With Covid-19 deaths set to almost double this month, the president is putting the stock market before lives, critics say
Donald Trump is effectively abandoning a public health strategy for the coronavirus pandemic and showing “clear willingness to trade lives for the Dow Jones”, critics say.
Related: Will Americans ever forgive Trump for his heartless lack of compassion? | Francine Prose
Continue reading...Donald Trump has denied any involvement by the US government in what Venezuelan officials have called a failed armed incursion in the South American country that led to the capture of two American “mercenaries”.
The president made the comment to reporters at the White House after Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, announced that authorities there had detained two US citizens working with a US military veteran who has claimed responsibility for the foiled operation.
Continue reading...Death toll of crew stranded by coronavirus continues to rise as industry blames ‘impractical’ safety requirements for blocking disembarkation
Some cruise companies have refused to agree to rules that would allow tens of thousands of stranded crew back to land, citing concerns about cost and potential legal consequences, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The largest trade association for the cruise industry has called the CDC’s requirements for disembarkation “impractical”.
The standoff comes amid a deteriorating situation on many ships around the world and a rising death toll of crew members.
Continue reading...Boy, 5, told officers he was driving to California to buy Lamborghini sports car – with $3 in his pocket
Utah state troopers pulled over a five-year-old boy driving his parents’ car down the highway. The precocious youngster told the officers he was on his way to California to buy himself a Lamborghini – with $3 in his pocket.
Troopers in Ogden, outside Salt Lake City, initially thought the car was being driven by an impaired driver. But when they found the boy driving, he told police he left home after an argument, in which his mother refused to buy him the luxury sports car.
Continue reading...At least six workers who have participated in protests or advocated for safer conditions have been fired during the pandemic
Amazon’s revenues topped $33m an hour in the first three months of the year as the coronavirus pandemic locked down large parts of the world. The sales boost has handed Amazon the biggest dilemma of its 25-year life: how to deal with a growing chorus of critics within the company. So far its reaction has only made matters worse.
Last week an Amazon vice-president, Tim Bray, resigned in protest at what he called the company’s “chickenshit” decision to fire colleagues in the company’s warehouse division who had highlighted safety issues. “Remaining an Amazon VP would have meant, in effect, signing off on actions I despised,” wrote Bray.
Continue reading...Austria says easing lockdown has not led to spike in infections; Macron says major foreign travel will be limited this summer; global deaths pass 250,000
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported 19,138 new confirmed cases; taking the total to at least 1,171,510. The number of deaths has risen by 823 to 68,279, it added.
The figures do not necessarily reflect those reported by individual states.
A regional capital in Brazil has become the country’s first city to declare a total lockdown – in direct opposition to the president Jair Bolsonaro, who has railed against social isolation and dismissed a soaring death-toll.
The lockdown in São Luís, capital of the north-estern state of Maranhão, and three neighbouring towns, was ordered by a judge after intensive care beds in state government hospitals filled up. States such as Rio de Janeiro are watching closely. But the move came as looser social isolation measures introduced by state governors crumble across Brazil and cases soar.
Continue reading...
That’s all for today, thanks for following along. A recap of the day:
Senator Elizabeth Warren said today she believed Joe Biden’s comments on the sexual assault allegation were “credible and convincing”.
“I saw the reports of what Ms [Tara] Reade said, I saw an interview with vice-president Biden. I appreciate that the vice-president took a lot of questions, tough questions. And he answered them directly and respectfully. The vice-president’s answers were credible and convincing,” the senator and former presidential candidate said, according to a CNN reporter.
Related: Senate rejects Joe Biden's request to search for records on Tara Reade
Continue reading...New York Times says it has obtained document that suggests administration expects daily death toll to rise throughout May
As Donald Trump proclaimed success in America’s fight against the coronavirus and continued to push for the US economy to reopen, it was reported on Monday that internal projections show the administration is expecting 3,000 deaths a day by 1 June.
Related: CNN's Don Lemon tells Trump to stop peddling 'crap' and 'conspiracy theories'
Continue reading...Tim Bray’s departure comes as company faces increased scrutiny and employee activism around its Covid-19 response
Tim Bray, a top engineer and vice-president at Amazon, announced on Monday he is resigning “in dismay” over the company’s firing of employee activists who criticized working conditions amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Bray’s resignation comes as Amazon faces increased scrutiny and employee activism surrounding its internal response to coronavirus. Amazon workers on Friday participated in a nationwide sick-out to, claiming the company has failed to provide enough face masks for workers, did not implement regular temperature checks it promised at warehouses, and has refused to give workers paid sick leave protest working conditions and inadequate safety protections.
Continue reading...Trump administration portrays crisis as example of danger Beijing’s leadership poses to China and the world
The escalating row between Washington and Beijing over blame for the coronavirus pandemic is fast becoming a battle over the Chinese Communist party’s legitimacy, raising the stakes in an already fraught relationship.
In castigating Beijing for its failure to contain the outbreak, senior Trump administration officials have gone out of their way to portray the crisis as a deadly illustration of the threat that Communist party rule poses the Chinese people – and the world beyond.
Continue reading...Senate secretary said legal counsel advised that ‘the secretary has no discretion to disclose any such information’
The US Senate has rejected a request from Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, to search for and release any records of a 1993 complaint against him from an aide who has accused him of sexual assault.
The former vice-president gave his first TV interview on the matter on Friday, flatly denying former aide Tara Reade’s allegation that when he was a senator from Delaware he pushed her against a wall and assaulted her.
Continue reading...Eight cruise ships to resume operations from 1 August, sailing from Texas and Florida
Carnival Cruise Line has announced plans to resume operations at the beginning of August despite dozens of deaths on cruise ships during the Covid-19 pandemic and investigations into the industry’s possible role in spreading the disease around the planet.
In a statement on Monday, the operator said eight cruise ships would resume operations from 1 August, sailing from Galveston, Texas, and Miami and Port Canaveral in Florida, once a no-sail order from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had expired.
Continue reading...This carefully authorised documentary offers glimpses of a dazzling presence on America’s political stage
Michelle Obama is a class act – one of the classiest – and her intelligence and poise now look like something from a lost golden age. The publication of her globally bestselling memoir Becoming in 2018 brought her dazzlingly into the public sphere on her own terms. It gave her an international A-list status to rival her husband’s and provided Democrats and non-Trumpians around the world with a manifesto of decency and dignity to cling on to.
Now we have this watchable, but carefully authorised, behind-the-scenes documentary for Netflix (from the Obamas’ company, Higher Ground Productions) about Obama’s American book tour (with a stopover at London’s O2 Arena). It shows her getting in and out of armoured sports utility vehicles, chatting easily and good-naturedly with her security detail, with colleagues and family members backstage, with beaming celebrity moderators onstage (starting with Oprah Winfrey) and with people getting their copies signed in bookstores who often dissolve in floods of tears just in coming face to face with her. (I was sorry, however, that we didn’t get to see again her amusing cameo in the TV comedy Parks and Recreation, which showed Amy Poehler’s earnest public official Leslie Knope reduced to a gibbering fangirl in her presence.)
Continue reading...I am about to go through an invasive therapy for my cervical cancer. The process has brought me closer to my seven-year-old self
In a large black planner that I keep next to my bed, I mark off each round of chemotherapy and radiation. And after each one, I feel a growing sense of dread.
That’s because every mark means I’m one step closer to brachytherapy, a process that involves doctors sticking radioactive materials into my cervix – or what’s left of it anyway. It’s a way for them to aim high doses of radiation at my tumor, without risking the other nearby organs.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed.
We’ve launched a new blog at the link below. Head over there for live developments in the pandemic worldwide:
Related: Coronavirus live news: WHO and Five Eyes reject Chinese lab theory as global deaths pass 250,000
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is taking the lead in pressing a hard line against Beijing over the coronavirus pandemic, AFP reports.
Pompeo, in an interview Sunday on ABC, said there was “enormous evidence” that the new coronavirus came out of a Wuhan lab - not a wet market, as most scientists suggest.
Continue reading...US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said there is 'enormous evidence' the coronavirus outbreak originated in a laboratory in Wuhan, China, but failed to provide evidence following his statement. Pompeo added,'experts seem to think it was manmade', before reversing his statement after he was reminded the US intelligence dismissed those claims last week.
Continue reading...Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan has spoken out in support of Joe Biden, telling CNN that when it comes to accusations of sexual assault, “not every claim is equal”.
Related: Tara Reade says she didn't explicitly accuse Biden of assault in Senate report
Continue reading...The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, claimed on Sunday there is “enormous evidence” the coronavirus outbreak originated in a Chinese laboratory – but did not provide any of the alleged evidence.
Related: Pandemic brings Trump's war on science to the boil – but who will win?
Continue reading...Watchdog groups say Trump’s close ties with donors and backers deserve scrutiny as trillions in federal funds are handed out
Fracking billionaire and Trump donor Harold Hamm was among an elite group of oil and gas executives who met with the president in early April to press for federal help, including access to big loans for businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic. It prompted Trump afterwards to promise to “make funds available to these very important companies”.
Related: Trump erupts over poll slump and threatens to sue campaign manager
Continue reading...YouTube deletes Covid-19 conspiracy theorist’s account; Warren Buffett optimistic; Rohingya refugees detained in Malaysia. Follow the latest updates
As more and more state and local officials announce the release of thousands of at-risk inmates from the nations adult jails and prisons, parents along with children rights groups and criminal justice experts say vulnerable youths should be allowed to serve their time at home, AP reports.
But they say demands for large-scale releases have been largely ignored. Decisions are often not made at the state level, but instead carried out county by county, with individual judges reviewing juvenile cases one by one.
Such legal hurdles have resulted in some kids with symptoms being thrown into isolation for 23 hours a day, in what amounts to solitary confinement, according to relatives and youth advocates. They say many have been cut off from programs, counsellors and school. Some have not been issued masks, social distancing is nearly impossible and they have been given limited access to phone calls home.
The Bolshoi ballet held its first online classes only this week, more than a month after lockdown began, AFP reports.
In the middle of their bedroom, Bolshoi ballet dancers Margarita Shrainer and Igor Tsvirko have placed a linoleum mat and a barre. Since the start of the lockdown, the couple, both soloists in the legendary troupe, have largely used their own initiative to keep up their dance skills at home.
Continue reading...