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      Merrick Garland faces down Republican attacks over Hunter Biden inquiry

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      Merrick Garland faced down the latest Republican attacks on the justice department’s handling of Hunter Biden and other issues on Wednesday, vowing to “not be intimidated”.The House judiciary inquiry came just a week before the Joe Biden impeachment hearing, which will also focus on the scope of Hunter Biden’s legal troubles and alleged corruption. Both are part of the Republican party’s ongoing attempt to erode trust in federal institutions such as the Department of Justice and its FBI arm, claiming they are partisan actors.“Our job is to pursue justice, without fear or favor. Our job is not to do what is politically convenient,” Garland said in his opening statement. “Our job is not to take orders from the president, from Congress or from anyone else about who or what to criminally investigate. As the president himself has said, and I reaffirmed today, I am not the president’s lawyer. I will add I am not Congress’s prosecutor.”The committee’s chairman, Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, launched into those queries in his opening statement, criticizing the attorney general’s decision to appoint David Weiss as a special counsel to handle the investigation into the president’s son. Weiss is the federal prosecutor in Delaware who was appointed by Donald Trump and kept in his job even after Joe Biden took the White House and swapped out most other US attorneys nationwide.Despite that, Jordan thinks Weiss is undermining the investigation into Hunter Biden, which has centered on claims he failed to pay income taxes and lied about using drugs while buying a gun. Biden was indicted on the latter charge last week.“He could have selected anyone,” Jordan said of Garland. “He could have picked anyone inside government, outside government. He could have picked former attorney generals, former special counsels, but he picks the one guy … he knows will protect Joe Biden. He picks David Weiss.”Matt Gaetz, a Republican from Florida, took a more colorful approach, criticizing Biden’s public loyalty to his son.“Has anyone at the department told President Biden to knock it off with Hunter? I mean, you guys are charging Hunter Biden on some crimes, investigating him on others, you’ve got the president bringing Hunter Biden around to state dinners. Has anyone told him to knock it off?” Gaetz asked.The judiciary committee’s highest-ranking Democrat, Jerry Nadler of New York, also asked Garland what would happen if the FBI was defunded, which has become a surprising rallying cry for extreme rightwing Republicans such as representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz, as well as the presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who claim the law enforcement agency has become politicized.Defunding the FBI “would leave the United States naked to the malign influence of the Chinese Communist party, to the attacks by Iranians on American citizens and attempts to assassinate former officials, to the Russian aggression, to North Korean cyber-attacks, to violent crime in the United States, which the FBI helps to fight against, to all kinds of espionage, to domestic violent extremists who have attacked our churches, our synagogues or mosques and who have killed individuals out of racial hatred,” Garland said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“I just, I cannot imagine the consequences of defunding the FBI, but they would be catastrophic.”Amid the back and forth, the White House put out a statement, calling the hearing a “circus” that wasted Garland’s time promoting conspiracy theories rather than dealing with more pressing business, like funding the government ahead of a shutdown on 30 September.“Extreme House Republicans are running a not-so-sophisticated distraction campaign to try to cover up their own actions that are hurtling America to a dangerous and costly government shutdown,” the White House spokesperson for oversight and investigations, Ian Sams, said of the hearing, which the judiciary committee regularly holds with the attorney general.“They cannot even pass a military funding bill because extreme House Republicans are demanding devastating cuts like slashing thousands of preschool slots nationwide and thousands of law enforcement jobs including border agents, so they cranked up a circus of a hearing full of lies and disinformation with the sole goal of baselessly attacking President Biden and his family,” Sams said. More

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      White House says Republicans turned Garland hearing into ‘circus’ – as it happened

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      From 2h agoThe Biden administration is out with a statement condemning House Republicans for their conduct during attorney general Merrick Garland’s ongoing hearing before the judiciary committee, saying they wasted him promoting conspiracy theories rather than dealing with more pressing business, like funding the government.“Extreme House Republicans are running a not-so-sophisticated distraction campaign to try to cover up their own actions that are hurtling America to a dangerous and costly government shutdown,” White House spokesperson for oversight and investigations Ian Sams said of the hearing, which the judiciary committee regularly holds with the attorney general.Sams continued:
      They cannot even pass a military funding bill because extreme House Republicans are demanding devastating cuts like slashing thousands of preschool slots nationwide and thousands of law enforcement jobs including border agents, so they cranked up a circus of a hearing full of lies and disinformation with the sole goal of baselessly attacking President Biden and his family. Don’t be fooled: they want to distract from the reality that their own chaos and inability to govern is going to shut down the government in a matter of days, hurting our economy and national security and jeopardizing everything from troop pay to fighting fentanyl. These sideshows won’t spare House Republicans from bearing responsibility for inflicting serious damage on the country.
      In his ongoing appearance before the House judiciary committee, the attorney general, Merrick Garland, defended the independence and integrity of the justice department from Republican attacks, saying “I am not the president’s lawyer”, and refusing to discuss the ongoing prosecution of the president’s son Hunter Biden. GOP lawmakers who control the committee nonetheless peppered him with questions, including one who wondered if Garland should tell Joe Biden to “knock it off” when it comes to seeing his son. The White House dismissed the hearing as a “circus” that was “full of lies”.Here’s what else happened today:
      Garland warned that defunding the FBI, as some far-right Republicans want to do, would undercut US national security.
      Pennsylvania senator John Fetterman has no time for those who criticize his choice of dress on the chamber floor while simultaneously failing to fund the US government.
      Cassidy Hutchinson, who gave gripping testimony to the January 6 committee, says in a new book she was groped on the day of the attack by Rudy Giuliani.
      There may be some movement in negotiations among House Republicans to avoid a government shutdown at the end of the month.
      Speaking of knocking it off, the Biden administration would reportedly like its ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel to stop insulting Chinese president Xi Jinping.
      Legend has it that in his days as a Democratic political operative, Rahm Emanuel sent a dead fish to a pollster who was late getting him data, and stabbed a knife into a table while reciting the names of those he felt had betrayed Bill Clinton after his 1992 presidential election victory.So the story NBC News just published about Emanuel, a former mayor of Chicago who is now the US ambassador to Japan, does not come as much of a surprise:
      President Joe Biden’s aides have asked that Rahm Emanuel, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, stop posting messages on social media taunting Chinese President Xi Jinping, according to three administration officials.
      Officials at the National Security Council told Emanuel’s staff in recent days that his comments risk undermining the administration’s efforts to mend deeply strained relations with China, including with a possible meeting this fall between Biden and Xi, according to the officials.
      Over the past two weeks Emanuel, who served as White House chief of staff to former President Barack Obama, has criticized Xi directly and sarcastically speculated about the Chinese leader’s treatment of his top aides, using the hashtag “#MysteryInBeijingBuilding.”
      Emanuel’s tweets are “not in keeping with the message coming out of this building,” a White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the issue.
      NBC talked to a supporter of the ambassador, who made him sound like some kind of football star:
      A spokesperson for Emanuel disputed NBC News’ report, calling it “absolutely not true.”
      “Ambassador Emanuel is serving with distinction as an uncommonly effective representative of the United States in Japan. Every day his inventiveness, passion and relentlessness are on full display,” Kurt Campbell, deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, said in an interview.
      He continued, “This guy is a superstar and when you put Rahm on the field you get the full Rahm.”
      Campbell did not comment when asked whether Emanuel will continue posting about China’s leadership.
      On a more serious note, Emanuel faced trouble getting confirmed by the Senate to his ambassador post from those angry with how he handled the police killing of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald during his time as mayor.For a sense of the type of “misinformation” the White House was condemning, take a look at these comments from Republican congresswoman Victoria Spartz.The Indiana lawmaker downplayed the January 6 attack on the Capitol, describing it instead as an event attended by people “with strollers and the kids” that happened because Americans are “sick and tired of this government not serving them” – even though it occurred while Donald Trump was in office.Here’s video her remarks at the just-concluded hearing:The Biden administration is out with a statement condemning House Republicans for their conduct during attorney general Merrick Garland’s ongoing hearing before the judiciary committee, saying they wasted him promoting conspiracy theories rather than dealing with more pressing business, like funding the government.“Extreme House Republicans are running a not-so-sophisticated distraction campaign to try to cover up their own actions that are hurtling America to a dangerous and costly government shutdown,” White House spokesperson for oversight and investigations Ian Sams said of the hearing, which the judiciary committee regularly holds with the attorney general.Sams continued:
      They cannot even pass a military funding bill because extreme House Republicans are demanding devastating cuts like slashing thousands of preschool slots nationwide and thousands of law enforcement jobs including border agents, so they cranked up a circus of a hearing full of lies and disinformation with the sole goal of baselessly attacking President Biden and his family. Don’t be fooled: they want to distract from the reality that their own chaos and inability to govern is going to shut down the government in a matter of days, hurting our economy and national security and jeopardizing everything from troop pay to fighting fentanyl. These sideshows won’t spare House Republicans from bearing responsibility for inflicting serious damage on the country.
      The Senate’s Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, announced the chamber would vote on the promotions of three top military leaders that have been held by up Republican senator Tommy Tuberville over the Pentagon’s abortion policy.Tuberville, who represents Alabama, began earlier this year blocking defense department promotions in protest of a new policy that will help service members travel to seek an abortion, if they are based somewhere where the procedure is banned. About 300 senior leaders currently have their promotions on hold because of the senator’s blockade, which has been criticized by military leaders and veterans groups.In a speech on the Senate floor, Schumer said the chamber would vote on promotions for the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, commandant of Marine corps and army chief of staff:There are some new developments in the House, where a revolt by rightwing Republicans has stopped consideration of a measure to fund the government as an end-of-the-month shutdown deadline nears.Politico reports that House speaker Kevin McCarthy signaled “progress” has been made in the negotiations, and also that the chamber may have to work over the weekend:Attorneys for Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell, two co-defendants that have been charged in the Georgia election interference case alongside Donald Trump, will be allowed to interview members of the special grand jury, The Hill reports.On Wednesday, the Fulton county superior judge Scott McAfee wrote in a court filing reviewed by the Hill:
      “Defense counsel here are entitled, and would be expected, to conduct a thorough investigation in the zealous representation of their clients …
      Setting aside scenarios involving harassment of some kind, the desire to simply talk to the grand jurors is not ‘illegal,’” he added.
      McAfee added that although there are rules to secrecy surrounding grand jury deliberations: “The court has not found nor been provided with any authority that suggests defense counsel are totally forbidden from contact.”Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania has hit back at Republicans criticizing his relaxed clothing choices in the Senate.The Democrat, who is known for routinely wearing oversized hoodies, sweaters and shorts, tweeted on Wednesday:
      “If those jagoffs in the House stop trying to shut our government down, and fully support Ukraine, then I will save democracy by wearing a suit on the Senate floor next week.”
      Senate Republicans have penned a letter to the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, in which they have asked him to retract the chamber’s new relaxed dress code.Forty-six Republicans sent Schumer the letter following Schumer’s announcement on Sunday that relaxes the chamber’s dress code.
      “For more than 230 years, the United States Senate has served the American people with honor and dignity. As members of this esteemed body, we understand the seriousness our positions require,” the letter said.
      “Allowing casual clothing on the Senate floor disrespects the institution we serve and the American families we represent. We the undersigned members of the United States Senate write to express our supreme disappointment and resolute disapproval of your recent decision to abandon the Senate’s longstanding dress code for members, and urge you to immediately reverse this misguided action,” it continued.
      Aside from Alabama’s Katie Britt, Indiana’s Mike Braun and Missouri’s Josh Hawley, every Republican senator signed the letter.Ex-president Donald Trump and his former chief of staff Mark Meadows joked about Covid-19 on a plane ride following the first debate with Joe Biden, a new book reveals.The Guardian’s Martin Pengelly reports:Donald Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows joked about the then US president having Covid on Air Force One after the first debate with Joe Biden in 2020 – an event at which Trump was not tested but three days before which, Meadows later confessed, Trump had indeed tested positive.On the flight, on 29 September 2020, Trump speculated about his health, saying he thought his voice had sounded “a little bit off” at a rally in Duluth, Minnesota. But he also said he did not want the media to “accuse me of something ridiculous, like having Covid”.Meadows “laughed and promised him that we would handle it if it happened”.“We” referred to Meadows and Cassidy Hutchinson, the chief of staff’s closest aide who has now written a memoir, Enough. The book, which describes Hutchinson’s journey from Trump loyalist to key witness in the January 6 inquiry, will be published in the US next Tuesday. The Guardian obtained a copy.For the full story, click here:In an ongoing appearance before the House judiciary committee, the attorney general, Merrick Garland, defended the independence and integrity of the justice department from Republican attacks, saying “I am not the president’s lawyer”, and refusing to discuss the ongoing prosecution of the president’s son Hunter Biden. GOP lawmakers who control the committee are nonetheless peppering him with questions, including one who wondered if Garland should tell Joe Biden to “knock it off” when it comes to seeing his son.Here’s what else has happened today so far:
      Garland warned that defunding the FBI, as some far-right Republicans want to do, would undercut US national security.
      Pennsylvania senator John Fetterman has no time for those who criticize his choice of dress on the Senate floor while simultaneously failing to fund the US government.
      Cassidy Hutchinson, who gave gripping testimony to the January 6 committee, says in a new book she was groped on the day of the attack by Rudy Giuliani.
      In a new book, one of the most-remembered witnesses to testify before the January 6 committee says that she was groped on the day of the insurrection by Rudy Giuliani, the Guardian’s Martin Pengelly reports:Cassidy Hutchinson, the former Trump aide turned crucial January 6 witness, says in a new book she was groped by Rudy Giuliani, who was “like a wolf closing in on its prey”, on the day of the attack on the Capitol.Describing meeting with Giuliani backstage at Donald Trump’s speech near the White House before his supporters marched on Congress in an attempt to overturn the 2020 election, Hutchinson says the former New York mayor turned Trump lawyer put his hand “under my blazer, then my skirt”.“I feel his frozen fingers trail up my thigh,” she writes. “He tilts his chin up. The whites of his eyes look jaundiced. My eyes dart to [Trump adviser] John Eastman, who flashes a leering grin.“I fight against the tension in my muscles and recoil from Rudy’s grip … filled with rage, I storm through the tent, on yet another quest for Mark.”Mark Meadows, Trump’s final chief of staff, was Hutchinson’s White House boss. Hutchinson’s memoir, Enough, describes the now 27-year-old’s journey from Trump supporter to disenchantment, and her role as a key witness for the House January 6 committee. It will be published in the US next Tuesday. The Guardian obtained a copy.The House is lurching towards both a government shutdown and an impeachment of Joe Biden that faces uncertain chances of success. But however those two issues are resolved, the Guardian’s David Smith reports they will take a toll on American democracy:If it’s Thursday, it must be impeachment. If it’s Saturday, it must be government shutdown. Next week, Republicans in Congress seem determined to prove that US democracy is broken.The party plans to hold the first hearing on its impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden over his family’s business dealings on 28 September. Meanwhile the Republican-controlled House of Representatives is barreling towards a deadline of 30 September to keep federal agencies running.The double header indicates how both impeachments and government shutdowns – once seen as rare, dangerous and to be avoided at all costs – have become political weapons deployed with increasing abandon.“In the past few years we’ve seen the routinisation of the unusual,” said Bill Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution thinktank in Washington. “It’s terrible for the country. It’s hard enough for a great nation to conduct its affairs without this sort of shortsighted nonsense getting in its way. Government as we know it is grinding to a halt.”Only three presidents have been impeached for “high crimes and misdemeanors” and none were convicted: Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Donald Trump in both 2019 and 2021. Now, House Republicans have launched an impeachment inquiry against Biden with no discernible evidence of an impeachable offence.As you can see in this video clip, it’s currently John Fetterman’s turn to preside over the Senate and, thanks to the new dress code, he’s doing so in his signature garb:As the government heads toward a shutdown thanks to infighting among House Republicans, the Democratic senator John Fetterman has made a proposition.If “those jagoffs in the House”, by which he most likely means the GOP, pass a resolution to fund the government, he’ll wear a suit on the Senate floor, the senator says on X:The Pennsylvania lawmaker is known for reporting to the Capitol in shorts and a hoodie, and a newly relaxed dress code in the chamber will allow him to cast votes without the coat and tie typically worn by male senators.Among the more colorful interlocutors on the House judiciary committee is Matt Gaetz, a far-right Republican who has lately been calling for defunding the FBI.He got into it with Merrick Garland over Hunter Biden’s interactions with his father. Though he may be a rightwing fixation and facing his own legal trouble, Joe Biden is often seen with his son at the White House or at events, and Gaetz wanted to know more about that.“Has anyone at the department told president Biden to knock it off with Hunter? I mean, you guys are charging Hunter Biden on some crimes, investigating him on others, you’ve got the president bringing Hunter Biden around to state dinners. Has anyone told him to knock it off?” Gaetz asked.“No one that I know of has spoken to the White House about the Hunter Biden case, of course not,” Garland replied, with barely concealed annoyance.Merrick Garland has warned that if the government shuts down at the end of the month, as it seems on course to do, the justice department’s ability to fight crime and work with law enforcement nationwide would be curtailed.“I haven’t done a complete calculation on the effects of a shutdown and the difference between which employees are indispensable under the statute and which ones not,” Garland said. “It will certainly disrupt all of our normal programs, including our grant programs to state and local law enforcement and to our ability to conduct our normal efforts with respect to the entire scope of our activities, including helping state and locals fight violent crime.”The federal government’s fiscal year ends on 30 September, but infighting among House Republicans has prevented Congress from reauthorizing spending beyond that date, or even agreeing on a short-term measure to keep the government funded while they negotiate a larger agreement.Much of the questioning the attorney general, Merrick Garland, is facing today centers on Hunter Biden, the president’s son whose foreign business entanglements and actions while struggling with drug addiction have been a fixation for Republicans eager to prove the president is corrupt. His case is long and complicated, so here is the Guardian’s Mary Yang with a look at the major events:Federal prosecutors indicted Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, over illegally possessing a firearm in Delaware on Thursday. The indictment comes a month after the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, appointed the US attorney David Weiss, a Trump nominee, to oversee the investigation as special counsel.Hunter Biden has been at the center of a years-long investigation into his tax affairs that was set to close with a guilty plea. But that plea deal fell apart at a Delaware courthouse after the Trump-appointed judge said she could not agree to the deal, which ensured Biden would avoid jail time in a separate case of illegally possessing a gun while using drugs.Amid the controversy, the president has repeatedly said he supports his son and Hunter has been seen regularly at family events. Asked if President Biden would pardon his son in the event of any conviction, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, told reporters: “No.”But the younger Biden has been embroiled in a list of unrelated controversies for years, including his overseas dealings and struggles with addiction, which ex-President Trump and his allies have regularly sought to use as fodder for attacks.Here’s a comprehensive timeline of the moments that have propelled Hunter Biden into the limelight. More

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      Biden uses executive power to create New Deal-style American Climate Corps

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      President Joe Biden will use his executive authority to create a New Deal-style American Climate Corps that will serve as a major green jobs training program.In an announcement on Wednesday, the White House said the program would employ about 20,000 young adults who will build trails, plant trees, help install solar panels and do other work to boost conservation and help prevent catastrophic wildfires.Biden had previously been thwarted by Congress on creating a climate corps. The climate corps had been proposed in early versions of the sweeping climate law approved last year but was jettisoned amid strong opposition from Republicans and concerns about cost.Democrats and environmental advocacy groups never gave up on the plan and pushed Biden in recent weeks to issue an executive order authorizing what the White House now calls the American Climate Corps. The program is modeled after the Civilian Conservation Corps, created in the 1930s by the Democratic president Franklin D Roosevelt as part of the New Deal.“This summer, our country saw heat waves, wildfires and floods that destroyed communities, uprooted families and claimed hundreds of lives,” the Sunrise Movement and other organizations wrote on Monday in a letter to Biden’s White House.“While previous executive orders and legislation under your administration demonstrate tremendous progress toward meeting our Paris climate goals and your campaign promises, this summer has made clear that we must be as ambitious as possible in tackling the great crisis of our time,” the groups wrote.More than 50 Democratic lawmakers, including the Massachusetts senator Ed Markey and the New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, also encouraged Biden to create a climate corps, saying in a separate letter on Monday that “the climate crisis demands a whole-of-government response at an unprecedented scale”.The lawmakers cited deadly heatwaves in the south-west and across the nation, as well as dangerous floods in New England and devastating wildfires on the Hawaiian island of Maui, among recent examples of climate-related disasters.A federal climate corps would “prepare a whole generation of workers for good-paying union jobs in the clean economy” while helping to “fight climate change, build community resilience and support environmental justice”, the lawmakers wrote.The White House declined to say how much the program will cost or how it will be paid for, but Democrats proposed $10bn for the climate corps in the climate bill before the provision was removed.Republicans have largely dismissed the climate corps as a do-gooder proposal that would waste money and could even take jobs away from other workers displaced by the Covid-19 pandemic.“We don’t need another FDR program, and the idea that this is going to help land management is a false idea as well,” the Arkansas representative Bruce Westerman, chairman of the House natural resources committee, said in 2021.Congressman Joe Neguse, a Colorado Democrat who has co-sponsored a climate corps bill, said it was important to train the next generation of federal land managers, park rangers and other stewards of our natural resources. Neguse and other Democrats have said the program should pay “a living wage” while offering healthcare coverage and support for childcare, housing, transportation and education.A key distinction between the original Civilian Conservation Corps and the new climate contingent is that, unlike the in 1930s, the US economy is not in an economic depression. The US unemployment rate was 3.8% in August, low by historical measures.The new corps is also likely to be far more diverse than the largely white and male force created 90 years ago.The White House climate adviser, Ali Zaidi, said the administration would work with at least six federal agencies to create the climate corps and would pair with at least 10 states. California, Colorado, Maine, Michigan and Washington have already begun similar programs, while five more are launching their own climate corps, Zaidi said: Arizona, Maryland, Minnesota, North Carolina and Utah.The initiative will provide job training and service opportunities to work on a wide range of projects that tackle the climate crisis, including restoring coastal wetlands to protect communities from storm surges and flooding; deploying clean energy projects such as wind and solar power; managing forests to improve health and prevent catastrophic wildfires; and implementing energy efficient solutions to cut energy bills for consumers, the White House said. More

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      Biden vows to lead by example on curbing weapons of mass destruction

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      Joe Biden has accused Russia of “shredding longstanding arms control agreements” but pledged that the US would “lead by example” in limiting the spread of weapons of mass destruction.In his address to the UN general assembly, Biden castigated the Putin regime for its suspension, in February this year, of the 2010 New Start treaty, the last arms control agreement between the two countries.That suspension, coupled with Russia’s withdrawal from the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty in 2007, was “irresponsible and makes the entire world less safe”, the president said.However, Biden insisted that the US “is going to continue to pursue good faith efforts to reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction and lead by example, no matter what else is happening in the world”.The statement appeared to be a confirmation that the US would continue the policy it has pursued since Vladimir Putin’s suspension of New Start, by not going beyond the treaty’s limits of 1,550 deployed strategic nuclear warheads, and 700 deployed delivery systems.At the time of Moscow’s suspension of the New Start treaty, Russian officials said their government would continue to observe those limits, but there have been no inspections of Russian nuclear weapons facilities since the start of the Covid pandemic, and Russia has ceased to share data that was required by the agreement.In his speech, Biden said the US also remained committed to diplomatic means to containing North Korean’s nuclear weapons programme and would “remain steadfast in our commitment that Iran must never acquire nuclear weapons”.Daryl Kimball, the head of the Arms Control Association, welcomed Biden’s statement on the New Start limits.“I’m glad that Biden said this to keep the flame going, if you think about how you don’t have much room in a UN speech,” Kimball said. “It’s a positive signal that the United States remains ready to engage in serious dialogue on nuclear weapons production and arms control despite whatever else has happened in the Russian relationship.”In his address, Biden urged the UN general assembly to uphold the UN charter in its approach to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, framing it as a matter of principle, national sovereignty and territorial integrity that was essential to all UN members.“Russia believes that the world will grow weary and allow it to brutalise Ukraine without consequence,” Biden said. “But I ask you this: if we abandon the core principles … to appease an aggressor, can any member state in this body feel confident that they are protected? If we allow Ukraine to be carved up, is the independence of any nation secure?“I respectfully suggest the answer is no,” the president added. “We must stand up to this naked aggression today to deter other would-be aggressors tomorrow.”Much of the rest of Biden’s speech was dedicated to the principles of global cooperation to take on basic issues of poverty, human rights and the climate crisis. The US and other supporters of Ukraine are well aware that many countries at the UN, especially the developing nations in the Group of 77, are becoming restive at the focus on Ukraine, when the death toll from conflict, famine and climate change is so enormous in the global south. Biden stressed that he takes these concerns seriously.“My country has to meet this critical moment to work with countries in every region, in common cause to join together with partners who share a common vision of the future of the world,” he said. “The United States seeks a more secure, more prosperous, more equitable world for all people, because we know our future is bound up with yours … No nation can meet the challenges of today alone.” More

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      Freed Americans on flight bound for US as families hold ‘emotional call’ with president Biden – as it happened

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      From 1h agoFive detained Americans and two of their family members have been allowed to leave Iran and are on their way back to the United States after the Biden administration reached a deal in which Washington freed five jailed Iranians and allowed Tehran to access $6b in oil revenue, but only for humanitarian purposes. The agreement comes as the United Nations general assembly kicks off in New York, but it’s too soon to say if the deal between the two archenemy nations will lead to further negotiations down the road.Here’s what else happened today:
      Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi described the release of the Americans as “purely a humanitarian action”.
      Joe Biden held what the White House described as “an emotional call” with the freed Americans as they traveled back to the United States.
      Michael McCaul, the Republican leader of the House foreign affairs committee, worried the deal would incentivize “future hostage-taking” and “free up funds for Iran’s malign activities.”
      Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American businessman, credited “all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me” for his release.
      Hunter Biden sued the IRS, arguing that the tax authority broke the law by failing to protect his privacy when two agents went public with claims of political meddling in their investigation.
      You can read our latest full report here:Our diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour has written about how this deal may signal new direction in western diplomacy:In a statement, Michael McCaul, the Republican chairman of the House foreign affairs committee, welcomed the release of the five Americans from Iranian custody, but criticized the Biden administration for allowing Tehran to access $6b in oil revenue:
      I am immensely relieved that five Americans held hostage by Iran are finally reunited with their families and on their way home. I wish them peace, strength, and health as they rebuild their lives in freedom.
      I am very concerned that this $6 billion hostage deal incentivizes future hostage-taking. Even though the Administration claims these funds are limited to humanitarian transactions, we all know that transactions are difficult to monitor and that money is fungible. There is no question this deal will free up funds for Iran’s malign activities.
      Republicans have generally called for harsh measures against Tehran, and during his presidency, Donald Trump went as far as to authorize a drone strike that killed top Iranian general Qassem Suleimani in 2020. Democrats, meanwhile, have tried to find common ground where they can with Iran, such as the 2015 deal Barack Obama reached to curb its nuclear weapons program – which Trump announced the US would withdraw from in 2018.In domestic political news, NBC News reports that the far-right Republican troublemaker Matt Gaetz is highly likely – in the estimation of one source, “100% in” – to run for governor in Florida in 2026.By then, the current hard-right Republican governor, the presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, will either be in the White House or at the end of his two-term time in state office.On Monday, NBC quoted one “longtime Florida Republican lobbyist” as saying that at a reception in Tallahassee on Sunday, “there was a lot of talk about it … and Gaetz was telling people to basically expect him to be in”.Another “Florida Republican operative” was quoted as saying: “He’s 100% in. I think Gaetz is an instant frontrunner and from what I hear he’s already won the Trump primary”, meaning Donald Trump’s endorsement.Gaetz, 41, told NBC: “Many did encourage me to consider running for governor one day.”He also aimed a dig at DeSantis, saying: “But we have an outstanding governor who will be in that position through 2026.”Gaetz’s “only political focus right now”, he added – other than opposing almost everything Kevin McCarthy does as US House speaker, including proposing ways to fund the federal government – “is Trump 2024”.Some further reading:The Iranian nationals who were released in a prisoner swap with the United States have landed in Tehran, state-run PressTV reports:Reuters reports that the two individuals arriving in Iran after transiting Qatar are Mehrdad Moin-Ansari and Reza Sarhangpour-Kafrani. Another two Iranians released by the United States will stay in the country, while a fifth will go to an undisclosed country to join his family.The White House announced that Joe Biden this morning “held an emotional call with the families of the seven American citizens who are returning home to the United States from Iran.”“Each family member who joined the call spoke with the president,” it added in a statement, which also confirmed the group had departed Doha, Qatar for the United States.The five Americans released by Iran today in a prisoner swap have departed Doha, Qatar for the United States, Reuters reports, citing a source familiar with the matter.Qatar helped broker the deal between the two archenemy nations, and the group of former detainees along with two American family members that had been prevented from leaving Iran were flown earlier today from Tehran to the Gulf nation.World leaders meeting at the United Nations in New York on Monday warned of the peril the world faces unless it acts with urgency to rescue a set of 2030 development goals to wipe out hunger and extreme poverty and to battle climate change, Reuters reports.The news agency further writes:
      Their declaration, adopted by consensus at a summit before the annual U.N. General Assembly, embraces a 2015 “to-do” list of 17 Sustainable Development Goals that also include water, energy, reducing inequality and achieving gender equality.“The achievement of the SDGs is in peril,” the declaration reads. “We are alarmed that the progress on most of the SDGs is either moving much too slowly or has regressed below the 2015 baseline.”U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the summit of leaders that only 15% of the targets are on track and that many are going in reverse.Earlier this month, Guterres called on G20 leaders to ensure a stimulus of at least $500 billion per year towards meeting the goals. He called on countries to act now.The leaders are meeting in the shadow of geopolitical tensions – largely fueled by the war in Ukraine – as Russia and China vie with the United States and Europe to win over developing countries, where achieving the Sustainable Development Goals are key.“Instead of leaving no one behind, we risk leaving the SDGs behind … the SDGs need a global rescue plan,” Guterres told the summit.The U.N. said this month that there are 745 million more moderately to severely hungry people in the world today than in 2015, and the world is far off track in its efforts to meet the ambitious United Nations goal to end hunger by 2030.
      The United Nations General Assembly is getting underway in New York with world leaders flying in and the biggest leaders getting ready to deliver their headline speeches tomorrow.Joe Biden has already traveled north and has a couple of Democratic fundraising events this evening in the Big Apple.Tomorrow, the US president will speak at the UN headquarters, following the major opening address by the UN secretary general António Guterres. Guterres will be followed by Brazil’s Lula and then Biden. We expect Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who appeared by video link last year but is attending in person this year, to make his speech around noon local time at a crucial time in the counteroffensive against Russia’s invasion 1.5 years ago.The Ukraine war will be the dominant topic, especially in the absence of Russia and China’s leaders.But Reuters adds:
      With the world on track to break the record for the hottest year in history, world leaders, business leaders, celebrities and activists have converged on midtown Manhattan for Climate Week and the U.N.’s Climate Action Summit, again focusing the world’s attention on the climate crisis. The annual climate gathering coincides with the start of the United Nations General Assembly, bringing heads of state and top government officials together with private-sector leaders to focus on climate change in a year marked by a record number of billion-dollar disasters, including eight severe floods.The main event will take place Wednesday when Guterres will host his own Climate Action Summit, a high-profile event meant to reverse backsliding on Paris climate agreement goals and to encourage governments to adopt serious new actions to combat climate change.“There is lingering doubt that … we can meet our climate goals. There is too much backtracking; so we’re really hoping that this summit can be used as a moment to inspire people,” Selwin Hart, special adviser on climate to the secretary-general, said in an interview.
      The five Americans freed from imprisonment in Iran are now on a flight bound for the US, Reuters reports.Citing an unnamed source, the news agency just reported that an aircraft has departed Doha, the capital of Qatar, where the Americans had been taken as an interim stage, en route for the States.Five detained Americans and two of their family members have been allowed to leave Iran, in a deal with the Biden administration that saw Washington release five jailed Iranians and $6b in oil proceeds, which Tehran can only spend on humanitarian supplies. The agreement comes as the United Nations general assembly kicks off in New York, but it’s too soon to say if the agreement between the two archenemy nations will lead to further negotiations down the road.Here’s what else has happened today so far:
      Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi described the release of the Americans as “purely a humanitarian action”.
      Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American businessman, credited “all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me” for his release.
      Hunter Biden sued the IRS, arguing that the tax authority broke the law by failing to protect his privacy when two agents went public with claims of political meddling in their investigation.
      Businessman Siamak Namazi said in a statement released on his behalf, “I would not be free today, if it wasn’t for all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me,” the Associated Press reports.Namazi was among the five Americans released by Iran today in exchange for the freeing of five Iranians detained in the United States and access to $6b in money from oil sales Tehran can spend only on humanitarian supplies.Namazi continued:
      Thank you for being my voice when I could not speak for myself and for making sure I was heard when I mustered the strength to scream from behind the impenetrable walls of Evin Prison.”
      A dual US-Iranian national, Namazi was detained in 2015 while visiting family in Tehran. Months later, his father, Baquer, was detained when he came to visit him in jail, before being released in 2022.Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the United Nations general assembly in New York, Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi cast Tehran’s release of five Americans as “a humanitarian action”, and hinted that similar deals could be possible, Reuters reports.“This was purely a humanitarian action … And it can certainly be a step based upon which in the future other humanitarian actions can be taken,” the Iranian leader, who was elected in 2021, told reporters.In his remarks to reporters, secretary of state Antony Blinken said seven, not five, Americans had been released by Iran.Blinken included in that number two Americans who had been prevented from leaving the country.“Just a few minutes ago, I had the great pleasure of speaking to seven Americans who are now free, free from their imprisonment or detention in Iran, out of Iran, out of prison, and now in Doha enroute back to the United States, to be reunited with their loved ones,” Blinken said.“Five of the seven, of course, had been unjustly detained, imprisoned in Iran, some for years. Two others had been prevented from leaving Iran.”In a briefing to reporters, secretary of state Antony Blinken said the $6bn in money from oil sales released to Iran can only be used to buy humanitarian supplies: More

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      ‘Cognitively impaired’? Trump’s confused attacks on Biden start to backfire

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      Donald Trump has long attacked Joe Biden, his likely opponent at the polls next year, as “Sleepy Joe”, portraying the 80-year-old president as too old and too mentally fogged to occupy the Oval Office. As recently as Friday, the former president attacked his successor for being unfit to deal with Russia and the threat of nuclear war.But Trump’s tactics rebounded when he said Biden threatened to lead the US into “world war two” – and suggested that he, Trump, thought he had beaten Barack Obama for the presidency back in 2016.There have been two world wars. The first ended in 1918, the second in 1945. The cold war, the nuclear stand-off between the US and the Soviet Union that often threatened a third world war, ended with the fall of the communist regime in Moscow in 1991.Obama was president, and Biden vice-president, from 2009 to 2017. In the 2016 election, Trump beat Hillary Clinton.Mockery of Trump’s stumbles was immediate and sustained. But it also pointed to an increasingly stark issue on both sides of the aisle: the advanced age of many American leaders, and polling that shows most voters want generational change.At 80, Biden is the oldest president ever. Should he win re-election and serve a full term, he will be 86 on leaving office. Polling has shown more than 75% of Americans think he is too old for a second term.Trump is 77 but polls show significantly fewer voters think he is too old to return to power. Whether gaffes like those he made in Washington move the needle remains, of course, to be seen.Addressing the Pray, Vote, Stand summit, a rightwing event, Trump said Biden was “cognitively impaired, in no condition to lead and … now in charge of dealing with Russia and possible nuclear war”.Under Biden, he added: “We would be in world war two.”On Monday, the MSNBC host Joe Scarborough, a former Republican congressman, laughed as he said: “It’s almost like it’s the summer of 1939 all over again. You know, [Trump’s] father’s going to a Nazi rally or something, or a Klan rally. I don’t know which rally he did or didn’t go to.”Trump’s father, Fred Trump, was arrested after a Klan riot in Queens, New York, in 1927. Donald Trump has reportedly expressed sympathy for Nazism and Adolf Hitler.“But yeah,” Scarborough said. “You think they may want to take out the ‘cognitively impaired’ part of his speeches from now on.”Jonathan Lemire, his fellow host, said: “That’s an attack line the Republicans and Trump love to use [against Biden] but, man, that does seem like he was looking in the mirror just there.“I mean … we see these polls that suggest that voters are more concerned about President Biden’s age than Donald Trump’s age. Trump is only three years younger and anyone watching Trump day in, day out says he’s changed too.”Biden says he is fit to serve. So does Trump, telling NBC in an interview broadcast on Sunday “there should be a competency” test for presidents, of the sort he “aced” while in the White House. That prompted memories of previous national mirth, when in summer 2020 Trump, then 74, bragged about successfully recognising “person, woman, man, camera, TV” in a cognitive exam.But, again, the issue remains a serious one.Democrats protest that disproportionate attention is paid to Biden’s age than that of Trump. Last week, Chuck Rocha, a Democratic strategist, told CBS News: “Joe Biden is getting older, we all know that. But the other guy he’s probably going to be running against is getting older, too. And in the focus groups that I’m doing, old and steady still beats old and crazy.”Nonetheless, on Sunday, a new poll from CBS and YouGov said only 34% of voters thought Biden would complete a second term if elected. Asked the same question about Trump, 55% said they thought he would complete a full four years.Asked if the two men had the necessary mental and cognitive health to be president, 26% said only Biden did, 44% said only Trump did and 23% said neither did.Ninety-one criminal charges and assorted civil lawsuits notwithstanding, Trump leads Republican polling by wide margins. His challengers have made age and cognitive ability an issue but such is Trump’s dominance, they have mostly directed their fire at Biden.Ron DeSantis, the hard-right Florida governor who is a distant second to Trump, said last week age was “absolutely a legitimate concern” when electing a president.“The presidency’s not a job for someone that’s 80 years old,” DeSantis told CBS.He did not say if he thought the same about someone who was 77, and who the former Republican party chair Michael Steele called a “dumbass”, over his Washington remarks.But DeSantis added: “Obviously, I’m the governor of Florida, I know a lot of people who are elderly, they’re great people, but you’re talking about a job where you need to give it 100%, we need an energetic president.”Concern about the age of many US party leaders has spread beyond the presidency, particularly given public health scares suffered by Mitch McConnell, the 81-year-old Republican leader in the Senate, and Dianne Feinstein, the 90-year-old Democratic senator from California.DeSantis said: “I think that if the founders could kind of look at this again, I do think they probably would’ve put an age limit on some of these offices.” More

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      US and Iran expected to complete $6bn prisoner swap deal

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      The US and Iran are expected to pull off a controversial prisoner swap on Monday involving the unfreezing by the Biden administration of $6bn (£4.8bn) of Iranian oil money held in South Korea since 2018.Tehran and Washington are due to swap five prisoners each, including the conservationist Morad Tahbaz, a British-American citizen.In an elaborate and delicate diplomatic deal, months in the making, the five Americans are due to be flown from Tehran to Qatar before transferring to flights to Washington.Republicans and some former Iranian political detainees have accused Joe Biden of striking a deal with the world’s No 1 terrorist state that will only encourage Iran to keep hostage taking as a central part of its diplomatic arsenal. The state department says the money that is being released is Iranian-owned oil money frozen by the Trump administration in 2018 when the US left the Iran nuclear deal.Last week three European countries including the UK accused Iran of building stocks of highly enriched uranium that could have no possible civilian purpose.The US says the prisoner swap’s mediator, Qatar, will ensure that the unfrozen money is only spent on goods – primarily food, agricultural goods and medicine – that are not subject to sanctions. Critics say it will be impossible to police, and that the US threat to pull out if Iran breaks the agreement is bogus.The path to the swap reached a turning point when the state department agreed a waiver facilitating the release of the cash from South Korean banks to accounts in Switzerland and Doha.The five Americans have already been transferred out of Evin jail in Tehran to various hotels in the capital. They are due to be flown initially to Doha before flying to the US for a homecoming.Tahbaz was left in Iran when the British Iranian dual nationals Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori were released as part of a deal negotiated by the then UK foreign secretary, Liz Truss.The identities of five Iranians that are being granted clemency in the US have all been made public by Tehran. It is not clear that all of them want to return to Iran. Most of them were jailed for breaches of US sanctions.The deal is a coup for Qatar, which has acted as a mediator between two countries that deeply distrust one another. The Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, due to speak to the UN general assembly on Tuesday in New York, is likely to laud the deal as another sign of US weakness.Michael McCaul, the Republican chair of the House foreign affairs committee, has accused Biden of being naive and returning to the mistakes of the past .The Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis described Biden’s decision as outrageous, adding that it “has sent a signal to hostile regimes that if you take Americans, you could potentially profit … A rogue regime should know that if you touch the hair on the head of any American, you will have hell to pay.”Richard Ratcliffe, the husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, has criticised the timing of the release, so close to the anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death in Iranian police custody.It is not clear if the deal will lead to a wider diplomatic breakthrough, or a new, less ambitious route to constrain Iran’s civil nuclear programme in which Tehran agrees to lower its stocks of highly enriched uranium.Iranian Americans, whose US citizenship is not recognised by Tehran, are often pawns between the two nations. In the last week there have been reports that three dual nationals were arrested in Iran and it was confirmed two weeks ago for the first time that Johan Floderus, an EU diplomat based in Iran, has been jailed since April 2022. More

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      Congressional Biden ally dismisses Republicans’ impeachment strategy

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      One of Joe Biden’s key congressional allies has rejected the notion that Republicans can bait the president’s fellow Democrats into embracing an impeachment inquiry as an opportunity for him to be cleared over questions about his son’s business affairs.“What the American people want is for us to fund government and solve their issues,” the California congressman Ro Khanna said on Fox News Sunday, referring to how some hard-right Republicans have made a Biden impeachment inquiry a condition for them to support new funding that would avoid at least a partial federal government shutdown after 30 September.Khanna, a leading progressive who sits on the US House’s oversight committee and is a member of Biden’s re-election advisory board, added: “There is no grounds for an impeachment inquiry, and this is why” Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy lacks the votes necessary to have already called one.The comments from Khanna to the Republican-friendly news program came after host Maria Bartiromo suggested that going along with a Biden impeachment could afford the president a chance to demonstrate – once and for all – that allegations of corruption stemming from his son Hunter’s foreign business deals are unfounded.Bartiromo said Republican congressman Scott Perry – Khanna’s fellow House oversight committee member – had previously advanced a similar line of argument to support impeaching Biden. And Bartiromo also alluded to Fox News polling which showed a percentage of voters believed Biden had done something unethical, if not illegal, as far as Hunter’s business dealings were concerned.But Khanna countered by pointing Bartiromo and her viewers to a Washington Post opinion piece by Colorado’s Republican House member Ken Buck, which asserted that there was no evidence to justify a Biden impeachment.Buck said that was his position even as he strongly condemned the Democrat-led impeachment of Biden’s Republican presidential predecessor, Donald Trump, in 2019. That impeachment concerned attempts by Trump to find dirt on his political rivals, including Biden, pertaining to politics and business in Ukraine.It was separate from Trump’s second impeachment stemming from his supporters’ violent attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 after his electoral defeat to Biden. Both impeachments resulted in Trump’s acquittal.Khanna said it was also telling that other Republicans have publicly shared Buck’s opinion that Biden’s impeachment would at best be a fruitless distraction. That reality contrasts sharply with the generally united front which Democrats presented when voting to impeach Trump, Khanna argued.“I mean, when we impeached President Trump, every Democrat voted for it,” said Khanna, though two House members belonging to his party opposed the 2019 impeachment. The GOP House speaker, Khanna said, “simply doesn’t have the votes on his side”, and a substantial number of Republicans in the chamber have expressed their preference to focus on avoiding a government shutdown.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“Fund the government; solve people’s problems,” those Republicans say, according to Khanna.Bartiromo conceded that there were “definitely Republicans saying they don’t want to go down this road” of impeaching Biden.As ultra-conservative rhetoric about impeaching Biden swirled, the president’s son was indicted on Thursday on federal firearms charges which can carry up to 25 years in prison. The charges were brought against Hunter Biden after the collapse in August of a plea deal that also involved two separate misdemeanor tax charges.Since last year’s midterm elections, Republicans have held only a thin majority in the US House, which has the power to draw up articles of impeachment. Democrats hold a thin majority in the Senate, where two-thirds of the members need to vote to convict – and, as a consequence, remove from office – an impeached official. More