roberts

Democratic congresswoman confirms engagement to Roberts, whom she met as a student at Boston University

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took a break between visiting Amazon union workers and endorsing progressive candidates to get engaged to her longtime partner Riley Roberts.

Ocasio-Cortez, 32, confirmed to Insider on Thursday that she and Roberts, who met while both were at Boston University, got engaged last month while visiting her parents’ home town in Puerto Rico.

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Oklahoma Republican-led legislature passes nation’s strictest abortion ban

Bill bans abortion at conception and if signed into law it would allow citizens to sue anyone who ‘aids or abets’ a patient

Oklahoma’s Republican-led legislature passed the nation’s strictest abortion ban on Thursday. The bill, if signed into law, would allows citizens to sue anyone, anywhere who “aids or abets” a patient in terminating a pregnancy.

The bill bans abortion from conception, even before an egg implants in the uterus, and would go into effect immediately if signed by Republican governor, Kevin Stitt. Abortion providers expect he will do so before the coming week.

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US withdrawal triggered catastrophic defeat of Afghan forces, damning watchdog report finds

Report by special inspector general blames Trump and Biden administrations, as well as the Afghan government of Ashraf Ghani

Afghan armed forces collapsed last year because they had been made dependent on US support that was abruptly withdrawn in the face of a Taliban offensive, according to a scathing assessment by a US government watchdog.

A report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar) on the catastrophic defeat that led to the fall of Kabul on 15 August, blamed the administrations of Donald Trump and Joe Biden as well as the Afghan government of Ashraf Ghani.

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US primary elections: Dr Oz tied with McCormick in test of Trump’s influence on Republicans – live

Joe Biden will welcome the prime minister of Sweden, Magdalena Andersson, and the president of Finland Sauli Niinistö to Washington tomorrow.

It will be a very visual symbol of US support for those two European, Russia-adjacent nations joining the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato).

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US sues casino mogul Steve Wynn to compel him to register as an agent of China

Justice department says Wynn lobbied the Trump administration for China to protect his business interests in Macau

The US Department of Justice on Tuesday sued Steve Wynn, the billionaire former casino mogul and senior Republican fund raiser, to compel him to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act as an agent of China.

The department said Wynn, 80, had contacted then-US president Donald Trump and members of his Republican administration in 2017 to convey China’s request to cancel the visa of or otherwise remove a Chinese businessperson who had sought political asylum in the United States.

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House panel not planning to seek Trump’s testimony on Capitol attack

After months of uncertainty, chairman says it is ‘not our expectation’ that investigators will summon former president

The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol is not expecting to call Donald Trump to testify about potentially unlawful schemes to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win, its chairman said on Tuesday.

The panel has been weighing for months whether to seek voluntary cooperation or subpoena the former president in its wide-ranging inquiry in an effort to obtain his insight into unlawful schemes to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

But Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the select committee, told reporters on Capitol Hill that it was “not our expectation” to demand testimony from Trump.

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Wisconsin electors and voter file lawsuit against fraudulent 2020 Trump electors

Suit seeks fines and damages from those casting fake ballots and prohibition from serving the future

Two of Wisconsin’s presidential electors and a voter in the state filed a lawsuit Tuesday seeking to punish a group of Republicans who tried to cast fake electoral votes for Donald Trump in 2020, asking a state court to order them to pay up to $2.4m collectively in damages and bar them from ever serving as legitimate electors in a presidential election.

Wisconsin was one of seven states Trump lost in 2020 where allies cast an alternative set of electoral votes as part of his effort to overturn the election. The suit, filed by Law Forward and the Georgetown Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection (Icap) on behalf of the legitimate electors, is the first of its kind seeking civil punishments against the electors. Federal prosecutors and the January 6 commission are reportedly also reviewing the fake slates.

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Biden tells Buffalo shooting mourners: ‘Evil will not win. Hate will not prevail’ – as it happened

My colleague Ed Helmore is at the site of Saturday’s mass shooting in Buffalo, and sent this dispatch about the importance to the predominantly Black community of the supermarket where it happened:

Tops Friendly on Jefferson Avenue in East Buffalo was more than just a grocery store. It served as community center, a place to hang out, a source of employment – and a spot for healthy sustenance unavailable at bodega stores in an area described as the oasis in a food desert.

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Pro-Israel lobbying group Aipac secretly pouring millions into defeating progressive Democrats

American Israel Public Affairs Committee has disguised its efforts to undermine pro-Palestinian candidates

The US’s most powerful pro-Israel lobby group is pouring millions of dollars into influencing Democratic congressional primary races to counter growing support for the Palestinian cause within the party, including elections today in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s money is focused on blocking female candidates who, if elected, are likely to align with “the squad” of progressive members of congress who have been critical of Israel.

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Senate to vote on $40bn Ukraine aid bill initially blocked by Rand Paul – live

A preliminary vote on military, humanitarian and economic aid to Kyiv is expected today, setting up a final vote on Wednesday

• Scrutiny of Republicans who embrace ‘great replacement theory’ after Buffalo massacre

A group of voters who challenged extremist congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s eligibility to run for re-election have filed an appeal of the Georgia secretary of state’s decision that she can appear on the ballot.

The five voters from Greene’s district alleged that the rightwing Republican played a significant role in the 6 January Capitol attack, which they said put her in violation of a 14th amendment clause concerning insurrection and ineligibility for office.

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US gun violence over weekend puts focus on easy access to weapons

Violence includes Buffalo shooting that left 10 people dead, as well as two dead in Houston, one in Los Angeles and five in Chicago

America on Monday was picking up the pieces from a weekend of gun violence that – outside the cost of lives – has refocused the country’s leadership on the toxic interplay of political ideology and easy access to handguns and battlefield weapons.

In the most recent case, two people were killed Sunday and at least three others hospitalized after a shooting at a large Houston, Texas, flea market. In California, also on Sunday, at least one person died and five were wounded – including four listed in critical condition – after a shooting at a church with a predominantly Taiwanese congregation in Orange county, south of Los Angeles.

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Fauci says he will resign if Trump retakes the presidency in 2024

Fauci said ‘no’ when asked if he would stay on as National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases director under Trump again

The US’s top infectious disease expert has said he would resign if Donald Trump retakes the presidency in 2024.

Dr Anthony Fauci bluntly said “no” when CNN’s Jim Acosta asked him during an interview on Sunday if he would want to stay on as the director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases in the event that voters gave Trump a second stint as president.

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John Fetterman, Democratic Pennsylvania Senate candidate, suffers stroke

Lieutenant governor and frontrunner in Democratic primary says he’s recovering and insists ‘campaign isn’t slowing down one bit’

John Fetterman, the lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania and frontrunner in the state’s Democratic US Senate primary, suffered a stroke Friday, and is recovering, he said in a statement.

“On Friday, I wasn’t feeling well, so I went to the hospital to get checked out. I didn’t want to go – I didn’t think I had to – but Gisele insisted, and as usual, she was right,” Fetterman said in a statement posted to Twitter, referring to his wife. “I hadn’t been feeling well, but was so focused on the campaign that I ignored the signs and just kept going.”

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