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    Listen up, weaklings: there’s no Epstein client list. Why are you so obsessed? Yours, Donald J Trump | Marina Hyde

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    You have to feel for Donald Trump’s Maga base. The one huge secret they didn’t want disclosed was that he actually really hates them. All populists despise their people, obviously – but please, Mr President, respect the playbook! You’re supposed to do it quietly. Regrettably, no one could accuse Trump of hiding his spite under a bushel after a week in which he described those of his supporters who want him to simply do what he repeatedly promised, and release the so-called Epstein files, as “weaklings” and “stupid people”. This is quite the (public) volte face from the guy who originally swept to office declaring “I love the poorly educated”.Most of you are unlikely to need a recap at this stage, but Jeffrey Epstein is the sex-trafficking financier and socialite, who conveniently died in jail while awaiting trial, apparently by suicide. A woman, Ghislaine Maxwell, was convicted of conspiring with him to sexually abuse minors, and is currently serving 20 years in a low-security Florida prison. But no big-hitting or even small-hitting male associate in the US has so much as been arrested for participating in what I believe the dead paedophile would have encouraged us to call his “lifestyle”. This second Trump administration didn’t just sweep to power while repeatedly screaming about the “cover-up” of this story, but it spent a good portion of its early months assuring its ravenous base that Epstein’s supposed “client list” was on a desk waiting for release approval. Yet now, Trump and his associates say there is no list. Nope. Never even was a list. Where did these weakling idiots get that idea? To summarise his administration’s position: “We took a look at the deep state and it turns out to be very shallow. Seriously, I’m standing in it right now and it doesn’t even come up to my knees.”Understandably, a significant proportion of the Maga crowd are not taking this well at all. One of the key takeouts of Trump’s rise has been that as long as you tell people that up is down or black is white in an engaging or sufficiently discombobulating fashion, truth is an extremely low-status commodity in contemporary politics. But, contrary to perceived trends, it seems that there do still exist some subjects on which you can only push even your own people so far. Maybe the ancient political adage still holds true: live by the paedo conspiracy, die by the paedo conspiracy.Late on Thursday, as footage of people burning Maga hats spread online, a palpably frustrated Trump announced that he was instructing the attorney general, Pam Bondi, to seek release of the Epstein grand jury testimony, “based on the ridiculous amount of publicity given to Jeffrey Epstein”. Though you’ll note the president failed to add the two key words: “by me”. Still, it’s good to hear Trump characterising what’s currently happening as “publicity”, confirming that he sees even the desire to see justice served on a suspected paedophile sex-trafficker and his associates as a form of limelight – which, like all limelight, should by rights be his.It feels harder to sustain the idea that there is nothing to see here, especially when leading wingnuts such as the Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, far-right activist Laura Loomer, Fox host Laura Ingraham, talkshow queen Megyn Kelly, Maga whisperer Steve Bannon and even the US House speaker, Mike Johnson, are out there pushing the base conviction that, actually, there might well be something to see here. “It’s definitely a full reversal on what was all said beforehand,” observed Marjorie in a once-in-a-career alignment with fact, “and people are just not willing to accept it.”We have to take our laughs where we can, meanwhile, so do please consider the cavalcade of podcasters and Maga influencers who got jobs like “director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation” and “deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation” and are now discovering that life comes at you fast. FBI chief Kash Patel spent the election campaign pushing Epstein conspiracies, and is now believed to be hiding under his big important desk wetting his pants. “Listen,” his deputy, Dan Bongino, used to instruct his podcast listeners. “That Jeffrey Epstein story is a big deal, please do not let that story go. Keep your eye on this.” Will do, Dan. Incidentally, a lot of people spent the weekend speculating feverishly that Bongino would sensationally quit his job – but in the end, he just came into work a bit late on Monday. What a tough guy. Make America Deep State Again!Other developments? That are perhaps not unrelated? The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump had served as a contributor to some kind of cursed 50th birthday scrapbook for Epstein, compiled by Maxwell, for which he’d sent a “bawdy” letter. This missive was reportedly typed inside a drawing of a naked woman’s silhouette, in which the famous Trump signature served as a kind of scribble of pubic hair. So far, so FDR. Unfortunately, particularly in the circumstances, the letter itself is said to conclude: “Happy birthday – and may every day be another wonderful secret.”Alas, the current president is not thrilled by this report, denying it completely, adding that he has never in his life “wrote a picture”. (It goes without saying that all Donald Trump statements, always, are very much [sic].) Much more promisingly, Trump is furious with the WSJ owner, Rupert Murdoch, and threatening to “sue his ass off”. Oh please don’t, Mr President! His ass is 94 years old and incredibly wrinkled. Also, half of Britain’s political class still lives up it. Then again, perhaps Trump v Murdoch is very much the desiccated-dick-waving contest the world … wants? Needs? Will have to endure? Unclear which of those applies at this stage, but let’s hold out for the possibility that both men are wholly – and indeed literally – consumed by it.Angles-wise, however, there are already signs that the Wall Street Journal might just be the common enemy the Magas need as an off-ramp for their civil war, allowing people who are obsessed with paedophiles to find common cause both with people who don’t care about paedophiles, and also with people who may actually have been close personal friends with paedophiles. There’ll probably only be one casualty, and it’ll probably be Pam Bondi. Women are great at taking these falls. Furthermore, the whole conflagration would once more pit a billionaire president against one of his billionaire buddies – exactly the kind of better world his supporters voted for, and a true testament to how truly, truly deeply he values them.

    Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

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      US House passes Trump plan to cut $9bn from foreign aid, public broadcasting

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      The US’s Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed president Donald Trump’s $9bn funding cut to public media and foreign aid early on Friday, sending it to the White House to be signed into law.The chamber voted 216 to 213 in favor of the funding cut package, altered by the Senate this week to exclude cuts of about $400m in funds for the global PEPFAR HIV/Aids prevention program.Only two House Republicans voted against the cut – representatives Brian Fitzpatrick from Pennsylvania and Mike Turner from Ohio – along with Democrats.“We are taking one small step to cut wasteful spending, but one giant leap towards fiscal sanity,” said representative Aaron Bean, a Florida Republican.House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries countered that the funding cut “undermines our ability to keep our people safe here and to project America’s soft power all over the globe”, and argued rural Americans’ access to emergency information on public radio will be diminished.The funding vote was delayed for hours amid Republican disagreements about other legislation, and calls from some members of the party for more government transparency about the deceased convicted sex offender and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.To satisfy the Epstein-related concerns without holding up the funding cut bill any longer, Republicans on the House rules committee introduced a resolution that calls for the release of Epstein documents by the US attorney general within 30 days.“It’s a sound, good-faith resolution that ensures protections for victims and innocent witnesses,” said representative Virginia Foxx from North Carolina, the Republican leader of the rules committee.But the top Democrat on the rules panel, representative Jim McGovern from Massachusetts, blasted the resolution as a “glorified press release” because it lacks an enforcement mechanism to make the Justice Department comply.When the chamber finally voted on the funding cut, it was the second close House vote on Trump’s request to claw back the funds previously approved by Democrats and his fellow Republicans in Congress.In June, four Republicans joined Democrats to vote against an earlier version of the rescissions package, which passed 214-212.House Republicans felt extra pressure to pass the Senate version as Trump’s administration would have been forced to spend the money if Congress did not approve the cuts by Friday.The $9bn cut is a small fraction of the country’s $6.8tn federal budget.Republicans say the foreign aid funds previously went to programs they deem wasteful, and they say the $1bn in public media funding supports radio stations and PBS television, which they claim are biased against conservative viewpoints.Prior to the vote in the House, the legislation, known as a rescissions package, was approved by a narrow margin of 51 votes to 48 in the Senate. All Democrats opposed the bill.This week’s funding clawback represents only a tiny portion of all the funds approved by Congress that the Trump administration has held up while it has pursued sweeping cuts.Democratic lawmakers say the administration has blocked more than $425bn of spending approved by Congress since Trump’s second term began in January. More

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      Tensions over Epstein files hamper Republican plan to vote on cuts bill

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      Tensions over the release of documents related to disgrace financier Jeffrey Epstein have complicated House Republicans’ plans to hold a vote Thursday on legislation demanded by Donald Trump to cancel $9bn in government spending.The House of Representatives faces a Friday deadline to pass the rescissions package demanded by Trump and approved by the Senate in the wee hours of Thursday morning, otherwise the administration will be obligated to spend about $8bn meant for foreign assistance programs, and $1.1bn budgeted for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds NPR and PBS.But before the House can vote on the package, it must be approved by the rules committee, where the Democratic minority has sought to capitalize on a growing furor among Republicans and their supporters over the Trump administration’s handling of documents related to the Epstein case by forcing the majority to take politically tricky votes.After several hours of delay, the committee announced it would hold a hearing into the package on Thursday evening, setting the stage for House Republicans to pass the legislation later in the night.Ranking member Jim McGovern accuse the GOP of “stalling” the rules committee hearing, and said Democrats would propose an amendment to the rescissions package meant to win release of any files related to Epstein.“They’re afraid to meet again to have another vote. Well, we’re going to keep the heat on and you need to keep the pressure on members of Congress,” McGovern said. “Release the files, full transparency.”On Monday, rules committee Democrats made two attempts to add language to a cryptocurrency bill that would have required the release of documents dealing with the financier, who was accused of running a sex-trafficking ring catering to global elites. Republicans voted both down.The Epstein case has grown into a crisis for Trump and the GOP ever since the justice department announced last week that, after a review of US government files, it had determined the financier’s 2019 death in federal custody was a suicide, and that no list of his clients existed to be made public.Trump’s Maga coalition includes believers in a conspiracy theory that the “deep state” is covering up a global pedophile ring in which Epstein was a major figure, and that files exist to prove it. The president has strenuously denied that his administration is hiding anything, and insulted those who call for the documents’ release as “weaklings” who fell for a “radical left” hoax intended to discredit him.Democrats, relegated to the minority in both chamber of Congress, have seized on that tension with an array of legislative maneuvers intended to make public any Epstein-related documents. On Tuesday, House speaker Mike Johnson told a conservative podcaster who asked about the case: “It’s a very delicate subject, but we should put everything out there and let the people decide it.”Meanwhile, Thomas Massie, an iconoclastic Republican congressman who has repeatedly clashed with Trump, and Democratic congressman Ro Khanna are trying to get a majority of the House to sign on to a petition that will force a vote on releasing the files, and has already received signatures from nine GOP lawmakers.The rescissions passage passed the House in June, but the chamber must vote on it again after the Senate declined to cut funding for Pepfar, a program credited with saving millions of people from infection or death from HIV that was created in 2003 under the Republican president George W Bush. More

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      A risky bet? Texas Republicans poised to redraw congressional map on Trump’s orders

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      At the behest of Donald Trump, Texas Republicans are poised to redraw their state’s congressional map to try and gain as many as five congressional seats, a move that is likely to further weaken the influence of the state’s fast-growing non-white population and could wind up backfiring on the party.The effort to redraw the map represents a blunt and undemocratic effort by Republican lawmakers to pick the voters who elect them, and comes at a time when many of the party’s positions are unpopular. The US president and national Republicans are making the push because the GOP holds a 220-212 advantage in the US House (there are three Democratic vacancies) and Trump’s party typically loses seats in the midterm elections, which will happen next year.But it’s a risky bet. Twenty-five of Texas’s 38 congressional districts are currently represented by Republicans, a result that was carefully engineered when lawmakers redrew the state’s congressional map in 2021. During that process, mapmakers focused on shoring up Republican seats instead of trying to pick up Democratic ones.In order to pick up new seats, Republicans will have to spread their voters from safe Republican ones into Democratic districts. It could allow them to pick up more seats, but also makes the Republican districts more competitive and potentially winnable by Democrats in a strong year.The number of seats Republicans are able to pick up “depends on how much risk Republicans want to take,” said David Wasserman, an analyst at the Cook Political Report who closely follows US House races. “Republicans could probably target three Democratic seats very easily, but once it gets to four or five, that could put additional Republican seats at risk.”When Republicans drew the existing map, they blunted the political influence of non-white voters in the state, who accounted for 95% of the state’s population growth over the last decade. The new maps could further weaken their ability to elect their preferred candidates.“The current maps are already blatantly racist and discriminate against voters of color, communities of color, all over the state,” said Anthony Gutierrez, the executive director of the Texas chapter of Common Cause, a watchdog group. “There would be absolutely no way you get to five more Republican districts without just completely trampling on minority voting rights.”Two Democratic seats likely to be targeted are the ones in south Texas currently held by representatives Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, Wasserman said. Trump won both districts in 2024 and Republicans could easily tweak their boundaries to make them winnable. Democrats also represent four districts in the Houston area, and Republicans could shift the boundaries to try and pick up one or two districts depending on how aggressive they want to be.The Republican push to redraw the map comes as the state is still reeling from deadly floods that left at least 134 people dead with more than 100 people still missing. Democrats in the Texas legislature are reportedly considering walking out of the special session in order to deny Republicans a quorum needed to pass the maps. Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, has said he will assist in “hunting down” members who walk out and compel them back to the capitol.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTo justify redrawing the maps, Texas governor Greg Abbott pointed to a 7 July letter from the justice department claiming lawmakers had impermissibly sorted voters based on their race. Both the letter’s argument, and Abbott’s quick acceptance of it, raised eyebrows because Texas officials have said for years they did not consider race at all when they drew the maps.“My jaw dropped when I saw that letter,” said Mark Gaber, an attorney at the Campaign Legal Center, who is representing some of the plaintiffs suing Texas over the maps already in place. “Either the witnesses were not telling the truth or the entire premise of this special session and the mid-decade redistricting is false.”In its letter, the justice department pointed to four districts where it claimed voters had been unconstitutionally sorted by race. In two of those districts, two different groups of minority voters constitute a majority that can elect their preferred candidates. Another district is majority Hispanic. The final district it raised issue with was drawn after judges found intentional discrimination in a previous district.Several legal experts said those claims were highly questionable.“The DoJ letter is completely concocted and it reflects a complete misunderstanding of the law, but that’s not what they’re interested in,” said Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is representing some of the plaintiffs challenging the current congressional map.“If I were them, I would be consulting legal counsel about the possibility of being found guilty of perjury in what they testified to under oath,” he added.Mapmakers may want to keep communities who share common interests together for reasons that have nothing to do with their race, said Michael Li, a redistricting expert at the Brennan Center for Justice.Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Law School who worked on voting rights issues at both the justice department and White House said the letter was “nonsense”.“What they appear to articulate in the letters is the notion that any time there happens to be multiple minorities in a district, that’s a constitutional violation. And that’s like seven different versions of wrong,” he said. More

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      US Senate passes aid and public broadcasting cuts in victory for Trump

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      The US Senate has approved Donald Trump’s plan for billions of dollars in cuts to funding for foreign aid and public broadcasting, handing the Republican president another victory as he exerts control over Congress with little opposition.The Senate voted 51 to 48 in favour of Trump’s request to cut $9bn in spending already approved by Congress.Most of the cuts are to programmes to assist foreign countries stricken by disease, war and natural disasters, but the plan also eliminates the $1.1bn the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was due to receive over the next two years.Trump and many of his fellow Republicans argue that spending on public broadcasting is an unnecessary expense and reject its news coverage as blighted by “anti-right bias”.Standalone rescissions packages have not passed in decades, with lawmakers reluctant to cede their constitutionally mandated control of spending. But the Republicans, who hold narrow majorities in the Senate and House, have shown little appetite for resisting Trump’s policies since he began his second term in January.The $9bn at stake is small in the context of the $6.8tn federal budget, and represents a tiny portion of all the funds approved by Congress that the Trump administration has held up while it has pursued sweeping cuts, many ordered by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (Dog)e.By mid-June, Trump was blocking $425bn in funding that had been appropriated and approved by Congress, according to Democratic lawmakers tracking frozen funding.However, the president and his supporters have promised more of the “rescission” requests to eliminate previously approved spending in what they say is an effort to pare back the federal government.The House of Representatives passed the rescissions legislation, without altering Trump’s request, by 214-212 last month. Four Republicans joined 208 Democrats in voting no.But after a handful of Republican senators balked at the extent of the cuts to global health programmes, Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, said on Tuesday that Pepfar, a global programme to fight HIV/Aids launched in 2003 by President George W Bush, was being exempted.The change brought the size of the package of cuts to $9bn from $9.4bn, requiring another House vote before the measure could be sent to the White House for Trump to sign into law.The rescissions must pass by Friday. Otherwise, the request would expire and the White House required to adhere to spending plans passed by Congress.Two of the Senate’s 53 Republicans , Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, joined Democrats in voting against the legislation. “You don’t need to gut the entire Corporation for Public Broadcasting,” Murkowski said told the Senateskip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionShe said the Trump administration had not provided assurances that battles against diseases such as malaria and polio worldwide would be maintained. Murkowski called for Congress to assert its role in deciding how federal funds were spent.The Republican Senate majority leader, John Thune of South Dakota, called Trump’s request a “small, but important step toward fiscal sanity”.Democrats scoffed at that, noting that congressional Republicans had this month passed a massive package of tax and spending cuts that nonpartisan analysts estimated would add more than $3tn to the country’s $36.2tn debt.Democrats accused Republicans of giving up Congress’s constitutionally mandated control of federal spending.“Today, Senate Republicans turn this chamber into a subservient rubber stamp for the executive, at the behest of Donald Trump,” Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic leader, representing New York, said. “Republicans embrace the credo of cut, cut, cut now, and ask questions later.”The cuts would overturn bipartisan spending agreements most recently passed in a full-year stopgap funding bill in March. Democrats warn a partisan cut could make it more difficult to negotiate government funding bills that must pass with bipartisan agreement by 30 September to avoid a shutdown.Appropriations bills require 60 votes to move ahead in the Senate but the rescissions package needs just 51, meaning Republicans can pass it without Democratic support. More

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      Trump lambasts Republicans pursuing what he calls the ‘Epstein hoax’ as ‘stupid people’ – live updates

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      The president then was asked what evidence he might have seen to change his stance on the Epstein case, which this morning he called a “hoax”.Trump doubled down on his claim that it’s a “big hoax,” but did not provide evidence to support this claim. He also claimed the Epstein case was “started by the Democrats,” but again cited no evidence (though he did mention the Steele Dossier, a report on Trump’s 2016 campaign that alleged cooperation with Russia?).“Some stupid Republicans and foolish Republicans fall into the net and try to do the Democrats’s work,” Trump said.“They’re stupid people,” he continued to say about Republicans who believe there is more to be revealed about the Epstein case.A federal judge in Tennessee said on Wednesday that he would not rule this week on the legal status of Kilmar Ábrego, the migrant returned to the US after being wrongly deported to El Salvador, according to Adam Klasfeld, a legal reporter who was in the Nashville courtroom.Federal prosecutors sought to convince US district judge Waverly Crenshaw to reverse a magistrate judge’s ruling allowing Ábrego – who faces human smuggling charges that were only developed after his wrongful deportation to a Salvadorian prison became a source of embarrassment for the Trump administration – to be released on bail to await a trial.The Trump administration claimed Ábrego was in the MS-13 gang, although he was not charged with being a member and has repeatedly denied the allegation. Facing mounting pressure and a US supreme court order, the administration returned Ábrego to the US last month to face the smuggling charges, which his attorneys have called “preposterous”.A department of homeland security investigator, Peter Joseph, testified about the investigation on Wednesday, detailing information authorities learned from alleged co-conspirators with Ábrego in a migrant smuggling ring.Ábrego’s lawyers have suggested that the testimony of his alleged co-conspirators is unreliable, since all of them have either criminal or immigration cases of their own, with their deportations being deferred in exchange for their cooperation with the government.Even if the judge in orders him released from criminal custody, the Trump administration has said Ábrego will immediately be detained by immigration authorities and face a second deportation.Ábrego’s lawyers have asked US district judge Paula Xinis in Maryland to order the government to send him to Maryland if he is released in Tennessee, a request that aims to prevent his expulsion before trial.Donald Trump, who reportedly consumes a dozen Diet Cokes every day, just announced that he has convinced Coca-Cola to return to using sugar in its drinks.“I have been speaking to Coca-Cola about using REAL Cane Sugar in Coke in the United States, and they have agreed to do so”, Trump posted on his social media network. “I’d like to thank all of those in authority at Coca-Cola. This will be a very good move by them — You’ll see. It’s just better!”Coca-Cola currently sweetens its drinks with high-fructose corn syrup, in large part because a previous Republican president, Ronald Reagan, imposed tariffs on imported sugar in 1981, dramatically raising prices.Those tariffs and quotas had the effect of incentivizing domestic corn syrup production and consumption in the United States. Trump’s initiative could have the unintended effect of lowering the demand for corn, the domestic production of which is heavily subsidized by the federal government.If enough Americans agree with the president that Coca-Cola sweetened with sugar is better tasting, that could also cut against the efforts of his health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, to make Americans healthier by getting them to consume less sweet, carbonated beverages.Kennedy has supported efforts to prevent Americans from spending food-aid benefits on sugary, carbonated beverages.High-fructose corn syrup isn’t necessarily worse for us than table sugar, Frank Hu of the Harvard School of Public Health told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in 2012, but it is also healthier to avoid both.Hu, professor of nutrition and epidemiology, told the daly that the two sweeteners are chemically quite similar. High-fructose corn syrup, made from corn, is about 55% fructose and 40% glucose. Table sugar, or sucrose, is made from sugar cane or beets and is 50% glucose and 50% fructose. While high-fructose corn syrup often gets blamed for the nation’s obesity epidemic, Hu said, “we should worry about sugar in general”.In 2020, the NBC News affiliate in Seattle spoke to experts who confirmed that Coca-Cola made in Mexico, where it is sweetened with sugar, is not healthier than Coca-Cola produced with corn syrup.In keeping with the frantic pace of posting maintained by their boss, Donald Trump, the White House press office has a hyperactive social media feed on X, @RapidResponse47, that is very frequently updated with clips of the president’s statements, hour after hour.The account has posted 49 times already on Wednesday, and featured seven video clips of Trump’s comments on a range of issues during his meeting with Bahrain’s prime minister Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa. But the aides who run the account seem to be studiously avoiding one subject: Trump’s claim that the uproar over his administration’s decision not to release files from the federal investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender he knew well, is ‘a hoax’.None of what Trump said about Epstein on Wednesday appeared on this official White House feed. Similarly, when Trump spoke to reporters on Tuesday, the account clipped and boosted his remarks on several other subjects, but ignored his claim that the subject of Epstein’s crimes was “sordid, but boring”.That marks a change from February, when the president’s press team shared a clip of Trump’s attorney general, Pam Bondi, telling Fox host Jesse Watters, that she had the Epstein files on her desk. With a siren emoji, the account showed video of Bondi saying: “I think tomorrow, Jesse, breaking news right now, you’re going to see some Epstein information being released by my office”.“What’s you’re going to see, hopefully tomorrow, is a lot of flight logs, a lot of names, a lot of information”, Bondi added. That information however has still not been released.Donald Trump has said that he thinks China will begin sentencing people to death for fentanyl manufacturing and distribution.Speaking at an event for the signing of the Halt Fentanyl Act, attended by family members of people who had died from overdoes, Trump said he imposed a tariff on China “because of fentanyl”.“I think we’re going to work it out so that China is going to end up going from that to giving the death penalty to the people that create this fentanyl and send it into our country,” Trump said. “I believe that’s going to happen soon.”Columbia University has agreed to adopt a controversial definition of antisemitism as it pursues an agreement with the administration aimed at restoring $400m in federal government grants frozen over its alleged failure to protect Jewish students.In a letter to students and staff, the university’s acting president, Claire Shipman, said it would incorporate the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism into its anti-discrimination policies as part of a broad overhaul.It is the latest in a string of concessions Columbia has made following criticisms – mainly from pro-Israel groups and Republican members of Congress – that university authorities had tolerated the expression of antisemitic attitudes in pro-Palestinian campus protests following the start of Israel’s assault on Gaza in 2023.“Columbia is committed to taking all possible steps to combat antisemitism and the University remains dedicated to ensuring that complaints of discrimination and harassment of all types, including complaints based on Jewish and Israeli identity, are treated in the same manner,” wrote Shipman.“Formally adding the consideration of the IHRA definition into our existing anti-discrimination policies strengthens our approach to combating antisemitism.”The definition, which describes antisemitism as “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews”, has been adopted by the US state department and several European government and EU groups.However, critics have say it is designed to shield Israel by punishing legitimate criticism of the country. They also complain that it conflates antisemitism with anti-Zionism.Among the examples of criticisms accompanying the definition are “claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor”, “applying double standards by requiring of [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nations” and “accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel … than to the interests of their own nations”.Vice-president JD Vance earlier made the administration’s first big pitch to sell the public on Donald Trump’s sweeping budget-and-policy package in the swing political turf of northeastern Pennsylvania.Vance, whose tie-breaking vote got the bill through the Senate, touted the legislation’s tax breaks and cast Democrats as opponents of the cutting taxes because of their unanimous opposition to the legislation.Democrats, who’ve decried the bill’s deep cuts to Medicaid and food stamps, along with other provisions, are expected to try to use it against Republicans in closely contested congressional campaigns next year that will determine control of Congress.The GOP plans to use it to make their case as well, something the vice-president asked the crowd in working-class West Pittston to help with.“Go and talk to your neighbors, go and talk to your friends, about what this bill does for America’s citizens. Because we don’t want to wake up in a year and a half and give the Democrats power back,” he said.Speaking at at an industrial machine shop, the Vance was also quick to highlight the bill’s new tax deductions on overtime.“You earned that money,” Vance said. “You ought to keep it in your pocket.”He also promoted the legislation’s creation of a new children’s savings program, called Trump Accounts, with a potential $1,000 deposit from the treasury department.Recognizing the significance of the coal and gas industry in Pennsylvania, he also talked up the ways the law seeks to promote energy extraction, such as allowing increased leasing for drilling, mining and logging on public lands, speeding up government approvals and cutting royalty rates paid by extraction companies.“We are finally going to drill, baby drill and invest in American energy,” Vance said. “And I know you all love that.”The historic legislation, which Trump signed into law earlier this month with near unanimous Republican support, includes key campaign pledges like no tax on tips but also cuts Medicaid and food stamps by a staggering $1.2tn.Democrats recently held a town hall in House speaker Mike Johnson’s home state of Louisiana to denounce the legislation as a “reverse Robin Hood — stealing from the poor to give to the rich”.Vance’s office declined to elaborate to the Associated Press on plans for other public events around the US to promote the bill. After his remarks, he visited a nearby diner where he picked up food and spoke to some of the patrons.Here’s my colleague Oliver Holmes’s report on Trump lashing out against his own supporters for questioning the transparency of a secretive government inquiry into the late high-profile socialite and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein:

      Donald Trump backed away from suggestions he was moving to fire Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell, following media reports that he had privately indicated to a meeting of GOP lawmakers last night that he would do so. After the bombshell reports rocked Wall Street this morning, the president pulled back, saying it was “highly unlikely” that he’ll fire Powell. “We’re not planning on doing anything,” Trump told reporters, unless Powell “has to leave” because of “fraud”, referring to the controversy over renovations to the Fed’s historic headquarters in Washington.

      Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren wrote on X: “Nobody is fooled by President Trump and Republicans’ sudden interest in building renovations — it’s clear pretext to fire Fed Chair Powell.” Trump indicated that he’d probably wait to replace Powell until his term ends next year. The president does not have the power to fire the Fed chair without cause.

      It has failed to distract from the growing furore from Trump’s usually ardently loyal Maga base over his administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case. His base is in uproar over the justice department’s recent decision to halt further disclosures related to Epstein, including the alleged client list, as well as its finding that he died by suicide. That reached new altitudes today when Trump branded the case a hoax and lashed out at his supporters-turned-critics, calling them “weaklings” and “stupid people” for buying into the conspiracy theories, which he blamed on (checks notes) Democrats. He is conveniently forgetting that both he himself and members of his administration have long stoked those same theories. He is also conveniently not acknowledging that prominent allies of his have joined the calls for the files to be released, including House speaker Mike Johnson, and influential Maga figures like far-right activist Laura Loomer.

      Trump also once again back Pam Bondi’s handling of the Epstein case and said: “Whatever’s credible she can release. If a document’s there that is credible, she can release [it], I think it’s good.”

      Secretary of state Marco Rubio, asked about Israeli strikes on Syria on Wednesday, said the United States was “very concerned”, adding that he had just spoken to the relevant parties over the phone. “We’re going to be working on that issue as we speak. I just got off the phone with the relevant parties. We’re very concerned about it, and hopefully we’ll have some updates later today. But we’re very concerned about it,” Rubio said. He added that the US wants fighting to stop as clashes between Syrian government troops and local Druze fighters broke out hours after a ceasefire agreement.

      Zohran Mamdani told New York business leaders yesterday he will not use the phrase “globalize the intifada” and discourage others from doing so. The mayoral frontrunner explained at the meeting that many use “globalize the intifada” as an expression of support for the Palestinian people and, for him, the phrase means protest against the Israeli occupation of Gaza, according to the Wall Street Journal. Mamdani also said he is willing to discourage the specific language, but not the idea behind it.

      A flight carrying immigrants deported from the US landed in Eswatini, the homeland security department announced, in a move that follows the supreme court lifting limits on deporting migrants to third countries.

      A group of 20 mostly Democrat-led US states filed a lawsuit seeking to block the Trump administration from terminating a multibillion-dollar grant program that funds infrastructure upgrades to protect against natural disasters.

      Robert F Kennedy Jr abruptly fired two of his top aides – chief of staff Heather Flick Melanson and deputy chief of staff for policy Hannah Anderson – CNN reported, citing two people familiar with the matter.
      “Many Republicans I’ve been talking to over the past few days have predicted that Trump would do something dramatic to distract from Epstein,” a Puck reporter wrote on X regarding today’s will he, won’t regarding sacking Jerome Powell.And as Politico notes, “though Trump appears to be holding off on Powell, a groundswell of backlash from both base and swing voters – over the Epstein files and the GOP megabill – continues to dominate headlines”.House speaker Mike Johnson has said he believes it would be beneficial to have new leadership at the Federal Reserve, although he added that he’s not sure the president has the authority to fire chair Jerome Powell, according to media reports.“I do I believe new leadership would be helpful at the Fed,” a Wall Street Journal reporter on X has quoted Johnson as saying.Punchbowl News, in a separate X post, reported Johnson said he’s “really not sure” if the president can fire Powell.US senator Elizabeth Warren has said that Donald Trump’s interest in renovations of Federal Reserve’s headquarters is “clear pretext” to fire chairman Jerome Powell.Last week, the White House intensified its criticism of how the Fed is being run when the director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, sent Powell a letter saying Trump was “extremely troubled” by cost overruns in the $2.5bn renovation of its historic headquarters in Washington.Earlier today, following bombshell news reports that Trump was planning to fire Powell which rattled financial markets, the president pulled back in the Oval Office. Though he confirmed that the conversation with GOP lawmakers about whether he should fire the central bank leader took place, the president said it’s “highly unlikely” that he’ll fire Powell.“We’re not planning on doing anything,” Trump told reporters, unless Powell “has to leave” because of “fraud”, referring to the controversy over the renovations. The president indicated that he’d probably wait to replace Powell until his term ends next year.“Nobody is fooled by President Trump and Republicans’ sudden interest in building renovations — it’s clear pretext to fire Fed Chair Powell,” Warren, the ranking Democrat on the Senate banking committee, which oversees the Fed, said in a post on X.As we’ve fact-checked, the president doesn’t have the power to fire Powell over a monetary dispute and today he backed away from the idea, saying instead that “we get to make a change in eight months” (when Powell’s tenure expires).US senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina has said that firing the Federal Reserve chair because “political people” don’t agree with his economic decision-making would undermine US credibility, adding that it would be a “huge mistake” to end the Fed’s independence.“You’re going to see a pretty immediate response and we’ve got to avoid that,” Tillis, a Republican member of the Senate banking committee, said on the floor of the chamber earlier.Trump has today backed away from the idea of firing Jerome Powell, saying instead that “we get to make a change in eight months” (when Powell’s tenure expires).The president does not have the power to fire the Federal Reserve chair. But reports today said that Trump had asked Republican lawmakers if he should fire Powell, and several people in the room indicated he will do it.Well, that more or less captures everything Donald Trump said in the oval office just now alongside Bahrain crown prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa.Trump again supported his attorney general, Pam Bondi, who has been under fire for her handling of the Epstein case.“I think she’s doing a great job.”The president was asked whether he would allow US attorney general Pam Bondi to release more information on the Jeffrey Epstein case.“Whatever’s credible she can release,” Trump said. “If a document’s there that is credible, she can release [it], I think it’s good.”But then he goes after Republicans again: “All it is is that certain Republicans got duped by the Democrats and they’re following the Democrat playbook. It’s no different than ‘Russia, Russia, Russia’ and all the other hoaxes.”Trump tries to pivot to the Biden-autopen investigation that Republicans are leading against his predecessor. It has been widely seen as a partisan move to discredit the former Democratic president.“That’s the scandal they should be talking about, not Jeffrey Epstein,” he said. “I think it’s the biggest scandal – one of them – in American history.” More

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      America’s famed ‘checks-and-balances’ governance system is failing | Jan-Werner Müller

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      It has been said many times, but saying it appears to have no consequences: our system of checks and balances is failing. The US supreme court allowing the president effectively to abolish the Department of Education only reinforces this sense; Sonia Sotomayor, in her dissent, explicitly wrote that “the threat to our Constitution’s separation of powers is grave” – but she did not explain how to counter the threat.The picture is complicated by the fact that what critics call “the stranglehold the checks and balances narrative on the American political imagination” has prevented positive democratic change. Hence it is crucial to understand where the separation of powers itself needs to be kept in check and where it can play a democracy-reinforcing role. Most important, we need counterstrategies against the Trumpists’ usurpation of what should remain separate powers.While pious talk of the founders’ genius in establishing “checks and balances” is part of US civil religion and constitutional folklore, the system in fact never functioned quite as intended. The framers had assumed that individuals would jealously guard the rights of the branches they occupied. Instead, the very thing that the founders dreaded as dangerous “factions” – what we call political parties – emerged already by the end of the 18th century; and thereby also arose the possibility of unified party government.The other unexpected development was the increasing power of the presidency; the founders had always seen the legislature as the potential source of tyranny; instead, the second half of the 20th century saw the consolidation of an “imperial presidency”, whose powers have steadily increased as a result of various real (and often imagined) emergencies. Some jurists even blessed this development, going back to Hamilton’s call for an energetic executive, and trusting that public opinion, rather than Congress or the courts, would prove an effective check on an otherwise “unbound executive”.The dangers posed by unified party control and a strong presidency were long mitigated by the relative heterogeneity of parties in the US; internal dissent meant that Congress would often thwart an executive’s agenda. Less obviously, Congress’s creation of largely independent agencies, acting on the basis of expertise, as well as inspectors general within the executive itself established an internal system of checks. It also remains true, though, that, compared with democracies such as Germany and the UK, an opposition party in the US does not have many rights (such as chairing committees) or ways of holding a chief executive accountable (just imagine if Trump had to face a weekly prime minister’s question time, rather than sycophantic Fox hosts).Most important, though, the executive itself tended to respect the powers of other branches. But Trump: not so much. In line with his governance model, of doing something plainly illegal and then seeing what happens, Trump is usurping powers reserved for the legislature. He uses money as he sees fit, not as Congress intended; he, not Congress, decides which departments are necessary. The tariff madness could be over if Congress called the bluff on a supposed “emergency” which justifies Trump’s capricious conduct of slapping countries with apparently random levies. The most egregious example is his recent threat vis-à-vis Brazil which has nothing to with trade deficits, but is meant to help his ideological ally, former president Jair Bolsonaro, escape a criminal trial for a coup attempt.Trump is also destroying the internal checks within the executive. Inspectors general have been fired; independent agencies are made subservient to the president – in line with the theory of a “unified executive” long promoted by conservative jurists. The US supreme court, occupied to 67% by Maga has been blessing every power grab. As the legal scholar Steve Vladeck noted, the court has granted Trump relief in every single emergency application since early April, with seven decisions – like this week’s on the Department of Education – coming with no explanation at all. If this were happening in other countries, one would plainly speak of a captured court, that is to say: one subordinated to the governing party. As commentators have pointed out, it is inconceivable that this court would simply rubber-stamp a decision by a President Mamdani to fire almost everyone at the Department of Homeland Security.Still, the main culprit is the Republican party in Congress. There is simply no credible version of “conservatism” that justifies Trump’s total concentration of power; and anyone with an ounce of understanding of the constitution would recognize the daily violations. This case can be made without buying into the separation of powers narrative criticized by the left (though what they aim at is less the existence of checks as such, but the empowerment of rural minorities in the Senate and the proliferation of veto points in the political system, such that powerful private interests can stop popular legislation).Paradoxically, Democrats should probably make Congress even more dysfunctional than it already is: use every procedural means to grind business to a halt and explain to the public that – completely contrary to the founders’ anxieties – the emasculation of the legislature is causing democracy’s demise (it never hurts to slip in such gendered language to provoke the Republican masculinists).Of course, one might question what role public opinion can really play as a check, and whether there’s still such a thing at all given our fragmented media world: it never constrained the George W Bush administration’s “global war on terror” in the way that Hamilton’s self-declared disciples had hoped. But it’s still the best bet. After all, there is a reason why some jurists see “we the people” as the fourth branch that ultimately makes the difference.

      Jan-Werner Müller is a Guardian US columnist and a professor of politics at Princeton University More

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      Senate Republicans advance Trump bill to cancel $9bn in approved spending

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      Senate Republicans on Tuesday advanced Donald Trump’s request to cancel about $9bn in previously approved spending, overcoming concerns about what the rescissions could mean for impoverished people around the globe and for public radio and television stations in their home states.JD Vance broke the tie on the procedural vote, allowing the measure to advance, 51-50.A final vote in the Senate could occur as early as Wednesday. The bill would then return to the House for another vote before it would go to the US president’s desk for his signature before a Friday deadline.Republicans winnowed down the president’s request by taking out his proposed $400m cut to a program known as Pepfar. That change increased the prospects for the bill’s passage. The politically popular program is credited with saving millions of lives since its creation under then president George W Bush to combat HIV/Aids.Trump is also looking to claw back money for foreign aid programs targeted by his so-called “department of government efficiency” and for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.“When you’ve got a $36tn debt, we have to do something to get spending under control,” said Senate majority leader John Thune.Republicans met with Russ Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, during their weekly conference luncheon as the White House worked to address their concerns. He fielded about 20 questions from senators. There was some back and forth, but many of the concerns were focused on working toward a resolution, either through arrangements with the administration directly or via an amendment to the bill, said senator John Hoeven.The White House campaign to win over potential holdouts had some success. Senator Mike Rounds tweeted that he would vote to support the measure after working with the administration to “find Green New Deal money that could be reallocated to continue grants to tribal radio stations without interruption”.Some senators worried that the cuts to public media could decimate many of the 1,500 local radio and television stations around the country that rely on some federal funding to operate. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting distributes more than 70% of its funding to those stations.Maine senator Susan Collins, the Republican chair of the Senate appropriations committee, said the substitute package marked “progress”, but she still raised issues with it, particularly on a lack of specifics from the White House. She questioned how the package could still total $9 billion while also protecting programs that Republicans favor.Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said she didn’t want the Senate to be going through numerous rounds of rescissions.“We are lawmakers. We should be legislating,” Murkowski said. “What we’re getting now is a direction from the White House and being told: ‘This is the priority and we want you to execute on it. We’ll be back with you with another round.’ I don’t accept that.”But the large majority of Republicans were supportive of Trump’s request.“This bill is a first step in a long but necessary fight to put our nation’s fiscal house in order,” said senator Eric Schmitt.Democrats oppose the package. They see Trump’s request as an effort to erode the Senate filibuster. They also warn it’s absurd to expect them to work with Republicans on bipartisan spending measures if Republicans turn around a few months later and use their majority to cut the parts they don’t like.“It shreds the appropriations process,” said senator Angus King, an independent from Maine who caucuses with Democrats. “The appropriations committee, and indeed this body, becomes a rubber stamp for whatever the administration wants.”Democratic leader Chuck Schumer cautioned that tens of millions of Americans rely on local public radio and television stations for local news, weather alerts and educational programs. He warned that many could lose access to that information because of the rescissions.“And these cuts couldn’t come at a worse time,” Schumer said. “The floods in Texas remind us that speedy alerts and up-to-the-minute forecasts can mean the difference between life and death.”Democrats also scoffed at the GOP’s stated motivation for taking up the bill. The amount of savings pales compared to the $3.4trn in projected deficits over the next decade that Republicans put in motion in passing Trump’s big tax and spending cut bill two weeks ago.“Now, Republicans are pretending they are concerned about the debt,” said senator Patty Murray. “So concerned that they need to shut down local radio stations, so concerned they are going to cut off Sesame Street … The idea that that is about balancing the debt is laughable.”With Republicans providing enough votes to take up the bill, it sets up the potential for 10 hours of debate plus votes on scores of potentially thorny amendments in what is known as a vote-a-rama. The House has already shown its support for the president’s request with a mostly party line 214-212 vote, but since the Senate is amending the bill, it will have to go back to the House for another vote.Republicans who vote against the measure also face the prospect of incurring Trump’s wrath. He has issued a warning on his social media site directly aimed at individual Senate Republicans who may be considering voting against the rescissions package. He said it was important that all Republicans adhere to the bill and in particular defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.“Any Republican that votes to allow this monstrosity to continue broadcasting will not have my support or Endorsement,” he said. More

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      US university leaders challenge campus antisemitism claims in House hearing

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      Rich Lyons, the chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, challenged US House Republicans on Tuesday as they questioned him and leaders of Georgetown University and the City University of New York in the latest hearing on antisemitism in higher education.The committee accused the schools of failing to respond adequately to allegations of bias or discrimination; however, the university leaders said that disciplinary action had been taken where appropriate and stressed the importance of protecting free speech.Lyons pushed back on the suggestion that antisemitism was more present on college campuses than anywhere else.“If somebody is expressing pro-Palestinian beliefs, that’s not necessarily antisemitic,” he said.Lyons, who has just completed his first year as chancellor, is also the first UC leader to face the House committee during the Trump presidency. In his opening remarks, he defended the campus’ commitment to free speech.“As a public institution, Berkeley has a solemn obligation to protect the quintessential American value of free speech,” Lyons said. “This obligation does not prevent us, let me repeat, does not prevent us from confronting harassment and discrimination in all its forms, including antisemitism.”The hearing was the ninth in a series Republicans have held to scrutinize university leadership over allegations of antisemitism on campuses after a wave of protests over Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of Gaza, which has killed more than 60,000 people, in retaliation to Hamas’ 7 October 2023 attack on Israel. Widely criticized testimony before the committee by the presidents of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard University in 2023 contributed to their resignations.At Tuesday’s hearing, Democrats blasted Republican committee members for their focus on antisemitism while not speaking on the dismantling of the education department, which is tasked with investigating antisemitism and other civil rights violations in schools.“They have turned this hearing room into a kangaroo court, where they spend our time litigating a predetermined outcome to do nothing, actually, to help Jewish students, just make public theater out of legitimate pain,” said the California representative Mark Takano.Republicans said university leaders have allowed campus antisemitism to run unchecked.“Universities can choose to hire antisemitic faculty, welcome students with a history of antisemitism, accept certain foreign funding, and let the behavior of antisemitic unions go unchecked,” Tim Walberg, a Michigan representative and committee chair, said in his opening statements. “But we will see today they do so at their own risk.”The hearing was periodically interrupted by protesters, who shouted pro-Palestinian slogans before being removed by Capitol police. Randy Fine, a Florida representative, berated the college presidents and said they were responsible because of the attitudes they had permitted on their campuses.Republicans pressed the three college leaders on whether they had disciplined or fired faculty and employees for behavior they said was antisemitic. Elise Stefanik, a Republican representative of New York, pressed the CUNY chancellor, Félix Matos Rodríguez, on the employment of a law professor who worked on the legal defense of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist the Trump administration attempted to deport over his role in protests at Columbia University.Stefanik pushed Matos Rodríguez to answer whether the professor should be fired. Without responding directly, Matos Rodríguez defended CUNY and said antisemitism had no place at the school. He said any student or employee who broke CUNY rules would be investigated.University leaders also emphasized the importance of free speech on campuses for students and faculty.Robert Groves, the interim president at Georgetown, said that as a Jesuit university, fostering interfaith dialogue and understanding was a key part of the school’s mission. He said the university has not experienced any encampments or physical violence since the Hamas attack in October 2023.“Given our Jesuit values, we expose students to different viewpoints on the Middle East,” Groves said. “In addition to speakers on Gaza, we’ve hosted IDF soldiers, families of Israelis and Palestinians who’ve lost their lives. US families of US hostages in Gaza. Georgetown is not perfect, and as events evolve, we’ve had to clarify rules of student behavior.”Lyons, as well, said his campus has “more work to do” to prevent antisemitism.“I am the first to say that we have more work to do. Berkeley, like our nation, has not been immune to the disturbing rise in antisemitism. And as a public university, we have a solemn obligation to protect our community from discrimination and harassment, while also upholding the first amendment right to free speech,” he said. More