Category Archives: US News

Trump leads Republican taunts of Biden after president drops out of 2024 race

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Former president and other Republicans say Biden is ‘not fit to serve’, with some saying he should resign immediately

Donald Trump’s vicious attack on Joe Biden and his legacy led the Republican party’s reaction to the president’s decision to withdraw from the 2024 race.

“Crooked Joe Biden was not fit to run for president, and is certainly not fit to serve – and never was!” Trump, the Republican nominee, said in a post to Truth Social, repeating his favored insult for the man who beat him in the 2020 election, and rehashing a familiar litany of unsubstantiated grievances.

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Israel says it intercepted missile fired by Houthis at port city of Eilat

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Houthi military says US ship in Red Sea also targeted after Israeli strikes on oil facilities and power station in Yemen

Israeli forces have said they intercepted a ballistic missile fired by Houthi militants in Yemen targeting the southern city of Eilat, in retaliation for a series of Israeli strikes on the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah.

Meanwhile, forest fires engulfed parts of northern Israel after a barrage of rocket fire from Lebanon.

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Trump attacks Biden and Harris in first rally since assassination attempt

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In first rally with running mate JD Vance, ex-president jibes at leadership chaos within Democratic party

Donald Trump launched a full-throated attack on Democratic rivals Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday as he returned to the campaign trail a week after surviving an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania.

In his first rally since the shocking shooting, and his first with new running mate Ohio senator JD Vance, Trump appeared on stage with the conspicuous white ear bandage he wore during the Republican national convention replaced by a smaller covering. He referred to the assassination attempt as a “horrific event” and said he stood before supporters “by the grace of God. I shouldn’t be here, but let’s face it, something very special happened.”

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Trump to hold first public campaign event since assassination attempt

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The former president and his running mate, JD Vance, will hold a joint rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan

Republican nominee Donald Trump will hold his first public campaign rally since a shocking assassination attempt a week ago by appearing in a crucial rust belt battleground state alongside his new running mate, Ohio senator JD Vance.

The return to the campaign trail by Trump comes after the attempted killing of the former US president at a Pennsylvania rally last Saturday when a 20-year-old gunman opened fire, injuring Trump and others and killing one rally-goer.

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Utah to use pentobarbital to execute man instead of three-drug combination

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Defense attorneys said the use of ketamine, fentanyl and potassium chloride could cause ‘excruciating suffering’

Utah officials said on Saturday that they are scrapping plans to use an untested lethal drug combination in next month’s planned execution of a man in a 1998 murder case. They will instead seek out a drug that’s been used previously in executions in numerous states.

Defense attorneys for Taberon Dave Honie, 49, had sued in state court to stop the use of the drug combination, saying it could cause the defendant “excruciating suffering”.

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Biden continues to resist Democratic calls to end re-election campaign

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Latest high-profile name to call on president to step aside is Sherrod Brown, the embattled senator from Ohio

Democrats were caught in an apparent stalemate on Saturday as a dug-in Joe Biden continued to endure high-profile calls to end his re-election campaign after a week of astonishing party moves to unseat the president in favor of a candidate many hope will be more likely to beat Donald Trump.

In the weeks since his disastrous debate performance against Trump, the 81-year-old Biden has attempted to fight off calls for him to step down from the top of the ticket amid concerns that his age and mental acuity are no longer up to the job. But a series of interviews, a press conference and speeches have done little to quell party nerves.

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Disneyland workers in Anaheim, California, vote to authorize strike

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Largest US strike so far this year could take place if negotiations, including over wages, fail next week

Members of four unions representing 14,000 workers at the Disneyland in Anaheim, California, have voted to authorize a strike amid contract negotiations.

The vote does not mean the workers will go on strike yet, but that the unions can call a strike at any point. If a strike takes place, it will be the largest strike so far in 2024.

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Gunman at Trump rally flew drone over fairgrounds earlier on day of shootings

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Latest disclosure about security lapses comes as larger picture of Thomas Matthew Crooks’ preparations emerges

Thomas Matthew Crooks, the gunman who tried to assassinate Donald Trump a week ago, was able to fly a camera-equipped drone over the fairgrounds near Butler, Pennsylvania, shortly before the former president was set to speak there, according to news reports.

The latest disclosure about security lapses that preceded the shooting comes as a more complete picture of Crooks’ preparations is emerging, though it still lacks any definitive motive for the 20-year-old’s actions that led to Trump being grazed by a bullet, the shooting death of former fire chief Corey Comperatore and the critical wounding of two rally-goers.

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Pro-Trump multimillionaire and election denier boosts funds to far-right voter-conspiracy groups

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Ex-Overstock chief Patrick Byrne using Maga-allied America Project to steer large amounts to groups pushing fringe theories

The multimillionaire and prominent election denier Patrick Byrne has been boosting his funding to the Maga-allied America Project and using it to steer six-figure checks to far-right groups that push voting conspiracies in Arizona, Michigan and elsewhere, according to tax records and voting experts.

Byrne, the former CEO of online retailer Overstock.com, said last fall that only $3m of the $30m the Florida-based project had raised at that point came from “the public”, with the rest coming from him.

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European divisions risk incoherent response to any second Trump term

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Optimists say administration would be open to persuasion while sceptics say it is beyond time to Trump-proof Europe

To be a foreign diplomat serving in the US, charged with interpreting the country’s politics so it appears predictable and explicable to your political masters in Europe, is currently no easy job.

In a week where Donald Trump purported to address the nation as a self-aware, reflective and thoughtful Christian, before reverting to type with a slew of diatribes, and where he announced a vice-presidential pick who has openly stated he does not care about the future of Ukraine one way or the other, events have moved at a pace that even the most tapped-in of ambassadors and their staff would struggle to keep up with.

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Democratic congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee dies aged 74, family says

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Jackson Lee, who was first elected to Congress almost 30 years ago, had said she was being treated for pancreatic cancer last month

US representative Sheila Jackson Lee, a strong progressive voice in the Democratic party who was outspoken on African American and women’s rights, has died, her family posted on X late on Friday.

Jackson Lee, of Texas, announced last month she had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and was undergoing treatment. She was 74 and had also previously had breast cancer.

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Man accused of Nazi salute during US Capitol attack jailed for nearly five years

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Tyler Dykes, 26, who said at sentencing he is supporting Trump to be president, pleaded guilty to assault charges

A Marine who stormed the US Capitol and apparently flashed a Nazi salute in front of the building was sentenced on Friday to nearly five years in prison.

Tyler Bradley Dykes, of South Carolina, was an active-duty US marine when he grabbed a police riot shield from the hands of two police officers and used it to push his way through police lines during the attack by a mob of Donald Trump’s supporters on 6 January 2021.

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Deli meat-linked listeria outbreak kills two and sends two dozen to hospital

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Largest number of people affected were in New York, and the two who died were from Illinois and New Jersey

At least two people have died and more than two dozen were hospitalized in an outbreak of listeria food poisoning linked to meat sliced at grocery store deli counters, US federal health officials said on Friday.

At least 28 people in a dozen states have gotten sick, though the largest number, seven, were in New York, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The people who died were from Illinois and New Jersey. Samples were collected from 29 May to 5 July and so far, all of the people known to be part of the outbreak have been hospitalized.

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Republican convention featured felons despite party’s ‘law and order’ pledge

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Trump and Peter Navarro – fresh out of Florida jail – both addressed convention with Paul Manafort in attendance

The Republican party that promised in its 2024 policy platform to restore “law and order” as a “pillar” of “American civilisation” packed up and left Milwaukee on Friday after a convention featuring numerous felons.

The most prominent was the keynote speaker: Donald Trump, the former president turned nominee who in May was convicted in New York on 34 criminal charges of falsifying business records arising from hush-money payments to an adult film star.

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Pressure mounts on Biden as tally of Democrats urging withdrawal passes 30

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US president reportedly feeling ‘angry and betrayed’ as speculation swirls that announcement could be imminent

A beleaguered Joe Biden entered potentially the most decisive weekend of his 50-year political career on Friday as the growing list of Democratic members of Congress calling on him to step aside surpassed 30, with the latest being the Ohio senator Sherrod Brown.

Biden is recovering from Covid-19 in self-isolation at his home in Delaware and reportedly feeling “angry and betrayed” by allies and speculation mounted that he might be preparing to announce his withdrawal from the race.

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Microsoft Windows IT outage: over 2,000 flights canceled across US; Fedex and UPS report service delays – live

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Microsoft says cause of global chaos fixed; CrowdStrike CEO ‘deeply sorry’ but services may take days to recover as major disruptions unfold across US

The deputy spokesperson for New York City’s mayor, Eric Adams, said that “critical infrastructure and emergency operations, including the 911 call system, have not been impacted”.

In a series of tweets, Fabien Levy wrote:

As this outage only affects Windows-based devices receiving automatic updates, our team at@NYCOfficeofTech has been working for the last few hours to halt any automatic updates and minimize potential service disruptions.”

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More Democrats call for Biden to exit 2024 race as president vows to return to campaign trail – as it happened

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This live blog is now closed. For the latest on Biden’s campaign, you can read:

The report is consequential because Biden relies heavily on his family to make major political decisions. They are his inner circle and his brain trust and include his wife, Jill Biden, his only living son, Hunter Biden, and his sister, Valerie Biden.

Behind the scenes, those close to Biden, his family and top allies, are reportedly seething over the way he is being treated. They believe the effort to dislodge him from the campaign has been “backhanded and disrespectful” according to the NBC report, which says the family is “distraught and moving through the stages of anger and grief over how people they perceived to be friends have treated the president”.

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Russian court sentences US journalist Evan Gershkovich to 16 years in prison

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Reporter found guilty of spying in trial thought to have been rushed in preparation for prisoner swap

A Russian court has found the US journalist Evan Gershkovich guilty of espionage and sentenced him to 16 years in prison, after a trial widely described as a sham.

Gershkovich, 32, denied the charges and pleaded not guilty during the secretive court proceedings in Yekaterinburg, mostly held behind closed doors. His employer, the Wall Street Journal, described the verdict as a “disgraceful, sham conviction”.

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US transportation, police and hospital systems stricken by global CrowdStrike IT outage

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US wakes up to Microsoft system collapse from software update that has crippled world IT systems

Thousands of air passengers were stranded across the US on Friday morning and police and hospital systems were left struggling as a global IT outage grounded major domestic airlines and struck rail services, shipping and police emergency systems, as well as some hospital functions.

Technology systems using both Microsoft’s Windows and CrowdStrike cybersecurity software were hit by the outage, after a CrowdStrike update installed faulty software in computers running Windows.

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Slow recovery from IT outage begins as experts warn of future risks

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Fault in CrowdStrike caused airports, businesses and healthcare services to languish in ‘largest outage in history’

Services began to come back online on Friday evening after an IT failure that wreaked havoc worldwide. But full recovery could take weeks, experts have said, after airports, healthcare services and businesses were hit by the “largest outage in history”.

Flights and hospital appointments were cancelled, payroll systems seized up and TV channels went off air after a botched software upgrade hit Microsoft’s Windows operating system.

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