Summary
Closing summary
Our live coverage is ending now. In the meantime, you can find all of our live US politics coverage here.
Here is a summary of the key developments from today:
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Donald Trump voted by mail in Florida’s Republican primary, Politico reports, citing Palm Beach County voting records. The White House has confirmed the president’s mail-in vote, according to the New York Times, which added that this is at least the third time the president has mailed his ballot. In March, the president signed an executive order restricting the use of mail-in ballots ahead of the November midterm elections that will decide control of US Congress. Trump has repeatedly criticized mail-in voting, calling for restrictions on the policy for years and falsely claiming that his 2020 election defeat was the result of widespread voter fraud. A federal judge has blocked the US Postal Service from implementing part of the executive order, although Trump’s administration has asked the supreme court to intervene.
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A northern California county plans to hire Tina Peters, the prominent Colorado election denier recently released from prison, to work on elections. Shasta county, a conservative region home to 182,000 people, has emerged as a center of the US election denialism movement in recent years. California governor Gavin Newsom’s office said the state is investigating Peters’ hiring.
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CNN has shared a statement saying it stands behind reporter Kristen Holmes after Donald Trump repeatedly told the CNN reporter to “be quiet” and accused her of being “a fake reporter” during questioning over conditions onboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. Shortly after the president reprimanded Holmes, the White House invoked her children in a social media post further attacking the reporter.
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Donald Trump again threatened to bomb Oman if it “gets in the way” of his effort to end the US-Israel war on Iran, as the two-month window to negotiate peace with Iran expired on Monday with no end to the conflict in sight. “If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” Trump told Fox News, the second time he has directed such a threat at Muscat, a longtime US strategic partner that has traditionally served as a key backchannel between Washington and Tehran.
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Trump said that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had responded to his overtures after he ordered the US to scale back military exercises with South Korea. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump was asked why Kim had not responded to his overtures. Trump shot back at the reporter: “How do you know he hasn’t responded?” The reporter then asked again if he had. “Um, yeah he has,” Trump said. Asked what stage the conversations with Kim were at, Trump said “it’s very positive”, but provided no further detail.
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Trump also claimed he had third-hand reports that the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is “beautifully maintained” despite extensive accounts of deteriorating living conditions during its lengthy deployment in the strait of Hormuz. “The Lincoln has been out there for a period of time – a good period of time – but over the years, we’ve had them out there much longer,” Trump said, describing an exchange with a veteran, whom he did not name, over the weekend. It has been more than 250 days since the Lincoln has touched land, and reports have described shortages of supplies and water and plumbing problems. Several sailors have attempted to leap from the ship according to their reports, prompting Democratic lawmakers to demand answers from the Pentagon.
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In Israel, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met Benjamin Netanyahu for more than four hours after the Israeli prime minister rejected a US-backed peace plan for the Gaza war that included a withdrawal of Israeli troops from the devastated territory. Netanyahu has said he rejected any withdrawal that would take place before Hamas fully disarms. Kushner was said to have told Netanyahu not to create obstacles to a peace deal, US officials told media outlets. He also told Fox News that progress in getting Hamas to give up its weapons and move forward with a Gaza peace plan could materialize in about a month.
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Elsewhere, the US supreme court rejected for a second time Trump’s attempt to overturn a jury verdict in 2023 that found him liable for sexually abusing writer E Jean Carroll, and later defaming her. The court announced the decision in an unsigned order, without providing an explanation. The decision leaves intact the $5m civil judgment against Trump, that was returned by the jury after the two-week trial in 2023.
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The House ethics committee announced that it is investigating Democratic representative Jimmy Gomez over allegations of sexual misconduct. The committee said in a statement that it is reviewing allegations that Gomez “engaged in sexual misconduct in violation of the Code of Official Conduct or any other applicable standard of conduct, including engaging in inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”
South Korean president Lee Jae Myung says that a strong US-South Korea alliance and independent national defense are mutually necessary. He added that the Ulchi exercise is defense and not intended to attack North Korea or raise tensions.
During a cabinet meeting, Lee said that South Korea should pursue as planned the transfer of wartime operational control of South Korean forces from Washington to a Seoul-led Future Combined Forces Command.
“A strong alliance makes the foundation of security stronger, and strengthening our own capabilities increases our value and necessity as an ally,” Lee said.
Updated
California governor Gavin Newsom’s office said the state is investigating news that Shasta County has hired Tina Peters, the prominent Colorado election denier recently released from prison, to work on elections.
“She should still be in prison. The state is investigating this,” Newsom’s office said in a social media post.
My colleagues Dani Anguiano and Sam Levine have the full story:
CNN has shared a statement saying it stands behind reporter Kristen Holmes after Donald Trump repeatedly told the CNN reporter to “be quiet” and accused her of being “a fake reporter” during questioning over conditions onboard the USS Abraham Lincoln.
“Kristen Holmes is one of the most respected and accomplished journalists covering the White House. This afternoon, she did her job and asked the President of the United States a tough, relevant and newsworthy question on behalf of the American people. Public officials are free to challenge reporting they disagree with, but personal attacks on journalists for asking questions are beneath the office and inconsistent with the principles of the free press. We stand firmly behind Kristen and reject these attacks in the strongest possible terms.”
Shortly after the president reprimanded Holmes, the White House invoked her children in a social media post further attacking the reporter.
“Someday, your children will come across your disgusting and inhumane question. They will be sickened and embarrassed to have a parent be so callous and vindictive. It’s quite troubling,” the White House wrote.
In a second social media post, it also called Holmes “a disgraceful, humiliating embarrassment to her alleged profession” and added “These scumbags are the lowest of the low.”
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In a post on Truth Social, Donald Trump continued his years-long false claims of election fraud in the United States – including by implying that mail-in voting is insecure, the same day that Politico reported he himself voted by mail last week.
“Earlier this month, India’s Chief Election Commissioner, Gyanesh Kumar, asked our Administration — How can you have Elections in the U.S. without a valid Photo ID? India’s last Election had 646,000,000 Voters! Less than 1% voted by mail, and every single Voter had to have a VALID Photo Identity Document. We need to pass THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, now!” Trump wrote.
James Talarico, the Texas Democratic candidate for Senate, has hired a staffer from outgoing Republican senator John Cornyn’s office, NOTUS reported. Across the aisle shuffling of campaign staff is highly rare.
NOTUS reports that Talarico’s campaign has hired Jacob Smith, who worked as Cornyn’s deputy legislative director and policy advisor, for five years.
“I’ve worked for Republicans like Senator Cornyn my entire career, but this year I’m proud to be joining James Talarico’s campaign,” Smith said in a statement to NOTUS. He also criticized Republican nominee Ken Paxton, calling him “the most corrupt, self-dealing politician in Texas.”
Smith is not the first surprising endorsement Talarico has won – in June, Houston attorney Dan Cogdell, who was part of Paxton’s defense team during the Republican’s historic impeachment trial in 2023 that ended in acquittal, endorsed Talarico and not his former client.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has proposed subsidising liability insurance for state and local police officers who enforce federal immigration laws, in an aim to shield officers who are accused of on-duty misconduct.
The Associated Press first reported the news, citing an ICE planning document detailing the policy.
According to the planning document, police officers would purchase liability insurance covering up to $500,000 – which could cover legal fees and settlements – for about $250 per year, and then be reimbursed that amount by ICE.
A northern California county that has become a hotbed of activism for those who sow doubts about the reliability of voting machines plans to hire Tina Peters, the prominent Colorado election denier recently released from prison, to work on elections.
Clint Curtis, the top election official in Shasta county, told the Guardian he plans to hire Peters as a consultant to replace Brent Turner, his top deputy, who has been on medical leave. He said Peters would not have access to the county’s voting system. Plans to hire Peters were first reported by Action News Now.
Shasta county, a conservative region home to 182,000 people, has emerged as a center of the US election denialism movement in recent years. In 2023, the county’s governing body unsuccessfully sought to remake the voting process by cutting ties with the voting machine company Dominion Voting Systems and implementing a hand-count system that experts warned would be costly and far less accurate. The MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, one of the leading promoters of falsehoods about election fraud in the US, said he would support the county’s effort. The state ultimately blocked Shasta’s plans. In addition, several candidates who lost their race for local office have embraced baseless conspiracy theories about election fraud and sued to overturn results.
Read our full report below:
Trump votes by mail amid his administration's ongoing attacks on policy
Donald Trump voted by mail in Florida’s Republican primary, Politico reports, citing Palm Beach County voting records. The White House has confirmed the president’s mail-in vote, according to the New York Times, which added that this is at least the third time the president has mailed his ballot.
In March, the president signed an executive order restricting the use of mail-in ballots ahead of the November midterm elections that will decide control of US Congress. Trump has repeatedly criticized mail-in voting, calling for restrictions on the policy for years and falsely claiming that his 2020 election defeat was the result of widespread voter fraud.
A federal judge has blocked the US Postal Service from implementing part of the executive order, although Trump’s administration has asked the supreme court to intervene.
After Politico reported on the president’s ballot Monday afternoon, citing local voting records, the New York Times reported that it “could not access these records through the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections website, which said that Mr. Trump’s voting record was ‘protected from public disclosure.’”
However, a White House spokeswoman later confirmed to the Times that Trump voted by mail, saying: “As everyone knows, the President is a resident of Palm Beach and participates in Florida elections, but he obviously primarily lives at the White House in Washington, D.C.”
In a post on Truth Social on Monday, Trump continued his years-long false claims of election fraud in the United States – including by implying that mail-in voting is insecure.
“Earlier this month, India’s Chief Election Commissioner, Gyanesh Kumar, asked our Administration — How can you have Elections in the U.S. without a valid Photo ID? India’s last Election had 646,000,000 Voters! Less than 1% voted by mail, and every single Voter had to have a VALID Photo Identity Document. We need to pass THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, now!” Trump wrote.
Trump first registered to vote in Palm Beach County, Flordia in 2019. Since then, he has voted by mail in 2020, during a special election for statehouse earlier this year and last week, when he mailed his ballot on 13 August.
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A federal judge halted the Trump administration’s effort to relocate the FBI headquarters to Washington DC, rather than a congressionally approved site in Maryland.
US District Judge Theodore Chuang sided with Marlyand’s attorney general and Prince George’s County, where the new FBI headquarters is slated to be located. Chuang wrote that the Trump administration’s selection of the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington violated congressional measures requiring the General Services Administration to select one of three locations outside Washington.
“Maryland and Prince George’s County committed more than a decade of work to earn the FBI headquarters and pledged hundreds of millions of dollars. By blocking the Trump Administration’s unlawful attempt to move the FBI to the Reagan Building and divert the funds Congress set aside for this project, the Court has cleared the path back to Greenbelt,” Maryland attorney general Anthony G. Brown said in a statement.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan urged Donald Trump in a call today to continue talks with Iran to de-escalate tensions between the two countries, and offered Ankara’s support in peace efforts, the Turkish presidency said.
In a statement, the presidency said Erdoğan and Trump also discussed Israel’s war in Gaza, a defence pact signed between Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, and bilateral ties.
It added that Erdogan told Trump that Israel’s attacks on Palestinians in Gaza had increased at a time when the second phase of Trump’s peace plan was supposed to come into effect.
The day so far
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Donald Trump again threatened to bomb Oman if it “gets in the way” of his effort to end the US-Israel war on Iran, as the two-month window to negotiate peace with Iran expired on Monday with no end to the conflict in sight. “If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” Trump told Fox News, the second time he has directed such a threat at Muscat, a longtime US strategic partner that has traditionally served as a key backchannel between Washington and Tehran.
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Trump said that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had responded to his overtures after he ordered the US to scale back military exercises with South Korea. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump was asked why Kim had not responded to his overtures. Trump shot back at the reporter: “How do you know he hasn’t responded?” The reporter then asked again if he had. “Um, yeah he has,” Trump said. Asked what stage the conversations with Kim were at, Trump said “it’s very positive”, but provided no further detail.
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Trump also claimed he had third-hand reports that the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is “beautifully maintained” despite extensive accounts of deteriorating living conditions during its lengthy deployment in the strait of Hormuz. “The Lincoln has been out there for a period of time – a good period of time – but over the years, we’ve had them out there much longer,” Trump said, describing an exchange with a veteran, whom he did not name, over the weekend. It has been more than 250 days since the Lincoln has touched land, and reports have described shortages of supplies and water and plumbing problems. Several sailors have attempted to leap from the ship according to their reports, prompting Democratic lawmakers to demand answers from the Pentagon.
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In Israel, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met Benjamin Netanyahu for more than four hours after the Israeli prime minister rejected a US-backed peace plan for the Gaza war that included a withdrawal of Israeli troops from the devastated territory. Netanyahu has said he rejected any withdrawal that would take place before Hamas fully disarms. Kushner was said to have told Netanyahu not to create obstacles to a peace deal, US officials told media outlets. He also told Fox News that progress in getting Hamas to give up its weapons and move forward with a Gaza peace plan could materialize in about a month.
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Elsewhere, the US supreme court rejected for a second time Trump’s attempt to overturn a jury verdict in 2023 that found him liable for sexually abusing writer E Jean Carroll, and later defaming her. The court announced the decision in an unsigned order, without providing an explanation. The decision leaves intact the $5m civil judgment against Trump, that was returned by the jury after the two-week trial in 2023.
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The House ethics committee announced that it is investigating Democratic representative Jimmy Gomez over allegations of sexual misconduct. The committee said in a statement that it is reviewing allegations that Gomez “engaged in sexual misconduct in violation of the Code of Official Conduct or any other applicable standard of conduct, including engaging in inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”
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Trump dismisses USS Lincoln criticism and snaps at CNN reporter to ‘be quiet’
Further to my earlier post, my colleague George Chidi has this report on Donald Trump'’s claims today that he had third-hand reports that the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is “beautifully maintained” despite extensive accounts of deteriorating living conditions during its record-breaking deployment in the strait of Hormuz.
At the White House earlier, Trump berated a CNN reporter at a press availability, insisting that she “be quiet” and describing the reporting as fake news.
“The Lincoln has been out there for a period of time – a good period of time – but over the years, we’ve had them out there much longer,” Trump said, describing an exchange with a veteran, whom he did not name, over the weekend.
“He happened to be an admiral, retired. He said, ‘I’ve been on ships that are out there much longer than that, sir. And I know people on the Lincoln, they say it’s beautifully maintained and beautifully taken care of.’ And other people went out and they found out that to be true,” said Trump. “It was fake news reporting from CNN.”
Trump also didn’t identify the “other people” he claimed had verified the anonymous admiral’s account.
The Lincoln, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier capable of long deployments without refueling, left port from San Diego on 21 November 2025 and has now set a modern record for the longest time at sea without a port call. It has been more than 250 days since it has touched land.
The Navy Times and Stars and Stripes – the latter notably under increased control of the Pentagon as a defense publication – have also largely confirmed reports of the Lincoln’s conditions.
The publications described shortages of supplies and water and plumbing problems. Several sailors have attempted to leap from the ship according to their reports, prompting Democratic lawmakers to demand answers from the Pentagon.
Naval families with loved ones deployed for months on US warships amid the Iran war have reacted with fury to Trump and defense secretary Pete Hegseth’s dismissal of their concerns about the extreme pressures and dire conditions they are enduring.
The Guardian also spoke to three naval families who have been following the physical and mental stresses bearing down on their relatives with mounting alarm.
“I grew up in a United States where you have to be very respectful of the military, as they’re making the ultimate sacrifice and protecting their country, and now you have the commander-in-chief and defense secretary dismissing their experiences and calling them liars,” said the sister of one Lincoln crew member, who spoke anonymously for fear of retribution. “I’m really angry.”
Kushner predicts Hamas disarmament progress in 'as little as 30 days'
More now from Jared Kushner’s interview with Fox News in Tel Aviv, where Donald Trump’s special envoy and son-in-law said that progress in getting Hamas to give up its weapons and move forward with a Gaza peace plan could materialize in about a month.
“We could be seeing progress ... in as little as 30 days, hopefully starting to take some of the weapons out,” Kushner said.
He said he met for nearly four hours with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and reassured him on several sticking points. “There were some valid concerns” on the Israeli side, Kushner said.
For example, he said, the Trump administration is committed to helping to rebuild Gaza. “But we will not allow Gaza to be rebuilt until the demilitarization occurs. Nobody wants to put more money into a place ... if it’s just going to be taken over by terrorists,” he said.
“We’re also not going to restrict Israel’s right to defend itself if there are any imminent threats and so we had to clarify what that means,” Kushner said. “For Israel we think it’s a win-win situation.”
Either Hamas will go ahead in disarming “willingly over the next 60 to 90 days” or “Israel will have a lot more support from the US and others to go and finish the job in the appropriate way,” Kushner added.
He said he had had a “very cordial” meeting with Hamas officials, but added that “it’s very, very hard to trust a terrorist organization.”
Updated
Construction on a US-Mexico border project in Big Bend national park has halted, the Trump administration said today, as Customs and Border Protection (CBP) evaluates the controversial project in Texas.
“CBP is pausing all construction activity in Big Bend National Park while I visit and conduct a personal, on-the-ground evaluation,” CBP’s head, Rodney Scott, wrote in a social media post.
Footage of bulldozers ploughing through the 800,000-acre (325,000-hectare) Chihuahuan desert national park emerged earlier this month, after the Trump administration did not announce and initially denied construction on a multibillion-dollar “smart wall” expansion in the park.
Last year, Congress approved $46.5bn for a border wall expansion in the “big, beautiful” spending bill Donald Trump signed into law on 4 July 2025.
Although many Texas Republicans have remained silent about the construction, outgoing senator John Cornyn sent a letter to Markwayne Mullin, Trump’s homeland security secretary, asking him to halt construction on the wall.
“My constituents believe that the 1,000-foot riverbank cliffs and remote Big Bend terrain offers its own sources of deterrence for any illegal migrants crossing into the United States,” Cornyn wrote.
Scott, the CBP chief, has said that he expects the agency will build the first layer of the wall by the end of next year.
Trump approval falls to 33%, lowest of his presidency, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds
Donald Trump’s approval rating fell to the lowest level of his presidency with an overwhelming majority of Americans concerned the war with Iran will last a long time, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that concluded today.
Just 33% of respondents in the four-day survey said they approved of Trump’s performance in the White House, while 64% disapproved.
Trump’s approval rating, down from 35% in a poll that closed earlier this month and lower than at any point in his current term, has now tied the lowest level of his prior term reached in December 2017.
After returning to the White House last year with just under half the country approving of his presidency, Trump’s popularity this year took a hit after he ordered strikes on Iran alongside Israel.
The ensuing conflict paralyzed a fifth of the global oil trade, triggering a surge in the price of gasoline which is weighing on US households - and on Trump’s Republican allies defending congressional majorities in November’s crucial midterm elections.
Trump, who campaigned on promises to keep inflation in check and avoid long-lasting wars, initially pledged the conflict with Iran would take a few weeks, and argued the war was the only way to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon that could threaten the US and its allies.
But Iran has proved resilient and has choked the oil trade through the strait of Hormuz even as the conflict has cooled. Some 80% of Americans - including 87% of Democrats and 71% of Republicans - think US involvement in Iran “will go on for an extended period of time”, the Reuters/Ipsos poll found.
Texas parents ask US supreme court to hear Ten Commandments in classrooms case
A group of Texas parents have asked the US supreme court to block a state law that requires the Ten Commandments to be displayed in public schools.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other groups joined the parents of diverse faiths with children in Texas public schools in asking the high court to hear the case.
“The US Supreme Court has rejected this kind of government-imposed religion before, and it should do so again,” Chloe Kempf, an attorney at the ACLU of Texas, said in a statement.
“Our nation’s bedrock principle of separating church and state means that families and faith communities – not politicians – get to decide what role religion plays in children’s lives,” she said.
In a similar case in 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that the display of the Ten Commandments in schools in Kentucky was unconstitutional.
However in April, a conservative-dominated appeals court ruled in favor of the Texas law, which requires the scripture to be posted in every classroom.
The judges ruled that the bill did not violate the establishment clause of the US Constitution, the part of the first amendment that prohibits the government from establishing a national religion or showing preference to one over another.
Conservatives enjoy a 6-3 majority on the supreme court and the justices have sided with religious rights claims in a number of recent high-profile cases.
Along with Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Alabama have all passed laws requiring the posters of the commandments in public schools. South Carolina, West Virginia and Missouri are also considering similar bills.
Updated
A reminder that the memorandum of understanding between the US and Iran expired today. Further to Donald Trump’s comments in the Oval Office earlier that Tehran was “not going to make the kind of deal I feel is necessary”, his special envoy and son-in-law Jared Kushner has been speaking to Fox News.
“Right now, they’re not showing any interest in doing something that makes sense for us,” Kushner said of Iran.
Asked what he felt the biggest roadblock to reaching an agreement, Kushner said, “They have to be willing to make a real deal.” He added:
If they’re going to play a trick or do something to hide certain cards and get certain concessions … Trump wants to make a fair deal that could be a win-win … but they have to want to be a real country, which means no nuclear weapons and no funding terror in the region.
Updated
House ethics committee investigating Jimmy Gomez over sexual misconduct allegations
The House ethics committee has announced that it is investigating Democratic representative Jimmy Gomez over allegations of sexual misconduct.
The committee said in a statement that it is reviewing allegations that Gomez “engaged in sexual misconduct in violation of the Code of Official Conduct or any other applicable standard of conduct, including engaging in inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”
It added that that existence of an investigation and public disclosure of the investigation “does not itself indicate that any violation has occurred”.
CNN reported back in June that the panel was investigating 51-year-old Gomez, of California, including over an alleged romantic relationship he had in 2023 with an aide who worked for another member of Congress. He’s been married since 2011.
According to CNN’s sources, the committee made early contacts in an attempt to follow up on a New York Post story, which alleged that Gomez had been spotted kissing a much younger aide, who worked for another member of Congress, outside a backyard party in 2023. A Gomez spokesperson told The Post at the time that the accounts were “not true” and the kiss “didn’t happen”.
While reaching out to look into that story, one of the sources told CNN that the committee had learned of other allegations of sexual misconduct against Gomez that it is now also investigating.
House rules don’t currently prohibit members of Congress from having relationships with staffers outside their own offices, but the bipartisan sexual misconduct task force is weighing whether to recommend changing this.
It comes not long after two other representatives, Democrat Eric Swalwell and Republican Tony Gonzales, recently resigned amid allegations of sexual misconduct with staffers.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that an unnamed former staffer had accused Swalwell, of California, of sexually assaulting her on two occasions. CNN later published a similar account, as well as allegations from three other women of him sending them unwanted sexual messages.
In the case of Gonzales, of Texas, he weathered for weeks calls to resign after admitting to an affair with an aide who later died by suicide, before eventually caving to pressure to not run for re-election.
Republican Chuck Edwards also recently dropped his bid for re-election after the committee determined that he “fostered a hostile work environment and engaged in sexual harassment” by giving gifts and lavishing attention on two young female staffers.
The committee has also opened an investigation into Republican Cory Mills regarding campaign financial misconduct and domestic abuse allegations.
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Trump then moved on to answering another reporter’s question, claiming that it was “a CNN fake report” that there isn’t enough food on the USS Abraham Lincoln, which hasn’t seen port in nine months.
“The Lincoln has been out there for a good period of time,” he said, claiming that it’s been out at sea for longer periods of time and is “beautifully maintained”. This echoes comments he made last Friday that the deployment was “not nearly long enough”.
Trump has repeatedly downplayed concerns from military families and members of Congress who have called attention to the intensifying mental health crisis and poor conditions for those onboard the aircraft carrier, as its 5,000 sailors and marines endure a record-breaking deployment at sea tied to Trump’s war with Iran.
The president also had an astonishing exchange with a CNN reporter, telling her multiple times to “BE QUIET” and accusing her of being “a fake reporter”.
She tried several times to ask her question, while Trump talked over and insulted her:
You’re fake news. You’re a loud, boisterous person, be quiet, be quiet, be quiet, you’re a fake reporter and you report fake news.
Trump has an ugly history of speaking to female reporters in this way.
Trump also claimed he was “actually making it much safer” for South Korea by scaling back joint military drills just days after North Korea test-fired ballistic missiles.
He said again that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had always “treated me with great respect” and that they understand each other.
I get along with him very well. Now, what I’m doing is making things safer.
Updated
Asked if the US was any closer to a deal with Iran to end its nuclear programme, Trump told reporters:
They want to make a deal, but they’re not going to make the kind of deal that I feel is necessary.
The US and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding on 17 June but the two-month window for a negotiated settlement closed today without a breakthrough.
Updated
Trump says Kim Jong-un has responded to his overtures but doesn't offer details
Donald Trump has said that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has responded to his overtures after he ordered the US to scale back military exercises with South Korea.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump was asked why Kim had not responded to his overtures. Trump shot back at the reporter: “How do you know he hasn’t responded?” The reporter then asked again if he had.
“Um, yeah he has,” Trump said. Asked what stage the conversations with Kim were at, Trump said “it’s very positive”, but provided no further detail. He added:
Kim Jong-un has always treated me with great respect and we met on numerous occasions, actually two primary occasions, spoken and spent time. I understand him. He understands me.
Their relationship was a dominant theme during Trump’s first term, including a series of meetings between them, but has received less emphasis in his second term.
Updated
Donald Trump is currently speaking to the press in the Oval Office as he meets Ryder Williams, a teenage lifeguard who saved a 10-year-old boy from pounding waves off the California coast last month.
Trump previously said on social media that he would be inviting Williams to the White House to reward his bravery. The child Williams saved, Nathanial Rai, and his father are also at the meeting.
Dramatic video of the rescue went viral last month. It showed Williams clinging to Rai as waves repeatedly crashed over them. The pair disappeared from view and re-emerged after several seconds as the wave receded.
A second lifeguard was eventually able to help get them both back to shore at Seabright Beach in Santa Cruz.
Williams’s father, Shane Williams, who is also at the Oval Office meeting today, told the Guardian at the time: “I almost started crying because how determined he was to save that boy’s life makes me so proud.”
Trump initially commented on the video in response to a post from his son, Eric Trump, who said Williams deserved “the highest civilian honor”.
Updated
Trump blames 'vandals' for damaged grass in the spot where he held his big July 4 celebration
Donald Trump has blamed “vandals” for large swaths of dead grass on the National Mall near the World War II Memorial — in the very spot where he had a stage built and hosted crowds for his 4 July celebration.
Trump made the accusation in a social media post yesterday without saying why he believes it’s the work of vandals instead of trampled turf from the Independence Day festivities. He posted a photo showing a once-grassy area by the World War II Memorial, now patchy and brown across much of the sprawling turf.
“Look what VANDALS did to the grass connecting the vandalized World War II Monument and the vandalized Reflecting Pool, which will be opened again, and better than ever, shortly,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform. “Anybody who thinks the Reflecting Pool wasn’t vandalized should go back to Law School!”
Trump has repeatedly blamed “vandals” for damage to his renovation projects in the nation’s capital, often without evidence and sometimes despite opposing accounts from his officials.
Trump lashed out at US attorney Jeanine Pirro this month after her office concluded that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was the result of poor construction and not the work of vandals.
Authorities on Friday announced an arrest in connection with vandalism at the World War II Memorial , after the words “Clean hands dirty $” were found painted on the monument and bubbles filled a fountain. Pirro said felony charges were being brought against Melissa L Farris, who was in custody and couldn’t be reached for comment by the Associated Press.
A woman identified on her Facebook page as Melissa Lovewell on Thursday posted a video in which she is seen taking cans of spray paint from her bag and then painting the monument. “I will wait here to be arrested for spraying our veterans’ fountain,” she says. “It was me. I’m doing it. It’s on camera.”
The woman was identified by her Kentucky driver’s license as Melissa L Farris, of Elizabethtown, Kentucky, an arrest warrant cited by the AP says.
Charging documents in that case make no mention of the grassy area Trump is highlighting in his new claims. Authorities said Farris had previously been arrested for camping on federal property a few blocks from the World War II Memorial, but not the area cited by Trump.
That stretch of lawn is instead where a large stage was built and crowds gathered to hear from Trump and watch fireworks at a 4 July event celebrating the nation’s 250th anniversary. Trump claimed without providing evidence that more than 400,000 people attended the event before a storm hit the area and delayed his remarks.
Photos from the time, taken by a streaming webcam atop the Washington Monument, show a large bandstand and seating areas covering nearly the entire lawn Trump now says has been vandalized. Associated Press photos from the days that followed showed workers removing the structures, revealing brown, damaged grass underneath.
On 1 August, Trump posted a different photo of the same area that appears to show the numbers “86 47” – which federal officials have said constitutes a threat against Trump, the 47th president – emblazoned into the grass.
He cited it as evidence refuting Pirro’s conclusion, calling it “a pure case of VANDALISM, that included the grass.” Trump wrote: “There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!”
Those numbers are not visible in the photo Trump posted yesterday.
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US gas prices this month are so far the highest ever recorded for August as peace talks between the US and Iran have stalled and Donald Trump launched fresh threats against Oman.
The national average price of gas was $4.06 per gallon on Monday, according to data from AAA, $0.05 higher than last week and $1 more expensive than a year ago. In California and Hawaii, averages hit about $5.50 a gallon.
Energy prices have been high since the US-Israel war with Iran began at the end of February and the strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway through which a fifth of the oil passes, was blocked.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, reached $112 a barrel in March, a high not seen since 2022. While prices have since come down closer to $85 a barrel, they are still about 30% higher than a year ago.
Attorney General Todd Blanche on Monday announced changes to the process for restoring federal gun possession rights to those who lost them as a consequence of criminal convictions.
“Restoration of firearm rights is neither automatic nor guaranteed,” Blanche said in a published statement on X.
Under the new rules, each applicant must prove to the attorney general’s satisfaction that their record, reputation and conduct since the prohibition show they are not likely to act in a manner dangerous to public safety; and that granting relief is not contrary to the public interest.
Violent felons, registered sex offenders, undocumented immigrants, fugitives, habitual drug users and people under domestic-violence restraining orders are presumed ineligible for gun rights restoration.
Previously, the restoration of federal gun rights effectively required a presidential pardon. The DoJ is launching a web-based portal for applications.
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Benjamin Netanyahu and US envoy Jared Kushner discussed putting an American general in charge of verifying Hamas’s disarmament earlier today, an Israeli official said, as the Israeli prime minister insisted there would be no pullout from Gaza until then.
Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law, flew to the region after Netanyahu, facing a tough re-election fight, publicly rejected the latest part of a US plan aimed at ending Israel’s devastating war on Gaza.
Kushner, who has long family ties to Netanyahu, met with him in Jerusalem a day after holding rare direct talks in Egypt with Hamas, which has publicly committed itself to the plan and to disarmament, winning praise from Trump but prompting deep scepticism in Israel.
The two sides “agreed that no redeployment or reconstruction would take place in the Gaza Strip before Hamas is disarmed throughout Gaza”, a senior Israeli official told AFP.
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Supreme court rejects Trump's bid to overturn E Jean Carroll verdict for second time
The US supreme court has rejected Donald Trump’s latest attempt to overturn a jury judgment that found him liable for sexually abusing and then defaming writer E Jean Carroll.
The high court did not give any reason for its decision not to rehear the president’s challenge. In late June it also refused to hear his appeal against the original May 2023 verdict, leaving intact the $5m that Carroll was awarded in damages.
Carroll, 82, a former journalist and columnist, accused Trump of assaulting her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in Manhattan in 1996.
When the allegations were published in an excerpt from her 2019 memoir, Trump called Carroll a “nut job” and accused her of lying.
Trump paid $5.6m in damages and post-judgement interest to Carroll last month after a civil jury found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation.
In a separate defamation case in New York, Trump was ordered to pay $83.3m to her. Trump has also appealed that judgment to the supreme court.
Republican senator Thom Tillis deplored Trump’s decision to cut US military drills with South Korea, which comes despite military officials from both countries warning that Kim Jong-un’s regime is learning new battlefield expertise, including new drone tactics, from assisting Russia with its war in Ukraine.
Tillis wrote on X:
South Korea has been a solid military ally for over 70 years that possesses exquisite military capabilities. Reducing joint exercises with South Korea does nothing more than free up thousands of North Korea’s troops to support Putin’s systematic kidnapping, torture, rape, and murder of innocent Ukrainian citizens.
Top Democrat slams Trump's 'inane, haphazard' cuts to US-South Korea drills
Senator Jack Reed has slammed “another inane, haphazard decision by President Trump and his chaotic administration” after Trump ordered the Pentagon to scale back “inappropriate and hostile” military drills with South Korea aimed at deterring North Korea.
The Democrat, who serves as the ranking member of the Senate armed forces committee, said in a statement that the president’s move amounted to punishing South Korea “for no reason beyond Trump’s ego”, would weaken confidence in US commitments to its allies – and handed a “propaganda victory” to Kim Jong-un.
“When President Trump cuts military exercises to flatter a dictator or punishes South Korea for declining to join a war he started, all of our allies – and adversaries – think that America’s commitments are negotiable,” Reed said. “Kim Jong-un has won a propaganda victory and South Korea, one of our strongest allies, has been punished for no reason beyond Trump’s ego.”
He added: “China and Russia are watching how easily this president abandons America’s allies, and they will remember it the next time they test us.”
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US senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia described his Republican opponent Mike Collins as a “bigot congressman surrounded at work and at home by neo-Nazis and white nationalists” and a “scandal piñata” at a rally on Sunday in Atlanta.
Ossoff was referencing reports that Collins’ son-in-law, David Alan Scheer II, is a white nationalist and social media influencer with a history of sharing antisemitic material and sentiment and Nazi imagery on the internet. Scheer is registered to vote at a property Collins owns and has been pictured in Collins’ campaign material and at campaign events.
Additionally, Collins’ former chief of staff Kevin “Kip” Talley posted on a message board that he took a meeting with white nationalists Richard Spencer and Nick Fuentes. First reported by Slate in May, Talley said he hoped to use his congressional position to help free a notorious Holocaust denier, Charles Johnson from prison.
Talley left his position with Collins’ office in June. “I’ve repeatedly said nobody speaks for me; I only speak for myself,” Collins said, shortly after reporting about Scheer emerged. “He has had no role in my campaign whatsoever, and I don’t believe or support those views, and I have always condemned racism and antisemitism regardless of the source”.
Collins fled news reporters at a press event in July when questioned about Scheer and his ties to white nationalism. Collins
Ossoff is seeking a second term in a swing state that Democrats almost certainly must hold to retake control of the Senate. Collins, in his second term representing Georgia’s 10th congressional district, has yet to poll ahead of Ossoff in any survey since winning the Republican nomination.
Ossoff spoke at length about problems of government corruption, highlighting the crypto trading and stock trading of the president as a sign of fundamental dysfunction.
”The situation is absurd,” Ossoff said. While the CEOs of AI firms build bunkers, “and warn us the new intelligence they’re training could lead to mass joblessness, or human extinction, our congress debates ballrooms and youth sports. We’ve amassed enough firepower to end the world a 1000 times over, but we can’t summon the will to guarantee healthcare and pre-K. I say all this to say … it’s the crushing weakness of our politics against the unmet needs of our people and the massive stakes of our times that’s shaking our faith in the future. But Atlanta, I refused to leave my girls a world as stark and dangerous and cruel as this one threatens to become.”
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Trump threatens to bomb Oman if it ‘gets in the way’ of Iran
Donald Trump threatened to bomb the Gulf state of Oman, an American ally, if it interfered in negotiations with Iran over control of the strait of Hormuz, Fox News reported this morning.
“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” Fox News’ Trey Yingst reported that Trump said to him in a phone call on Sunday.
Oman is America’s longest-serving diplomatic and military partner in the Gulf, dating to a treaty of “Amity and Commerce” in 1833. Oman has served as a go-between in negotiations between Iran and the United States over the years, and has offered the United States military access to its ports since 1980, and opened ports capable of servicing an aircraft carrier to the United States in 2019.
Iran began attacking those ports in Oman with drones at the start of the war in February, leading Oman to withdraw its agreement to service US navy oilers.
This is not the first time Trump has threatened to strike Oman. In May, as Oman and Iran began discussing a mechanism for collecting tolls on ship traffic through the strait of Hormuz, Trump said at a press availability that, “Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we’ll have to blow them up.”
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President Donald Trump reiterated on Monday that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon amid a lack of progress in diplomatic efforts to resolve the Middle East conflict.
“The number one Goal is, and always will be, that Iran cannot have, in any way, shape, or form, a Nuclear Weapon,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
New Mexico’s attorney general is mounting a full-court press against technology companies to improve their child safety measures, capitalizing on a landmark win in court against Meta earlier this year.
Raúl Torrez is working with state lawmakers to draft two new bills he says will strengthen consumer protections and child safety online. The legislation, expected to be announced in the coming weeks, will build on the state’s case against the parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram. A jury found in March that the company misled its users about the safety of its platforms and enabled harm, including child sexual exploitation. The social media giant was fined nearly $1bn as a result of the case.
The trial was the first to hold Meta liable for harmful acts committed on its platforms. It followed a 2023 Guardian investigation that exposed how Facebook and Instagram had become marketplaces for child sex trafficking.
Torrez is pursuing additional lawsuits, including a second case against Meta and one against an AI company whose chatbot has become a source of emotional attachment for children.
In an interview with the Guardian, the state’s top legal official said the proposed laws would go beyond social media, creating a broader consumer protection framework for emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence and chatbots. He has also had preliminary discussions about the legislation with Deb Haaland, the former US interior secretary and Democratic nominee for New Mexico governor, who expressed support for his efforts.
“I think there’s a lot of momentum coming out of our victory in court, and the idea is to build on that momentum,” said Torrez, who is running for re-election this year.
Donald Trump’s son-in-law and envoy, Jared Kushner, held a rare meeting with Hamas’s political chief on Sunday in Egypt, in a new diplomatic effort to make progress in the stalled Gaza ceasefire.
Kushner will meet on Monday with Benjamin Netanyahu, who is under pressure after rejecting the new 15-point, US-backed road map.
The talks aim to salvage the plan for Hamas to disarm and Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian territory shattered by war.
At stake are the lives of 2 million people in Gaza and reconstruction of the crowded territory now largely controlled by Israeli forces, more than 10 months since the ceasefire ended major military operations. A meeting between Kushner, fellow envoy Steve Witkoff and Hamas leaders in Egypt last year helped clinch the ceasefire, whose progress until now had been stalled over the key issue of Hamas’s disarmament.
The over two-hour meeting in Egypt with Hamas’s political chief, Khalil al-Hayya, was confirmed by a regional official and a Hamas official, both speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters. Kushner was one of a trio of envoys meeting with al-Hayya, with officials from mediating countries Egypt, Qatar and Turkey also there.
Hamas in a statement later called on mediators and the US-created Board of Peace overseeing the ceasefire to “compel” Israel to approve the road map for next steps.
Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, last week rejected the 15-point plan in a rare public show of defiance against the Trump administration, Israel’s closest ally.
Republican senator Bill Cassidy – a medical doctor who voted to confirm anti-vaccine activist Robert F Kennedy as federal health secretary in early 2025 – on Sunday denounced Donald Trump’s “crazy, stupid” claims about the safety of the combined MMR vaccine for undermining faith in immunization.
When Trump recently ordered changes to the recommended childhood vaccination schedule, with Kennedy by his side, the president called for two shots of the combined Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine to be scrapped in favor of two doses of three separate vaccines, claiming that the MMR shots are “sort of like a nuclear weapon” that could be “quite lethal”.
Cassidy, whose re-election bid ended in defeat to a Trump-backed challenger in a Republican primary in Louisiana, has been on the president’s enemies list since 2021, when the senator voted to convict him of “incitement of insurrection” in connection with the US Capitol attack carried out by Trump supporters toward the end of his first presidency.
Asked about Trump’s comment that “nothing bad can happen” from advising parents to get six separate shots for their children, instead of two, Cassidy told CNN on Sunday: “If it wasn’t so potentially tragic, you would break out laughing at a comment like that.
“Let’s just take it from the perspective of the parent: now instead of going to the doctor twice to get their child vaccinated, they have to go six times. Instead of the child getting two jabs, they get six jabs,” he continued. “Instead of the insurance company paying for two doctor’s visits, they’re paying for six, which is going to ultimately drive up premiums …
“So the president is wrong; there’s a lot of bad things that will come out of this.”
Cassidy’s critics have lambasted the outgoing senator for expressing misgivings about Trump’s actions, including a recent shouting match over the ongoing Iran war – but continuing to cast crucial votes to confirm the president’s nominees.
British PM exchanged messages with individual impersonating Trump chief of staff
Andy Burnham exchanged messages with someone impersonating Donald Trump’s chief of staff, the Guardian understands.
The UK prime minister was in contact with an unknown individual pretending to be the senior White House aide Susie Wiles before concerns were raised about the incident. No messages of significance were sent and the suspicious activity was quickly reported to the appropriate authorities, it is understood.
The British embassy in Washington was so concerned it raised the matter with the White House, according to Politico, which first reported the exchange. A UK government spokesperson said: “We do not comment on national security matters.”
Last year, the Wall Street Journal reported that the FBI had launched an investigation into efforts to access Wiles’s phone after an unknown person pretending to be her contacted prominent Republicans and business chiefs.
It is unclear when the messages were sent and what was discussed between Burnham, who succeeded Keir Starmer in Downing Street on 20 July, and the impersonator.
Trump orders Pentagon to cut back military exercises with South Korea
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.
US president Donald Trump said he ordered the Pentagon to scale back “inappropriate and hostile” military drills with South Korea, hours before the exercises began on Monday.
The drills under Ulchi Freedom Shield, one of two major annual exercises held by South Korea and the US, start on Monday and run until 27 August.
They were expected to involve about 18,000 South Korean troops, alongside US forces and personnel from 11 of the 18 member states of the United Nations Command (UNC), the multinational body that oversees the 1953 armistice that halted hostilities of the Korean war.
However, on Sunday evening, the US president said he was “not happy” with US participation “based on my very good relationship with Kim Jong-un”. He added that they were costly and “send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile, to a country that, as long as Donald J Trump has been president, has been unthreatening and respectful”.
Trump added that it was too late to cancel the drills so he had ordered the defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, to “substantially reduce” them. He also said South Korea had refused to help in the “denuclearisation of the Islamic republic of Iran”.
Cheong Seong-chang, vice-president of the Seoul-based Sejong Institute thinktank, said Trump could go further if he meets Kim again, potentially deciding to suspend the exercises altogether or reduce US troop levels without consulting South Korea.
However, Leif-Eric Easley, a professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, cautioned that downsizing the exercise would “slow the process of South Korea taking on greater responsibility for its own defence, and weaken deterrence against possible conflicts in Asia”.
“The cost savings from downsizing drills are marginal, while the diplomatic benefits for relations with North Korea are doubtful,” he told Agence France-Presse.
Lim Eul-chul, a North Korea expert at Kyungnam University, added that Pyongyang was unlikely to be moved by Trump’s announcement. “The North will only view it as meaningful if the joint exercises are cancelled in their entirety rather than scaled back. It has little reason to see this as meaningful.”
Read the full story here:
In other developments:
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Andy Burnham exchanged messages with someone impersonating Donald Trump’s chief of staff, the Guardian understands. The UK prime minister was in contact with an unknown individual pretending to be the senior White House aide Susie Wiles before concerns were raised about the incident. No messages of significance were sent and the suspicious activity was quickly reported to the appropriate authorities, it is understood.
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Donald Trump’s son-in-law and envoy, Jared Kushner, held a rare meeting with Hamas’s political chief on Sunday in Egypt, in a new diplomatic effort to make progress in the stalled Gaza ceasefire. Kushner will meet on Monday with Benjamin Netanyahu, who is under pressure after rejecting the new 15-point, US-backed road map.
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Republican senator Bill Cassidy – a medical doctor who voted to confirm anti-vaccine activist Robert F Kennedy as federal health secretary in early 2025 – on Sunday denounced Donald Trump’s “crazy, stupid” claims about the safety of the combined MMR vaccine for undermining faith in immunization.
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Democrats on Sunday intensified their demands for answers from the Trump administration over conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln as the aircraft carrier’s nearly nine-month deployment continued fueling concern over crew morale, mental health and living conditions.
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US attorney general Todd Blanche on Sunday declined to assure that the federal justice department he helms would always act independently of the White House and Donald Trump. “No, I’m not going to pledge that,” he said when asked about the topic by NBC’s Meet the Press host, Kristen Welker. “And no attorney general should ever pledge that.”
