Teflon Don has become Felon Don, but the US constitution has no objection to him holding the highest office

It was the moment America, or at least America’s politicians and media, had been waiting for. It was the day justice finally caught up with Donald Trump. The former president’s manipulation of the 2016 election, by hushing up a sex scandal that threatened his chances, and his attempts to discredit a criminal justice system intent on punishing him, was famously thwarted. It was an all-time presidential and judicial first, a historic result that transformed Teflon Don into Felon Don, thanks to a jury of 12 ordinary men and women and a brave prosecutor, Alvin Bragg.

Looked at another way, however, last week’s much anticipated dramatic denouement of the criminal trial of the New York playboy, billionaire and presumptive 2024 Republican presidential candidate may turn out to be less pivotal than anticipated. According to the US networks, most Americans tuned out weeks ago, not least because cameras were barred from the Manhattan courtroom. One not untypical public survey found that 67% of respondents said a conviction would make no difference to how they voted this autumn. The 34 guilty verdicts were an overnight sensation. But they may not significantly shift the political dial.

US representative and failed contender for president says Kathy Hochul should grant pardon ‘for the good of the country’

The outgoing Democratic US representative who failed in his presidential primary challenge against Joe Biden called on the New York governor, Kathy Hochul, to pardon Donald Trump over his criminal conviction for hush-money payments to influence the 2016 election “for the good of the country”.

Minnesota representative Dean Phillips, who was the first Democrat to call on fellow party member Henry Cuellar to resign following bribery charges against the Texas representative, urged for the pardon on Friday in a post on X.

Trump and his Republican allies sow distrust in US judicial system as analysts warn backlash could tear at social fabric in already volatile election year

A shameful day in American history. A sham show trial. A kangaroo court. A total witch-hunt. Worthy of a banana republic.

These were the reactions from senior elected Republicans, who once claimed the mantle of the party of law and order, to the news that Donald Trump had become the first former US president convicted of a crime.

Justices to address abortion, guns, social media – and whether Donald Trump can be prosecuted for role in January 6 insurrection

The US supreme court is poised to deliver a raft of politically sensitive decisions as it ends its judicial term, addressing tumultuous issues including whether Donald Trump can be prosecuted for his role in the January 6 insurrection in 2021, abortion access for millions of women and the basic functioning of the federal government.

With the court entering its traditional June climax, observers are bracing themselves for yet another potentially seismic four weeks that could radically reshape American public life. Matters before the court include a possible loosening of gun laws in a country with already exceptionally lax controls, and new guardrails on how social media platforms deal with misinformation.

Robinson, who moved to White House when Barack Obama won presidency, helped to care for granddaughters Malia and Sasha

Marian Shields Robinson, the mother of Michelle Obama, who moved with the first family to the White House when son-in-law Barack Obama was elected president, has died. She was 86.

Robinson’s death was announced in an online tribute by Michelle Obama, and included details of the time Robinson spent living in the White House, as an informal first grandmother to the Obama children.

The former president’s rambling tirade at Trump Tower contained a number of questionable assertions

Donald Trump delivered a rambling, incoherent speech laden with falsehoods and conspiracy theories from the atrium of Trump Tower, a day after the former president was convicted of all 34 counts of falsifying business records in his hush-money criminal trial.

Here is a fact check of some of the things he said on Friday – and why they weren’t true.

Emily Baden says after a disagreement over political lawn signs with the US supreme court justice’s wife, a black car began parking at her mother’s home

Neighbors of Samuel Alito and his wife described how a disagreement over political lawn signs put up in the wake of the 2020 presidential election quickly devolved into “unhinged behavior towards a complete stranger” by the supreme court justice’s wife.

Emily Baden says she never intended to get into a fight with Alito and his wife, Martha-Ann, her powerful neighbors who live on the same suburban cul-de-sac as her mother outside Washington DC.

The prosecution and the guilty verdicts are unprecedented. But making history is not the same as shifting election outcomes

Guilty. The New York jury’s unanimous verdicts on 34 counts mean that Donald Trump is not only the first sitting or former US president to be prosecuted in a criminal trial, but the first to be convicted.

Trump was found to have falsified business records to hide $130,000 of hush money paid to cover up a sex scandal he feared might hinder his run in 2016. Before his entry into politics, it would have been taken for granted that such charges would kill a campaign. Yet Trump is running for the White House as a convicted criminal. If he is jailed when he is sentenced in July – which most experts think unlikely – it is assumed that he would continue. If anything, the prospect of such a sentence spurs him on.

Revisited: Guardian journalist Jonathan Freedland speaks to Sam Levine about how Donald Trump became the first US president, sitting or former, to become a convicted criminal

Today, we are sharing Politics Weekly America’s latest episode with Today in Focus listeners.

Donald Trump has made history again, becoming the first US president, sitting or former, to be a convicted criminal. Late on Thursday a New York jury found him guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying records to cover up a sex scandal. Within minutes of leaving the courtroom, Trump said he would appeal.

US president says it is ‘reckless’ and ‘irresponsible’ for Republicans to malign integrity of America’s justice system

• Donald Trump conviction – live updates

Joe Biden warned on Friday that it was reckless and “dangerous” for anyone to claim Donald Trump’s criminal conviction was the result of a rigged trial, as the former president hit out at the verdict against him and Republicans maligned the integrity of America’s justice system.

Donald Trump hit out furiously on Friday morning at the new status of “felon” conferred on him by a New York jury, whose guilty verdict made him the first former US president ever to become a convicted criminal.

The president said ‘Donald Trump was given every opportunity to defend himself’ and ‘no one is above the law’

While Donald Trump and his team argued for a change of venue for the New York hush money trial because Manhattan was so heavily Democrat, New York was where Trump made his name. The 58-storey Trump Tower has been a part of the skyline since 1983. His hit reality show, The Apprentice, took place here.

After the verdict was read yesterday, New Yorkers reacted with both jubilation and horror.

This must be a day to reflect that in just one decade it has become realistically possible for a multiple felon to lead the free world

No rest for political cartographers. It turns out that what lay beyond America’s uncharted waters was some more uncharted waters. The unanimous verdict in Donald Trump’s hush-money trial found the former president guilty, making him the first US president to be convicted of a crime. Forgive me: 34 crimes. A potential bar to security clearance, voting and owning a gun – but not, apparently, a bar to running for president. “I am a political prisoner,” ran an instant campaign fundraising message from Trump, probably typed on the same gold toilet he once pretty much ran the world off.

And might well again. Previous polls have indicated some Trump voters would switch in the event of a guilty verdict, but this morning the betting markets had Trump’s chances above 50% for the first time. On the other hand, if criminal trial verdicts going the wrong way for you is such great news, how come Trump is trying so hard to stall the other three cases he’s facing? By way of a reminder, those involve mishandling classified documents, trying to change the outcome of the election, and fomenting the 6 January attack on the US Capitol. He’s already been found liable for sexual abuse and defamation in another trial last year, and impeached twice. Take in his thousands of business-related court cases and he’s a one-man law degree.

Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

In a divided world that can’t seem to agree on a single fact, we now have one that is impossible to argue with: Trump is a felon

For decades, he skated. Nothing seemed to stick to the Teflon-coated businessman-turned-president. The guy who didn’t pay his bills, who constantly lied, who mocked a disabled journalist, who insulted a Gold Star family, who bragged about grabbing women by their private parts, who praised dictators, who urged a violent mob to overturn an election, who was unperturbed as his own vice-president was threatened with hanging.

Yes, he skated – through two impeachments, through countless investigations and accusations, and through so much chaos that responsible US citizens became almost numb and hopeless.

Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist writing on media, politics and culture

Prosecutors took a case that was about boring paper crimes and successfully turned it into one that was about something simple: lying

• Donald Trump guilty on all counts – latest updates

Donald Trump’s conviction on all 34 felony counts on Thursday marked a full-blown victory for Alvin Bragg, the first-term Manhattan district attorney who was criticized for using a novel legal strategy to bring a historic criminal case against a former president.

The decision to convict Trump on all 34 counts is significant. Jurors could have acquitted him on some and convicted on others. But the fact that they went all-in, and relatively quickly, suggests they believed the wider story prosecutors told at trial. It is a full-throated win for Bragg and the worst possible outcome for Trump.

Twelve jurors in New York have presented their fellow Americans with a simple question: are you willing to elect a convicted criminal to the White House?

On Thursday, Donald Trump was found guilty of all 34 counts of falsifying business records in a criminal hush-money scheme to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. The verdict makes him the first president, current or former, to be found guilty of felony crimes in the US's near 250-year history. Regardless, the conviction does not disqualify Trump as a presidential candidate or bar him from again sitting in the Oval Office.

Trump, who opted not to take the stand during the trial, has denied wrongdoing, railed against the proceedings and ahead of the verdict compared himself to a saint: “Mother Teresa could not beat these charges. The charges are rigged,” he said on Wednesday. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, is expected to appeal the verdict.

The Guardian’s Sam Levine has been in court over the last several weeks covering all the developments – here are three testimonies he found most memorable. 

• Could Trump go to prison? Here’s what happens next after the guilty verdict

Donald Trump has become the first former US president to be convicted of a crime after historic hush-money trial in New York

• Full report: Trump found guilty of hush-money plot to influence 2016 election
• Analysis: Trump was convicted of 34 felonies. What is Biden’s next move?

Republican House speaker Mike Johnson bemoans ‘shameful day’ while Democrats praise strength of US justice system

• Trump found guilty – live updates

Donald Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records set off a political firestorm in Washington on Thursday, with Republicans furiously lambasting the verdict as a miscarriage of justice while Democrats commended New York jurors for rendering a fair judgment in one of the most historic trials in US history.

Republicans unsurprisingly rallied around Trump, reiterating their baseless allegations that the Biden administration had engaged in political persecution of the former US president.

Donald Trump has made history again, becoming the first US president, sitting or former, to be a convicted criminal. Late on Thursday a New York jury found him guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying records to cover up a sex scandal. Within minutes of leaving the courtroom, Trump said he would appeal.

On a historic night for American politics, Jonathan Freedland and Sam Levine look at what the verdict will mean – both for Trump himself, and for the election in November

Archive: CNN, CBS, MSNBC, ITV, NBC

So rarely held to account, Trump has finally had a small taste of justice. This is a good day for American democracy

The former president of the United States, and the presumptive Republican nominee in the 2024 presidential election, is now a convicted felon 34 times over. In New York on Thursday, 12 jurors found Donald Trump guilty of falsifying business records in order to influence the 2016 election. It is the first criminal conviction for Trump, who has also been charged with felonies in three other criminal cases currently under way in Florida, Georgia and Washington DC. He is the first former president to ever stand trial on criminal charges.

The jury found that Trump, who denies the charges, falsified business records in 2016 and 2017, when he made a series of payments to his lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, to reimburse Cohen for a payment of $130,000 that he had made to Stormy Daniels, a pornographic film actor, in exchange for Daniels’ silence about a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006. Paying Daniels to shut up, the prosecution had argued, amounted to a conspiracy to influence the election. Labeling the payments to Cohen, as Trump and his flacks did, as payments of Cohen’s “legal retainer” was a fraud committed in furtherance of that conspiracy.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

Former president calls verdict ‘a disgrace’ after being convicted in New York on all 34 counts of falsifying business records

• Is Trump going to prison? What happens next

Donald Trump has been found guilty of all 34 counts of falsifying business records in a criminal hush-money scheme to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.

The verdict came after a jury deliberated for less than 12 hours in the unprecedented first criminal trial against a US president, current or former. It marks a perilous political moment for Trump, the presumptive nominee for the Republican nomination, whose poll numbers have remained unchanged throughout the trial but could tank at any moment.

In a presidential election where poll after poll shows voters favouring Trump over Biden, the president’s tone will be crucial

Twelve jurors in New York have presented their fellow Americans with a simple question: are you willing to elect a convicted criminal to the White House?

On Thursday, Donald Trump was convicted of all 34 counts of falsifying business records in his hush-money trial, a verdict making him the first former president to be found guilty of felony crimes in America’s near 250-year history.

The ex-president was found guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in the hush money case – what will his punishment be?

• Full report: Trump found guilty on all 34 counts

A Manhattan jury has convicted Donald Trump on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in the hush-money case.

The immediate next question is: what punishment should the former US president receive?

The ex-president lost a hush-money trial in New York. But if you think that will keep him from the Oval Office, think again

On Thursday, a Manhattan jury found Donald Trump guilty of all 34 counts of conspiracy and fraud in a case stemming from payments that the former president arranged to cover up an affair with the adult film actor Stormy Daniels. The presumptive Republican nominee is now a convicted felon.

He was already an adjudicated sexual predator and fraudster. Trump once quipped that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it. Maybe not.

Lloyd Green is an attorney in New York and served in the US Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992

Bill Pruitt also says the then reality TV star was incompetent and implied illicit trysts while engaged to Melania

Donald Trump used a racial epithet to reject the prospect of a Black winner on the debut season of The Apprentice, the Emmy-nominated series that transformed the former president into a reality TV star and fuelled his political career.

Trump rejected the views of close aides that Kwame Jackson, a broker who worked for Goldman Sachs, had been the most impressive contestant, saying, “Would America buy a [N-word] winning?”, according to a producer who worked on the NBC show’s opening series in 2004, when it was called Meet the Billionaire.

Justices release opinions on three cases – banking regulations, a free speech claim and a death penalty case – but delay rulings on Trump and abortion

If a New York jury finds Trump guilty of business fraud charges, what impact would it have on the election? Reporting from two swing states, the Guardian’s Alice Herman and George Chidi looked for the answer:

For Josh Ellis, a refrigerator technician from southern Wisconsin, Donald Trump’s trial in New York is a sideshow. He’s not convinced of the prosecution’s narrative, or the former president’s – and the verdict will not likely affect his vote in November, anyway.

‘I think Kwame would be a great addition to the organization,’ Kepcher says to Trump, who winces while his head bobs around in reaction to what he is hearing and clearly resisting.

‘Why didn’t he just fire her?’ Trump asks, referring to Omarosa. It’s a reasonable question. Given that this the first time we’ve ever been in this situation, none of this is something we expected.

Politicians parroted untrue rumors that Hamas had beheaded Israeli babies. When the children are Palestinian, they shrug

Earlier this week, I sat down to write a piece about a campus safety officer at a public college in New York who told pro-Palestinian protesters that he supported genocide. “Yes I do, I support genocide,” the officer said, after a protester accused him of this at a graduation event at the College of Staten Island, part of the public City University of New York (Cuny) system, last Thursday. “I support killing all you guys, how about that?”

It’s possible that you didn’t hear about this incident: while it was covered by a few outlets, including the Associated Press, it didn’t get a huge amount of press. It certainly wasn’t splashed all over the front page of the New York Post the way it would have been if that guard had made the same comment about Israelis. The New York Times, which has written a lot about safety on college campuses – and published a piece on anti-Israel speeches at Cuny just a couple of days before this incident – didn’t seem to deem it newsworthy. And the White House didn’t chime in with a horrified statement about anti-Palestinian bias on campuses. After all, this wasn’t a big deal, right? It was just a security guard saying he supports genocide. Which, it should be clear now, is essentially the same position as the US government.

Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

Many seem ambivalent on whether the ex-president will be found guilty – and some think it will only deepen polarization

For Josh Ellis, a refrigerator technician from southern Wisconsin, Donald Trump’s trial in New York is a sideshow. He’s not convinced of the prosecution’s narrative, or the former president’s – and the verdict will probably not affect his vote in November anyway.

“Biden’s running this country into the ground,” said Ellis, who said the economy was his main concern. At 49, Ellis has long viewed politicians as out of touch on economic issues; he used to vote for Democrats, but switched in 2016 to vote for Trump, who he saw as possibly offering a change.

Calls, notes and witness testimony appear to fit with prosecutors’ case that Trump falsified records as part of plot to influence 2016 election

As the jury began deliberations on Wednesday, Donald Trump appeared to have little room to extricate himself from the mass of evidence presented in the weeks-long case.

A recording of Trump directing hush money to be paid in cash. Handwritten notes by Trump’s ex-chief financial officer about how to reimburse Cohen. A parade of witnesses who testified the Trump campaign was desperate to suppress the story of his affair with the adult film star Stormy Daniels.

by violating the Federal Election and Campaign Act, which in 2016 made it a crime for any person to make contributions to a campaign in excess of $2,700 per year, or for a corporation to make a contribution of any amount to any candidate’s campaign in a federal election.

by causing the falsification of other business records, including bank records for the shell companies that Cohen established on false pretenses to pay the hush money to Daniels.

by violating federal tax and New York state tax law 1801(a)3 and 1802 since Cohen’s reimbursement for the hush money was “grossed up” to compensate him for taxes he would have to pay on the $130,000 when he recorded it as income on his tax returns.

President and vice-president gear up for 2024 election with ‘Black Voters for Biden-Harris’ rally at majority Black Philadelphia school

Gearing up for the 2024 election, the Biden-Harris campaign launched its Black voters initiative on Wednesday at Philadelphia’s Girard College, a majority Black boarding school.

Around 2pm in an auditorium filled with hundreds of Black Philly residents, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris approached the podium to applause and an audience shouting “four more years”.

Wall Street Journal reports pair have had several phone calls recently and that Musk could assist if Trump wins another term

Donald Trump has floated a possible advisory role for the tech billionaire Elon Musk if he were to retake the White House next year, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal.

The two men, who once had a tense relationship, have had several phone calls a month since March as Trump looks to court powerful donors and Musk seeks an outlet for his policy ideas, the newspaper said, citing several anonymous sources familiar with their conversations.

After Judge Juan Merchan instructs jury, Trump rails against proceedings, saying even saint ‘could not beat these charges’

• A ‘catch-and-kill’ scheme and Trump’s pyjamas: key trial moments
• Who is Juan Merchan, the judge in Trump’s criminal trial

Donald Trump’s criminal hush-money case in New York inched towards its conclusion on Wednesday with jury deliberations starting just before 11.30am local time.

Right after jurors began weighing the former president’s fate, Trump railed against the proceedings and compared himself to a saint, saying in the hallway: “Mother Teresa could not beat these charges. The charges are rigged. The whole thing is rigged.”

Former mayor repeatedly lied and deceived creditors about his finances to avoid money going to them, lawyers say in court filing

A bankruptcy judge should appoint a trustee to immediately take control of Rudy Giuliani’s financial affairs after the former mayor repeatedly lied and deceived creditors about his finances, lawyers for the creditors said in a Tuesday court filing.

Among other things, the lawyers said Giuliani was funneling money into his businesses to avoid it going to creditors, undervalued his jewellery, and refused to disclose what several Apple and Amazon purchases were for. Giuliani filed for bankruptcy in December, shortly after a jury in Washington DC ordered him to pay $148.1m in damages to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss – two Atlanta, Georgia, election workers he spread lies about after the 2020 election.

Biden campaign holds press conference with Oscar winner and two Capitol officers in first clear foray into ex-president’s legal troubles

It was a scenario that Donald Trump, in his pre-presidential celebrity days, might have relished; as he sat inside a Manhattan courtroom, Robert De Niro was waiting outside.

But this was politics and De Niro, the pugnacious star of myriad Hollywood gangster films, was there not to pay homage to the former president as a fellow VIP, but to diss him in terms that might have been in place in Goodfellas or Mean Streets.

Former president transfers ownership of Cessna Citation X, worth $8.5m to $10m, to holding company tied to Mehrdad Moayedi

With more than $500m in court fines on his back, Donald Trump has sold one of the two private jets he owns to a major Republican donor.

According to FAA records, the former US president transferred ownership of the 1997 Cessna Citation X on 13 May. While it is unclear how much he sold the plane for, the private aviation company evoJets estimates a Citation X costs about $8.5m to $10m.

Exclusive: Investigation reveals how intelligence agencies tried to derail war crimes prosecution, with Netanyahu ‘obsessed’ with intercepts

• Revealed: Israeli spy chief ‘threatened’ ICC prosecutor over war crimes inquiry

When the chief prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC) announced he was seeking arrest warrants against Israeli and Hamas leaders, he issued a cryptic warning: “I insist that all attempts to impede, intimidate or improperly influence the officials of this court must cease immediately.”

Karim Khan did not provide specific details of attempts to interfere in the ICC’s work, but he noted a clause in the court’s foundational treaty that made any such interference a criminal offence. If the conduct continued, he added, “my office will not hesitate to act”.

Joshua Steinglass tells hush-money jurors that scheme to bury negative stories before 2016 election distorted democracy

Donald Trump’s secret plot to bury negative press ahead of the 2016 election deprived Americans of their right to choose a candidate at the ballot box, said the prosecution in its summation on Tuesday at the former president’s New York hush-money trial.

Joshua Steinglass’s closing statement reminded jurors of a summer 2015 meeting at Trump Tower where the real estate mogul sat with then consigliere Michael Cohen and tabloid honcho David Pecker.

In divergent messages, president pays tribute to fallen heroes, while Trump fulminates on social media against opponents

Joe Biden and Donald Trump marked the Memorial Day national holiday honoring America’s war dead with jarringly divergent messages that promised to foretell the forthcoming US presidential election campaign as a contest of sharply contrasting characters.

In a ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, Biden paid tribute to the fallen as heroes who sacrificed themselves in the service of American democracy and ideals. Meanwhile, Trump, taking to his Truth Social site, took a very different tack – bestowing holiday wishes on those he branded “human scum” and accused them of trying to destroy the country.

Presumptive Republican nominee calls demonstrations against Israel’s war in Gaza part of a ‘radical revolution’

Donald Trump has told a group of wealthy donors that he will crush pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses if he is returned to the White House.

The former president and presumptive Republican nominee called the demonstrations against Israel’s war in Gaza part of a “radical revolution” and promised the predominantly Jewish donors that he would set the movement back 25 or 30 years if they helped him beat Joe Biden in November’s presidential election.

Claim rests on a misquoted section of FBI policy in a legal motion, and moreover, Trump was not in Florida during search

Donald Trump’s campaign has issued another extraordinary fundraising request to supporters by doubling down on a false claim that rival Joe Biden was prepared to hurt or kill him by authorizing the use of deadly force during an FBI search for classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago compound in August 2022.

The claim has become a currency among some Trump supporters and is widely described by them as an “attempted assassination” – but rests on a misquoted section of FBI policy in a legal motion. Moreover, Trump was not even in Florida during the search.

The New York court’s camera ban provides room for Trump to shape the narrative, with conservative media eager to help

Donald Trump has retained much of his political support amid his ongoing hush-money trial in part due to a combination of the courtroom’s ban on cameras and conservative media echoing his claims that both the prosecutor and judge are corrupt, media analysts say.

The experts suggest that the former president could retain political support on the right even if the jury determines he is guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to his reimbursements to Michael Cohen for a payment to Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential campaign.

A TikTok ban threatens to destroy millions of jobs and silence diverse voices. It would change the world for the worse

I’m a TikTok creator. I’ve used TikTok to build a multimillion dollar business, focused on sharing interesting things I’ve learned in life and throughout my years in college. TikTok allowed me to create a community and help further my goal of educating the public. I always feared that one day, it would be threatened. And now, it’s happening.

Why does the US government want to ban TikTok? The reasons given include TikTok’s foreign ownership and its “addictive” nature, but I suspect that part of the reason is that the app primarily appeals to younger generations who often hold political and moral views that differ significantly from those of older generations, including many of today’s politicians.

Dominic Andre is a content creator and the CEO of The Lab

President, Republican rival and RFK Jr eager to recruit big names whose reach is bigger than ever – will it be decisive?

Once heard, never forgotten, the voice is familiar to admirers of The Godfather Part II, Taxi Driver, The Deer Hunter, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Heat, The Irishman and countless others. “Trump wants revenge,” says Robert De Niro, “and he’ll stop at nothing to get it.”

This was an ad released on Friday by Joe Biden’s campaign to remind voters of Donald Trump’s dark and divisive presidency and warn that his return to power could be even worse. The use of De Niro – a fierce Trump critic – as narrator was no accident but a reminder of the power of celebrities at the ballot box in America.

Possible Trump running mate makes extreme remark as former president steps up efforts to woo Black and minority voters

Donald Trump’s inner circle is stepping up efforts to woo Black and other minority voters, with a leading candidate to be his vice-presidential running mate claiming falsely on Sunday TV that Joe Biden was resegregating US public schools.

Tim Scott, the US senator from South Carolina who has been open about his desire to be on Trump’s ticket, made one of the most extreme claims yet. Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union show, he described President Biden as a supporter of educational segregation.

Senate Democrats seek meeting with Chief Justice John Roberts to discuss issue and seek Alito’s recusal on January 6 cases

The wife of US supreme court justice Samuel Alito reportedly justified the display of an upside-down American flag at the couple’s home by saying it was “an international signal of distress”, as senior Democrats have requested a meeting with the chief justice over the growing scandal.

Martha-Ann Alito made the comments to a Washington Post reporter, the outlet reported on Saturday, when the journalist visited the couple’s Virginia home in January 2021, not long after the attack on the US Capitol by extremist supporters of Donald Trump.

Missouri state representative Ben Baker’s daughter and her husband were reportedly ambushed when leaving a church

The daughter and son-in-law of a US Republican politician are among three Christian missionaries who have been killed by gang members in Haiti as it emerged that the long-awaited deployment of an multinational security force tasked with rescuing the Caribbean country from months of bloodshed had been delayed.

Ben Baker, a Republican state representative from Missouri, announced the news of the couple’s murder on Facebook late on Thursday, writing: “My heart is broken in a thousand pieces. I’ve never felt this kind of pain.”

Independent candidate pledges to pardon Snowden and drop Assange charges, and says Trump ‘caved’ over pandemic response

Robert Kennedy Jr, a longshot independent candidate for US president, has sought to woo Libertarian party voters by casting rivals Donald Trump and Joe Biden as enemies of individual freedom.

Kennedy, 70, brought Libertarians to their feet by promising to pardon government whistleblower Edward Snowden, currently exiled in Russia, and drop espionage charges against Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder battling US attempts to extradite him from Britain.

Adrian Fontes made comments on NBC panel of elections officials from states whose voters could decide 2024 presidential election

The rising threats against US elections officials are a form of domestic terrorism, the secretary of state in the presidential campaign battleground state of Arizona has said.

“Terrorism is defined as a threat of violence for a political outcome,” Adrian Fontes said in remarks recorded for an NBC Meet the Press episode airing on Sunday morning. “That’s what this is, and … we do have to address it for what it is.”

Two young men are promoting a grab-bag ideology celebrating ‘honor’ and condemning ‘global elites’ – and winning powerful friends on the right

In the last few years, a self-styled political movement that sounds like a contradiction in terms has gained ground online: “Maga communism”.

Promoted by its two most prominent spokespeople, Haz Al-Din, 27, and Jackson Hinkle, 24, Maga communism comprises a grab bag of ideas that can seem lacking in coherence – ranging from a belief in the power of Donald Trump’s followers to wrest power from “global elites” to an emphasis on masculine “honor”, admiration for Vladimir Putin and support for Palestinian liberation.

Latest tranche of aid includes Himars ammunition, artillery rounds and javelin anti-armor systems

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Ohio’s governor, Mike DeWine, has called for a special legislative session to include Joe Biden on the election ballot.

Robert Tait reports for the Guardian:

From midnight tweets, to drinking bleach, to tear-gassing citizens and staging a photo op, we knew Trump was out of control when he was president, and then he lost the 2020 election and snapped.

Desperately trying to hold on to power. Now he’s running again, this time threatening to be a dictator, to terminate the constitution.

This ad lays out the clear contrast voters will see a month from now when Trump stands on the debate stage next to Joe Biden: Trump is running to regain power for himself, Joe Biden is running to serve you, the American people.