US Politics

Officials claim to find ‘rampant fraud’ in childcare funding, but prosecutions began in Biden era and Tim Walz says ‘we’ve spent years cracking down on it’ The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it is freezing federal funding for childcare programs in Minnesota after allegations of fraud – first exposed and prosecuted during the Biden administration – recently became the focus of conservative influencers and media outlets.Jim O’Neill, the deputy secretary of health and human services, said in a video statement that the funding freeze was in response to what he called “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country … We have turned off the money spigot and we are finding the fraud.” Continue reading… More

More musical acts pull out of performances after Trump slaps his name on the building – key US politics stories from 30 December at a glanceThe list of musical artists canceling gigs at the Kennedy Center, which Donald Trump has attempted to rename the “Trump-Kennedy Center”, in Washington DC continues to grow.A second jazz band has pulled out of a New Year’s Eve gig, giving just two days’ notice before the event was set to take place. Continue reading… More

A pity that Trump, or one of the 18 intelligence agencies reporting to him, did not trace the image back to its sourceEven while on holiday at his Florida resort, Donald Trump has refused to take a break from his unrelenting war on wind energy.Late Tuesday, the US president posted an image of a dead bird beneath a turbine on social media, accompanied by the lament: “Windmills are killing all of our beautiful Bald Eagles!” Continue reading… More

Lawyers for Brian Cole argue he should be released ahead of trial for allegedly planting devices in DC in 2021The man accused of planting pipe bombs outside the headquarters of both the Democratic and Republican national committees the night before the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol appeared at a federal detention hearing before a magistrate judge on Tuesday.Earlier this month, authorities arrested Brian Cole Jr of Woodbridge, Virginia. He has yet to enter a plea. Cole’s lawyers argued that he should be released while he awaits trial, as he does not present any danger. They also noted that Cole had agreed to home detention enforced by GPS monitoring, and would live under the supervision of a relative. The defense rebuked federal prosecutors who pushed for the suspect to remain in custody. Continue reading… More

Emergency request by several of the country’s nationals and an immigrants rights group was granted by the courtA federal judge on Tuesday blocked plans by the Trump administration to end temporary protections from deportation that had been granted to hundreds of South Sudanese nationals living in the United States.US district judge Angel Kelley in Boston granted an emergency request by several South Sudanese nationals and an immigrant rights group to prevent the temporary protected status they had been granted from expiring as planned after 5 January. Continue reading… More

Over the holiday period, the Guardian leader column is looking ahead at the themes of 2026. Today, how US foreign policy has dramatically – and alarmingly – turned towards Latin America and the CaribbeanDonald Trump is not generally noted as a student of history. Yet over the past year, his decisive reorientation of US foreign policy towards the Americas has revived a playbook dating back two centuries, to the fifth president, James Monroe. Now the 47th is doubling down. An anti-interventionist is having second thoughts. Remarks that sounded at first like bad jokes or random outbursts from the presidential id have become more sinister through repetition or accompanying actions. Only a fool would take all of Mr Trump’s comments literally – but they should certainly be taken seriously.He has refused to rule out using military force to take control of Greenland and repeatedly floated the idea of making Canada the 51st state. He threatened to seize the Panama canal. He has imposed swingeing tariffs on key partners, and says he might abandon the Canada-Mexico trade pact signed in his first term. He has meddled outrageously in elections in Honduras and Argentina, and sought to interfere with Brazilian justice. He imposed sanctions on Colombia’s president in October. He has launched deadly attacks on alleged drug boats in international waters – extrajudicial killings that the administration has sought to legitimise by arbitrarily designating traffickers as terrorists – and threatened military strikes on Mexico, Venezuela and any other country he blames for drugs consumed in the US.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading… More

Calculating the actual savings and impact of the bulldozing US department that vowed to cut $1tn in waste is difficultElon Musk, AI and the antichrist: the biggest tech stories of 2025When Elon Musk vowed late last year to lead a “department of government efficiency” (Doge), he claimed it would operate with “maximum transparency” as it set about saving $2tn worth of waste and exposing massive fraud.Today, with Musk out of the White House, Doge having cut only a tiny fraction of the waste it promised, and dozens of lawsuits alleging violations of privacy and transparency laws, much of what the agency has done remains a mystery. Continue reading… More

After the far-right US representative’s resignation, Harris wonders who his opponent for Georgia’s 14th district will beRetired brigadier general Shawn Harris had been all geared up for a campaign to defeat Marjorie Taylor Greene next November, and then the far-right representative quit the field. Now he’s wondering what Republicans will throw at him.In November, Greene announced she would resign from Congress rather than face a challenger backed by the president after she began disagreeing with Donald Trump’s policies on Iran, healthcare and the release of the Epstein files, opening the field for a successor. Continue reading… More