Closing summary
An appeals court judge in New York denied Donald Trump’s third attempt in three days to delay his hush-money criminal trial. Trump was denied his attempt to push back the 15 April trial on charges stemming from hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels, paving the way for the first-ever criminal trial of a former US president.
Donald Trump said he believes the Arizona supreme court went too far with its ruling upholding a near-total abortion ban. Asked if he would sign a national abortion ban if elected president in 2024, Trump said: “No.”
In response, the Biden campaign said Trump “owns the suffering and chaos happening right now” and warned that he has banned abortion “every chance he gets”.
Asked what he would say to the people of Arizona, Joe Biden said: “Elect me. I’m in the … 21st century, not back then.” Biden also said he is “considering” a request from Australia to end the prosecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Kamala Harris will visit Arizona on Friday as part of her nationwide reproductive freedoms tour. The White House said Harris would highlight “extremists” in the state who are pushing for abortion bans during her visit.
Democrats in Florida are teaming up with operatives from Biden’s re-election campaign in an all-out assault on Republicans’ extremist positions on abortion, believing it will bring victory in presidential and Senate races in November.
The House voted to block the reauthorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a high-profile warrantless surveillance program that is now in limbo before a 19 April expiration date.
House speaker Mike Johnson will meet on Friday with Donald Trump for a press conference on “election integrity” at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, a Trump campaign official said. Johnson met with Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene on Wednesday, marking the first time the two have spoken since Greene filed a motion to vacate the speakership late last month. Greene described the meeting as “passionate”.
The independent presidential candidate Cornel West announced that Melina Abdullah would serve as his running mate, joining the former Harvard professor’s long-shot bid in the US presidential race.
The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, told donors and supporters last weekend that he would help raise money for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, according to multiple reports.
Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, is accused of covering up a $130,000 hush-money payment his former lawyer Michael Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels for her silence before the 2016 election about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump in 2006, Reuters neatly recaps.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records and denies any such encounter with Daniels.
Judge Juan Merchan has not yet ruled on Trump’s motion for him to recuse himself. The defense has argued that the judge’s daughter’s work for a political consulting firm with Democratic clients poses a conflict of interest.
On Monday, a judge at the appellate division denied Trump’s request to delay the case while he pursues a challenge to the trial being held in heavily Democratic Manhattan.
On Tuesday, another judge rejected his bid to pause the trial while he appeals Merchan’s decision to impose a gag order restricting his public statements about potential witnesses, court staff, lawyers and family members of the judge and district attorney Alvin Bragg. Those appeals will still be heard by a full panel.
Updated
