Closing summary
It’s a wrap on Monday’s US politics blog. Thanks for joining us.
Joe Biden sought to allay rising fears of a recession in the US, but admitted during a press conference in Tokyo that the fight against inflation and soaring prices “is going to be a haul”.
But it was the president’s comments on Taiwan, and his pledge that the US would defend the island if it was attacked by China, that raised eyebrows and caused some confusion. White House aides were forced to step in and insist nothing had changed in the US approach to China.
Here’s what else we followed:
- Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis suffered defeat at the appeals court over his law attempting to ban social media companies from removing politicians, and fining them $250,000 a day if they did.
- The House ethics committee is launching an inquiry into allegations that extremist Republican congressman Madison Cawthorn improperly promoted a cryptocurrency in which he had a financial interest, and engaged in an improper relationship with a staffer.
- The Washington DC attorney general is suing Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg over “data harvesting” related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
- A Covid-19 vaccine for children younger than five appears closer after Pfizer-BioNTech said clinical trials showed three low doses generated a strong immune response, and was safe and well-tolerated.
- The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol is expected to stage six public hearings in June on how Donald Trump and some allies broke the law as they sought to overturn the 2020 election result.
Please join us again tomorrow on a big day for US politics, including intriguing midterm primary elections in Georgia, Texas and several other states.
Water restrictions are coming to California, the state’s Democratic governor Gavin Newsom warned Monday, if residents do not drastically reduce usage during an ongoing severe drought.
“We all have to be more thoughtful about how to make every drop count,” Newson said in a statement about his meeting today with leaders of California’s largest urban water providers.
“Californians made significant changes since the last drought but we have seen an uptick in water use, especially as we enter the summer months”.
Until now, the agencies have had the power to set rules for water use in the cities and towns they supply, the Associated Press says, even as California enters its third year of severe drought.
But Newsom says the lack of significant rain and snow from January to March, this year the driest in at least a century, and Californians not responding to his earlier calls for water conservation, are forcing a rethink.
A spokesperson for Newsom’s office said the administration would reassess conservation progress in “a few weeks”.
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