Labour leader says UK ‘should not honour president who uses racist and misogynist rhetoric’
Jeremy Corbyn has declined an invitation to attend a state dinner with Donald Trump when the US president visits the UK in June.
Trump has accepted an invitation to a long-delayed state visit, including a formal white-tie dinner hosted by the Queen.
Continue reading...‘Absurd’ that US and its closest allies are not leading players in technology, former PM says
Malcolm Turnbull has revealed that he encouraged Donald Trump to “take the lead” and develop 5G networks in cooperation with allies, including Australia, to hold out “ferocious competition” from China and to safeguard networks against cyber-attacks.
In a speech in New York overnight, the former prime minister said that in response to concerns China was stealing a technological march he had urged the US president to “ensure that we had at least one viable and secure 5G vendor from the United States and/or its Five Eyes partners”.
Continue reading...Hill said ‘I will be satisfied when I know there is real change’ after former vice-president’s campaign said he spoke to her
Charlottesville was a main focus in Joe Biden’s video announcing his run for president. It’s the first word he utters on camera, and the video features footage from the right-wing marches that took place in Charlottesville in 2017.
The core values of this nation… our standing in the world… our very democracy...everything that has made America -- America --is at stake. That’s why today I’m announcing my candidacy for President of the United States. #Joe2020 https://t.co/jzaQbyTEz3
“But I wasn’t surprised,” Bro, co-founder of the Heather Heyer Foundation set up in her daughter’s memory, told The Daily Beast. “Most people do that sort of thing. They capitalize on whatever situation is handy. He didn’t reach out to me, and didn’t mention her by name specifically, and he probably knew we don’t endorse candidates.”
In yet another instance of men telephoning women in performative but ultimately empty gestures, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey reportedly called Congresswoman Ilhan Omar regarding a tweet that President Trump broadcasted to his millions of followers that sparked a spike in death threats to the freshman lawmaker.
The Washington Post is reporting that in the phone call, Dorsey “stood by the company’s decision”:
Omar pressed Dorsey to explain why Twitter didn’t remove Trump’s tweet outright, according to a person familiar with the conversation who spoke on condition of anonymity because the call was private. Dorsey said that the president’s tweet didn’t violate the company’s rules, a second person from Twitter confirmed.
Dorsey also pointed to the fact that the tweet and video already had been viewed and shared far beyond the site, one of the sources said. But the Twitter executive did tell Omar that the tech giant needed to do a better job generally in removing hate and harassment from the site, according to the two people familiar with the call.
Continue reading...Biden, who handled her testimony before the Senate in 1991, contacted Hill to express ‘regret for what she endured’
Former vice-president Joe Biden, who launched his third campaign for president on Thursday, told Anita Hill he regretted the way he handled her testimony against Clarence Thomas at the 1991 supreme court hearings but she was not “satisfied” by the conversation.
Biden contacted her earlier this month to express his “regret for what she endured” during the hearing, an attempt to reckon with a defining moment from his past that looms over his present bid for the White House.
Continue reading...Top watchdog promises to force change following Cambridge Analytica scandal as New York announces new investigation
Facebook broke Canadian privacy laws when it collected the information of some 600,000 citizens, a top watchdog in the country said on Thursday, pledging to seek a court order to force the social media company to change its practices.
Canada’s privacy commissioner, Daniel Therrien, made his comments while releasing the results of an investigation, opened a year ago, into a data sharing scandal involving Facebook and the now-defunct British political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.
Continue reading...Company beat sales and profit expectations to join Apple and Amazon in prestigious club
Microsoft has become the third publicly listed US company, after Apple and Amazon, to boast a market value of more than $1tn after bumper quarterly results boosted its share price.
The company beat sales and profits expectations in the three months to 31 March, thanks in part to its cloud computing business, which signed up major corporate clients over the period.
Continue reading...US official who was sent to retrieve Warmbier signed an agreement to pay the surprise invoice, the Washington Post reports
The United States was handed a $2m bill from North Korea for the hospital care of American Otto Warmbier, who died soon after his release back to the US in a comatose state in 2017, after being detained for 17 months.
Acting on instructions passed down from Donald Trump, the main US official who was sent to North Korea to bring Warmbier back to the US signed an agreement to pay the surprise invoice he was handed by Pyongyang, according to the Washington Post on Thursday, which cited two anonymous sources familiar with the situation.
Continue reading...The warlord Khalifa Haftar, who controls eastern Libya, has never disguised his ambitions. Once one of Muammar Gaddafi’s generals, he returned from exile in the US when the dictator fell in 2011, attempted to launch a coup three years later, repeatedly declared his intention to take Tripoli and has said that his country may not be ready for democracy.
So the professions of shock from his backers when he mounted his assault on the western capital, held by the internationally recognised Government of National Accord, cannot be treated with great seriousness. The only real surprise about his advance was its timing. By moving while the UN secretary-general was in the country, to discuss arrangements for a UN-organised conference intended to lead to elections, he destroyed muted hopes of a political solution and underscored his already evident contempt for the process. As the prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, complained, the response of many supposed allies was silence.
Continue reading...Barack Obama's former vice-president has entered the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. It is his third presidential campaign – after two unsuccessful attempts at earning the nomination in 1988 and 2008. He joins a crowded and diverse field. If successful, the 76-year-old would become the oldest person to be elected president in US history
Continue reading...Owners of Purdue Pharma face more than 2,000 lawsuits by officials who blame prescription opioids for sparking drug crisis
The members of the multi-billionaire Sackler family who own a painkiller manufacturer and are being sued by hundreds of state and local officials as part of the opioids litigation want to settle, a leading lawyer for the family said this week.
The attorney Mary Jo White represents four members of the family that controls Purdue Pharma, the company that developed and marketed the painkiller OxyContin. Purdue, along with other opioid makers, wholesalers and distributors, is facing more than 2,000 lawsuits by state, city and county officials who blame prescription opiates for sparking an unprecedented epidemic of drug abuse.
Continue reading...The president has already been tweeting about the Mueller report this morning, ahead of two Democratic town halls today
This is also not true.
“Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson accuses United Kingdom Intelligence of helping Obama Administration Spy on the 2016 Trump Presidential Campaign.” @OANN WOW! It is now just a question of time before the truth comes out, and when it does, it will be a beauty!
GCHQ on Trump tweet: "As we have previously stated, the allegations that GCHQ was asked to conduct 'wire tapping' against the then President Elect are nonsense. They are utterly ridiculous and should be ignored."
While railing against the Mueller report this morning on Twitter, Trump said the 448-page document was crafted by “angry Democrats” and had unlimited money/$35m behind it - one lie and one maybe truth.
Not to mention, his suggestion that the Supreme Court could intervene in impeachment is something the Supreme Court ruled it wouldn’t do in 1993.
The Mueller Report, despite being written by Angry Democrats and Trump Haters, and with unlimited money behind it ($35,000,000), didn’t lay a glove on me. I DID NOTHING WRONG. If the partisan Dems ever tried to Impeach, I would first head to the U.S. Supreme Court. Not only......
.....are there no “High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” there are no Crimes by me at all. All of the Crimes were committed by Crooked Hillary, the Dems, the DNC and Dirty Cops - and we caught them in the act! We waited for Mueller and WON, so now the Dems look to Congress as last hope!
Related: Trump says aides need not testify to Congress amid growing power struggle
Continue reading...So, Donald Trump is coming back to the UK. What should we expect, style-wise?
Caroline, by email
Re-inflate the orange blimp, the human orange blimp is coming back. This June, to be precise, for his first official UK state visit, as opposed to his last visit which was – amusingly, adorably – described as “a working visit”, which is like when I tell my toddlers how helpful they are when they unload the dishwasher by putting all the cutlery in the bin. Last summer, if you remember – and who could forget – Trump spent his four days in Britain alternately hiding from and grumping about the British people who seemed less than enthusiastic about his visit. He managed to be a dick even to the Queen, barging ahead of the 93-year-old woman as she valiantly attempted to humour the giant man-baby on walkabouts around Windsor. But the Queen might, or might not, have had her revenge, possibly-allegedly-maybe sending coded messages through the medium of her brooches to communicate her distaste for this man even other Americans refer to as “that vulgar American”. It was a headily exciting time for us all, and cost the UK tax payer a mere £18m for the joy. Ma’am, we are keenly awaiting your brooch messages. Red for emergency, orange for double emergency.
Continue reading...Former vice-president to officially launch bid for president, while Jared Kushner says Mueller investigation ‘just a big distraction’
Beto O’Rourke, the Texas congressman and presidential candidate, is jumping into the race for big donor $$$ with a New York City fundraiser next month in which hosts are asked to raise $25,000. The New York Times reports:
NEW: Beto O'Rourke will be holding private big $$$ fundraisers (his campaign has not previously held any).
Hosts are asked to raised $25,000 for a New York City event next month on May 13. pic.twitter.com/RbMpNz8DX8
The Guardian can confirm reports that former vice president Joe Biden will launch his 2020 campaign this week.
Sources close to Biden said he will make his announcement in a video to be released on Thursday and plans to hold an event in Pittsburgh on Monday.
Biden was initially expected to kick off his campaign on Wednesday before delaying his launch. Early polling shows Biden in the top tier of the Democratic field but in close competition with Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders for frontrunner status.
President’s son-in-law and senior adviser dismissed concerns about Russian spying operations at Time 100 summit
Jared Kushner has played down Russian interference in the 2016 US election, describing Moscow’s attack as “a bunch of Facebook ads” and calling Robert Mueller’s two-year special counsel investigation “a big distraction”.
Speaking at the Time 100 summit in New York City on Tuesday, Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser dismissed concerns about Russian spying operations laid out in alarming detail over 199 pages of the Mueller report released last week.
Continue reading...President has backed Khalifa Haftar, seen by UK and UN as aggressor in Libya conflict
European officials are hoping Donald Trump’s surprise expression of support for the Libyan warlord Khalifa Haftar can be reversed amid division in Washington over US policy on the north African country.
A clarification of US policy is considered necessary in order to build an international consensus condemning the attack on Tripoli that has claimed nearly 300 lives and injured more than 1,000, including migrants trapped in detention centres, since it began this month.
Continue reading...Defamation lawsuit alleges that Smollett’s lawyer and firm repeatedly assert that the brothers carried out a real, bigoted attack on actor
Two brothers who say they helped Jussie Smollett stage a racist and homophobic attack against himself filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the Empire actor’s attorneys, alleging that they repeatedly asserted publicly that the brothers carried out a real, bigoted attack on Smollett despite knowing that was not true.
A lawyer for Olabinjo Osundairo and Abimbola Osundairo filed the federal lawsuit on behalf of the brothers. It names the well-known defense attorney Mark Geragos and his law firm as defendants.
Continue reading...Preventing Iran’s oil from reaching the market will raise oil prices and US business costs
The past two and a bit years have shown that it is naive to expect Donald Trump’s strategic and economic policies to demonstrate coherence. Even so, the lack of joined-up thinking in the decision to end the waiver against sanctions from nations that buy oil from Iran takes some beating.
Related: US toughens stance on Iran, ending exemptions from oil sanctions
Continue reading...Balloon depicting nappy-wearing US president could be five times size of predecessor
The Donald Trump baby blimp, which became the focal point of protests against the US president’s visit to the UK in July, will rise again for the state visit and could be accompanied by a bigger version, activists have revealed.
Related: What happened next? The Trump baby blimp: 'In retrospect, we should have ordered a bigger balloon'
Continue reading...Gonzalez Carranza was once permitted to live and work in the US but his future is uncertain as Trump pushes to deport non-criminal immigrants like him
On a warm April morning in the Arizona desert, Jose Gonzalez Carranza, a thickset man with a slight lisp, a crooked smile and an intricate tattoo of a hundred-dollar bill creeping across his left hand, sits at his kitchen table trying to unpack what’s happened to him.
Gonzalez Carranza, 30, the Gold Star immigrant dad who made national news when he was briefly and mistakenly deported to Mexico in early April, has seen his life spiral out of control.
Continue reading...House judiciary committee chair demands McGahn testify before Congress as Democrats escalate investigation of Trump
The Democratic chairman of the House judiciary committee has issued a subpoena ordering that the former White House counsel Don McGahn testify before Congress. The move came as the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, vowed to hold Donald Trump to account following the release of Robert Mueller’s report on Russian influence on the 2016 US election.
Related: Giuliani rails against Mueller report as Democrats mull Trump impeachment
Continue reading...