Good morning.
Donald Trump has been compelled to testify under oath by a congressional committee investigating the deadly attack on the US Capitol on January 6, which named the ex-president the “central cause”.
“We have left no doubt – none – that Donald Trump led an effort to upend American democracy that directly resulted in the violence of January 6,” said Bennie Thompson, chair of the committee, watched by police officers who defended the Capitol that day.
“He tried to take away the voice of the American people in choosing their president and replace the will of the voters with his will to remain in power. He is the one person at the center of the story of what happened on January 6. So we want to hear from him.”
Yesterday’s House of Representatives select committee move may prove a largely symbolic gesture, given legislative time constraints before the midterms and Trump’s probable legal resistance.
Trump responded on his Truth Social platform but did not say whether he would comply. “Why didn’t the Unselect Committee ask me to testify months ago?” he wrote. “Why did they wait until the very end, the final moments of their last meeting? Because the committee is a total ‘BUST’.”
“Can you believe I lost to this effing guy?” said Trump a week after the 2020 presidential election was called in favor of Joe Biden, according to former White House aide Alyssa Farah. Yet at the same time, he attempted to undermine and change the results.
Senator investigates Qatar link to $1.2bn Kushner property rescue
A leading financial firm faces questions about whether Qatar was secretly involved in the $1.2bn rescue of a Fifth Avenue property owned by Jared Kushner’s family while Kushner was serving in the White House.
Ron Wyden, the Oregon Democrat who leads the Senate finance committee, has given the chief executive of Toronto-based Brookfield Asset Management until 24 October to answer a series of questions about a 2018 deal in which Brookfield paid Kushner Companies for a 99-year lease on the family’s marquee 666 Fifth Avenue property.
When it was announced in August 2018, the rescue reportedly generated enough money for the Kushner family to pay $1.1bn of debt on the building and buy out a partner.
“I remain deeply concerned that funding from a foreign government was involved in the rescue of a Kushner-owned property while Jared Kushner was employed as a senior White House official closely involved in the formulation of US policy towards the Middle East,” Wyden said.
‘Committee stonewalled’. Brookfield may have “intentionally misled” the public when it said that “no Qatar-linked entity” had been involved in the deal, according to Wyden. It has been alleged that Brookfield used a Qatari-backed fund to fund the transaction. A spokesperson for Brookfield did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Kushner could not immediately be reached for comment.
Five people, including police officer, killed in North Carolina shooting
A North Carolina mayor has announced that five people, including a police officer, were killed in a shooting in a residential area yesterday. Raleigh mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin told reporters that several people were shot on the Neuse River greenway trail around 5pm, and that the police department had told her the suspect had been “contained” at a residence in the area.
Numerous police vehicles and multiple ambulances had rushed to the Hedingham neighborhood starting in the late afternoon, and officers remained there for hours during an apparent hunt for the shooter. Details of what happened were still scant by early evening.
“State and local officers are on the ground and working to stop the shooter and keep people safe,” governor Roy Cooper had tweeted shortly before 7pm ET.
Source of the firearm used in shooting still unclear. The state has stronger gun laws than other southern states where people are allowed to buy and carry firearms without a permit. In North Carolina, prospective buyers are required to pass background checks before they buy a handgun.
Russia to evacuate Kherson, which could become frontline
Moscow has announced it will evacuate Kherson after an appeal from the Russian-installed head of the region, raising fears the occupied city at the heart of the south Ukrainian oblast will become a new frontline.
Marat Khusnullin, a Russian deputy prime minister, told state television that residents would be helped to move away from the region, which remains only partly occupied by invading troops because of a successful Ukrainian counterattack in recent months.
“The government took the decision to organise assistance for the departure of residents of the [Kherson] region to other regions of the country,” Khusnullin said.
It comes after a public request by Volodymyr Saldo, a former mayor of the port city, who was installed in April by the Russian forces as head of the wider Kherson region, imploring Vladimir Putin to help those who wished to flee the fighting, claiming Ukrainian attacks were imperilling the lives of local people.
Saldo, who was mayor of Kherson city between 2002 and 2012, said: “We, residents of the Kherson region, certainly know that Russia does not abandon its own, and Russia always lends a shoulder where it is difficult.”
In other news …
Dissidents in China detained and harassed as Beijing prepares for party congress. Authorities have stepped up surveillance of government critics as part of a crackdown on dissent before the Communist party’s 20th congress, its key twice-a-decade political gathering.
Dutch crown princess moves out of student flat after security threats. Catharina-Amalia, 18, has moved to the royal palace after threats to her security, amid reported fears that criminal gangs may target her for kidnapping or an attack.
Bankers’ bonuses in the UK have doubled since the 2008 financial crash, according to research by the unions’ umbrella body that accuses the government of enriching City financiers while suppressing the pay of key workers.
Elon Musk is under a federal investigation related to his $44bn takeover of Twitter, the social media company said in a court filing made public yesterday. Twitter, which sued Musk in July to force him to close the deal, said his attorneys had claimed “investigative privilege” when refusing to hand over documents.
Stat of the day: 70.8bn tonnes of east Antarctic glacier melts a year
Researchers from Australia’s national science agency have said the Denman ice shelf in remote east Antarctica could be at risk of unstable retreat as it melts at a rate of 70.8bn tonnes a year because of an ingress of warm sea water. It was thought east Antarctica would not experience the same rapid ice loss that is occurring in the west but some recent studies have shown warm water is reaching that part of the continent, too.
Melting of the floating part of the glacier does not add to sea level rise, writes Lisa Cox, but as the ice shelf becomes thinner or weaker it provides less resistance to the flow of ice from Antarctica into the ocean. “One of the take-home messages is when we’re looking at how much sea level is going to rise into the future, we do need to take east Antarctica into account, as well as west Antarctica,” said Steve Rintoul, one of the paper’s authors.
Don’t miss this: I broke every bone in my face
“One evening, the three of us were chilling on the balcony of my apartment, then my brothers went to bed,” Justin Starks tells Daniel Dylan Wray. “From then on, I don’t know what happened. I remember waking up in a hospital and being told I had fallen off our 30ft (nine-metre) balcony. I can remember my life about 30 minutes before the fall, but nothing after that. A lot of people say: ‘Oh my God, that must be the most painful experience imaginable,’ but I don’t remember.
“When I regained consciousness, my main concern was for my twin brother because I wasn’t sure if he knew what had happened to me – he might have thought I was dead. I didn’t have my phone on me, but the hospital called him. I later found out that he had seen my body on the ground. Someone on the ground floor had heard the impact of my fall and called the paramedics.”
Climate check: Egypt ‘silenced’ critical voices before Cop27
Egypt’s independent environmentalists have been neutralised before the country hosts this year’s UN climate talks, the environment director at Human Rights Watch has said. Richard Pearshouse said a failure to address abuses by Egypt and other authoritarian regimes would hold back the introduction of the forward-thinking climate policies needed to move away from dirty energy and rein in the climate crisis, in an interview with Nina Lakhani.
“It will be a fundamental mistake if diplomats go to Cop27 thinking they need to go softly-softly on human rights in order to make progress in the climate talks,” he said. “We will not get the urgent climate action needed without civil society pressure, the situation in Egypt shows us that.”
Last Thing: the many mysteries of the magic mushroom
The time of year when not-your-average ramblers can be seen hunting for a natural – if illegal – high across the northern hemisphere is upon us once more, writes Ed Douglas. “As is usually the case at this time of year, in among the ovine poo were some familiar mushrooms: purple russulas, ones to avoid, puffballs, and the spindly stem and Phrygian cap of Psilocybe semilanceata, or the magic mushroom,” he recounts of a hike in Eyam Moor, nestled in middle England.
“Magic mushrooms do particularly well on sheep pasture, thriving on all that manure and the nitrogen in sheep urine. But is it a two-way street? Some mushrooms are toxic to sheep just as they are to humans. The sheep don’t know this, though, and tiny magic mushrooms must be hard to avoid. Watching the sheep grazing peacefully, I wondered how you would know a sheep was tripping? Do they have visions? Are there shaman sheep?”
Sign up
First Thing is delivered to thousands of inboxes every weekday. If you’re not already signed up, subscribe now.
Get in touch
If you have any questions or comments about any of our newsletters please email newsletters@theguardian.com
