Elections

President Biden’s increasingly emphatic declarations that he will not exit the presidential race are delivering an unmistakable message to potential wayward Democrats: Any criticisms going forward damage the party’s chances against Donald J. Trump.For days, Mr. Biden has said he will remain his party’s nominee after his poor debate short of an intervention from “the Lord Almighty.” On Monday, he put that assertion into action.It began with an open letter to congressional Democrats saying he was definitely running. It continued with a defiant call into one of his favorite cable news shows decrying the “elites” trying to shove him out. It included a midday appearance on a private video call with some of his campaign’s top financiers as well as a call into a virtual meeting on Monday evening with a bulwark of his past support: the Congressional Black Caucus.“I am not going anywhere,” Mr. Biden told the donors.The moves amounted to a show of defiance that the Biden operation hoped would earn him some deference, as uneasy Democratic lawmakers trickled back to Capitol Hill after a holiday break. At the same time, the Biden team was trying to reframe the pressure campaign to get him to step aside as one hatched by the elite party establishment rather than a genuine reflection of grass-roots voter fears about the 81-year-old commander in chief’s age and acuity.“I love this fighting Joe Biden,” said Representative Robert Garcia of California, a Democrat and an outspoken Biden supporter. “When he takes a punch, he’s going to come back and punch harder.”As lawmakers returned to Washington, Mr. Biden received some key words of support, including from Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York (“He is in this race; the matter is closed”), but also some concerns among influential lawmakers, including Senator Patty Murray of Washington, who is in the Democratic leadership (“We need to see a much more forceful and energetic candidate”).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Jay Johnston, an actor best known for his role on the animated comedy show Bob’s Burgers, has pleaded guilty to charges related to his role in the storming of the US Capitol in January 2021.Johnston, 54, faces a maximum of five years in prison and pleaded guilty to a felony count of civil disorder. He was released on a $25,000 bond in June 2023 after an initial court appearance in California.Johnston was also charged with felony obstruction of officers during civil disorder, unlawful entry on restricted buildings or grounds, and impeding passage through Capitol grounds.Documents filed in court allege Johnston joined a mob of protesters attacking police. A video from the incident showed the actor take a shield from an officer and use it to push back law enforcement officers defending the Capitol.Johnston “was close to the entrance to the tunnel, turned back and signaled for other rioters to come towards the entrance”, the charging documents stated. He also acknowledged his role in the Capitol riot, sending a text message that stated it “wasn’t” an attack but that it “kind of turned into that”.“It was a mess,” another message said.Three current or former associates of Johnston identified him as a suspect from photos the FBI published online, according to the agent. The FBI said one of those associates provided investigators with the text message in which Johnston acknowledged being at the Capitol on January 6.Airline records also proved Johnston booked a round-trip flight from Los Angeles to Washington DC, leaving on 4 January 2021 and returning on 7 January, according to FBI filings.In addition to Bob’s Burgers, Johnston has appeared on HBO’s Mr Show with Bob and David and held smaller roles on the Fox sitcom Arrested Development. US district judge Carl Nichols is set to sentence Johnston on 7 October.Also on Monday, a Texas woman pleaded guilty to assaulting a Metropolitan police department officer during the Capitol attack. Video captured Dana Jean Bell cursing at officers inside the Capitol and grabbing an officer’s baton, according to an FBI agent’s affidavit.Bell, 65, of Princeton, Texas, also was shown on video assaulting a local television journalist outside the Capitol that day. The FBI affidavit says Bell appeared to reach out and try to push or grab the journalist, who worked for the Fox affiliate in Washington DC.Bell faces a maximum sentence of eight years in prison. US district judge Timothy Kelly is scheduled to sentence her on 17 October. Her estimated sentencing guidelines recommend a term of imprisonment of between two and two and a half years.Approximately 1,000 people have been convicted of or pleaded guilty to federal crimes related to the Capitol riot, according to the Associated Press, with more than half of those sentenced getting terms of imprisonment ranging from seven days to 18 years. More

A Russian missile strike on a children’s hospital in Kyiv on Monday highlighted the growing number of deadly attacks on medical facilities, vehicles and workers.A Russian missile strike on Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital on Monday highlighted the growing number of deadly attacks on medical facilities, vehicles and workers in the country this year. It adds to data from the World Health Organization and suggests that more Ukrainians may be on track to be killed in such attacks this year than last year.Before the strike on the Ohmatdyt Children’s Hospital in Kyiv, the W.H.O. documented 18 deaths and 81 injuries from more than 175 attacks on health care infrastructure in Ukraine for the first half of 2024. The organization also recorded 44 attacks on medical vehicles in that period.In all of 2023, the organization tallied 22 deaths and 117 injuries from 350 such attacks, and 45 more specifically on medical vehicles like ambulances. Other organizations put the death toll even higher.In the attack on Monday, at least one doctor and another adult were killed at the hospital, and at least 10 other people, including seven children, were injured during a Russian barrage across the country. In all, the bombardment killed at least 38 people, including 27 in Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, local officials said. Attacks on civilian hospitals are prohibited under Article 18 of the Geneva Convention, which was ratified by United Nations member states after World War II. And Article 20 of the convention says that health care workers must be protected by all warring parties.Russia has repeatedly attacked Ukrainian health care infrastructure, experts say, in a campaign that some say amounts to war crimes.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

With millions of utility customers in East Texas cut off from electricity by the storm, the utility serving the overwhelming majority of those customers said it was working to set up mobile power sources for critical facilities.The utility, CenterPoint Energy, which supplies power in and around Houston, said that some 2.26 million customers had lost their electric service at the peak on Monday, and that the figure had since fallen only slightly.The company said it was looking into using mobile generation units to provide temporary power to places like cooling centers, health care facilities, police and fire stations, senior centers and educational centers.“We are mobilizing all of our available resources, as well as mutual assistance resources from other utility companies, to begin the process of quickly and safely restoring power to our customers,” Lynnae Wilson, senior vice president for electric business at CenterPoint, said in a statement. “We understand how difficult it is to be without power for any amount of time, especially in the heat.”The utility said it had begun assessing damage to its facilities and rerouting power to transmission lines that had not been damaged.Once it has assessed the damage, CenterPoint said, it will publish estimates for how soon service can be substantially restored. Customers in the hardest-hit areas should prepare for an extended period without electricity, the company said.“This will be a multiday restoration effort,” said Thomas Gleeson, the chairman of the state’s Public Utility Commission, discussing the widespread power outages. “It’s going to take a few days to get this restored.” More

Eleven days after his disastrous debate performance, the president’s strategy is coming into focus.Good evening. Tonight, we’re taking a look at the strategy behind President Biden’s efforts to steady his candidacy. And I’m covering a new ad campaign from Republicans who want to defeat Trump.The latest developmentsAn expert on Parkinson’s disease visited the White House eight times in eight months, including at least once for a meeting with President Biden’s physician.Biden told his biggest donors he is staying in the presidential race.Jill Biden, the first lady, emphasized to voters in several states that her husband was “all in” on his campaign.A defiant President Biden sent a simple message on Monday to the detractors who say he needs to bow out of the presidential race: Bring it.“Any of these guys that don’t think I should run, run against me. Announce for president, challenge me at the convention,” Biden said while calling into MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” show, all but daring the Democrats who have been complaining about his electability since his disastrous debate performance to stand up and do something about it.Biden has been roundly criticized not just for his halting debate performance but also for moving too slowly to acknowledge and quell the hailstorm of doubts about his fitness to campaign and serve another four years. He is now rolling out a more aggressive playbook to try to shut down talk of his being shoved aside as the Democratic presidential nominee.Biden campaigned in North Carolina the day after his showdown with Donald Trump, but it wasn’t until Friday, eight days after the debate, that he sat for questions about it in a major television interview. He held campaign events in two swing states over the holiday weekend.“Even the president acknowledges that, that there was too much distance between, you know, between the debate and being out there,” said Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland, a Democrat, noting the North Carolina stop. “He understands that, in order to be successful, we’re going to have to do that and then some.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

The gift, made by Michael R. Bloomberg’s philanthropic organization, will also cover living expenses for some Johns Hopkins University students.A $1 billion gift from Michael Bloomberg to Johns Hopkins University, announced on Monday, will allow most students at the university’s medical school to attend free of cost and will also increase financial aid for other students in the university’s schools of nursing and public health and other graduate programs.Bloomberg Philanthropies, which oversees Mr. Bloomberg’s charitable efforts, said in a statement that the gift would ensure that “the most talented aspiring doctors representing the broadest range of socio-economic backgrounds will have the opportunity to graduate debt-free” from the university.Starting with the fall semester, Johns Hopkins will offer free tuition for medical students from families that earn less than $300,000 annually, Bloomberg Philanthropies said. The university will also pay for living expenses and other fees for students from families earning up to $175,000.Mr. Bloomberg, a former mayor of New York City and a graduate of Johns Hopkins, said in a statement that the high cost of medical school and graduate school “too often bars students from enrolling” at a crucial time when the United States faces a shortage of medical professionals.“By reducing the financial barriers to these essential fields, we can free more students to pursue careers they’re passionate about and enable them to serve more of the families and communities who need them the most,” Mr. Bloomberg said.Other universities have also been able to waive tuition for medical students in recent years. Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx did so after Ruth Gottesman, a longtime professor there, made a $1 billion donation earlier this year. In 2023, Kenneth G. Langone, a billionaire financier and a founder of Home Depot, and his wife, Elaine Langone, made a $200 million donation to the N.Y.U. Long Island School of Medicine, making tuition free for medical students.This is not the first large contribution to Johns Hopkins from Mr. Bloomberg, who routinely makes donations toward the arts, education, the environment and public health. Bloomberg Philanthropies made a $1.8 billion donation to the university in 2018 as part of an effort to ensure that undergraduate students would be accepted by the university regardless of their family’s income.Ron Daniels, the president of Johns Hopkins University, said in a statement on Monday that “removing financial barriers to individual opportunity fuels excellence, innovation and discoveries that redound to the benefit of society.”The new gift from Mr. Bloomberg will mean that nearly two-thirds of medical students who currently attend Johns Hopkins or who will enter programs at the university soon will be eligible for free tuition or both free tuition and living expenses, according to the university. Those who are eligible will soon receive updated financial aid packages.José Luis Castro, the president and chief executive of Vital Strategies, a nonprofit public health organization, said on social media that the gift to Johns Hopkins was “transformational and inspiring” and that it would “help meet the growing need for doctors and public health professionals.” More

Sullivan & Cromwell is requiring job applicants to explain their participation in protests. Critics see the policy as a way to silence speech about the war.For as long as students at colleges across the United States have protested the war in Gaza, they’ve drawn the fury of some of the financial world’s mightiest figures — investors, lawyers and bankers — who have flexed their financial power over universities, toppling school leaders in the process.It didn’t stop the students. The protests intensified this year until campuses emptied out for the summer.Now, a prominent Wall Street law firm is taking a more direct approach with protesters. Sullivan & Cromwell, a 145-year-old firm that has counted Goldman Sachs and Amazon among its clients, says that, for job applicants, participation in an anti-Israel protest — on campus or off — could be a disqualifying factor.The firm is scrutinizing students’ behavior with the help of a background check company, looking at their involvement with pro-Palestinian student groups, scouring social media and reviewing news reports and footage from protests. It is looking for explicit instances of antisemitism as well as statements and slogans it has deemed to be “triggering” to Jews, said Joseph C. Shenker, a leader of Sullivan & Cromwell.Candidates could face scrutiny even if they weren’t using problematic language but were involved with a protest where others did. The protesters should be responsible for the behavior of those around them, Mr. Shenker said, or else they were embracing a “mob mentality.” Sullivan & Cromwell wouldn’t say if it had already dropped candidates because of the policy.“People are taking their outrage about what’s going on in Gaza and turning it into racist antisemitism,” Mr. Shenker said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Nara and Lucky Blue Smith make sunscreen and toothpaste from scratch. Experts have thoughts.Last month, the model and influencer Nara Smith said she had recently run out of sunscreen. Instead of buying more, she asked her husband, Lucky Blue Smith, to make some from scratch.Mr. Smith’s process, which Ms. Smith posted to TikTok last month, looked more like a cooking video than anything else. Wearing an unbuttoned shirt and holding a toothpick between his lips, he combined ingredients including coconut oil, shea butter, jojoba oil and zinc oxide powder in a clear bowl.In a certain pocket of social media, Ms. Smith has become known for such do-it-yourself content. It began with her posting recipes to satisfy food cravings, but grew to include videos of her husband making personal care products such as sunscreen, toothpaste and moisturizer from scratch.Some commenters admire the couple’s D.I.Y. cosmetics, while others wonder whether their content is satire. But cosmetic chemists, dentists and dermatologists agree that making beauty products from scratch isn’t always a good idea. Homemade moisturizer presents few risks, but homemade sunscreen is far less likely to offer protection, and D.I.Y. toothpaste may be bad for tooth enamel, experts said.Ms. Smith, who did not respond to requests for comment, has at times nodded to the limitations of her experience. In the toothpaste video, for example, she acknowledged that she is not a professional dentist. But at other times, as in her sunscreen TikTok, she assured viewers that her husband “is a baker, so he makes sure that everything is very precise.”Cosmetic chemistry is not the same as baking, said Marisa Plescia, the vice president-elect of the Society of Cosmetic Chemists. Experts make products according to precise formulas; attempting that process at home when you’re not a chemist can lead to D.I.Y. products that are ineffective, don’t last long or react poorly with your skin, she said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More