Category Archives: US News

US-Mexico border crossings fall to three-year low after Biden’s executive order

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About 84,000 people crossed into the US in June, the lowest monthly total since Biden assumed office in January 2021

Undocumented crossings at the US’s southern border have fallen to a three-year low, marking the lowest in Joe Biden’s presidency just a short time after he signed a controversial executive order limiting immigration there in June.

The latest data from the federal Customs and Border Patrol obtained by CBS News is the most recent since Biden signed his executive order – and comes as the president is accused of failing to address concerns about the amount of people crossing into the US without permission.

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Sotomayor says immunity ruling makes a president ‘king above the law’

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Stark dissent from liberal supreme court justice says decision will let presidents commit crimes with impunity

In a stark dissent from the conservative-majority US supreme court’s opinion granting Donald Trump some immunity from criminal prosecution, the liberal justice Sonia Sotomayor said the decision was a “mockery” that makes a president a “king above the law”.

The court ruled Monday that Trump cannot be prosecuted for “official acts” he took while president, setting up tests for which of the federal criminal charges over his attempt to subvert the 2020 election are considered official and sending the case back to a lower court to decide.

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Anxious donors plot next moves after Biden debate calamity

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Campaign announces record fundraising in wake of Trump debate but wealthy Democrats undecided on path forward

A silver lining of Joe Biden’s pernicious debate performance was, according to a succession of upbeat emails from the president’s re-election campaign, a record fundraising haul.

By Sunday night, only three days after he stumbled through 90 painful minutes in the company of presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, more than $33m had dropped into Biden campaign coffers. Debate day itself was “our best grassroots fundraising day ever”, officials announced.

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Biden’s family reportedly tell him to stay in presidential race as blame shifts to advisers

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The US president met with his family at Camp David, after a disastrous debate performance last week led to calls for him to drop out of the election

Joe Biden’s family have urged him stay in the race after a disastrous debate performance last week, according to reports in the US media, as senior democrats and donors have expressed exasperation at how his staff prepared him for the event.

The president gathered with his family at Camp David on Sunday, where discussions were reported to include questions over his political future. It came after days of mounting pressure on Biden, after a debate in which his halting performance highlighted his vulnerabilities and invited calls from pundits, media and voters for him to step aside.

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Rare white buffalo sacred to Lakota not seen in Yellowstone since birth

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Park staff say they have not been able to locate calf, who fulfilled Lakota prophecy and is named Wakan Gli

A rare white buffalo calf in Yellowstone national park has not been seen since its birth on 4 June, according to park officials.

In a statement released on Friday, the National Park Service (NPS) confirmed that a white buffalo calf was born in Lamar Valley earlier this month, adding that the park’s buffalo management team had received numerous reports of the calf on 4 June from park visitors, professional wildlife watchers, commercial guides and researchers.

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Lindsey Graham warns ‘accountability coming to Biden’ if Trump wins

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Republican senator warns of retribution: ‘Pandora’s box opened by the Democrats is going to be applied’

South Carolina’s Republican senator Lindsey Graham warned of retribution against Democrats amid Donald Trump’s ongoing criminal cases.

In an interview with CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday, Graham, a staunch Trump ally, said without evidence, “The Democrats keep calling president Trump a felon. Well, be careful what you wish for. I expect there will be an investigation of Biden’s criminality at the border.”

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Biden meets with his family amid pressures to step down after debate

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Officials dismiss reports family would discuss president quitting race and say summit was scheduled before debate

Joe Biden was meeting with his family on Sunday, a discussion believed to include talk about his political future even though it was already scheduled to take place before his calamitous presidential debate on Thursday with Donald Trump.

The meeting at Camp David came as pressures mounted on Biden following the vast fallout of the debate, in which his halting performance highlighted his vulnerabilities in a close election and invited calls from pundits, media and voters for him to step aside.

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New York police kill boy wielding replica handgun, authorities say

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A 13-year-old was killed Friday in Utica after police stopped two youths in connection with armed robbery investigation

Video released late Saturday shows an officer in upstate New York fatally shooting a 13-year-old boy who had been tackled to the ground after he ran from police and pointed a replica handgun at them.

The teen was killed late Friday in Utica after officers in the city about 240 miles (400km) north-west of Manhattan stopped two youths a little after 10pm in connection with an armed robbery investigation, police said.

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Most voters want Biden to step down, but don’t agree on suitable alternative – poll

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60% of respondents, Republicans and Democrats, say president should be replaced, while 11% were unsure

A majority of voters want Joe Biden to stand down following his dismal debate performance, yet aren’t convinced there is a suitable alternative Democratic candidate, new polls have found.

In a Morning Consult poll, 60% of respondents, Republicans and Democrats, said the president should be replaced by his party for November’s election, while another 11% were unsure.

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Toxic PFAS absorbed through skin at levels higher than previously thought

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Absorption through skin could be ‘significant source of exposure’ to toxic forever chemicals, study shows

New research “for the first time proves” toxic PFAS forever chemicals are absorbed through human skin, and at levels much higher than previously thought.

Though modeling and research has suggested the dangerous chemicals are absorbed through skin, University of Birmingham researchers say they used lab-grown tissue that mimics human skin to determine how much of a dose of PFAS compounds can be absorbed.

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Trump loyalists plan to name and shame ‘blacklist’ of federal workers

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AAF to publish dossiers of employees they consider hostile to ex-president, with goal of ultimately replacing them

Armed with rhetoric about the “deep state”, a conservative-backed group is planning to publicly name and shame career government employees that they consider hostile to Donald Trump.

This “blacklist” of civil servants, which will be published online, is intended to advance Trump’s broader goals, which, if elected, include weeding out government employees and replacing them with loyalists.

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South Carolina implements one of US’s most restrictive public school book bans

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Education superintendent and Moms for Liberty ally drafts law requiring all reading be ‘developmentally appropriate’

South Carolina has implemented one of the most restrictive book ban laws in the US, enabling mass censorship in school classrooms and libraries across the state.

Drafted by Ellen Weaver, the superintendent of education and close ally of the far-right group Moms for Liberty, the law requires all reading material to be “age or developmentally appropriate”. The vague wording of the legislation – open to interpretation and deliberately inviting challenge – could see titles as classic as Romeo and Juliet completely wiped from school shelves.

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Black swing voters in Georgia aren’t swayed by the ‘Trump okey-doke’ – and then there’s Biden

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From a barbershop and a cigar bar in Atlanta, many Black voters say they remain undecided after an underwhelming debate

Inside a barbershop in Atlanta’s affluent Buckhead neighborhood, eight Black men gathered to talk politics on the day before the presidential debate. Most were business owners around town, social media stars and notable conservatives.

All but one.

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Ron DeSantis strips more than $32m in Florida arts funding

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Political allies are also surprised at move, which cancels nearly entirety of state’s funding and will affect economy

Ron DeSantis stripped more than $32m in arts and culture funding from Florida’s state budget over his hatred of a popular fringe festival that he accused of being “a sexual event”, critics of the rightwing governor say.

DeSantis justified his unprecedented, wide-ranging veto of grants to almost 700 groups and organizations by saying it was “inappropriate” for $7,369 of state money to be allocated to Tampa fringe, a 10-day festival that took place earlier this month with a strong message of inclusivity, and its sister event in Orlando.

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North Korea says drills by South Korea, US and Japan show nations have developed ‘Asian Nato’

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Pyongyang calls ‘Freedom Edge’ drills involving fighter jets and nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier ‘provocative’

North Korea has criticised a joint military exercise by South Korea, Japan and the US held this month, state media have said, saying such drills show the relationship among the three countries has developed into “the Asian version of Nato”.

On Thursday, the three countries began the large-scale joint military drills called “Freedom Edge”, involving navy destroyers, fighter jets and the nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, aimed at boosting defences against missiles, submarines and air attacks.

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Firefighters near Phoenix battle wildfire as temperatures surpass 100F

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Residents evacuate after Boulder View fire rips alongside Scottsdale, and wildfires in California and Oregon rage

A wildfire north-east of Phoenix has, as of Saturday, threatened scores of homes, forced dozens of residents to evacuate and required more than 200 firefighters to battle it.

No structures have been damaged as the wildfire has traversed nearly 6 sq miles (15 sq km) on the cusp of the Boulder Heights subdivision of Scottsdale, said Matthew Wilcox, spokesperson for a multi-agency wildfire response team.

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More than 100 dolphins stranded in shallow water around Cape Cod

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Volunteers work to herd Atlantic white-sided dolphins found Friday in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, into deeper water

More than 100 dolphins have become stranded in the shallow waters around Cape Cod on Friday in what an animal welfare group is calling “the largest single mass stranding event” in the organization’s 25-year history.

A group of Atlantic white-sided dolphins were found Friday in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, about 100 miles south-east of Boston, in an area called the Gut – or Great Island at the Herring River – which experts have said is the site of frequent strandings, due in part to its hook-like shape and extreme tidal fluctuations.

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Florida shark attack leaves man in critical condition

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Swimmer off Fernandina beach was rescued by Nassau county marine unit after distress call from boat on Friday

A shark attack off Florida’s Atlantic coast left a man with a “severe bite to his right arm” on Friday, authorities say, leaving him in critical condition from blood loss.

The Nassau county sheriff’s office marine unit, which was patrolling off the coast of Fernandina beach near the Florida-Georgia border, said it had received a distress call from a boat on Friday and had applied a tourniquet to stop the bleeding.

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Four dead and nine injured after minivan crashes into New York nail salon

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Driver taken to hospital and charged with driving while intoxicated after rescuers free people trapped in building

A minivan slammed into a Long Island, New York, nail salon on Friday, killing four people and injuring nine others inside the business at the time, a Suffolk county fire official said.

The vehicle came to a stop at the back of the Hawaii Nail & Spa salon in Deer Park at about 4.40pm.

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Revealed: the tech entrepreneur behind a pro-Israel hate network

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The Guardian used public records and open source materials to identify Daniel Linden of the Shirion Collective

A prime mover behind the Shirion Collective, a conspiracy-minded, pro-Israel disinformation network seeking to shape public opinion about the Gaza conflict in the US, Australia and the UK, is a tech entrepreneur named Daniel Linden living in Florida who co-wrote a guidebook for OnlyFans users, the Guardian can reveal.

Shirion has harassed pro-Palestinian activists, including many Jews, offered bounties for the identity of pro-Palestinian protesters, spread conspiracy narratives centered on figures like George Soros, and boasted of an AI-surveillance platform but offered few concrete details of how the technology functions.

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