Closing summary
Our live coverage is ending now. In the meantime, you can find all of our live US politics coverage here, including coverage of New York City’s mayoral race. Here is a summary of the key developments from today:
Donald Trump arrived in the Netherlands for the annual Nato summit, where he will meet Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The US president is expected to take a victory lap after a ceasefire and apparent end to the 12-day war between Israel and Iran. But, a preliminary US intelligence report indicates that, contrary to Trump’s insistence that Iran’s capability to build a nuclear bomb was “totally obliterated” by weekend US airstrikes, they did not destroy their targets and in fact set back Iran’s ambitions only “by months”.
Democrats reacted angrily to the Trump administration’s decision to postpone an all-senators briefing on Iran. Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, said in a statement: “Senators deserve full transparency, and the administration has a legal obligation to inform Congress precisely about what is happening. What is the administration so afraid of?”
New York City residents were headed to the polls in a primary election that is both likely to decide the city’s next mayor and have major political implications for the future of the Democratic party. In a podcast appearance today, a former aid to Barack Obama questioned the Democratic party’s loyalty to former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, who resigned in disgrace amid sexual harrassment allegations in 2021. The race has come down to a close competition between the former governor and Zohran Mamdani, a 33-year-old Democratic socialist and current state assemblymember.
Testifying before a House health panel today, health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr voiced his skepticism of vaccines and reasoning behind his decision to stop recommending Covid-19 vaccines for pregnant women. Earlier today, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted a report saying evidence does not support a link between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism or other neurodevelopmental disorders, a claim vaccine skeptics have long seized upon. After the hearing, senator Bill Cassidy posted on social media that a meeting of vaccine advisors appointed by Kennedy and scheduled to convene tomorrow should be postponed.
A panel of judges in New York heard arguments in Trump’s appeal of an $83.3m defamation ruling against him after he was adjudicated to have sexually abused writer E Jean Carroll in the 1990s.
The Trump administration has approved $30m in funding for the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an Israeli-backed group delivering aid to Gaza. Since the foundation began operating last month, Palestinian witnesses and health officials have reported Israeli forces repeatedly shooting at Palestinians seeking aid at the food distribution centers. The organization says it has delivered 44m meals to Palestinians.
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As voters cast their ballots in New York City’s mayoral race, Central Park has recorded its hottest temperature in more than a decade.
The official weather station for the city, located in Belvedere Castle in Central Park, hit 99F (37C) this afternoon, the highest temperature it’s recorded since 30 June 2012.
In response to the extreme heat, the city’s emergency management team has shared on social media that it is “leading a full coordinated response to this brutal heat and support Election Day operations”, including opening cooling centers, protecting the electrical grid, and coordinating with the board of elections to keep poll sites open.
Here are some photographs from the historically hot day:
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