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      I’m no fan of Elon Musk. But Trump’s threat to deport him is sickening | Justice Malala

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      Elon Musk is an utterly deplorable human being. He has unashamedly flashed an apparent Nazi salute; encouraged rightwing extremists in Germany and elsewhere; falsely claimed there is a “genocide” in South Africa against white farmers; callously celebrated the dismantling of USAID, whose shuttering will lead to the deaths of millions, according to a study published in the Lancet this week; and increased misinformation and empowered extremists on his Twitter/X platform while advancing his sham “I am a free speech absolutist” claims. And so much more.So the news that Donald Trump “will take a look” at deporting his billionaire former “first buddy” Musk has many smirking and shrugging: “Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.”I like a good comeuppance, but this doesn’t please me at all. It sends a chill down the spine. It is the use of law enforcement agencies as a tool to chill debate, to silence disagreement and dissent, and to punish political opposition. Democracy is dimming fast in the United States, but threats to deport US citizens for disagreeing with the governing administration’s policies are the domain of authoritarian regimes such as Belarus or Cameroon.Coming just hours after his officials raised the possibility of stripping Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic mayoral candidate for New York who was naturalised in 2018, of his US citizenship, Trump’s threat should have all of America – a country of immigrants – appalled, afraid and up in arms. As the Guardian reported on Tuesday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, appeared to pave the way for an investigation into Mamdani’s status after Andy Ogles, a rightwing Republican congressman for Tennessee, called for his citizenship to be revoked on the grounds that he might have concealed his support for “terrorism” during the naturalization process. Trump has branded Mamdani “a pure communist” and said “we don’t need a communist in this country”.Mamdani has not broken any laws. His sin? Running for office.In his threats against Mamdani and Musk, the president comes across like the notorious Republican senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s. McCarthy was, according to the Harvard law dean Ervin Griswold, “judge, jury, prosecutor, castigator, and press agent, all in one”. Trump’s threats to Musk and Mamdani are a departure from the administration’s modus operandi of targeting foreign students involved in pro-Palestinian organizing on US college campuses. It is now targeting people it disagrees with on any issue. The threats are not based on any generally applicable laws but on the whim of the president or other administration leaders. It is an escalation of the assault on civil liberties using government entities to arbitrarily investigate and potentially punish critics.Over the past four weeks Musk’s sin has been to vehemently oppose Trump’s sweeping spending bill, calling it a “disgusting abomination”. Musk is of course not concerned about the bill’s slashing of health insurance, food stamps and other aid for the poor, but that it does not slash enough and that its cuts to green energy tax credits may cost his company, Tesla, about $1.2bn.But Musk is a US citizen with the right to oppose a piece of legislation without threats from the highest office in the land and the fear of deportation. When Musk poured $288m of his money into Trump and other Republicans’ 2024 candidacies, no one raised a hand to question his credentials as an American. Instead, the administration gave him the run of the White House including midnight ice cream binges and a job as a glorified bean counter at the so-called department of government efficiency (Doge).The hypocrisy and the corruption embedded within Trump’s deportation threats is mind-boggling but unsurprising given his track record. The consequence, like the McCarthyism of the 1950s, is a climate of fear and a chilling of political discourse and action. Proud Americans who arrived here recently, such as Mamdani, are fearful of running for office, of speaking their minds in true American tradition, despite having the same responsibilities and privileges as every other American conferred on them. Trump’s threat does to Musk what it does to every immigrant: it shuts them up, it holds over their head the possibility of made-up charges and deportation to El Salvador or some other country.Musk and his like were chortling when the Columbia University activist Mahmoud Khalil was cruelly detained for months. It is in the nature of those who like to tweet about freedom but do not think about it deeply enough, such as Musk, to not realize that their silence when the rights of a Khalil or a Mamdani are trampled upon will come back to haunt them. The Republican rump is silent today as Musk is threatened with deportation, just as it has been when masked men have come for Khalil and others who dared exercise their first amendment rights.There will be silence when they come for the Republicans. That’s because we will all be gone by then, after no one else said a thing.

      Justice Malala is a political commentator and author of The Plot To Save South Africa: The Week Mandela Averted Civil War and Forged a New Nation More

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      House set to vote on Trump’s big bill as Johnson vows to ‘get it over the line’

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      Donald Trump’s signature tax-and-spending bill is hanging in the balance as Republicans struggle to muster sufficient votes in the US House of Representatives.A five-minute procedural vote remained open and tied for more than an hour on Wednesday as Republican leaders told members they could leave the floor, suggesting they still do not have the numbers they need.Trump, JD Vance and the House speaker, Mike Johnson, had spent much of the day trying to pressure conservatives to support the bill despite changes made by the Senate.A preliminary motion on the sweeping tax-and-spending bill did gain approval on party lines with 214 in favor and 212 against, setting the stage for another vote later on Wednesday afternoon to adopt the rule. If that is successful, the chamber will debate the bill, then vote on its final passage.But with the House at a standstill, the timing of the all-important rule vote was uncertain. “Either you vote on the rule or you go home,” said the conservative Tennessee representative Tim Burchett as he exited the Capitol.The Senate passed the bill, with Vance casting the tie-breaking vote, on Tuesday, after a record-setting all-night session. Now the chambers must reconcile their versions: the sprawling mega-bill goes back to the House, where Johnson has said the Senate “went a little further than many of us would have preferred” in its changes, particularly to Medicaid, a program that provides healthcare to low-income and disabled Americans.But the speaker vowed to “get that bill over the line”. Trump has set a Fourth of July deadline for Congress to send the bill to his desk.According to CNN, Johnson told reporters: “When you have a piece of legislation that is this comprehensive and with so many agenda items involved, you’re going to have lots of different priorities and preferences among people because they represent different districts and they have different interests.“But we can’t make everyone 100% happy. It’s impossible. This is a deliberative body. It’s a legislative process. By definition, all of us have to give up on our personal preferences. [I’m] never going to ask anybody to compromise core principles, but preferences must be yielded for the greater good, and that’s what I think people are recognizing and come to grips with.”Early on Wednesday morning, the House rules committee advanced the measure, sending it to the floor for consideration. On their way into the Capitol, two conservative Republicans signaled optimism that the bill would get through the House.Congresswoman Nancy Mace told reporters: “I think these votes will take a little bit or a lot longer than usual. But that’s Washington. You guys are watching how the sausage is made, and that’s how business is run.”Like several other members, Mace wound up driving from her South Carolina district to Washington after a flurry of thunderstorms yesterday prompted major flight delays and cancellations around the capital.Smoking a cigar, Congressman Troy Nehls of Texas said: “There’s things in the bill I don’t like, but would I change the bill because I didn’t get what I wanted? I don’t think that would be good for America.”The House approved an initial draft of the legislation in May by a single vote, overcoming Democrats’ unanimous opposition. But many fiscal conservatives are furious over cost estimates that project the Senate version would add even more to the federal deficit than the House-passed plan.But Johnson’s wafer-thin Republican majority risks losing decisive votes from rightwing fiscal hardliners demanding steep spending cuts, moderates wary of dismantling safety-net programs and Republicans from Democratic-led states expected to make a stand on a contentious tax provision. Any one of these groups could potentially derail the bill’s passage through a chamber where the GOP can afford to lose no more than three votes.Trump celebrated the Senate’s passage of the bill as “music to my ears”. He has described the bill as crucial to his second-term agenda, and congressional Republicans made it their top priority.The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the bill in its current form would add $3.3tn to the US budget deficit through 2034.It will extend tax cuts enacted during the president’s first term in 2017, and includes new provisions to cut taxes on tips, overtime and interest payments for some car loans. It funds Trump’s plans for mass deportations by allocating $45bn for Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities, $14bn for deportation operations and billions of dollars more to hire an additional 10,000 new agents by 2029.It also includes more than $50bn for the construction of new border fortifications, which will probably include a wall along the border with Mexico.To satisfy demands from fiscal conservatives for cuts to the US’s large federal budget deficit, the bill imposes new work requirements on enrollees of Medicaid. It also imposes a limit on the provider tax states use to fund their program, which could lead to reductions in services. Finally, it sunsets some incentives for green-energy technologies created by Congress under Joe Biden.In a floor speech on Wednesday, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York, warned: “This bill is a deal with the devil. It explodes our national debt. It militarizes our entire economy, and it strips away healthcare and basic dignity of the American people.“For what? To give Elon Musk a tax break and billionaires, the greedy, taking of our nation. We cannot stand for it and we will not support it. You should be ashamed.”Speaker emerita Nancy Pelosi said of the policy bill: “Well, if beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then you, GOP, you have a very blurred vision of what America is about.“Is it beautiful to cut off food from seniors and children? Is it beautiful to cut off 17 million people from healthcare? Is it beautiful to do this? To give tax cuts to billionaires in our country? Is it beautiful to take money from education and the rest? The list goes on and on.” More

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      Trump’s sweeping tax cut and spending bill heads to House – US politics live

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      CBS parent company Paramount on Wednesday settled a lawsuit filed by Donald Trump over an interview broadcast in October, in the latest concession by a media company to the US president, who has targeted outlets over what he describes as false or misleading coverage.Paramount said it would pay $16m to settle the suit with the money allocated to Trump’s future presidential library, and not paid to Trump “directly or indirectly”.“The settlement does not include a statement of apology or regret,” the company statement added.Trump filed a $10bn lawsuit against CBS in October, alleging the network deceptively edited an interview that aired on its 60 Minutes news program with then-vice-president and presidential candidate Kamala Harris to “tip the scales in favor of the Democratic party” in the election. In an amended complaint filed in February, Trump increased his claim for damages to $20bn.CBS aired two versions of the Harris interview in which she appears to give different answers to the same question about the Israel-Hamas war, according to the lawsuit filed in a federal court in Texas.CBS previously said the lawsuit was “completely without merit” and had asked a judge to dismiss the case.The White House did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Edward A Paltzik, a lawyer representing Trump in the civil suit, could not be immediately reached for comment.Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics as Donald Trump’s sweeping tax cut and spending legislation is expected to head to the House after it cleared the Senate last night with the narrowest of margins.The Senate passed the measure in a 51-50 vote with Vice President JD Vance breaking a tie after three Republicans – Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky – joined all 47 Democrats in voting against the bill.It followed a long debate in which Republicans grappled with the so-called “one big beautiful” bill’s price tag – it is set to raise the deficit by $5 trillion – and its impact on the US healthcare system.The vote in the House, where Republicans hold a 220-212 majority, is likely to be close.Mike Johnson, the House speaker, said during an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity that Republican leadership would seek to move the legislation through the Rules Committee this morning and get it before the entire House before Friday’s holiday, unless travel plans were upset by thunderstorms that have menaced the Washington area.“Hopefully we’re voting on this by tomorrow or Thursday at latest, depending on the weather delays and travel and all the rest – that’s the wild card that we can’t control,” Johnson said yesterday.A White House official told reporters that Trump would be “deeply involved” in pushing House Republicans to approve the bill. “It’s a great bill. There is something for everyone,” Trump said at an event in Florida. “And I think it’s going to go very nicely in the House.”Is Trump’s optimism misplaced? You can read our report on the bill’s progress so far and prospects for today here:Entertainingly at least, the bill has reanimated the much-missed Musk-Trump feud, with the tech billionaire calling the legislation “insane” and suggesting he could form a new political party if it passed.In response, Trump claimed he could “look into” deporting Musk. So stay with us for all the developments.In other news:

      Trump announced on his social media platform that Israel has agreed to a 60-day ceasefire in its war in Gaza and urged Hamas to accept the terms of the agreement. The news comes as Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is scheduled to visit the White House on 7 July.

      Trump toured “Alligator Alcatraz”, a controversial new migrant detention jail in the remote Florida Everglades, and celebrated the harsh conditions that people sent there would experience. Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, and Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, said detainees could arrive at the rapidly constructed facility as soon as tomorrow. Trump later revisited his idea of “renovating and rebuilding Alcatraz”, with a view to reopening the infamous island prison in San Francisco, which has been closed for over 60 years.

      The Pentagon has halted shipments of air defense missiles and other precision munitions to Ukraine over concerns that US stockpiles are too low. On Sunday, Moscow fired more than 500 aerial weapons at Ukraine overnight, in a barrage that Kyiv described as the biggest air attack so far of the three-year war.

      USAID will officially stop implementing foreign aid starting today, secretary of state Marco Rubio said. He added that the US’s assistance in the future will be targeted and limited, focusing on trade rather than aid.

      The Trump administration raised the possibility of stripping Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic mayoral candidate for New York City, of his US citizenship over his vocal support for Palestinian rights. Democrat senator Chris Murphy slammed the idea as “racist bullshit”. More

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      Senate Republicans pass Trump’s sweeping policy bill, clearing major hurdle

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      Senate Republicans on Tuesday passed a major tax and spending bill demanded by Donald Trump, ending weeks of negotiations over the comprehensive legislation and putting it another step closer to enactment.But it remains unclear whether changes made by the chamber will be accepted by the House of Representatives, which approved an initial draft of the legislation last month by a single vote. While Republicans control both houses of Congress, factionalism in the lower chamber is particularly intense, with rightwing fiscal hardliners demanding deep spending cuts, moderates wary of dismantling safety-net programs and Republicans from Democratic-led states expected to make a stand on a contentious tax provision. Any one of these groups could potentially derail the bill’s passage through a chamber where the GOP can lose no more than three votes.The bill’s passage is nonetheless an accomplishment for Senate Republicans who faced their own divisions in getting it passed, and saw one lawmaker announce his retirement after clashing with Trump over the bill. The push to get the legislation done intensified on Saturday when the chamber voted to begin debate, then continued with amendment votes that began on Monday and stretched all night.The vote for passage came just after noon on Tuesday, and required the vice-president, JD Vance, to break a tie that resulted after three Republicans joined with all Democrats in voting against it.In a joint statement, the speaker, Mike Johnson, and the House Republican leadership said: “Republicans were elected to do exactly what this bill achieves: secure the border, make tax cuts permanent, unleash American energy dominance, restore peace through strength, cut wasteful spending, and return to a government that puts Americans first. This bill is President Trump’s agenda, and we are making it law.”The Senate majority leader, John Thune, said Republican senators and staff began laying the groundwork for this budget bill more than a year ago, planning how they would extend tax breaks if they had the votes. He said: “Since we took office in January, Republicans have been laser-focused on achieving the bill before us today. And now we’re here, passing legislation that will permanently extend tax relief for hard-working Americans.”The lower chamber will take up the measure on Wednesday, before a deadline Trump has imposed to have it on his desk by Friday, the Independence Day holiday. But the president has recently made comments indicating the bill could arrive later, saying at a press conference on Friday “we can go longer”, before writing on Truth Social that “the House of Representatives must be ready to send it to my desk before July 4th”.Trump has described the bill as crucial to his presidency, and congressional Republicans made it their top priority. It will extend tax cuts enacted during the president’s first term in 2017, and includes new provisions to cut taxes on tips, overtime and interest payments for some car loans. It funds Trump’s plans for mass deportations by allocating $45bn for Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities, $14bn for deportation operations and billions of dollars more to hire an additional 10,000 new agents by 2029. It also includes more than $50bn for the construction of new border fortifications, which will probably include a wall along the border with Mexico.To satisfy demands from fiscal conservatives for cuts to the US’s large federal budget deficit, the bill imposes new work requirements on enrollees of Medicaid, which provides healthcare to low-income and disabled Americans. It also imposes a limit on the provider tax states use to fund their program, which could lead to reductions in services. Finally, it sunsets some incentives for green-energy technologies created by Congress under Joe Biden.Nonetheless, the bill would add $3.3tn to the US budget deficit through 2034, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a non-profit focused on fiscal responsibility, called the bill “a failure of responsible governing” because it will add to the federal debt and includes budget gimmicks that disguise how much debt it is adding. The group estimated it would add more than $4tn to the national debt through 2034, and said that if some “arbitrary expirations” were made permanent, they would add $5.4tn.“The Senate reconciliation bill fails almost every test of fiscal responsibility,” said Maya MacGuineas, the group’s president. “Instead of worrying about arbitrary deadlines or sparing the Senate another vote-a-rama, fiscal conservatives should stand up for what’s right and reject the Senate plan to explode our debt.”While it was formally titled the one big beautiful bill act, the Senate’s Democratic minority leader, Chuck Schumer, managed to get the name stricken minutes before the vote for passage, though that is not expected to change how many lawmakers refer to it. Because it was passed using the budget reconciliation procedure that requires legislation only affect spending, revenue and the debt limit, Democrats were unable to use the filibuster to block its passage in the Senate.Schumer called the bill a “big, ugly betrayal”, pointing to the millions who will lose health insurance, job losses and debt increase done in favor of tax breaks for the wealthy and corporate special interests. He also decried the process Republicans used to pass the bill, saying they pushed the rules and norms of the chamber in a way that did “grave damage” to the body.“Today’s vote will haunt our Republican colleagues for years to come as the American people see the damage that is done – as hospitals close, as people are laid off, as costs go up, as the debt increases. They will see what our colleagues have done and they will remember it, and we Democrats will make sure they remember it,” Schumer said.In the lead-up to the bill’s passage, several moderate Republicans signaled unease with its cuts to the social safety net, including North Carolina’s Thom Tillis. After saying on Saturday he would not vote for the bill, Trump publicly attacked him, and the senator announced he would not run for re-election next year, potentially improving Democrats’ chances of picking up the purple state’s seat.“It is inescapable this bill will betray the promise Donald Trump made,” Tillis said on Sunday. Pointing to a forecast that the bill would cost 663,000 North Carolinians their Medicaid coverage, Tillis said: “What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years, when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there any more, guys?”In addition to Tillis, Rand Paul of Kentucky voted against passage, criticizing the bill’s impact on the budget deficit and national debt. Susan Collins, who is expected to face a fierce re-election challenge next year from Democrats for her seat in Maine, also opposed it, saying the measure would “threaten not only Mainers’ access to healthcare, but also the very existence of several of our state’s rural hospitals”.The Alaska moderate Lisa Murkowski expressed similar concerns about its effect on Medicaid, but ended up voting for passage.Now that the legislation is back in the House, Johnson faces a difficult task in getting the Senate’s changes cleared by his conference’s competing factions.Moderates remain concerned about the safety-net cuts, while rightwing Republicans have railed against the bill’s expensive price tag. Last week, David Valadao, a Republican representative whose central California district has one of the highest Medicaid enrollment rates in the nation, said he would not support the measure over its funding changes to the program.On Monday, before the bill’s passage, the Democratic National Committee announced the launch of an organizing campaign to capitalize on the unpopularity of the budget plan’s provisions. Ken Martin, the chair of the DNC, shared in a press briefing that when he was growing up, his family relied on the kinds of safety-net programs that are being cut.Martin said in a statement on Tuesday that the bill helps billionaires at the expense of American families – the sort of messaging the party will rely on as it hits the road to turn out voters for the midterms and special elections.“It’s a massive scheme to steal from working folks, struggling families and, hell, even from nursing homes – all to enrich the already rich with a tax giveaway,” Martin said. “Billionaires don’t need more help – working families do. Democrats will stand shoulder to shoulder with working families to kick these Republicans out of their seats in 2026.”The rightwing House Freedom caucus has also criticized the bill for its price tag. “The Senate must make major changes and should at least be in the ballpark of compliance with the agreed upon House budget framework. Republicans must do better,” they wrote on Monday, as amendments were being considered.In a Tuesday press conference, the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, said the bill represents the “largest cut to Medicaid in American history”. He expects his caucus will uniformly oppose the bill and will be making the case to vote it down in the rules committee and on the House floor.When asked whether House Democrats would use any procedural moves to delay passage of the bill, Jeffries said: “All procedural and legislative options are on the table.” More

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      Senate holds marathon ‘vote-a-rama’ on Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ – US politics live

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      Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics and the second Trump administration.The US Senate is holding a marathon vote on a sprawling budget that is vital to Donald Trump’s agenda and would see sweeping tax breaks and cuts to healthcare and food programmes if passed.Senators have convened at the Capitol for a process known as “vote-a-rama”, in which lawmakers will propose amendments to the legislation over what is expected to be many hours.Democrats say the bill’s tax cuts would disproportionately benefit the wealthy at the expense of social programs for lower-income Americans.The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (yes, it is formally called this) is expected to add an estimated $3.3tn to the national debt over the next decade. Republicans are rushing to pass the bill Trump’s self-imposed deadline of 4 July.Republicans – who control both chambers of Congress and are generally loyal to Trump – are heavily divided over how deep welfare cuts should be in order to extend tax breaks in the legislation.It is about 2.30am in Washington and it has been over 16 hours since voting began. We are expecting a result in around two and a half/ three hours time. Stay with us for all the latest developments.In other news:

      Tech billionaire Elon Musk, who spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars in support of Trump’s candidacy, has pledged to found a new political party he called the “America Party” and support candidates who did not back the budget bill in future elections.

      The Senate parliamentarian found that Republicans can include a provision that would block Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood in the “big, beautiful bill”.

      Trump signed an executive order overturning sanctions on Syria today and issued a memorandum on US policy toward Cuba.

      The Trump administration sued the city of Los Angeles over policies limiting city cooperation with federal immigration authorities, continuing a confrontation over Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation efforts in the largely Democratic city.

      The Trump administration informed Harvard University that its investigation found that the university violated federal civil rights law over its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students, putting its federal funding further at risk.

      Trump will host Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on 7 July.

      Trump wrote to Fed chair Jerome Powell again urging him to lower interest rates.
      Beginning early on Monday and so far having run for roughly 19 hours, it remains unclear how long the voting in the marathon ‘vote-a-rama’ will last.Republicans can afford to lose no more than three votes in either chamber to pass a bill the Democrats are united in opposition to.If approved in the Republican-controlled Senate, Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act will return to the lower House of Representatives, also Republican controlled, which passed its own version by a single vote at the end of May (215 to 214).In the House, a full vote on the Senate’s final version of the bill could then come as early as Wednesday morning.The senate has adopted an amendment offered by Republican senator Joni Ernst – who represents Iowa – to prevent jobless millionaires from claiming unemployment compensation.Lawmakers voted 99-1 to strike the AI regulation ban from the bill by adopting an amendment offered by Republican senator Marsha Blackburn.Republican Senator Thom Tillis, who announced his retirement on Sunday after voting not to proceed with the megabill, was the lone lawmaker who voted to retain the ban.The Senate version of Trump’s legislation would have only restricted states regulating AI from tapping a new $500m fund to support AI infrastructure.Major AI companies, including Alphabet’s Google and OpenAI, have expressed support for Congress taking AI regulation out of the hands of states.Blackburn presented her amendment to strike the provision a day after agreeing to compromise language with Senate Commerce Committee chair Ted Cruz that would have cut the ban to five years and allowed states to regulate issues such as protecting artists’ voices or child online safety if they did not impose an “undue or disproportionate burden” on AI.But Blackburn withdrew her support for the compromise before the amendment vote.In a statement, the Tennessee Republican said:
      The current language is not acceptable to those who need these protections the most.
      Until Congress passes federally preemptive legislation like the Kids Online Safety Act and an online privacy framework, we can’t block states from making laws that protect their citizens.
      The Republican-led US Senate has voted overwhelmingly to remove a 10-year federal ban on state regulation of AI from Trump’s mega bill, Reuters is reporting. More details soon…Johana Bhuiyan is a senior tech reporter and editor for Guardian US, based in San FranciscoThe US Department of Homeland Security has for the first time built a national citizenship database that combines information from immigration agencies and the social security administration.The database was created in collaboration with the “department of government efficiency” (Doge) in an effort to bridge the gaps between disparate information sources to make it easier to determine whether someone is a citizen, according to NPR, which first reported the details of the database.The database is the result of an expansion of the systematic alien verification for entitlements (Save) program, made up of smaller databases within the homeland security department, and an integration with information from the Social Security Administration.The centralized repository is searchable and can be accessed by state and local election officials to look up the names of anyone trying to vote to determine if they are citizens, according to NPR. Until now, election officials had to ask potential voters for documents verifying their citizenship or rely on a hard-to-navigate patchwork of databases.You can read the full story here:Some more news from the US senate now, where Republicans are – for the most part – still trying to pass Trump’s mega-bill.Maine’s Republican senator Susan Collins has blamed Democrats for tanking her amendment to increase the bill’s rural hospital relief fund, saying they are “hypocrites” for championing themselves as protectors of Medicaid but then opposing her efforts to reduce the impacts of the legislation on rural hospitals.“I was surprised at the hypocrisy of the Democrats on it, had they voted for it would have passed easily,” ABC News quoted Collins as having told reporters this morning.Only two Democrats out of 22 senators supported Collins’ amendment, which would have seen the creation of a new top marginal tax rate used to double the size of the proposed rural hospital relief fund from $25bn to $50bn.Collins added:
      They complained repeatedly about the distribution in this bill of Medicaid cuts, hurting individuals in rural hospitals and tax cuts being extended for people who are wealthy. And yet, when we tried to fix both those problems, they took a very hypocritical approach.
      Rural and smaller hospitals are at risk of bankruptcy because of the steep Medicaid cuts being proposed in the budget bill.Elon Musk has vowed to unseat lawmakers who support Donald Trump’s sweeping budget bill, which he has criticized because it would increase the country’s deficit by $3.3tn.Musk wrote on his social media platform, X:
      Every member of Congress who campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history should hang their head in shame!
      And they will lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this Earth.
      A few hours later he added that if “insane spending bill passes, the America Party will be formed the next day”.With these threats, lobbed at lawmakers over social media, the tech billionaire has launched himself back into a rift with the US president he helped prop up.Since taking leave from his so-called “department of government efficiency”, or Doge, Musk has sharply criticized Trump’s budget bill, which he has said will undermine his work at Doge by increasing spending.You can read the full story by my colleague, Maanvi Singh, here:

      The Senate bill includes $4.5tn in tax cuts, according to the latest analysis from the congressional budget office, making permanent Trump’s 2017 rates, which would expire at the end of the year if Congress fails to act.

      The Senate package would roll back billions of dollars in green energy tax credits, which Democrats warn will wipe out wind and solar investments nationwide.

      It would impose $1.2tn in cuts, largely to Medicaid and food stamps, by imposing stricter work requirements, making sign-up eligibility more stringent and changing federal reimbursements to states. Medicaid provides government-sponsored health care for low-income and disabled Americans.

      The bill would provide a $350bn infusion for border and national security, including for deportations, some of it paid for with new fees charged to immigrants.
      Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer says Democrats will bring “amendment after amendment after amendment to the floor, so Republicans can defend their billionaire tax cuts.”He said Democrats would offer amendments to “see once and for all if Republicans really meant all those nice things they’ve been saying about ‘strengthening Medicaid’ and ‘protecting middle-class families’, or if they were just lying”.As the marathon session grinds into the early hours of the morning, some lawmakers are finding ways to relax or vent away from the heat of the chamber.GOP senators took breaks from the Senate floor as well.Republican US senator Tommy Tuberville, of Alabama, smoked a cigar on the Capitol terrace at sunset while other GOP senators took calls and chatted in rooms near the Senate chamber.This weekend’s dramatic senate session saw a narrow 51-49 passing of a procedural vote on Saturday night to advance the budget bill and a forced reading of the 940-page bill by Democrats, a political manoeuvre that was deployed to stall its progress.Two Republicans sided with Democrats in voting against opening debate, wanting to change parts of the contentious legislation.One of these Republicans was the North Carolina moderate Thom Tillis, who said the package was a betrayal of Donald Trump’s promise not to withdraw healthcare from people, something he fears could happen if rural hospitals close. The other was Rand Paul of Kentucky.The bill must now clear a formal Senate vote and be returned to the lower House for approval – which Trump wants done before a self-imposed Fourth of July holiday deadline.As my colleague Chris Stein explains in this story, after Tillis declined to vote for the bill, Trump attacked him and the senator announced he would not stand for re-election next year, potentially improving Democrats’ chances of picking up the purple state’s seat.Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics and the second Trump administration.The US Senate is holding a marathon vote on a sprawling budget that is vital to Donald Trump’s agenda and would see sweeping tax breaks and cuts to healthcare and food programmes if passed.Senators have convened at the Capitol for a process known as “vote-a-rama”, in which lawmakers will propose amendments to the legislation over what is expected to be many hours.Democrats say the bill’s tax cuts would disproportionately benefit the wealthy at the expense of social programs for lower-income Americans.The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (yes, it is formally called this) is expected to add an estimated $3.3tn to the national debt over the next decade. Republicans are rushing to pass the bill Trump’s self-imposed deadline of 4 July.Republicans – who control both chambers of Congress and are generally loyal to Trump – are heavily divided over how deep welfare cuts should be in order to extend tax breaks in the legislation.It is about 2.30am in Washington and it has been over 16 hours since voting began. We are expecting a result in around two and a half/ three hours time. Stay with us for all the latest developments.In other news:

      Tech billionaire Elon Musk, who spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars in support of Trump’s candidacy, has pledged to found a new political party he called the “America Party” and support candidates who did not back the budget bill in future elections.

      The Senate parliamentarian found that Republicans can include a provision that would block Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood in the “big, beautiful bill”.

      Trump signed an executive order overturning sanctions on Syria today and issued a memorandum on US policy toward Cuba.

      The Trump administration sued the city of Los Angeles over policies limiting city cooperation with federal immigration authorities, continuing a confrontation over Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation efforts in the largely Democratic city.

      The Trump administration informed Harvard University that its investigation found that the university violated federal civil rights law over its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students, putting its federal funding further at risk.

      Trump will host Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on 7 July.

      Trump wrote to Fed chair Jerome Powell again urging him to lower interest rates. More

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      Republican senator denounces Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ in fiery speech

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      “It is inescapable this bill will betray the promise Donald Trump made,” Thom Tillis, the North Carolina Republican senator, said on Sunday night, sandblasting the Senate version of the “big, beautiful bill” that is meant to codify the president’s agenda.Tillis made his speech on the Senate floor on Sunday night, a few hours after announcing he would not seek re-election in politically competitive North Carolina. Observers described it as “fiery” and “savage”. But Tillis carefully avoided direct criticism of the president as he denounced proposed cuts to Medicaid, a lack of rigor in the legislative process and the Senate’s headlong drive to an artificial deadline.Instead, in one of the most forceful Republican denunciations of the bill, Tillis attacked “amateurs” advising the president who have “no insight into how these provider tax cuts are going to be absorbed without harming people on Medicare”.Tillis’s office published an analysis concluding that the Senate budget would have a $32bn impact on the North Carolina healthcare system and threaten insurance coverage for 663,000 Medicaid expansion beneficiaries in the state – about one in 16 North Carolinians.“What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years, when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there any more, guys?” Tillis said in his floor speech.It has become increasingly difficult for lawmakers in the Republican party to break ranks with the president without facing withering blowback from conservative media, “Maga” diehards and Trump himself on social media.“Tillis is a talker and complainer, NOT A DOER! He’s even worse than Rand ‘Fauci’ Paul!” Trump posted on Truth Social after announcing his opposition to the bill. Trump pledged to back a primary challenger to Tillis. When Tillis subsequently announced he would not seek re-election, Trump called it “good news”, and threatened primary challenges against other Republican fiscal conservatives standing in the way of the bill’s passage.Arguments critical of conservative doctrine on healthcare would fall on deaf ears. Instead, Tillis’s rhetoric emphasized the political threat to Republican lawmakers and the president himself if the bill passed in its current form.“I’m telling the president that you have been misinformed,” he said. “You supporting the Senate mark will hurt people who are eligible and qualified for Medicaid.”Tillis referred back to Trump’s promise not to cut Medicaid while campaigning for president.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“The last time I saw a promise broken around healthcare, with respect to my friends on the other side of the aisle, is when somebody said “If you like your healthcare, you could keep it. If you like your doctor, you could keep it,” Tillis said. “We found out that wasn’t true. That made me the second Republican speaker of the House since the civil war.”Tillis signaled he would be willing to support the House version of the reconciliation bill.The procedural vote passed 51-49 Sunday. Budget reconciliation bills are not subject to cloture and the 60-vote threshold limiting debate. Trump has repeatedly pushed a 4 July deadline for passage. More

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      Senate wrangles over Trump’s ‘one big beautiful bill’ to continue – US politics live

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      Iran criticised US president Donald Trump’s shifting stance on whether to lift economic sanctions against Tehran as “games” that were not aimed at solving the problems between the two countries.“These [statements by Trump] should be viewed more in the context of psychological and media games than as a serious expression in favour of dialogue or problem-solving,” foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei told a press conference on Monday.Trump had said he is not speaking to Iran and was not offering the country “anything”, as he claimed that America “totally obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear facilities when it struck them earlier this month.Trump’s comments, posted to Truth Social this morning, followed reports that his administration had discussed possibly helping Iran access as much as $30bn to build a civilian-energy-producing nuclear program.The reported proposal would mark a major reversal in policy for Trump, who exited Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran in 2018, claiming the sanction relief and unfreezing of assets provided Tehran with “a lifeline of cash”.Trump wrote:
      Tell phony Democrat Senator Chris Coons that I am not offering Iran ANYTHING, unlike Obama, who paid them $Billions under the stupid “road to a Nuclear Weapon JCPOA (which would now be expired!), nor am I even talking to them since we totally OBLITERATED their Nuclear Facilities.
      Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics with senators scheduled to start voting on a potentially long list of amendments to Donald Trump’s “one big beautiful bill” beginning at 9 am EDT.Yesterday, Republicans in the Senate Republicans pushed Trump‘s sweeping tax cut and spending bill forward in a marathon weekend session even as a nonpartisan forecaster said it would add an estimated $3.3 trillion to the nation’s debt over a decade.The estimate by the Congressional Budget Office of the bill’s hit to the $36.2 trillion federal debt is about $800 billion more than the version passed last month in the House of Representatives.“Republicans are doing something the Senate has never, never done before, deploying fake math and accounting gimmicks to hide the true cost of the bill,” Democratic Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said as debate opened on Sunday.The Senate only narrowly advanced the tax-cut, immigration, border and military spending bill in a procedural vote late on Saturday, voting 51-49 to open debate on the 940-page megabill.Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, one of two Republicans who voted to block the bill, explained his position in a speech to the Senate, saying White House aides had failed to give Trump proper advice about the legislation’s Medicaid cuts.“What do I tell 663,00 people in two years, three years, when president Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there anymore,” Tillis said, referring to his constituents.Tillis said he would not seek re-election next year, after Trump threatened to back a primary challenger in retribution for Tillis’ Saturday night vote against the bill.On Sunday, Trump celebrated Tillis’ announcement as “Great News!” on Truth Social and issued a warning to fellow Republicans who have concerns over the bill. “REMEMBER, you still have to get reelected. Don’t go too crazy!” Trump wrote in a post.Tillis’ North Carolina seat is one of the few Republican Senate seats seen as vulnerable in next year’s midterm elections.Read the full story here:In other news:

      Donald Trump has said he is not speaking to Iran and was not offering the country “anything”, as he claimed that America “totally obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear facilities when it struck them earlier this month. Trump’s comments, posted to Truth Social this morning, followed reports that his administration had discussed possibly helping Iran access as much as $30bn to build a civilian-energy-producing nuclear program.

      The University of Virginia received “explicit” notification from the Trump administration that the school would endure cuts to university jobs, research funding and student aid as well as visas if the institution’s president, Jim Ryan, did not resign, according to a US senator. In an interview with CBS, Virginia Democrat Mark Warner defended Ryan – who has championed diversity policies that the president opposes – and predicted Trump would similarly target other universities.

      Donald Trump said he was weighing forcing journalists who published leaked details from a US intelligence report assessing the impact of the recent American military strikes on Iran to reveal their sources. The president also claimed his administration may prosecute those reporters and sources if they don’t comply.

      The president threatened to block New York City from receiving federal funds if favoured mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, “doesn’t behave himself” should he be elected. Mamdani, meanwhile, denied that he was – as the president claimed – a communist. But he reaffirmed his commitment to raise taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers while saying: “I don’t think that we should have billionaires.”

      Blood-sucking ticks that trigger a bizarre allergy to meat in the people they bite are exploding in number and spreading across the US, to the extent that they could cover the entire eastern half of the country and infect millions of people, experts warn.

      Iran’s ambassador to the UN said the Islamic republic’s nuclear enrichment “will never stop” because it is permitted for “peaceful energy” purposes under the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. “The enrichment is our right,” Iravani told CBS News. More