Category Archives: US News

California developers want to build a city in the wildlands. It could all go up in flames

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Tejon Ranch Company says its plan to build 20,000 homes would help the housing crisis. Experts warn it could put people in danger

About an hour’s drive north of Los Angeles lies one of the last remaining pieces of the truly wild, wild west.

The 270,000-acre Tejon Ranch is dotted with centuries-old native oaks. Endangered mountain lions roam the grounds, and California condors soar above it. Rains paint the hills bright orange with poppies, and purple with lupine. But in the summer, and during drought years, the landscape dries to a shimmering gold. A small group of cowboys still run cattle here.

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Obama says Trump violated ‘core tenet’ of democracy with election ‘hooey’ – as it happened

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– Maanvi Singh and Vivian Ho

As the United States has become more diverse, it has also become more racially segregated, according to a new nationwide analysis from researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

More than 80% of America’s large metropolitan areas were more racially segregated in 2019 than they were in 1990, the researchers found, even though explicit racial discrimination in housing has been outlawed for half a century. The levels of residential segregation appeared highest not in the American south, but in parts of the north-east and midwest: the most segregated metropolitan area in the US according to the study is New York City, followed by Chicago, Milwaukee and Detroit.

Related: ‘Where you live determines everything’: why segregation is growing in the US

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Obama: Trump broke ‘core tenet’ of democracy with ‘bunch of hooey’ over election

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Ex-president calls for action to stop ‘delegitimizing of democracy’ during redistricting fundraiser

Barack Obama said on Monday that his successor in office, Donald Trump, violated a “core tenet” of democracy when he made up a “bunch of hooey” about last year’s election and refused to concede he lost.

Speaking at his first virtual fundraiser since the 2020 election, the former Democratic president said former Republican president’s claims undermined the legitimacy of US elections and helped lead to other anti-democratic measures such as efforts to suppress the vote.

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Miami condo collapse: death toll rises to 11 as rescue teams continue search

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  • More than 150 unaccounted for as officials urge people to hope
  • White House says Biden wants federal inquiry into collapse

The death toll from a building collapse in the Miami suburb of Surfside rose to 11 on Monday, as rescue operations continued into a fifth day.

Officials urged people to maintain hope survivors might be found in the wreckage of the collapsed condo building. A further 150 people who may have been in the building remained unaccounted for, the mayor of Miami-Dade, Daniella Levine Cava, said on Monday evening.

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New Michael Wolff book reports Trump’s confusion during Capitol attack

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Mark Meadows reportedly said ‘We can’t organize that’ after Trump told supporters he’d march, according to Landslide

Donald Trump told supporters he would march on the Capitol with them on 6 January – then abandoned them after a tense exchange with his chief of staff, according to the first excerpt from Landslide, Michael Wolff’s third Trump White House exposé.

Related: Top US general got into shouting match with Trump over race protests – report

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‘He’s phoning it in’: why Biden is losing the voting rights fight

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Activist say the president and Democrats have failed to stop Republican efforts to curtail the vote

For months, Biden and other Democrats have raised alarm about efforts to restrict the vote. Republicans have succeeded nonetheless.

Since January, Republican lawmakers in Georgia, Florida, Iowa, Arkansas and Montana have all enacted new legislation that impose new barriers to voting. The successful Republican filibuster this week – which stalled the sweeping voting rights legislation, the For the People Act – only underscored how Democrats have failed to stop GOP efforts to curtail the vote.

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UN calls for end of ‘impunity’ for police violence against black people

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Report launched in aftermath of George Floyd murder cites example of 2018 death of Kevin Clarke in UK

A UN report that analysed racial justice in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd has called on member states including the UK to end the “impunity” enjoyed by police officers who violate the human rights of black people.

The UN human rights office analysis of 190 deaths across the world led to the report’s damning conclusion that law enforcement officers are rarely held accountable for killing black people due in part to deficient investigations and an unwillingness to acknowledge the impact of structural racism.

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‘Republicans are defunding the police’: Fox News anchor stumps congressman

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The Fox News anchor Chris Wallace made headlines of his own on Sunday, by pointing out to a senior Republican that he and the rest of his party recently voted against $350bn in funding for law enforcement.

Related: Keith Ellison urges Congress to act on stalled police reform after Chauvin sentencing

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New York prosecutors set deadline for Trump on legal action – report

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Ex-president’s lawyers have 24 hours Monday to say why the Trump Organization should not face charges, reports claim

New York prosecutors have given lawyers for Donald Trump 24 hours to respond with any last arguments as to why criminal charges should not be filed against his family business, according to a report on Sunday.

The deadline set for Monday was another strong signal that the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance, and the New York attorney general, Letitia James, are considering criminal charges against the former president’s company as an entity, according to sources quoted by the Washington Post.

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Keith Ellison urges Congress to act on stalled police reform after Chauvin sentencing

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Minnesota attorney general secured conviction and sentencing of former police officer who murdered George Floyd last year

The Minnesota attorney general who secured the conviction and sentencing of Derek Chauvin said on Sunday Congress must pass stalled policing reform named for George Floyd, the African American man the former officer murdered in May last year.

Related: ‘I have begged for justice’: key moments from the Derek Chauvin sentencing

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Republicans will ‘move forward’ on infrastructure after Biden veto threat

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A lead Republican negotiator has welcomed Joe Biden’s withdrawal of his threat to veto a $1.2tn bipartisan infrastructure bill unless a separate Democratic spending plan also passes Congress.

Related: White House seeks to put infrastructure deal back on track after Biden blunder

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Miami condo collapse: death toll rises to nine as crews search pile for survivors

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Crews make progress against flames while questions asked about 2018 report on structural damage

Officials in Florida insisted on Sunday there was still hope of finding survivors in the rubble of a collapsed oceanfront condominium building, as firefighters finally controlled a large blaze inside the wreckage that hampered three days of rescue efforts.

Related: Engineer reportedly warned in 2018 of ‘major damage’ at Miami condo complex

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Romney: Trump’s lie that he lost 2020 election from voter fraud ‘like WWF’

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‘It’s entertaining. But it’s not real’, says Utah senator, referring to artificial world of professional wrestling

Donald Trump’s “big lie” that he lost the 2020 US election because of voter fraud is “a bit like WWF”, Mitt Romney said on Sunday, referring to the gaudy and artificial world of professional wrestling, an arena in which Trump starred before entering politics.

Related: ‘First of all, I’m taller’: AOC dismisses Greene’s ‘little communist’ attack

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Where the buffalo roam: world’s longest wildlife bridge could cross the Mississippi

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Conservationist aims to replace old bridge with bison preserve, benefiting environment and spotlighting Indigenous history

Between Iowa and Illinois, spanning the only stretch of the Mississippi River that flows from east to west, sits an exhausted 55-year-old cement bridge. Each day 42,000 cars drive across the ageing structure, which is slated to be torn down and replaced.

But when Chad Pregracke looks at the bridge, he has a different vision entirely – not an old overpass to be demolished, but a home for the buffalo to roam.

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US fight against Covid threatened by growing vaccine gap in the south

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Less than 50% of adults in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana have received at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine

In the United States, to bring about a long-awaited end to the Covid-19 pandemic, federal and state health officials have been urging all Americans to get vaccinated. But, amid stagnating national vaccine rates, some states in the south have been lagging behind when it comes to vaccinating their populations, raising fears of deepening regional disparities.

That raises the prospect that for a complex web of reasons much of the southern US will continue to experience the pandemic in a different way than the rest of America. That is especially worrisome as the south contains more communities that are more vulnerable to the virus.

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Ghislaine Maxwell began to share ‘little black book’ with Epstein as early as the 1980s

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New documentary reveals sex offender used socialite for access to her famous and rich friends years from the 1980s onwards

Ghislaine Maxwell’s association with Jeffrey Epstein began years earlier than previously understood, according to a documentary investigating the socialite who became an alleged procuress for the paedophile financier.

The new information challenges the common assumption that Epstein stepped into a vacuum in her life after the death of her father, the newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell, who was found in the sea near the Canary Islands in 1991.

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‘Johnson & Johnson helped fuel this fire’ – now it’s out of the opioids business

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Whether the pharmaceutical giant jumped or was pushed, its New York deal is a significant sign of the way the wind is blowing

Johnson & Johnson said it had already jumped. New York’s attorney general suggested the pharmaceutical giant was pushed.

Either way, the American drug maker is the first to formally agree to get out of the multibillion-dollar business of selling the powerful narcotic painkillers that drove the US opioid epidemic.

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‘He’s not a quitter’: faithful out in force as Trump gets back to the campaign trail

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Thousands of adoring fans turned out in Ohio to remind America that Trump’s cult of personality never went away

There were raucous cheers and boos. There were Secret Service agents and metal detectors, food trailers in long grass and loudspeakers booming songs by Elton John and Dolly Parton. There were flags, hats, and T-shirts proclaiming Donald Trump the true winner of the 2020 election – or the man to beat in 2024.

And flying overhead was a small plane trailing a banner that proclaimed: “Ohio is Trump country.”

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Donald Trump returns to campaign trail with rally targeting Ohio Republican

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As New York legal troubles mount, ex-president hints at 2024 run and targets those who voted for impeachment

Donald Trump was set to return to the campaign trail with a rally in Ohio on Saturday night, campaigning against a Republican who voted for his impeachment and trailing his own candidacy for president in 2024.

Related: Trump Organization could face criminal charges in New York next week

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