Category Archives: US News

Trump throws baseball caps into crowd days before announcing positive Covid test – video

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Two days before announcing he had contracted Covid-19, Donald Trump tossed two campaign baseball caps into the crowd with his bare hands while at a rally in Duluth, Minnesota. 

The venue was crowded with hundreds of supporters on Wednesday and Trump, who did not wear a face mask, entered the stage smiling and waving to the crowd before addressing the rally. The president frequently minimised the seriousness of the pandemic in its early stages and has repeatedly predicted it would go away. 

Trump announced he and his wife, Melania, tested positive for Covid-19 in a tweet on Friday

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Fears for Obamacare if Amy Coney Barrett confirmed to supreme court

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Case due before court seeks to strike down landmark Affordable Care Act – which could leave millions of Americans adrift

This month, Congress is expected to begin confirmation hearings for Donald Trump’s nominee for the supreme court, Amy Coney Barrett. If confirmed, she could be the decisive vote in a case being heard days after the election, which seeks to strike down the landmark Affordable Care Act – a move that could leave millions of Americans without healthcare in the middle of a pandemic.

Related: Amy Coney Barrett: what will she mean for women's rights?

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Trump’s positive Covid test was a surprise that many saw coming

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The president has been cavalier throughout the coronavirus pandemic. Now, a month before the election, this changes everything

It is likely to go down as the biggest “October surprise” in the history of US presidential elections. Yet anyone who was paying attention could have seen it coming.

Donald Trump tested positive for the coronavirus after claiming “it will disappear”, telling the journalist Bob Woodward he was downplaying it deliberately, failing to develop a national testing strategy, refusing to wear a face mask for months, floating the idea of injecting patients with bleach, insisting to one of his many crowded campaign rallies that “it affects virtually nobody” and, at Tuesday’s debate, mocking his rival, Joe Biden: “He could be speaking 200 feet away and he shows up with the biggest mask I’ve ever seen.”

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Burned bottles and scorched vines: wineries hit hard by California fires – in pictures

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The Glass fire is sweeping through the famous wine regions of Napa and Sonoma in northern California. The wildfire, which erupted on 27 September, has damaged numerous wineries and vineyards, charring grapes and incinerating inventory. Tasting rooms and restaurants have also been hit. The effect on the industry has been described as “catastrophic”. Several Napa Valley growers have said they will forgo a 2020 vintage altogether due to smoke contamination of their crop.

The Glass fire has torched more than 50,000 acres and firefighters are battling to bring it under control. It has also destroyed dozens of homes and thousands of people remain under evacuation orders.

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Coronavirus live news: Paris faces being placed on ‘maximum alert’ as India nears 100,000 deaths

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Bars and restaurants in Paris face closure from Monday; Turkey condemned for underreporting cases; Scottish National Party lawmaker suspended after travelling by train despite positive test. Follow the latest updates

In the UK, strictly Come Dancing contestant HRVY has tested positive for coronavirus, just over two weeks before the launch of the new series.

The singer and YouTube star, whose real name is Harvey Leigh Cantwell, announced the news on social media, telling fans he does not have any symptoms and is now isolating for 10 days.

Related: Strictly Come Dancing contestant HRVY tests positive for Covid-19

The death toll in India, which has the second-highest number of cases worldwide, is nearing the grim milestone of 100,000. There are currently 98,678 deaths confirmed on the Johns Hopkins University tracker.

India’s deaths are the third-highest worldwide, after Brazil with 143,952 and the US with 207,651.

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Coronavirus live news: WHO approves new rapid Covid test; Madrid to enter partial lockdown

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Health body gives green light to second test that gives results in up to 30 minutes; Spanish capital is Europe’s worst hotspot

France reported 12,148 new Covid-19 infections over the past 24 hours, the French health ministry said.

Friday’s figure is lower than Thursday’s 13,970 and well below highs of over 16,000 seen last week.

The Democratic presidential candidate, Joe Biden, and his wife, Jill, have tested negative for coronavirus, their doctor said in a statement on Friday.

“Vice-president Joe Biden and Dr Jill Biden underwent PCR testing for Covid-19 today and Covid-19 was not detected,” Dr Kevin O’Connor said in a statement.

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‘We had minutes’: California Glass wildfire rips through wine country – video report

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A destructive wildfire is being driven by strong winds through wine country north of San Francisco in California.

The Glass fire burned through Napa and Sonoma counties burning down buildings including wineries in the area.

The fire began Sunday as three fires merged and drove into vineyards and mountain areas, including part of the city of Santa Rosa. Around 70,000 people were under evacuation orders

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Trump rejects change to rules despite chaos and cringe of first debate

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  • President interrupted and talked over Biden and moderator
  • Commission wants changes for ‘more orderly discussion’

Donald Trump’s re-election campaign has rejected calls to change the rules of the next two presidential debates with Democratic challenger Joe Biden after the first chaotic event in Cleveland was marred by constant interruptions and outbursts.

Related: Trump signals he won't agree to rules changes for debates – live

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Thousands of migrants cross into Guatemala with slim hopes of reaching US

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The caravan from Honduras is the biggest since the pandemic hit Central America in March, triggering a rise in unemployment and poverty

Thousands of Honduran migrants hoping to reach the United States have entered Guatemala, testing the newly reopened frontier that had been shut by the coronavirus pandemic.

Authorities had planned to register the migrants as they crossed and offer assistance to those willing to turn back, but early on Thursday, the group pushed past armed guards without registering. By midday more than 3,000 migrants had crossed illegally, said Guatemalan officials.

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Charred homes and crumbled walls: tallying the destruction of a California wildfire

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Fueled by a heatwave, the Glass fire left a trail of smoldering remains along Mountain Hawk Drive in Santa Rosa

Smoke mixed with morning mist on Mountain Hawk Drive in Santa Rosa, California, on Wednesday morning, creating a thick layer of gray that hung over the smoldering remains of family homes that had been charred by the Glass fire days before.

The fast-moving fire had arrived in the neighborhood on Monday night, consuming roughly an acre every five seconds and leveling many of the hillside homes. Now, remnants of lives lived lined the street. Melted squirt guns left on burned patio tables. A charred piano underneath askew picture frames. Homegrown apples on a singed tree were cooked on the vine.

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Sheikh Sabah al-Sabah, emir of Kuwait obituary

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Ruler of Kuwait for 14 years who was known as ‘the dean of Arab diplomacy’

The emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who has died aged 91, ruled his country for 14 years and acquired a reputation for being committed to peaceful dialogue and unity among other Gulf states known for their divisive quarrels in recent times. Discreet, mild-mannered and valuing his personal links with fellow monarchs, Sabah was known as “the dean of Arab diplomacy”.

Since 2017, however, when the younger, more assertive leaders of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates boycotted their rival Qatar, he found it increasingly hard to play the role of regional mediator, but was still credited with having forestalled potentially disastrous military action. The war in Yemen, scene of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, was another nightmarish situation.

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Revealed: Amy Coney Barrett supported group that said life begins at fertilization

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Barrett signed newspaper ad in 2006 sponsored by St Joseph County Right to Life, an extreme anti-choice group

Amy Coney Barrett, the Trump administration’s supreme court nominee, publicly supported an organization in 2006 that has said life begins at fertilization. It has also said that the discarding of unused or frozen embryos created in the in vitro fertilization (IVF) process ought to be criminalized, a view that is considered to be extreme even within the anti-abortion movement.

The revelation is likely to lead to new questions about how Barrett’s personal views on abortion may not only shape reproductive rights in the US for decades to come if she is confirmed by the Senate, but how her appointment could affect legal rights for women undergoing fertility treatment, as well as their doctors.

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Trump signals he won’t agree to rules changes for debates – as it happened

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From me and Joan E Greve:

In a memorable moment from the Republican National Convention, Guilfoyle rallied supporters in what Guardian Washington bureau chief David Smith described as “a high-octane audition for Evita – without an audience”.

She said that Democrats “want to destroy this country and everything that we have fought for and hold dear” and later screamed, “Ladies and gentlemen, leaders and fighters for liberty and the American Dream: the best is yet to come!”

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Covid-19 live news: Madrid lockdown looms; Italy’s PM proposes extending state of emergency

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Africa approaching 1.5m cases across its 54 countries; Italy could extend government powers to January; record cases high in Ukraine

Sweden has registered its highest daily Covid caseload since June, with 752 new infections recorded on Thursday, though no new related deaths have been recorded.

The Scandinavian country has shunned lockdowns, leaving most schools, restaurants and businesses open throughout the pandemic. Thursday’s rise was the highest since 30 June, when the health agency recorded just over 800 new cases.

The mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, has said infections in Russia’s capital are rising by about 2,000 a day, and ordered employers to transfer at least 30% of staff to remote work.

Writing on his blog, Sobyanin said the rate of Covid-19 hospitalisations was also rising by around 5,000 per week.

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Human rights lawyers sue Trump administration for ‘silencing’ them

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Exclusive: group claims executive order targeting the international criminal court has led them to halt work on war crimes cases

Prominent US human rights lawyers are suing the Trump administration over an executive order they say has gagged them and halted their work pursuing justice on behalf of war crimes victims around the world.

As a result of the order in June threatening “serious consequences” for anyone giving support to the work of the international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague, the lawyers say they have had to cancel speeches and presentations, end research, abandon writing ICC-related articles and dispensing advice and assistance to victims of atrocities.

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Chrissy Teigen and John Legend speak of ‘deep pain’ of losing baby

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US model and TV presenter was pregnant with third child when taken to hospital with complications

Chrissy Teigen has said she and husband John Legend are “shocked” and in “deep pain” after losing their baby during pregnancy.

The US model and TV presenter had been taken to hospital because of excessive bleeding.

Teigen, 34, later wrote in a statement on social media: “We are shocked and in the kind of deep pain you only hear about, the kind of pain we’ve never felt before.

“We were never able to stop the bleeding and give our baby the fluids he needed, despite bags and bags of blood transfusions. It just wasn’t enough,” she wrote on Wednesday night.

Teigen shared the news with a black-and-white picture showing her crying while sitting in a hospital bed.

pic.twitter.com/iBFKYtYwi2

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A contrast of styles: New Zealand v US leaders’ election debate – video

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New Zealand and the United States both had leaders' debates this week, and some political junkies noticed a distinct difference in tone. In New Zealand, where the Labour leader and incumbent prime minister Jacinda Ardern faced off against National leader Judith Collins, the pair exchanged compliments in a debate described by Collins as 'robust and a win for politics'. Meanwhile, in America, president Donald Trump's attacks on his Democratic rival Joe Biden turned highly person 

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Joe Biden tells white supremacist groups to ‘cease and desist’ – video

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Joe Biden warned white supremacist groups including the Proud Boys to 'cease and desist', in Alliance, Ohio, the second stop of his Build Back Better train tour to Pennsylvania.

Donald Trump refused to condemn white supremacists and the Proud Boys during Tuesday night’s election debate, and on Wednesday Trump claimed he had never heard of Proud Boys, after saying on Tuesday they should 'stand back and stand by'.

The Proud Boys have since offered for sale T-shirts with the motif 'standing by'

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Biden tells white supremacist groups to ‘cease and desist’ after Trump’s debate ’embarrassment’ – live

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When a reporter asked Trump about his comments on the Proud Boys last night, the president asked for a “definition” of the extremist far-right group.

Trump says he does "not know who the Proud Boys are," but they should "stand down and let law enforcement do their work."

(He said they should "stand by" last night.) pic.twitter.com/kgi2R8DgN9

Trump just spoke to reporters on the South Lawn before leaving for Minnesota, where he will hold campaign events this evening.

Addressing his comments last night on the Proud Boys, Trump claimed he did not know who the extremist far-right group was.

Related: Trump's refusal to condemn white supremacy fits pattern of extremist rhetoric

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What does the first climate question at a US debate in 20 years reveal?

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The question framed the existence of a human-made climate crisis as something that is for some Americans still debatable

The long-awaited climate question in last night’s presidential debate broke a 20-year silent streak from moderators on the crisis – thrusting it into prime time but also revealing just how stuck in the past much of the US is on the issue.

After more than an hour of chaos as the candidates talked over each other, the Fox News anchor Chris Wallace asked Donald Trump: “What do you believe about the science of climate change and what will you do in the next four years to confront it?”

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