Category Archives: US News

Britain delivers two mine-hunting ships to Ukraine

Posted on by

Move comes as defence secretary prepares to host Norwegian counterpart to discuss plans to help Kyiv

Britain has said it delivered two mine-hunting ships to Ukraine, as Grant Shapps prepares to host a visit from his Norwegian counterpart aimed at bolstering Kyiv’s fragile position in the Black Sea.

The summit in London is aimed at building a “maritime capability coalition” for Ukraine – but it will not be accompanied by an announcement of how much military aid the UK is prepared to provide Ukraine from April 2024.

Continue reading...

Catholic priest killed by attack in Nebraska church residence

Posted on by

Stephen Gutgsell assaulted ‘during an invasion’ of a Fort Calhoun church and suspect was taken into custody, authorities said

A Catholic priest in a small Nebraska community died Sunday after being attacked in a church rectory, authorities said.

Stephen Gutgsell was assaulted “during an invasion” of St John the Baptist Catholic church in Fort Calhoun, Nebraska, the archdiocese of Omaha said in a Sunday statement.

Continue reading...

Trump says he won’t return to witness stand in $250m New York fraud trial

Posted on by

Former president, who was expected to take the stand, announced on Truth Social on Sunday that he already testified to everything

Donald Trump announced he would not take the witness stand for a second time at his fraud trial in New York on Monday, the former US president’s last chance to make his case as he combats a potential $250m fine that hangs over his family business.

Trump had been expected to take the stand again as the hearings draw to a close. But on Sunday he announced on the Truth Social site that he would no longer be making an appearance.

Continue reading...

Trump tests federal gag order with attack on Bill Barr: ‘He was a coward’

Posted on by

Audience at gala event included allies that Trump is expected to tap for top roles should he be re-elected next year

Donald Trump tested the contours of his gag order in the federal criminal case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, assailing his former attorney general and potential trial witness William Barr in remarks at a Saturday night New York gala event.

“I make this commitment to you tonight: we will not have Bill Barr as our attorney general, is that OK?” Trump said as he discussed a potential second presidency. “He was a coward. He was afraid of being impeached.”

Continue reading...

Mitt Romney says his endorsement in 2024 race would be ‘kiss of death’

Posted on by

Republican senator also declines to rule out voting for Biden, and added he wishes Joe Manchin would ‘be the Democratic nominee’

Utah senator Mitt Romney declined to rule out voting for Joe Biden next year and said he hasn’t offered an endorsement in the Republican race because his backing would probably be a “kiss of death”.

“If I endorsed them, it would be the kiss of death – I’m not going to do that,” Romney said during an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press.

Continue reading...

Biden under scrutiny after bypassing Congress to supply tank shells to Israel

Posted on by

Administration reportedly not carrying out continual assessments on whether war crimes being committed in Gaza

The Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza has come under intensified scrutiny after it revealed it had bypassed Congress to supply tank shells, and was reported not to be carrying out continual assessments of whether Israel was committing possible war crimes.

Israeli tanks were reported to have reached the centre of Khan Younis on Sunday, after battling through stiff resistance in the southern city which is overcrowded by civilians who have fled fighting in the north. Israeli airstrikes pounded the city blocks west of the frontline.

Continue reading...

Liz Cheney: Speaker Mike Johnson can’t be trusted to defend the constitution

Posted on by

Former congresswoman makes comments as she continues to warn of dangers that a second Trump presidency would present

US House speaker Mike Johnson and his fellow Republicans who comprise a majority in the chamber cannot be trusted to protect the American constitution, former congresswoman Liz Cheney said Sunday.

Cheney made the comments on ABC’s This Week as she continued to warn of the dangers that a second Donald Trump presidency would present following the release of her book Oath and Honor: A Warning and a Memoir. In the book, she is deeply critical of Johnson, who played a key role in Trump’s legal strategy to contest the election and organized an amicus brief signed by 126 US House members urging the supreme court to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election won by Joe Biden.

Continue reading...

McCarthy endorses Trump for president: ‘We’re very honest with each other’

Posted on by

Former House speaker, who has driven out by Trump loyalists, also expressed interest in joining his cabinet should Trump win in 2024

Former US House speaker Kevin McCarthy has endorsed Donald Trump in the 2024 race for the Oval Office while also expressing interest in joining his administration should he win, even though loyalists of the ex-president drove the congressman into an early exit.

While serving as a House leader, McCarthy did not formally endorse Trump’s campaign for a second presidency, though the California representative was generally supportive of his fellow Republican. But, four days after announcing in an opinion column in Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal that he was leaving Congress at the end of December, McCarthy appeared on CBS’s Sunday Morning and made clear that he backed Trump’s attempts to return to power.

Continue reading...

‘If this was about money, we’d still be teaching’: inside the longest adjunct strike in US history

Posted on by

Academics at Columbia College in Chicago are in a fierce dispute over cuts to courses and poor working conditions

The longest strike of adjuncts in US labor history is still ongoing, with academics at Columbia College in Chicago remaining in a fierce dispute over cuts to college courses and a host of complaints over poor working conditions.

The fierce dispute began when Columbia College leadership suddenly announced plans to implement significant cuts to courses and course sections, and consolidating classes which have ballooned class sizes, citing a $20m budget shortfall.

Continue reading...

Local elections officials inundated with records requests by rightwing activists

Posted on by

Counties in swing states like Georgia overwhelmed with requests at the same time as they scramble to prepare for 2024

Deb Cox has been elections director of Lowndes county in southern Georgia for more than a decade – and has never before received so many time-consuming demands for public information.

Like many elections officials across the country, Cox has been inundated with Freedom of Information Act and open records requests from rightwing activists who believe the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. That’s forced her and other local officials to spend an unusual amount of time and money providing polling documents to partisan groups – an additional burden as they scramble to prepare for the fraught 2024 presidential election.

Continue reading...

Republicans to meet allies of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán on ending Ukraine aid

Posted on by

Hungarian appearance at two-day event part of Orbán’s transatlantic attempt to bolster Russia’s war

Allies of Hungary’s far-right prime minister Viktor Orbán will hold a closed-door meeting with Republicans in Washington to push for an end to US military support for Ukraine, the Guardian has learned.

Márton Ugrósdy, the deputy state secretary for the prime minister’s political director’s office, and Attila Demkó, a leading pro-Orbán academic, along with members of the Hungarian embassy in Washington, will on Monday begin a two-day event hosted by the conservative Heritage Foundation thinktank.

Continue reading...

Bank of England, Fed and ECB poised to leave interest rates on hold

Posted on by

Stubbornly high inflation forces central banks to avoid cuts, but markets expect falls next year

The western world’s largest central banks are poised to keep interest rates on hold this week amid concerns over stubbornly high inflation, despite growing expectations for sharp cuts in borrowing costs next year.

In a crunch week for the global economy, the US Federal Reserve, Bank of England (BoE) and European Central Bank are expected to keep interest rates at their current restrictively high levels to ensure inflation continues to fall back from the highest levels in decades.

Continue reading...

Groundbreaking graphic novel on Gaza rushed back into print 20 years on

Posted on by

When Joe Sacco created Palestine no one knew what ‘comics journalism’ was. Now his pioneering book has eager new readers

An acclaimed nonfiction graphic novel about Gaza, which pioneered the medium of “comics journalism”, has been rushed back into print after surging demand since the fresh outbreak of the conflict two months ago.

Palestine, by Joe Sacco, was originally released in comic book form by the American publisher Fantagraphics 30 years ago, then published as a single volume by the company, and by Jonathan Cape in the UK in 2003.

Continue reading...

Elon Musk says X will reinstate Alex Jones’s account after poll of users

Posted on by

Rightwing conspiracy theorist was banned from platform in 2018, but could be back after 2m votes cast

The social media platform X will reinstate the account of the US conspiracy theorist Alex Jones after a poll of the site’s users backed his return, its owner, Elon Musk, has said.

“The people have spoken and so it shall be,” Musk posted in reply to a poll on Saturday on whether to reinstate the Jones account. Close to 2m votes were cast by the time the poll closed, with about 70% voting in favour of Jones’s return.

Continue reading...

Tennessee storms: tornadoes kill at least six and cut power to tens of thousands

Posted on by

Three deaths reported in Montgomery county and a further three in the suburbs of Nashville, officials say

Severe storms and tornadoes in Tennessee killed at least six people on Saturday and caused what local emergency services described as extensive damage with tens of thousands of residents without power.

Nashville police said in a statement Sunday that a two-year-old boy and his mother were among three people killed there.

Continue reading...

Blow to Biden as poll shows Trump in lead for 2024 presidential election

Posted on by

Trump ahead 47% to 43%, worrying some Democrats as others caution avoiding ‘mad poll disease’

Donald Trump has nudged ahead of Joe Biden in national polling for the 2024 presidential election, a survey published on Saturday revealed, a day after the US president branded his predecessor as “despicable” at an event in California.

The Wall Street Journal poll shows Biden with the lowest approval rating of his presidency, a finding broadly in line with other recent studies that have sparked concern in Democratic circles less than a year before voters go to the polls.

Continue reading...

University of Pennsylvania president resigns after furor over free speech and antisemitism

Posted on by

Elizabeth Magill has resigned her position as leader of the beleaguered college

Elizabeth Magill, the president of the University of Pennsylvania, has resigned her position as leader of the beleaguered college in the wake of a fierce debate over free speech and antisemitism.

Universities across the United States have been accused of failing to protect Jewish students amid a spike of antisemitism amid fallout from Israel’s intensifying war in Gaza, which faces heightened criticism for the mounting Palestinian death toll. There has also been a spike in Islamaphobia in the US.

Continue reading...

Biden bypasses Congress to sell tank shells to Israel amid further fighting in Khan Younis

Posted on by

Emergency declaration used to sell $106.5m worth of ammo for Israel’s tanks as reports of fierce fighting in southern Gaza city of Khan Younis emerge

The Biden administration has used an emergency authority to allow the sale of about 14,000 tank shells to Israel without congressional review, the Pentagon said on Saturday.

The state department on Friday used an Arms Export Control Act emergency declaration for the tank rounds worth $106.5m for immediate delivery to Israel, the Pentagon said in a statement.

Continue reading...

Lost in space no more: missing tomato found in space station after eight months

Posted on by

But Nasa and space jocks alike haven’t explained either the mysterious disappearance or reappearance of space-grown fruit

It might have remained one of the greatest mysteries of the universe, destined never to be solved until a freak recent discovery by the crew of the International Space Station (ISS).

The subject? A tomato grown from seed in microgravity by US astronaut Francisco “Frank” Rubio as part of an agricultural experiment.

Continue reading...

Casey DeSantis encourages Republicans nationwide to vote in Iowa caucus

Posted on by

On Fox News, wife of Ron DeSantis mistakenly invites ‘moms and grandmoms’ to cross state lines and illegally vote in caucus

Casey DeSantis, the wife of Republican presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis, has upset party officials in Iowa by urging her husband’s supporters from around the US to “descend” on the state and illegally take part in next month’s caucuses.

The former television news reporter, who has become the Florida governor’s chief supporter on the campaign trail, made the faux-pas during an appearance with him on Fox News on Friday, in which she wrongly stated it was legal for out-of-state residents to participate.

Continue reading...