Category Archives: US News

US supreme court tackles politics’ most tantalising mystery: Trump’s tax returns

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The president’s tax documents have been reported on by various outlets, even winning the New York Times a Pulitzer

The US supreme court is in its second week of working by telephone during the coronavirus pandemic. On Tuesday it will hear the highest-profile arguments so far presented remotely: regarding the release, or not, of Donald Trump’s tax returns.

When Trump ran for president in 2016, he bucked tradition by refusing to release such information. Saying he was under audit, which would not in fact have precluded action, he promised to release his returns in due course. He has not.

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‘You know what the crime is’: Trump stumped on ‘Obamagate’ details – video

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Days after tweeting about 'Obamagate' and accusing his predecessor, Barack Obama, of committing crimes, US president Donald Trump was asked to specify what those exactly were. He replied: 'Obamagate, it's been going on for a long time, it's being going on from even before I got elected and it's a disgrace that it's gone on.' He continued: 'some terrible things happened and it should never be allowed to happen in our country again.' When he is again asked what the crime is, Trump says: 'You know what the crime is.'

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‘You should ask China’: Trump terminates press conference after clash with reporters – video

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Donald Trump's press conference on coronavirus testing ended abruptly after a terse exchange with two female reporters. Asked by CBS's Weijia Jiang about his focus on international comparisons rather than US deaths, Trump snapped: 'Don’t ask me, ask China that question'. After being asked by Jiang, who is Asian-American, why he had directed the remark at her, Trump cut off the CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins as she asked a question and walked away from the podium

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Elon Musk reopens California Tesla factory in defiance of lockdown order

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CEO announces electric carmaker will begin production on Monday after company sues county over Covid-19 restrictions

Elon Musk announced on Twitter that Tesla would resume production at its northern California factory on Monday afternoon, in defiance of a local public health order designed to slow the spread of coronavirus.

“Tesla is restarting production today against Alameda County rules,” the billionaire CEO tweeted. “I will be on the line with everyone else. If anyone is arrested, I ask that it only be me.”

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Coronavirus US live: Trump abruptly leaves press conference after clash with reporters

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Trump ends the briefing on a very abrupt and sour note.

Asked by CBS White House Correspondent Weijia Jiang why he is so fixated on comparing the US’ testing capability to other countries as opposed to focusing on the lag that still exists here, Trump snapped: “Maybe that’s a question you should ask China. Don’t ask me, ask China that question, okay?”

Trump throws a fit when @kaitlancollins of CNN tries to ask him a question and abruptly ends the press conference pic.twitter.com/58AVZ9CABl

Trump walked out of his own news conference after accusing @weijia of asking a "nasty question" and refusing to take @kaitlancollins's questions after calling on her.

Trump spent Mother’s Day sending conspiratorial tweets about his predecessor. In one tweet he accused Obama of committing the “biggest political crime in American history, by far!” Trump.

Asked to name the crime he is accusing Obama of committing, Trump replied: “Obamagate. it’s been going on for a long time it’s been going on before I even got elected.”

Related: Trump charges Obama with 'biggest political crime in American history'

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Interpol issues red notice for ‘fugitive’ Anne Sacoolas

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Suspect in UK death of teenager Harry Dunn fled to US claiming diplomatic immunity

An Interpol notice has been circulated worldwide making Anne Sacoolas in effect a fugitive from justice if she sets foot outside her native United States.

Sacoolas was charged in the UK withcausing the death by dangerous driving of a 19-year-old motorcyclist, Harry Dunn, last August.

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Mexican border town uses ‘sanitizing tunnels’ to disinfect US visitors from Covid-19

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Authorities in Nogales, Sonora, are hoping to reduce chances of bringing the virus over from Arizona, one of the states most affected

Fears of foreigners bringing infectious disease into the country. Enhanced border checkpoints. And the use of disinfectant spray to sanitize human beings.

These aren’t notes from one of Donald Trump’s freewheeling press conferences. The United States’ troubled response to the coronavirus pandemic is such that the Mexican border city of Nogales, Sonora, has set up “sanitizing tunnels” to disinfect people leaving the US through Nogales, Arizona.

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‘We’re on the other side of the mountain’: Cuomo hails falling rate of coronavirus infections

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As state prepares to reopen, governor says new cases on par with mid-March – but death rate may have been far higher than believed

As parts of New York prepared to reopen on Friday, the governor said new infections had fallen to the same rate as 19 March, the date he said the state “went into the abyss”.

Related: No quarantine for Mike Pence despite rash of Covid-19 cases in White House

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Release of Iranian scientist in doubt as US official ‘calls BS’

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Homeland security questions whether Tehran wants return of Sirous Asgari

A potential deal to release a renowned Iranian scientist from a US jail and return him to Iran appears to be in danger of breaking down after a senior US official questioned whether Tehran really wanted him returned.

Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, claimed on Monday that Sirous Asgari had been freed by US authorities and would be able to return to Iran immediately if he tested negative for coronavirus.

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Midwesterners were already doubting Trump. Covid could seal his political fate

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The genius may think we are suckers, but in Iowa we don’t ruin good corn liquor with Clorox

Drake Custer is a union man who, along with about 30 of his buddies, had an Old English “K” tattooed on their chests about 15 years ago. It stands for “Keokuk”, a deflated Mississippi River manufacturing town of 10,000 tucked into the south-east corner of Iowa that Washington and Des Moines forgot.

“We know who we are,” said Custer.

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Jerry Stiller, star of Seinfeld and father of Ben, dies aged 92

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Comedian who formed a popular duo with his wife, Anne Meara, has died of natural causes

The comedian Jerry Stiller has died at the age of 92. His death was announced on Monday on Twitter by the actor Ben Stiller, who called him “a great dad and grandfather, and the most dedicated husband”.

Jerry Stiller enjoyed a long career on stage and screen, often accompanied by his wife, Anne Meara, with whom he formed a popular comedy act. They met in 1953, married the following year and regularly teamed up for improv sketches, performing in Las Vegas nightclubs and on The Ed Sullivan Show and other TV programmes, often in character as the squabbling spouses Mary Elizabeth Doyle and Hershey Horowitz, playing upon their Irish Catholic and Jewish cultures. In 2010, they took their act online, performing from the front room of their New York apartment. Meara died in 2015.

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Coronavirus live news: Putin to ease Russia lockdown despite record number of new infections

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UK and WHO to lead global Covid-19 information campaign; Aden declared an ‘infested’ city

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported 985 more deaths and 23,792 more confirmed cases since the weekend’s update, taking the overall totals to 79,756 and 1,324,488.

The CDC said the weekend’s numbers were preliminary and had not been confirmed by individual states.

The Guardian has published its editorial on the prime minister’s message to the country as it moves into a dangerous new phase of the epidemic.

For more than 30 years, the term “consensus politics” fell out of fashion in Britain. For generations of Conservative politicians schooled in the dogmas of Thatcherism, the phrase came to connote unpleasant images of sandwiches with union leaders in No 10 and weak government.

Boris Johnson urgently needs to discover the virtues of consensus-building now, after a chaotic few days of mixed messages and confused assertions.

Related: The Guardian view on 'stay alert': a divisive muddle | Editorial

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Trump’s environmental ‘blitzkrieg’ advances under cover of coronavirus

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Administration is weakening protections ahead of the election, making changes that could take years for a Democratic president to undo

The Trump administration is diligently weakening US environment protections even amid a global pandemic, continuing its rollback as the November election approaches.

During the Covid-19 lockdown, US federal agencies have eased fuel-efficiency standards for new cars; frozen rules for soot air pollution; proposed to drop review requirements for liquefied natural gas terminals; continued to lease public property to oil and gas companies; sought to speed up permitting for offshore fish farms; and advanced a proposal on mercury pollution from power plants that could make it easier for the government to conclude regulations are too costly to justify their benefits.

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Trump charges Obama with ‘biggest political crime in American history’

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Donald Trump continued to fume over the Russia investigation on Sunday, more than a year after special counsel Robert Mueller filed his report without recommending charges against the president but only three days after the justice department said it would drop its case against Michael Flynn, Trump’s first national security adviser.

Related: Kayleigh McEnany - the 'acceptable' face of Trumpism who infuriates liberals

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Betty Wright, US soul, funk and R&B singer, dies aged 66

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Singer with remarkable vocal range had been sampled by generations of hip-hop and R&B artists, including Beyoncé and Mary J Blige

The soul, funk and R&B singer Betty Wright, celebrated across pop genres for her remarkable vocal prowess, has died aged 66.

The cause of death was not immediately known but Wright’s niece confirmed the news, writing on Twitter: “Sleep in peace aunty Betty Wright. Fly high angel.”

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Coronavirus US live: death toll nears 80,000 as Trump rages over Russia

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Precautions against Covid-19 infection have been stepped up at the White House but are hampered by the cramped and poorly ventilated conditions in the West Wing, Kevin Hassett, a special adviser to Donald Trump on the pandemic response, said on Sunday.

Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin has been talking to Fox News Sunday about the Trump administration’s attempts to reopen and restart the stalled US economy, and whether there will be another huge stimulus bill. Democrats who control the House want one of those but the White House doesn’t – that’s the short version.

The White House is “absolutely pushing for a payroll tax cut”, Mnuchin says. Most observers think that is a non-starter, because Democrats won’t let it. Payroll taxes, meaning deductions from regular paychecks, include funds for Social Security and Medicare, vital social benefits.

Related: US job losses have reached Great Depression levels. Did it have to be that way?

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Surfer killed in shark attack at northern California beach

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Unknown shark species attacked 26-year-old man surfing on northern end of Monterey Bay, state park officials say

A surfer was killed in a shark attack off a northern California beach, state park officials said on Saturday.

The 26-year-old man was surfing off Manresa State Beach on the northern end of Monterey Bay at around 1.30pm when he was attacked by an unknown shark species, the California State Parks said in a statement.

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Veep impact: battle to be Joe Biden’s running mate plays out in public

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The presumptive Democratic nominee has said his No2 will be a woman and Warren, Abrams, Harris, Whitmer and Klobuchar lead the contenders

Traditionally, American presidential candidates pick vice-presidential running mates largely in secret, outside the view of the public or even members of their own party so as to maximize news value – and not offend those passed over for the job.

But in 2020 – during a campaign already driven mostly online due to the coronavirus pandemic – Joe Biden’s quest to make a vice-presidential pick has been an unusually open, vocal and public audition, both within the campaign and outside it.

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Biden sexual assault claim divides Democrats as Republicans pounce

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While high-profile Democrats voice support for the presumptive presidential nominee, some progressives call for a closer look at Tara Reade’s allegations

The allegations of sexual misconduct by Tara Reade against the former vice-president Joe Biden have caused new fault lines within the Democratic party, especially between its left wing and the establishment.

Reade is a former Biden Senate staffer who has accused the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee of sexually assaulting her while she worked in his office in the 1990s. Biden and his campaign have flatly denied the allegations and major news outlets have continued to investigate.

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The ‘United States of Europe’ speech that Winston Churchill so nearly made

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A recently discovered document sheds new light on the wartime leader’s ‘iron curtain’ address

It was a speech that electrified the world, one that coined a phrase that was to characterise the political era that followed the second world war. But its content could have been very different, reveals a document freshly unearthed by a historian researching the life of Winston Churchill.

On 5 March 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, before a huge crowd which included the US president, Harry Truman, Britain’s wartime leader issued a famous description of the political division that was opening across Europe between the Soviet-dominated Communist east and the western democracies. “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic,” Churchill declared, “an iron curtain has descended across the continent.”

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