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‘Americans are democracy’s equivalent of second-generation wealth’: a Chinese journalist on the US under Trump – podcast
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Trump says Maduro’s days are numbered but ‘doubts’ US will go to war with Venezuela
Donald Trump has sent mixed signals about potential US intervention in Venezuela, playing down concerns of imminent war against the South American nation but saying its leader Nicolás Maduro’s days were numbered.The president’s remarks, made during a CBS interview released on Sunday, come as the US amasses military units in the Caribbean and has conducted multiple strikes on alleged drug-trafficking vessels, killing dozens.Asked during the 60 Minutes program if the US was going to war against Venezuela, Trump said: “I doubt it. I don’t think so.” However, when asked if Maduro’s days as president were numbered, he replied: “I would say yeah. I think so, yeah.”Maduro, who faces indictment on drug charges in the US, has accused Washington of using drug trafficking as a pretext for “imposing regime change” in Caracas to seize Venezuelan oil.More than 15 US strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific have killed at least 65 people in recent weeks, with the latest taking place on Saturday, prompting criticism from governments in the region.Washington has yet to make public any evidence that its targets were smuggling narcotics or posed a threat to the US.In the same interview, Trump alleged countries including Russia and China had conducted underground nuclear tests unknown to the public, and that the US would test “like other countries do”.“Russia’s testing, and China’s testing, but they don’t talk about it,” he told 60 Minutes.“I don’t want to be the only country that doesn’t test,” he said, adding North Korea and Pakistan to the list of nations allegedly testing their arsenals.Confusion has surrounded Trump’s order that the US begin testing, particularly if he meant conducting the country’s first nuclear explosion since 1992.Trump first made his surprise announcement in a social media post on Thursday, minutes before entering a summit with the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, in South Korea, saying he had “instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis”.The announcement came after Russia said it had tested a new nuclear-powered cruise missile, the Burevestnik, and a nuclear-powered and nuclear-capable underwater drone.Asked directly if he planned for the US to detonate a nuclear weapon for the first time in more than three decades, Trump told CBS: “I’m saying that we’re going to test nuclear weapons like other countries do, yes.”No country other than North Korea is known to have conducted a nuclear detonation for decades. Russia and China have not carried out such tests since 1990 and 1996, respectively.Pressed on the topic, Trump said: “They test way underground where people don’t know exactly what’s happening with the test. You feel a little bit of a vibration.”However, Trump’s energy secretary, Chris Wright, on Sunday downplayed any possible tests by the US, telling Fox News on Sunday: “I think the tests we’re talking about right now are system tests. These are not nuclear explosions.”The US has been a signatory since 1996 to the comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty, which bans all atomic test explosions, whether for military or civilian purposes.Other topics addressed in the interview included:
Trump said he “won’t be extorted” by Democrats to reopen the government, making clear that he has no plans to negotiate as the government shutdown will soon enter its sixth week.
Asked to clarify whether he would try to run for a third term, which is barred by the constitution, Trump said: “I don’t even think about it,”
Trump said immigration enforcement officials hadn’t gone far enough in deporting people who were in the country without legal authorisation.
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Trump news at a glance: Republicans insist Trump is ‘desperate’ to resolve shutdown as Snap payments end
Republicans are insisting that Donald Trump is “desperate” to end the government shutdown, which has now entered its 33rd day.The comments by the Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, come as the US president delays food assistance funding for millions of low-income Americans but steams ahead with construction of his $300m gilded White House ballroom.Johnson presented Trump as a man angry and desperate to break the impasse so as to ease mounting pain for ordinary Americans. “He’s just desperate for the government to open, he’s tried everything he can,” Johnson said, adding that Trump was a “big-hearted president, he wants everybody to get their services”.Yet Trump continues to exert an iron grip on the shutdown, resisting political and even federal court pressure to ease the burden on vulnerable Americans while protesting that he has no power to end the impasse.Here are the day’s key Trump administration stories at a glance.Johnson claims ‘big-hearted’ Trump wants to reopen US governmentHouse speaker Mike Johnson’s claims that Donald Trump is desperate to reopen the US government come two days after the president hosted a lavish, Great Gatsby-themed soiree at Mar-a-Lago.Two federal court judges ruled on Friday that the Trump administration must use $5bn in contingency funds to keep paying food assistance Snap benefits for up to 42 million low-income Americans. The payments stopped on Saturday under the shutdown, posing the risk of hunger for millions of people.Read the full storyFBI fires top official amid Patel’s outrage at reports of agency jet useA top FBI official with 27 years standing has reportedly been fired by the bureau after its director, Kash Patel, became enraged by press stories revealing he had used a government jet to travel to see his girlfriend sing the national anthem at a wrestling match.Steven Palmer, who had worked at the bureau since 1998, was fired as head of the FBI’s critical incident response group, which is responsible for handling major security threats as well as overseeing the agency’s fleet of jets. He was the third head of the unit to be dismissed since Patel became FBI director in February.Read the full storyThree killed in US military strike on alleged drug vessel in CaribbeanThe US military has carried out another lethal strike on alleged drug smugglers in the Caribbean Sea, US defense secretary Pete Hegseth said.He said on Saturday the vessel was operated by a US-designated terrorist organization but did not name which group was targeted. Three people were killed in the strike, he said.It is at least the 15th such strike carried out by the US military in the Caribbean or eastern Pacific since early September.Read the full storyICE spoils celebrations in ChicagoImmigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in Chicago mean that celebrations of Halloween, All Saints Day on 1 November and Día de los Muertos have been muted in the neighborhoods of Pilsen and Little Village.“Clearly it’s because of ICE,” said resident Cecilia Romero. Referring to how JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, had unsuccessfully requested that the Trump administration pause immigration enforcement operations for the Halloween weekend that began Friday, Romero added: “I think people are just scared. It’s just kind of sad that kids are not allowed to have fun on a day where they should be [kids].”Read the full storyWhat else happened today:
California voters appear poised to approve a redistricting measure placed on the ballot in August by Democrats and the state’s governor, Gavin Newsom, who have cast it as a chance to check Trump’s power.
As the US president builds his palace, Americans are going hungry, writes David Smith.
Catching up? Here’s what happened on 1 November. More - in US Politics
George Clooney says replacing Joe Biden with Kamala Harris ‘was a mistake’
George Clooney has said he feels it was a “mistake” for Kamala Harris to replace Joe Biden in the 2024 US presidential election, adding that he had no regrets about the New York Times opinion piece in which he called on the Democrats to find a new presidential nominee.Speaking on CBS’ Sunday Morning, the actor and activist, who is a prominent financial donor to the Democratic party, said he would write his op-ed again if given the chance, and that he wished the Democrats had held a new primary to elect a presidential candidate. Instead, Harris was nominated by a virtual vote of party delegates.“We had a chance,” Clooney said. “I wanted there to be, as I wrote in the op-ed, a primary. Let’s battle-test this quickly and get it up and going. I think the mistake with it being Kamala is she had to run against her own record. It’s very hard to do if the point of running is to say, ‘I’m not that person’. It’s hard to do and so she was given a very tough task.“I think it was a mistake, quite honestly. But we are where we are. We were gonna lose more House seats, they say. So I don’t know. To not do it would be to say, ‘I’m not gonna tell the truth’.”Clooney’s op-ed, headlined “I Love Joe Biden. But We Need a New Nominee”, was a prominent example amid a growing wave of dissent among Democrat voters about Biden’s ability to continue as US president, after he performed poorly during his first presidential debate with Donald Trump.“We are not going to win in November with this president,” Clooney wrote at the time. “On top of that, we won’t win the House, and we’re going to lose the Senate. This isn’t only my opinion; this is the opinion of every senator and congress member and governor that I’ve spoken with in private. Every single one, irrespective of what he or she is saying publicly.”In July, Biden’s son Hunter Biden gave a profanity-laced, three-hour interview to the US outlet Channel 5 in which he attacked Clooney for writing the op-ed.“Fuck him!” Hunter Biden said of Clooney. “Fuck him and everybody around him. I don’t have to be fucking nice.”He questioned why anyone listened to Clooney, saying: “What do you have to do with fucking anything? What right do you have to step on a man who’s given … his fucking life to the service of this country and decide that you, George Clooney, are going to take out basically a full-page ad in the fucking New York Times.”Asked by CBS if he saw Hunter Biden’s reaction, Clooney laughed wryly and said, “Yeah, I saw it”. Asked what he made of it, he said, “I could spend a lot of time debunking many of the things he said … but the reality is, I don’t think looking backwards like that is helpful to anyone. Particularly to him. I don’t think it is helpful to the Democratic party. So I’m just going to wish him well on his ongoing recovery and I hope he does well and just leave it at that.“I have many personal opinions about it but I don’t find it to be helpful to have a public spat with him.”Since her failed presidential bid, Harris has been critical of Biden’s initial decision to run for a second term. In her book 107 Days, published in September, she wrote that she was “in the worst position to make the case that he should drop out” because “I knew it would come off to him as incredibly self-serving if I advised him not to run. He would see it as naked ambition, perhaps as poisonous disloyalty, even if my only message was: don’t let the other guy win.” More
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FBI fires top official amid Kash Patel’s outrage over reports of agency jet use
A top FBI official with 27 years standing has reportedly been fired by the bureau after its director, Kash Patel, became enraged by press stories revealing he had used a government jet to travel to see his girlfriend sing the national anthem at a wrestling match.Steven Palmer, who had worked at the bureau since 1998, was fired as head of the FBI’s critical incident response group which is responsible for handling major security threats as well as overseeing the agency’s fleet of jets. He was the third head of the unit to be dismissed since Patel became the second Trump administration’s FBI director in February.Bloomberg Law, which broke the story, said that three unnamed sources had expressed astonishment at the sacking given that Patel’s flight schedules were fully public and trackable on websites. A day after her performance, Patel himself had reposted photos showing him together with his girlfriend, country singer Alexis Wilkins, on his X account.According to Bloomberg, Patel had become furious over stories published after the event about his use of the FBI jet to go on the date with Wilkins. Soon after, Palmer had been told he could resign instantly or be fired.The dismissal was made official on Friday.Flight logs publicly trackable on Flight Aware for Patel’s plane, N708JH, show that the jet landed at an airport near Penn State on 25 October. That evening Wilkins performed at a Real American Freestyle wrestling event, and the flight logs show Patel’s FBI plane later flying to Nashville.Records for the movements of the jet N708JH were blocked on Flight Aware as of Sunday. A search for the government jet generates a message saying that it is “not available for public tracking per request from the owner/operator”.On Sunday, Patel posted a lengthy statement on his X account in which he said he refused to be “distracted by baseless rumors or the noise from uninformed internet anarchists and the fake news”. He said it was a “disgrace” to go after “people doing great work, my personal life, or those around me”, reserving his harshest words for what he called the “disgustingly baseless attacks against Alexis – a true patriot and the woman I’m proud to call my partner in life”.He also fueled further speculation by attacking “our supposed allies” whom he lambasted for “staying silent”, though he did not name names. “Your silence is louder than the clickbait haters,” he said.In an earlier statement his spokesperson, Ben Williamson, pointed out that the FBI director is required under government rules to pay some reimbursement for his private jet travel and claimed Patel had “significantly limited” personal trips compared with his predecessors Chris Wray and James Comey. “He’s allowed to take personal time on occasion to see family, friends or his longtime girlfriend,” the spokesman said.As the Daily Beast has noted, Patel was highly critical of Wray’s use of government jets for personal use when Wray was director of the bureau. In 2023, Patel scathingly dubbed Wray “#GovernmentGangster” and accused him of “jetting off on out (sic) tax payer dollars while dodging accountability for the implosion of the FBI on his watch”.Palmer’s dismissal makes him the third head of the FBI critical incident response group to be ditched under Patel. Wes Wheeler was fired in March, and Brian Driscoll in August.Driscoll is now suing the Trump administration for unfair dismissal claiming he was targeted for showing lack of loyalty to the president.Patel’s travel on a government jet for a date night was first spotted by Kyle Seraphin, a former FBI agent who has become a thorn in the side of the Trump administration. His podcast is caustically critical of the current leadership of the FBI.“We’re in the middle of government shutdown … and this guy is jetting off to hang out with his girlfriend in Nashville on our dime?” Seraphin said in a recent podcast.The government shutdown to which Seraphin alluded had entered its 32nd day.In a separate unflattering development for him, Patel is facing heat from a defense lawyer in Michigan who is objecting to the FBI director’s allegations Friday that five young men had been arrested as they planned a Halloween terror attack. The lawyer, Amir Makled, who represents one of the five individuals, said that having reviewed the case he was convinced no such terror event had been in the pipeline.Makled told Associated Press that the FBI director’s claims were “hysteria and fearmongering”. The five men were aged 16 to 20 – and were US citizens and gamers.“I don’t believe that there’s anything illegal about any of the activity they were doing,” he said. More
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Republicans argue ‘big-hearted president’ Trump is keen to end shutdown
Top Republicans are portraying Donald Trump as a “big-hearted president” who is desperate to reopen the US government, even as he delays food assistance funding for millions of low-income Americans but steams ahead with construction of his $300m gilded White House ballroom.As the government shutdown entered its 33rd day, the Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, presented Trump as a man angry and desperate to break the impasse so as to ease mounting pain for ordinary Americans. “He’s just desperate for the government to open, he’s tried everything he can,” Johnson said, adding that Trump was a “big-hearted president, he wants everybody to get their services”.The speaker’s claims, made in an interview with Fox News Sunday two days after Trump hosted a lavish, Great Gatsby-themed soiree at Mar-a-Lago, gave a slanted take on the president’s position. Trump continues to exert an iron grip on the shutdown, resisting political and even federal court pressure to ease the burden on vulnerable Americans while protesting he has no power to end the impasse.Two federal court judges ruled on Friday that the Trump administration must use $5bn in contingency funds to keep paying food assistance Snap benefits for up to 42 million low-income Americans. The payments stopped Saturday under the shutdown, posing the risk of hunger for millions of people.Despite the two court orders, it remains unclear when or whether the administration will restart the payments. Trump has said he is waiting for clarification from the federal judges on where the money should come from.The federal court orders require that partial payments of Snap start as early as Wednesday. Asked by CNN’s State of the Union whether that deadline could be met, the treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said: “Could be”. He said that the administration would not be appealing Friday’s rulings.Instead of authorising use of the contingency funds, Trump has instead exhorted fellow Republican senators to break the impasse by ending the Senate filibuster. The mechanism requires 60 votes in the 100-vote chamber for most kinds of legislation – including an end to the shutdown – to pass.The House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries accused Trump on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday of “weaponising hunger”. He said that the funds exist to continue food assistance benefits through November.Without mentioning by name the president’s $300m ballroom construction project, Jeffries added that Trump and his administration can find funding “for other projects, but somehow they can’t find money to make sure that Americans don’t go hungry”.As the impact of the shutdown begins to bite across the country, threatening poorer Americans and generating mounting delays at US airports, opinion polls suggest that Trump’s Republican party is facing most of the blame from citizens. An NBC News poll carried out at the end of October found that 52% of voters blamed Trump and congressional Republicans for the stalemate, with 42% blaming Democrats.The split fell along familiar partisan divisions, with those identifying as liberal, young people, Black and higher-educated voters blaming Trump – and Democrats being blamed by self-identified supporters of the president’s Make American great again (Maga) movement, white men and rural voters.So far Democrats in the Senate are holding firm with their refusal to support Republicans in reopening the government. Only three Democratic senators have broken ranks so far, with the majority insisting that any deal on the shutdown must be tied to extending healthcare tax credits to avoid steep rises in premiums in 2026 under Affordable Care Act health plans.One of the three Democrats who have joined Republican senators to vote for ending the shutdown, John Fetterman from Pennsylvania, turned on his own party on Sunday. He told CNN’s State of the Union that “Democrats really need to own the shutdown, I mean, we’re shutting it down … This is wrong, we are hurting the very people that we fight for.”Airports are starting to experience delays amid shortages of air traffic controllers who are deemed to be essential federal employees and are obliged to work – yet have ceased being paid. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said 80% of controllers did not show up for shifts in the busy New York region on Friday.At least 35 FAA facilities, including some of the largest airports in the country, are reporting staffing issues.The transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, told CBS News’s Face the Nation on Sunday that safety would not be compromised, adding: “The real consequence is, what kind of rolling delays do you have throughout the system? I think it’s only going to get worse.”He said that as the shutdown continued, more air traffic controllers would “make the decisions of funding their families, putting food on their table, gas in their cars, versus coming into work. That’s not what I want, but I’m a realist.” More
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Obama calls Mamdani and offers to be ‘sounding board’ if he wins mayoral race
Zohran Mamdani, who holds a lead in polling ahead of New York City’s mayoral election on Tuesday, reportedly received a call Saturday from his fellow Democrat Barack Obama – and the former president offered to be a “sounding board” if his advantage turns into victory.Obama also praised the campaign Mamdani had run against his main independent rival, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and the Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa.The call was first reported by the New York Times and then confirmed to Reuters by Mamdani’s spokesperson.“Zohran Mamdani appreciated President Obama’s words of support and their conversation on the importance of bringing a new kind of politics to our city,” Mamdani spokesperson Dora Pekec said.Mamdani, a Uganda-born state assembly member, has polled well ahead of Cuomo and Sliwa prior to Tuesday’s general election. A recent Atlas poll estimated Mamdani (40%) had about a six-point edge over Cuomo (34%) and a 16-point advantage over Sliwa (24%).Cuomo, who resigned as governor amid sexual harassment allegations, is running as an independent after losing to Mamdani in the Democratic primary. Sliwa is the founder of the Guardian Angels, a non-profit organization dedicated to unarmed crime prevention.Mamdani, a democratic socialist, shocked political observers on 24 June with a convincing victory in the primary. Since then, his candidacy has won endorsements from party holdouts such as former vice-president Kamala Harris and New York governor Kathy Hochul, and he has received a steady stream of financial backing from small donors.Mamdani’s policies range from hiking taxes on New York City’s wealthiest, raising the corporation tax, freezing stabilized apartment rental rates and increasing publicly subsidized housing. The finance community has expressed concerns that the city’s competitiveness will suffer if Mamdani wins the mayoral election.Meanwhile, his rise is two-sided coins for Democrats on the national stage, who know they need to appeal to young voters but could become more vulnerable to Republican attacks due to Mamdani’s criticism of Israel and his democratic socialism.Mamdani was out late into the night Saturday dropping in on bars and night clubs campaigning, with Sunday marking the last day of early voting, as the New York Times reported. One video reported on by the Times showed him standing behind a DJ booth and saying into a microphone, “Are we ready to beat Andrew Cuomo?” He was met with cheers, the video showed.For his part, Obama on Saturday rallied alongside New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mikie Sherrill, who is competing in a closely contested race against Republican Jack Ciattarelli. He also attended a rally for Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger.
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Pall of ICE spoils weekend celebrations in Chicago: ‘I think people are just scared’
For 40-year-old Cecilia Romero, the days before and after Halloween are not just any other holiday. It’s the time of year when she can take her kids trick-or-treating in the neighborhood she’s from – and a connection to her own past when she would go celebrate as a little girl.She remembers years of streets brimming with families and children, with street vendors selling food and cempasúchil, the marigolds that loved ones place on altars for Day of the Dead – or Día de los Muertos – from 1 to 2 November.But this year, things are much, much different – because of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids that have been happening in and around Chicago since early September.“Clearly, it’s because of ICE,” Romero said. Referring to how JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, had unsuccessfully requested that the Trump administration pause immigration enforcement operations for the Halloween weekend which began Friday, she added: “I think people are just scared. It’s just kind of sad that kids are not allowed to have fun on a day where they should be [kids].”In the Chicago neighborhoods of Pilsen and Little Village, Halloween, All Saints Day on 1 November, and Día de los Muertos collectively play an important part in bringing the community together to celebrate, mourn and pray as a whole. This year, amid ICE enforcement and raids, the celebrations were a lot more muted. At any point throughout years past, the corridors of 18th Street in Pilsen and 26th Street in Little Village would be packed with people. Those same corridors were much more empty for hours at a time when the Halloween weekend began Friday on this occasion.Prior to Pritzker’s plea to let families celebrate Halloween, federal agents released pepper spray on 25 October in Old Irving Park in an incident that led to the cancellation of a Halloween parade. On Friday, ICE operations in Evanston got out of control, according to neighbors, close to Chute middle school. Federal agents used pepper spray and arrested three US citizens, according to NBC 5 Chicago, on allegations of “violence against law enforcement”.Marco DeSantiago, 49, grew up on Chicago’s South Side, but has been taking his kids to Pilsen for the Halloween festivities for the last 12 years. And he said the changed tone for the revelry this time was striking.“I guess the big difference this year is you could just feel [the] sadness,” DeSantiago said. “It’s a somberness, we feel personally, I could just see [it] in people’s faces. It’s not a joyous occasion.“You’re kind of doing it to keep it going for the kids but everybody, I think, is feeling pretty sad and upset.”He said that in years past more businesses and people had their doors open to trick-or-treaters – more street vendors were on the street, and the vibe was happier and more celebratory.Instead, it felt more like a solemn occasion, he said, adding: “It’s definitely a different feeling.”View image in fullscreenAt nearby soccer fields owned by the Catholic church and school St Procopius, an annual Día de los Muertos celebration featured the usual elaborately decorated altars with photos of deceased loved ones. The tributes had their favorite snacks and items they owned – rosaries or bags, or even Pond’s face cream, and the iconic orange marigolds, in some cases substituted for a plastic alternative, along with votive candles, decorated skulls, as well as many depictions of the Virgin Mary.Yet a lower attendance than usual was obvious to those who went.“It would be packed from the afternoon till the end, like there will be people coming in and out and so you can definitely see a change or a shift – but I don’t think that has to do with the [lack of] motivation or the love for the holiday,” said Isabel Hernández, 27, who was sitting next to an intricate altar for her grandmother, Lorenza Hernández. “I think it’s more so part of the fear right now of … what’s going on in the city, in the country.”Hernández feels particularly sad for people who might be mourning a recent loss – but, due to the ICE raids, might not feel comfortable or safe enough to be able to celebrate with others or partake in the traditions.“I don’t think the grieving is going to ever just go away, but I think you just have to heal with time … or be able to control it some more,” she said. “I can’t even imagine, for those that just recently lost someone … what they’re experiencing seeing people celebrating and then not being able to celebrate with others. I think that’s really hard.”Hernández’s mom, Cecilia, said that it was important for her and her loved ones to keep going with their traditional celebrations despite the pervading sadness.“One of the questions was like, ‘Should we have this event take place?’” Cecilia, 52, said. “For me personally, I was like, ‘Yes, let’s have it,’ because we don’t want what’s happening out there with ICE [to] take that away from us.”For Romero, she just wants to continue celebrating like she used to. “Hopefully, ICE will leave,” she said. “We don’t want them here. We don’t need them here. You know, our city – and I think our country – has been doing fairly well without them coming in.” More
