Tony Blair has warned Democrats in the US that nominating Bernie Sanders to face Donald Trump for the presidency would be “an enormous gamble”, risking defeat on a similar scale to that suffered by the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn.
Related: How Bernie Sanders went from frontrunner to the last-chance saloon
Continue reading...Trump tests negative while Spanish PM’s wife tests positive; France and Israel announce partial closure of country; scientists condemn UK ‘herd immunity’ strategy. Follow live news
The US city of Hoboken, across the Hudson River from New York City, has announced a night curfew starting 16 March and ordered bars and restaurants to conduct only delivery services amid the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
An Uzbek citizen has tested positive for coronavirus after returning from France, Uzbekistan’s Healthcare Ministry said on Sunday, marking the first infection from the virus in the Central Asian country of 34 million.
Number of UK deaths rises to 35 while other countries introduce stricter new measures
Here comes Donald Trump.
Speaking of which:
California governor Gavin Newsom announces that the state's bars, nightclubs, breweries and wineries be closed.
Continue reading...The president’s response to the coronavirus pandemic has been ‘haphazard’, from a cascade of false statements to a public address that fueled anxiety
With his back to the wall, Donald Trump turned to perhaps the only people that truly impress him: not health experts or scientists but the titans of corporate America.
Confronted by a global pandemic he cannot bully, insult or out-tweet, the president paraded chief executives at the White House in the hope they could dig him out of a hole partly of his own making.
Continue reading...The coronavirus pandemic has shifted Sunday’s Democratic debate behind closed doors – but it is still hugely important
Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders will square off in the 11th Democratic debate on Sunday night, in a contest moved from Arizona to Washington DC and held without a live audience due to the coronavirus outbreak.
Related: Can Democrats unite the party in time for November's election?
Continue reading...All travel between the United States and the UK and Ireland will be suspended from midnight EST on Monday. Vice-president Mike Pence announced the new measure at a coronavirus task force news briefing on Saturday.
A top medical official Anthony Fauci said the move could change the course of coronavirus's spread across the country, which he said 'has not yet reached its peak'.
Continue reading...A 22-year-old African American woman has filed a civil rights lawsuit in New York, claiming she was shackled to a hospital gurney during labor, after being arrested on a minor assault charge that was later dismissed.
The lawsuit filed on behalf of “Jane Doe” against the City of New York and several New York police department (NYPD) officers who arrested the woman in December 2018, when she was more than 40 weeks pregnant, claims the woman was also handcuffed and shackled after she gave birth to her son.
Continue reading...Donald Trump has confirmed he took a coronavirus test after exposure to infected people including a member of Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s entourage in Florida last weekend. He revealed he had been tested at a briefing where it was announced the US would ban travellers from the UK and Ireland from entering the country from Monday.
A White House physician later issued a statement confirming that Trump does not have Covid-19. Meanwhile, his daughter Ivanka Trump, a White House adviser, entered self-isolation on Friday after meeting an Australian politician later revealed to have tested positive.
Continue reading...Donald Trump has welcomed legislation that will help fund paid sick leave, unemployment insurance, free testing and other measures to help Americans affected by the coronavirus pandemic.
Related: 'I don't take responsibility': Trump shakes hands and spreads blame over coronavirus
Continue reading...The city isn’t a ghost town – yet – but small businesses are hurting for customers as polite pedestrians avoid physical contact
Running through Manhattan from the Battery to the Bronx, Broadway is New York City’s lifeline. So in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak – and the raft of restrictive measures being implemented across the city and the state in an attempt to contain it – it seems like a good place to check the prevailing mood.
It doesn’t bode well when, on the 4 train down to Wall Street, a busker with a guitar performs a song featuring the words “coronavirus everywhere you turn”. Other than that, and the presence of a few face masks and latex gloves, everything appears relatively normal.
Continue reading...In the early 90s, Donald Trump judged the world’s biggest modelling competition - since hit by allegations of abuse. This is how the people who were there remember it.
Special investigation by Lucy Osborne, Harry Davies and Stephanie Kirchgaessner
On 1 September 1991, a large private yacht cruised towards the Statue of Liberty. It was a clear, breezy evening, and from the upper deck of the Spirit of New York, a golden sunset could be seen glinting off the Manhattan skyline. Downstairs, a party was in flow. Scores of teenage girls in evening dresses and miniskirts, some as young as 14, danced under disco lights. It could have been a high school prom, were it not for the crowd of older men surrounding them.
As the evening wore on, some of the men – many old enough to be the girls’ fathers, or even grandfathers – joined them on the dancefloor, pressing themselves against the girls. One balding man in a suit wrapped his arms around two young models, leering into a film camera that was documenting the evening: “Can you get some beautiful women around me, please?”
Continue reading...During a press conference on Friday, in which Donald Trump declared a national emergency due to the coronavirus outbreak, PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor asked the US president about the US Pandemic Response Team that was disbanded in May 2018. Trump replied that he knew nothing about it
Nearly 19,000 schools have or will close across the US, affecting more than 8.1m students and counting, according to Education Week, one of the few outlets tracking school closures nationally. There are roughly 76 million students in US schools.
That number will likely rise as coronavirus spreads to Midwest and rural areas of the country.
Update: At least 18,700 schools have closed or will close, affecting at least 8.1 million students, due to #coronavirus, as of today at 11 a.m. (Some of those schools have reopened.)
Six governors have ordered or asked schools to close; via @educationweek https://t.co/0U0CPCCyYm pic.twitter.com/yn5wwSvHVv
Hours before the House was scheduled to vote on a package that would provide assistance those affected by the coronavirus outbreak, President Trump criticized the proposal, throwing a compromise into question.
“We don’t think they’re giving enough,” Trump said, referring to Democrats during a midday press conference from the Rose Garden. “They’re not doing what’s right for the country.”
On 17 March, Donald Trump told reporters he knew this coronavirus 'was a pandemic all along', but that is in stark contrast to many of his previous statements. Here's a look back at how the US president has spoken about Covid-19 since January 2020
Donald Trump on Friday declared a national emergency over the fast-spreading coronavirus, opening the door to providing what he said was about $50bn in federal aid to fight the disease. Speaking at a news conference in the Rose Garden, the US president said he was declaring the national emergency in order to 'unleash the full power of the federal government'.
Queen cancels engagements; Canadian prime minister self-isolates; UK cases rise by 208
Plans to close off Catalonia have been announced by the northeastern Spanish region’s president, Quim Torra, who called on the central government to help by authorising the closure of ports, airports and railways.
The evolution of the contagion calls for most drastic action. We need to restrict entry and exit to protect ourselves.
In Europe, Hungary is closing all schools and will continue education as best as it can via digital channels, its prime minister Viktor Orbán has said.
In a Facebook video, he said he expected the Hungarian economy to stall soon and it will have to be restarted; an effort the government will participate in.
Continue reading...The vast incarcerated population is uniquely vulnerable to the pandemic as experts urge release of cash bail prisoners and others
To curb the spread of coronavirus, doctors and advocates are calling on the US to temporarily forgive bail and to clamp down on other programs that keep low-risk offenders imprisoned.
Jails and prisons remain uniquely vulnerable to coronavirus outbreaks, experts say, potentially leaving a major hole in America’s defenses against the outbreak.
Continue reading...Pentagon says attacks targeted Iran-backed militia, which it blames for Wednesday’s killing of two US soldiers and UK servicewoman
US forces have carried out air strikes in Iraq against what the Pentagon described as five weapons storage sites run by an Iranian-back militia, in retaliation for a rocket attack which killed two American and one British soldier near Baghdad.
The tit-for-tat attacks come just two months after a similar escalation brought the US and Iran to the brink of direct conflict. This time the two sides are facing off in Iraq while struggling to contain coronavirus outbreaks at home.
Continue reading...Ex-army analyst, held for refusing to testify to grand jury over WikiLeaks, attempted suicide this week, legal team said
A federal judge has ordered that Chelsea Manning be released from jail in Virginia.
Related: Chelsea Manning hospitalized after suicide attempt, legal team say
Continue reading...On Thursday, the two contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination criticised the Trump administration for its handling of the coronavirus outbreak in the US. Bernie Sanders spoke of the 'largely incompetent' administration during his speech in Burlington, Vermont, while Joe Biden said in Delaware that Trump's ban will not stop the spread of the virus