‘I’m not losing hope’: loved ones await news of people missing in Miami building collapse – video

Family and friends of the more than 100 people still missing after a building collapsed in Miami said they were not 'losing hope' of hearing from their loved ones who remained unaccounted for. Four people are known to have been killed and 11 injuries were reported following the collapse of much of the 12-storey Champlain Towers South building in Miami, on the south Florida coast.

The residential structure pancaked into a pile of concrete and metal more than 30ft high for reasons still unknown

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Pence breaks from Trump and calls bid to reverse election result ‘un-American’ – live

Vice-president Kamala Harris is visiting the Southern border today amid ongoing criticism from Republicans about Harris’s absence from traveling there yet.

VP Kamala Harris boards AF2 to El Paso for her first visit to the border as VP. She was greeted by Sec. Mayorkas, Sen. Durbin and Rep. Escobar, all of whom are joining her on her trip. pic.twitter.com/GFr44Lw62Y

Vice President Kamala Harris will be in El Paso on Friday, where she will tour a Customs and Border Protection processing facility, meeting with advocates and NGOs. She will also be delivering remarks on her visit.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who has been helping with negotiations on immigration legislation on Capitol Hill, and Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso, will be accompanying Harris and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on the trip.

Excerpts from a new book about Donald Trump’s presidency includes details about the 45th president’s increasingly violent language in the oval office.

CNN reports:

...the book reveals new details about how Trump’s language became increasingly violent during Oval Office meetings as protests in Seattle and Portland began to receive attention from cable new outlets. The President would highlight videos that showed law enforcement getting physical with protesters and tell his administration he wanted to see more of that behavior, the excerpts show.

“That’s how you’re supposed to handle these people,” Trump told his top law enforcement and military officials, according to Bender. “Crack their skulls!”

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Miami condo collapse: death toll rises to four and more than 150 unaccounted for

  • Biden releases federal funds after 12-storey building collapsed
  • Rescue crews hampered overnight by heavy rain and lightning

The death toll in a Miami building collapse rose to four on Friday morning a day and 159 were unaccounted for after a 12-storey condominium slumped into rubble on the south Florida Atlantic coast.

Related: ‘There’s just too much at risk’: Arizona closes parks to prevent extreme wildfires

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Kamala Harris heads for political minefield on visit to US-Mexico border

  • Vice-president to visit migrant processing center in El Paso
  • Rises in families and unaccompanied children migrating

Kamala Harris faces the most politically challenging moment of her vice-presidency on Friday when she visits Texas as part of her role leading the Biden administration’s response to recent increases in families and unaccompanied children migrating across the US-Mexico border.

While in El Paso, Texas, she will tour a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) processing center near the international bridge that connects the western city with its twin city, Juárez, across the Rio Grande in Mexico.

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Brazil’s inquiry into Covid disaster suggests Bolsonaro committed ‘crimes against life’

Televised congressional investigation looks at political decisions that lead to crisis that has killed half a million

A congressional inquiry into Brazil’s disastrous response to the coronavirus pandemic has found mounting evidence that Jair Bolsonaro’s administration committed “crimes against life”, according to the senior politician leading the investigation.

Launched in April to scrutinize the government’s handling of a crisis that has killed half a million citizens, the nationally televised investigation is digging into the political decisions that led up to one of the cruelest moments in the country’s history.

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New Yorkers fled to the Hamptons in 2020 – and sparked a major sewage crisis

A water quality crisis has been hiding in the ritzy Hamptons, but the pandemic pushed it over the edge. Will clean-up efforts be too little too late?

Growing up in Southampton, Bryan McGowin spent his summers swimming in a beautiful local pond. Now in his 40s, McGowin won’t let his kids into the water.

“If you drink that now, you will get sick,” said McGowin. Across the New York coastal community better known as the Hamptons, residents face perilously declining water quality, which has shut down recreation in many freshwater ponds.

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‘Something happened here’: Roswell prepares for Pentagon’s UFO report

City leaders hope big news could bring a tourism surge as the town grapples with the pandemic economy

On the eve of the release of the Pentagon’s highly anticipated report on unidentified aerial phenomena, life here in one of the world’s UFO hotspots was exceedingly normal.

Downtown’s alien souvenir shops and the International UFO Museum welcomed a steady stream of visitors escaping their pandemic malaise on Thursday as coronavirus restrictions continued to loosen in New Mexico.

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Herd of cattle runs through suburban streets after escaping LA slaughterhouse – video

A herd of about 40 cattle escaped a Los Angeles slaughterhouse, after a gate was unintentionally left open, before running through residential streets. The cattle remained on the loose of the streets of Pico Rivera into the evening as local authorities attempted to round them up. One cow was shot by local police after it charged at four members of a family while another that evaded capture was sent to an animal sanctuary after songwriter Diane Warren intervened

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‘We’ve struck a deal’: Biden says agreement reached on infrastructure plan – live

  • Republican and Democratic senators have reached deal – president
  • Speaker: ‘It is imperative that we seek the truth as to what happened’
  • Giuliani’s New York law license suspended ‘effectively immediately’
  • Biden urges unvaccinated to get shots as ‘deadlier’ Delta strain spreads

Here’s some more on Rudy Giuliani losing (potentially temporarily) his law licence in New York today, from my colleague Sarah Betancourt:

Giuliani, 77, helped lead Trump’s legal challenge of his election loss as his personal attorney. He argued without evidence that voter fraud was rampant in Georgia, and that voting machines in the state and others were rigged. He urged Georgia’s Republican electors to vote for Trump, despite the state’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, and secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, countering there was no evidence of fraud.

Related: Rudy Giuliani barred from practicing law in New York over election lies

Biden has pumped the brakes just a little on the infrastructure bill, saying it must be paired with a larger spending bill, which will likely only be supported by Democrats, if he is to sign it.

“If they don’t [both] come, I’m not signing it. Real simple,” Biden said.

Biden says bipartisan infrastructure deal has to be paired with D-only reconciliation bill.

"If this is the only thing that comes to me I'm not signing. It's in tandem."

Asked about Pelosi plan to hold first bill in House until second bill arrives, says he supports it.

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US plans to evacuate thousands of interpreters before Afghanistan pullout

• Operation expected to include up to 50,000 people

• Interpreters and families fear reprisals from Taliban

The United States is planning to evacuate a group of vulnerable Afghan interpreters before the US military completes its withdrawal from Afghanistan so they can wrap up their visa applications from safety, according to officials.

The evacuation of the at-risk Afghans will include their family members for a total of as many as 50,000 people, a senior Republican lawmaker told Reuters.

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Rudy Giuliani barred from practicing law in New York over election lies

• Court: Trump lawyer made ‘false and misleading’ statements

• License suspended pending possible disciplinary action

Rudy Giuliani is suspended from practicing law in New York state following disciplinary proceedings over his misleading statements to courts and the public following the 2020 US presidential election.

The New York supreme court issued its decision on Thursday, saying that it had found “uncontroverted evidence” that Giuliani made “demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large”, on behalf of his client, then-president Donald Trump, and created a “narrative that due to widespread voter fraud, victory in the 2020 United States presidential election was stolen from his client”.

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Stars and fans rally behind Britney Spears after shocking claims

Justin Timberlake and Rose McGowan among those calling for end to singer’s conservatorship

There was tentative anticipation surrounding Britney Spears’ address to an LA court during a hearing on Wednesday on the future of the conservatorship that has governed her life for 13 years.

Would she affirm the theories of the #FreeBritney movement, which alleges she is being held against her will? Or would it be a disappointing procedural affair of little substance?

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‘I want to understand’: top US general defends studying critical race theory in military – video

Top Pentagon leaders on Wednesday passionately defended the military's approach to addressing racism and said that it was important for personnel to study critical race theory, after Republican rep Matt Gaetz and others questioned them about it, saying it was lowering moral.

Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said the military need not apologize for fostering open-mindedness and that he wants to  'understand white rage'.

Critical race theory is a concept developed by academics and leading scholars of jurisprudence, with intellectual origins in the 1960s which were organized officially in the late 1980s. The theory states that racism is embedded both in US history and modern American law. It holds that legal institutions in the US are inherently racist.

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Footage shows aftermath of Miami building collapse – video report

Dozens of rescue units were on the scene of a partial building collapse in Miami after the entire back side of the 12-story building collapsed.

Photos and video from the scene show the collapse affected half the block. Piles of rubble and debris surrounded the area just outside the building. One person was reportedly killed and at least 10 injured, according to the Washington Post

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Magic Johnson: the NBA superstar who smashed HIV stigma – then built a huge fortune

He stunned basketball fans and transformed HIV awareness by announcing his diagnosis in 1991. Thirty years on, he discusses his relationship with Anthony Fauci, the meaning of money and why he’s still optimistic

On 7 November 1991, a press conference in Inglewood, California, brought America to a standstill. Against a black-draped backdrop, dressed in a black suit, white shirt and multicoloured tie, Earvin “Magic” Johnson, spoke calmly into a single microphone and told the world that he had been diagnosed with HIV.

Cameras flashed and reporters clamoured to ask questions, but Johnson, National Basketball Association (NBA) superstar and one of the world’s most revered athletes, appeared unfazed as he announced his immediate retirement. Had he grappled with his own mortality? When had he found out? How had he acquired the virus? What would he do next?

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Kamala Harris to visit US-Mexico border for first time as vice-president – live

Rising homicide rates and gun violence has become a major issue in local political races, including in the New York mayoral primary elections.

For Joe Biden, rising concern about crime has proved to be a politically convenient opportunity for him to boost gun control reforms he touted as a candidate. But the president’s wide-ranging policy proposals are sure to divide Democrats.

We can't let legitimate concerns about shootings and homicides undermine momentum to overhaul law enforcement. We can't repeat the mistakes of the past and think that we can arrest our way out of rising gun violence. https://t.co/0ifVpEJCFE

Biden is speaking at the White House to explain his administration’s plans to address crime and gun trafficking.

My colleague David Smith is covering the event live:

Joe Biden: “Crime historically rises during the summer.” As we open after the pandemic; the summer spike might be higher than usual. pic.twitter.com/XfWoQ0JGQd

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John McAfee: antivirus entrepreneur found dead in Spanish prison

McAfee’s extradition to the US on tax charges had been approved hours earlier

The antivirus software entrepreneur John McAfee has been found dead in his cell in Spain, hours after the country’s highest court approved his extradition to the United States, where he was wanted on tax-related criminal charges that carry a prison sentence of up to 30 years.

Catalan’s regional police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, confirmed a report in El País that McAfee, 75, had been found dead in the Brians 2 prison near Barcelona, late on Wednesday.

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Trump hoped Covid-19 would ‘take out’ former aide John Bolton, book claims

  • Nightmare Scenario details final year of presidency
  • Washington Post reporters’ book one of several on Trump

Donald Trump wanted Covid-19 to “take out” his former national security adviser John Bolton, a new book is set to reveal, as a heated summer of further colourful revelations about the controversial former president spills out from competing tomes.

The forthcoming Nightmare Scenario will stake out the claim, in addition to telling of how Trump advocated shipping Americans who contracted coronavirus while abroad to the prison at Guantánamo Bay.

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Democrats seek way forward after voting rights bill hits Senate roadblock

The White House warned democracy was ‘in peril’ but while key Democrats stay committed to the filibuster, progress looks difficult

After nearly six months of watching Republicans relentlessly make it harder to vote in the US, Democrats suffered a major blow on Tuesday after GOP senators used a legislative maneuver to halt a sweeping voting rights and ethics bill.

The vote doesn’t kill the bill, but it marks one of the most significant setbacks for Democrats in Joe Biden’s presidency so far. Democrats heralded the legislation as their No 1 priority, even knowing they were unlikely to get any Republican votes for it. The bill would amount to the most significant expansion of the right to vote in a generation, requiring early voting and automatic and same-day registration, while prohibiting excessive manipulation of electoral district boundaries, a process often called gerrymandering.

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