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      The charges mount, but Trump’s not worried. He’s just the guy to make jail great again | Marina Hyde

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      Donald Trump announced his latest indictment last night in front of a painting of a guy literally twirling his moustache. “I am an innocent man,” the former president insisted, next to this cartoon shorthand for villainy. The oil painting in question is not so much an artwork as a lift-music version of an artwork, and seems to hang at Trump’s Bedminster golf club in New Jersey – which is the same place he buried his former wife Ivana, as all admirers of both exquisite taste and private-cemetery tax breaks may already know. Either way, Ivana’s there, right near the first tee. It’s what she would have wanted.As for her surviving ex-husband, it’s fashionable to say that anything that would represent a catastrophic setback for any other human being is exactly what Trump would have wanted. By this metric, his indictment on federal charges for the first time, including under the Espionage Act, is an absolute gift and a triumph. He’ll use it to pull in fundraising, it’ll rally his base, it’ll make every Republican beta – which is to say, every Republican – feel they have to swear loyalty to him. Furthermore, it’s already got him right where he most loves to be: with everyone talking about him. And these are all reasonable points – or at least reasonable in a through-the-looking-glass way, given that to many outside observers the United States passed reason two or three election cycles ago. If only they could invade themselves to bring democracy.Even so, it must be said the Espionage Act is one of the not-great laws to allegedly break, rather like obstruction of justice, of which Trump also stands accused. Individuals convicted of those felonies can face long stretches in facilities that are often entirely oil painting-free, and have never even been offered the chance to host a golf major. They do, however, have “lively” canteens and communal areas, which could make Mr Clubhouse feel at home.As always with this defendant, however, let’s not run ahead of ourselves. Trump has been indicted by the justice department on seven counts that are still under seal, but relate to his mishandling and retention of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. He is due in court on Tuesday in Miami. Following an incomplete search of his Palm Beach estate and club last year by members of his own legal team, then an FBI raid some months later, the documents saga constitutes something Trump keeps calling the “boxes hoax”. Quick note on vocab: down the rabbit hole we all descended some years ago now, “hoax” is the antidote to “-gate”: a sort of all-purpose bolt-on Trump can use to dismiss any scandal. Once he’s called it a hoax, the true scandal becomes the fact that anyone is trying to tar him with scandal. Trump himself becomes the poor local innocent who is being persecuted on account of his being mildly unconventional. See also: “witch-hunt”.To Mar-a-Lago, then, where someone saw Goody Trump with a classified document about Iran’s missile programme. And another about US intelligence work in China. And at least a hundred other mildly unconventional classified souvenirs of his time in office. Clearly, these are the sorts of keepsakes that any of us, had we ascended to the presidency, may afterwards wish to retain and transport to our home, which is also a members’ club thronging with hundreds of terrible people at any given time.Anyone now taking the opportunity to chant “Lock him up!” is indulging in pure McCarthyism.Unfortunately, that is not how Jack Smith, special counsel for the documents investigation, seems to have seen it. I am also confused that Mr Smith has not accepted Trump’s earlier suggestion that he could declassify documents merely by thinking about it. Last September, the former president told Fox News: “There doesn’t have to be a process, as I understand it.” Yet according to that old spoilsport “the law”, there apparently does. So here we are.In terms of where Trump himself is, it’s complicated. He’s the hot favourite for the Republican nomination, and also the defendant or potential defendant in a number of ongoing legal actions. There simply isn’t the space to recap all of them, but the standouts are the charges of hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels, on which he has already been indicted by Manhattan state prosecutors, and the federal criminal investigation into his attempts to overturn the 2020 election results, which remains in train and for which Smith is also the special counsel.Speaking of McCarthys, finally, the house speaker, Kevin McCarthy, reacted to news of the Trump indictment in that hyper-partisan, truth-free way that has become so commonplace that it should surely redefine “McCarthyism” for our own era. Having begun with a false claim (that Joe Biden indicted Trump), Kevin sought to delegitimise a legitimate process before kowtowing to Trump in entirely abject style. Even Trump’s not-very-arch rival for the Republican nomination, Ron DeSantis, was too weak to do anything other than obediently defend Trump – while elsewhere, a new poll found that 43% of Republicans believed Trump should be allowed to serve again even if he were convicted of a felony. However positive some may feel about the charges, the whole picture is – how to put this? – no oil painting. Ultimately, Trump will be easier to deal with than the culture he has created.
      Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist
      On Tuesday 13 June, Marina Hyde will join Gary Younge at a Guardian Live event in Brighton. Readers can join this event in person
      What Just Happened?! by Marina Hyde (Guardian Faber, £9.99). To support the Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply
      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      Digested week: A beer with Mike Pence to figure out what his deal is? Possibly …

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      MondayIn a reversal of the who-would-you-most-like-to-have-a-drink-with test, candidates declaring for the Republican presidential race this week presented as so singularly unappetising as to beg the question who among them would you leave the bar to avoid? Trump is not, weirdly, at the top of this list, since when he cares to use it one knows his charm is considerable. Mike Pence, who declared his candidacy on Monday and remains enduringly weird, would definitely break the top three, although a small part of me would like to take a crack, over a beer, at figuring out what his deal is. The former vice-president and evangelical Christian’s very clenched personality and eagerness to be photographed at the weekend in leathers on a Harley-Davidson, is suggestive of a range of possibilities.Also throwing his hat into the ring this week is Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey and, for my money, the least appealing candidate in the current Republican lineup, even taking into account Ron DeSantis. Christie, you may remember, was for a hot minute in 2016 spoken of as a credible centrist Republican before everyone remembered who he was. (My favourite Christie story is the one from 2017 when he was snapped from a news helicopter enjoying a deserted beach with his family during a state-wide shutdown when the beaches were closed.) In the years since, he has flip-flopped between craven appeasement and condemnation of Trump and is now running – hollow laugh – as a moral standard-bearer on the strength of his objection to the events surrounding the storming of the US Capitol on January 6.Other candidates in the race include the requisite comedy multimillionaire who has never held office – in this case, the former pharmaceutical company CEO Vivek Ramaswamy whose manifesto seems to be the single word “anti-woke” – and a lone woman, Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina. Described by the former CNN host Don Lemon earlier this year as a woman who “isn’t in her prime”, Haley, at 51, is among the youngest of the candidates. There are reasons to dislike Haley (“America is not racist”) as strong as any triggered by the rest of the field, but assuredly, that isn’t one of them.TuesdayAs hot takes continue to fly around in the wake of Hannah Gadsby’s “disastrous” (ARTnews), “silly” (New York Times) curated exhibition about Picasso at the Brooklyn Museum, let’s turn instead to Françoise Gilot, whose death at the age of 101 was announced on Tuesday. Gilot was an artist, an icon in her own right and – there’s no avoiding her connection to the man, although it was the source of career-long irritation to her – the only one of Picasso’s lovers ever to walk out on him. I met her a few years ago in her apartment on the Upper West Side where she presented with the kind of fanatical chic only French women of a certain age can pull off. She wasn’t interested in false modesty. “I was considered astonishingly good,” she said of herself as a young artist. And she wasn’t sentimental about the past. “I have to admit,” she told me, “that I was never so much in love with anyone that I could not consider my own plan as interesting.” When I asked if leaving Picasso had been a liberating experience, she looked at me as if I was mad. “No, because I was not a prisoner. I’d been there of my own will and I left of my own will. That’s what I told him once, before I left. I said watch out, because I came when I wanted to, but I will leave when I want. He said, nobody leaves a man like me.” She smiled and the thrill of that moment, 70 years later, disturbed the air in the room. “I said, we’ll see.”WednesdayThe school field trip to Staten Island is cancelled because of air quality in New York, a decision parents bemoan in the morning and revisit at lunchtime when the sky darkens to a Martian glow. The air is nicotine yellow; the sun is an eery orange disc; the cars have their headlights on at midday. While Californians fold their arms and say to New Yorkers “We told you”, people in the city re-mask and shut the windows. Outside my apartment, it smells as if there is a five-alarm fire a block away.The fires burning in Canada cover an area 10 times larger than is usual for this time of year and Kathy Hochul, the governor of New York, describes the smoke across the state as “an emergency crisis”, while New Yorkers describe it, variously, as smelling like “a barbecue”, “cigars”, and “9/11”. It smells to me like cigarette smoke, carried 500 miles down wind by an area of low pressure and bringing a forecast to terrify us all.ThursdayThe spectacle of Harry in court this week makes one wince for the gap between what he might hope his appearance will achieve and how things in reality are likely to play out. I don’t mean in terms of judgment, exactly, but as John Crace wrote this week, the court system is an imprecise mechanism for the deliverance of closure and it is more likely to aggravate than soothe your unease. As ever with Harry, one understands that while the Mirror group is the main target of his ire, there is a family dynamic playing out, too. The 38-year-old prince must know how unbearable his father will find the breach of protocol inherent in his appearance in court, not to mention the implied criticism that while the king did nothing, Harry is the only one in the family with the mettle to take on the tabloids. And the corrupt you-asked-for-it logic of justifying the way he was hounded on the basis that he still seeks publicity seems likely to trail him until he retires to Gloucestershire and is never heard of again.FridayDrew Barrymore on the cover of New York magazine this week exhibits a style of celebrity that seems to date back to Lucille Ball. Barrymore, at 48, has a daytime chatshow in the US in which she giggles and sits on her legs and drops her jaw when someone says something mildly diverting, and empathises so busily with her guests that at times she looks in danger of exploding. (This style is described, by the magazine, as “radically intimate” and involves a lot of “manifesting” of “precepts”.) I urge you to look up her recent interview with the actor Melanie Lynskey, during the course of which Barrymore seizes on the alcoholism of Jason Ritter, Lynskey’s husband, with the avidity of a shark happening upon a seal. I would pay good money to see her apply that unruly energy to the field of Republican candidates for president. More

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      Texas Republicans turn on their own in attorney general impeachment scandal

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      Everything is bigger in Texas, including the drama unfolding within the chambers of its government.The impeachment of Texas attorney general Ken Paxton came as a shock to many, not just because of the nature of his alleged crimes, but because it is a rare instance of the party holding its own to account.William Flores, a political and social science professor at the University of Houston-Downtown called the situation “absolutely historic.”“This is a Republican-led impeachment against one of the highest Republican leaders in the state. It is absolutely unprecedented, at least in recent times,” Flores said.The Republican-majority Texas congress had largely remained silent on Paxton’s ethically questionable conduct that dates back before his first term in 2014, when the Texas state securities board fined him for violating financial laws.In 2020, things heated up when aides from his own office asked the FBI to investigate him. They alleged Paxton abused his power by accepting bribes in the form of donations from a real estate developer. They also claimed Paxton recommended that a wealthy donor to his campaign hire a woman with whom he was having an affair.When Paxton fired the staff members, they claimed he was unlawfully retaliating.In May, the house general investigating committee, composed of four Republicans and one Democrat, voted unanimously to recommend Paxton’s impeachment. Twenty articles of impeachment were brought against him.It’s not surprising for politicians to be embroiled in a scandal, but it is unusual for Texas Republicans, who usually remain in lockstep, to eat their own.Paxton belongs to the most extreme wing of his party. He is the architect of some of the most severe voting restrictions imposed on the state, such as preventing most mail-in ballots and disbanding drive-through voting, two methods counties have tried to implement to make voting widely accessible. He established an “election integrity” division in his office that dedicates tens of thousands of hours to investigating voter fraud cases, despite no evidence that it is a widespread problem.More recently, Paxton launched an investigation into Austin’s Dell children’s hospital for the gender-affirming care it provided, which led to the swift departure of doctors from its adolescent unit, disrupting treatment not just for transitioning teens, but also those with cancer and eating disorders. He is now pursuing a similar investigation into the Texas children’s hospital, the largest such facility in the country.He also stands in staunch opposition to reproductive choice and federal immigration policy, and in firm support of gun rights despite the string of school mass shootings his state has suffered.In 2022, faced with a subpoena to testify in a lawsuit filed by abortion advocacy organizations at his doorstep, Paxton fled in a truck driven by his state senator wife, Angela Paxton.Animosity towards Paxton culminated when he tried earlier this year to use state funds to pay a legal settlement of over $3m to the former office members who blew the whistle on their boss’s dealings.In order to use taxpayer dollars to pay legal fees for an elected official, the state legislature needs to give approval. But obtaining that approval was not as simple as Paxton might have hoped.If there’s one thing that can be counted on in tax-averse Texas, it’s less spending and limited government. And that extends to the Republicans in charge.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHouse members Andrew Murr and Ann Johnson are some of the Republicans who drafted the articles of impeachment against Paxton, but also the two that serve on the far-right Texas Freedom Caucus.David Spiller, a Republican who also serves on the general investigation committee, began a statement with praise for the attorney general’s “brilliant legal mind” but said: “I have a duty and obligation to protect the citizens of Texas from elected officials who abuse their office and their powers for personal gain. I cannot be complicit in condoning the improper actions of Attorney General Paxton. I cannot ignore it and pretend it didn’t happen.”Even more atypical is the infighting now seen among party members. Hours before the investigation into Paxton was announced, Paxton called for the resignation of Republican house speaker Dade Phelan, whom he accused of drunken behavior while serving in office. Phelan’s retort was presented through his spokesperson, who called Paxton’s move “a last-ditch effort to save face”.Abbott remains silent on the impeachment of his attorney general and the fault lines emerging within his party. The state’s lieutenant governor, Dan Patrick, offered a milquetoast statement which was neither informative nor indicative of where he stood.However, Donald Trump weighed in on the drama on the Truth Social social media platform in defense of Paxton.Trump wrote: “The Rino Speaker of the House of Texas, Dade Phelan, who is barely a Republican at all and failed the test on voter integrity, wants to impeach one of the most hard working and effective Attorney Generals in the United States, Ken Paxton, who just won re-election with a large number of American Patriots strongly voting for him.”Although the spectacle has shaken up the party, Flores said not much will change within the state’s Republican party regardless of if Paxton gets ousted or not.“The red meat kind of issues that go to the core and are very popular not only in the state of Texas, but with conservatives – it’s a national playbook,” Flores said. “Texas is filled with with contradictions, but the conservatives are pretty unified around conservative issues.”Now, a senate trial will be held no later than 28 August. A two-thirds majority is needed to remove Paxton from office, including possibly one vote from his wife who has yet to recuse herself due to an unethical conflict of interest.In the event that happens, Abbott will be forced to appoint his permanent replacement and Texas will see the historic toppling of a leader not seen before in the state. More

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      Donald Trump attempts to cut sexual abuse damages for E Jean Carroll to $1m – as it happened

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      From 2h agoDonald Trump has asked a federal court in New York to slash the $5m penalty awarded against him in the sexual assault and defamation civil case won by writer E Jean Carroll down to just $1m – or grant him a new trial.The case went in Carroll’s favor last month when a jury decided that Trump had sexually abused and defamed her.Trump’s legal team has argued to the court that the damages awarded against him are excessive and the court should either slash them or allow a new trial.Reuters adds:
      The lawyers noted in a written submission that a Manhattan federal court jury last month rejected a rape claim made by the writer, E. Jean Carroll, concluding instead that she had been sexually abused in spring 1996 in the store’s dressing room.
      “Such abuse could have included groping of Plaintiff’s breasts through clothing, or similar conduct, which is a far cry from rape,” the lawyers wrote.
      They said the $2 million granted by the jury on a sexual abuse claim was “grossly excessive” and another $2.7 million issued for compensatory defamation damages was “based upon pure speculation.”
      The award should consist of no more than $400,000 for sex abuse, no more than $100,000 for defamation and $368,000 or less for the cost of a campaign to repair Carroll‘s reputation, the lawyers wrote.
      If a judge does not grant the suggested reduction in the award, then he should permit a new trial on damages, they said.
      Roberta Kaplan, Carroll’s attorney, said in an emailed statement that the arguments by Trump’s lawyers were frivolous.
      She said the unanimous jury had concluded that Trump sexually assaulted Carroll and then defamed her “by lying about her with hatred, ill-will, or spite.”
      “This time, Trump will not be able to escape the consequences of his actions,” Kaplan said.
      Trump may still face a second defamation trial resulting from another lawsuit Carroll filed against him. That case has been delayed with appeals as the U.S. Justice Department sought to substitute the United States as the defendant in place of Trump. Government lawyers say Trump can’t be held liable for the comments he made as president.
      Hello US politics blog readers, it’s been an eventful day in US political news. We’re closing this blog now and will start afresh on Friday. We have stand alone stories on some of the biggest news of the day, links in the bullet points below.Here’s where things stand:
      Donald Trump has asked a federal court in New York to slash the $5m penalty awarded against him in the sexual assault and defamation civil case won by writer E Jean Carroll down to just $1m – or grant him a new trial.
      The White House has had to postpone a party due for this evening, where thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer-plus (LGBTQ+) people were invited to a celebration and, essentially, a political defiance event. Reuters further reports that Biden said violence against LGBTQ+ people in the United States is on the rise and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric is an appeal to fear that is “unjustified” and “ugly.”
      Hardline Republicans have effectively paralyzed the chamber because they’re unhappy at speaker Kevin McCarthy over the deal with Democrats that resolved the problem with the US debt ceiling. The spat appears to have widened to envelop No 2 House Republican Steve Scalise, who appears unhappy with the speaker.
      The US supreme court ruled that Alabama discriminated against Black voters when it drew its seven congressional districts last year. The ruling in Allen v Milligan means that Alabama will have to draw its congressional map afresh to include a second majority-Black district.
      Donald Trump has asked a federal court in New York to slash the $5m penalty awarded against him in the sexual assault and defamation civil case won by writer E Jean Carroll down to just $1m – or grant him a new trial.The case went in Carroll’s favor last month when a jury decided that Trump had sexually abused and defamed her.Trump’s legal team has argued to the court that the damages awarded against him are excessive and the court should either slash them or allow a new trial.Reuters adds:
      The lawyers noted in a written submission that a Manhattan federal court jury last month rejected a rape claim made by the writer, E. Jean Carroll, concluding instead that she had been sexually abused in spring 1996 in the store’s dressing room.
      “Such abuse could have included groping of Plaintiff’s breasts through clothing, or similar conduct, which is a far cry from rape,” the lawyers wrote.
      They said the $2 million granted by the jury on a sexual abuse claim was “grossly excessive” and another $2.7 million issued for compensatory defamation damages was “based upon pure speculation.”
      The award should consist of no more than $400,000 for sex abuse, no more than $100,000 for defamation and $368,000 or less for the cost of a campaign to repair Carroll‘s reputation, the lawyers wrote.
      If a judge does not grant the suggested reduction in the award, then he should permit a new trial on damages, they said.
      Roberta Kaplan, Carroll’s attorney, said in an emailed statement that the arguments by Trump’s lawyers were frivolous.
      She said the unanimous jury had concluded that Trump sexually assaulted Carroll and then defamed her “by lying about her with hatred, ill-will, or spite.”
      “This time, Trump will not be able to escape the consequences of his actions,” Kaplan said.
      Trump may still face a second defamation trial resulting from another lawsuit Carroll filed against him. That case has been delayed with appeals as the U.S. Justice Department sought to substitute the United States as the defendant in place of Trump. Government lawyers say Trump can’t be held liable for the comments he made as president.
      Here’s New York civil rights campaigner and politician Al Sharpton on the supreme court decision.
      This was an unexpected decision that hopefully means the Supreme Court’s era of disenfranchising voters is coming to an end.
      Alabama’s gerrymandering policies were quintessential, modern-day Jim Crow tactics to suppress Black voters in the state. That you had two conservative-leaning judges rule against the state all but confirms that.
      This is a major step forward in the fight to protect voting rights. Let’s not forget that we’re in this mess because the Supreme Court took a sledgehammer to the Voting Rights Act a decade ago when it ruled on Shelby v. Holder.
      States essentially got the green light to recut lines, purge voter rolls, and take any other steps to keep Black and Brown Americans from showing up at the polls. Today’s ruling only goes to show why Congress has a moral imperative to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act this year.
      We have been promised since we lost John Lewis three years ago, amid historic protests against racial injustice, and we will not wait until next year when lawmakers need our vote again. On August 26th, we will gather for the 60th Anniversary of the March on Washington to send a clear message that this legislation must pass now.”
      US attorney general Merrick Garland has issued a response to the supreme court’s decision on Alabama and also a fresh call to the US Congress to pass some of the voting rights legislation that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris campaigned on in 2020 but is growing mildew on Capitol Hill.Garland said:
      Today’s decision rejects efforts to further erode fundamental voting rights protections, and preserves the principle that in the United States, all eligible voters must be able to exercise their constitutional right to vote free from discrimination based on their race.
      The right to vote is the cornerstone of our democracy, the right from which all other rights ultimately flow.
      Over the past two years, the Justice Department has rededicated its resources to enforcing federal voting rights protections. We will continue to use every authority we have left to defend voting rights. But that is not enough. We urge Congress to act to provide the Department with important authorities it needs to protect the voting rights of every American.”
      Here’s Janai Nelson, president and director- counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (LDF), on the Scotus decision.There is praise to go around.On Deuel Ross, racial justice attorney at the Legal Defense Fund:More reaction now to the surprise decision by the US supreme court earlier to defend the Voting Rights Act in a case involving Alabama’s electoral map.The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has released a statement thus, which includes some useful background:
      The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled in Allen v. Milligan in favor of Black voters who challenged Alabama’s 2021-enacted congressional map for violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for diluting Black political power, affirming the district court’s order that Alabama redraw its congressional map.
      By packing and cracking the historic Black Belt community, the map passed by the state legislature allowed Black voters an opportunity to elect candidates of their choice in only one of seven districts even though they make up 27 percent percent of the voting-age population. In its decision, the court also affirmed that under Section 2 of the VRA, race can be used in the redistricting process to provide equal opportunities to communities of color and ensure they are not packed and cracked in a way that impermissibly weakens their voting strength.
      The case was brought in November 2021 on behalf of Evan Milligan, Khadidah Stone, Letetia Jackson, Shalela Dowdy, Greater Birmingham Ministries, and the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP who are represented by the Legal Defense Fund (LDF), American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Alabama, Hogan Lovells LLP, and Wiggins, Childs, Pantazis, Fisher & Goldfarb. It was argued before the court on Oct. 4, 2022.
      “This decision is a crucial win against the continued onslaught of attacks on voting rights,” said LDF senior counsel Deuel Ross, who argued the case before the court in October. “Alabama attempted to rewrite federal law by saying race had no place in redistricting. But because of the state’s sordid and well-documented history of racial discrimination, race must be used to remedy that past and ensure communities of color are not boxed out of the electoral process. While the Voting Rights Act and other key protections against discriminatory voting laws have been weakened in recent years and states continue to pass provisions to disenfranchise Black voters, today’s decision is a recognition of Section 2’s purpose to prevent voting discrimination and the very basic right to a fair shot.”
      Davin Rosborough, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, said, “The Supreme Court rejected the Orwellian idea that it’s inappropriate to consider race in determining whether racial discrimination led to the creation of illegal maps. This ruling is a huge victory for Black Alabamians.”
      It’s been a busy morning in US politics and there will be plenty more developments on subjects ranging from Trump and E Jean Carroll to the supreme court’s surprise ruling on Alabama’s biased voting maps.Here’s where things stand:
      Donald Trump has asked for a new trial in the civil case brought by author E Jean Carroll, in which a Manhattan jury last month found the former US president liable for sexually abusing and defaming the writer and awarded her $5m in damages.
      The White House has had to postpone a party due for this evening, where thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer-plus (LGBTQ+) people were invited to a celebration and, essentially, a political defiance event.
      Hardline Republicans have effectively paralyzed the chamber because they’re unhappy at speaker Kevin McCarthy over the deal with Democrats that resolved the problem with the US debt ceiling. The spat appears to have widened to envelop No 2 House Republican Steve Scalise, who appears unhappy with the speaker.
      The US supreme court ruled that Alabama discriminated against Black voters when it drew its seven congressional districts last year. The ruling in Allen v Milligan means that Alabama will have to draw its congressional map afresh to include a second majority-Black district.
      Another quick reminder that British prime minister Rishi Sunak and US president Joe Biden are about to hold a press conference at the White House.It’s beginning any moment and our London colleagues are glued to it. There’s a live feed and all the developments as they happen, via the UK politics blog, here.No sooner had a New York jury found for E Jean Carroll than Donald Trump verbally attacked her during a live town hall-style interview on CNN (the broadcast which was probably the penultimate nail in the coffin for departing CNN chair Chris Licht before the crushing Atlantic article).Carroll promptly went back to court to to demand “very substantial” additional damages from Trump for the disparaging remarks, filing an amended lawsuit seeking an additional $10m in compensatory damages – and more in punitive damages.During the town hall in New Hampshire the day after the 9 May verdict, Trump further and repeatedly demeaned Carroll and her experiences.Trump said her account of a sexual assault, in the case which he is appealing, was “fake” and a “made-up story” and referred to it as “hanky-panky”. He repeated past claims that he’d never met Carroll and considered her a “whack job”.The filing by Carroll the following week claimed Trump’s statements at the televised town hall “show the depth of his malice toward Carroll, since it is hard to imagine defamatory conduct that could possibly be more motivated by hatred, ill will or spite”.Now Trump wants a new trial.Last month a New York jury found that Donald Trump sexually abused the former advice columnist, E Jean Carroll, in one of New York City’s most upscale stores, in the changing room at Bergdorf Goodman on Fifth Avenue, 27 years ago.The verdict on 9 May, for the first time, essentially legally branded a former US president as a sexual predator. It was the result of a civil not criminal case, and the only legal sanction Trump faced was financial.At the time, my colleagues Chris McGreal and Martin Pengelly noted that: In explaining a finding of sexual abuse to the jury, the judge said it had two elements: that Trump subjected Carroll to sexual contact without consent by use of force, and that it was for the purpose of sexual gratification.The jury deliberated for less than three hours. It did not find Trump raped Carroll, but did find him liable for sexual abuse.It awarded about $5m in compensatory and punitive damages: about $2m on the sexual abuse count and close to $3m for defamation, for branding her a liar.In an interview the following day, Carroll said she was “overwhelmed with joy for the women in this country”.It would be staggering if Donald Trump succeeded in getting a new civil trial in the issues brought against him by E Jean Carroll, after she sued him for defamation and sexual abuse and won hands down after a brisk jury decision.But the former US president is having a go.Donald Trump has asked for a new trial in the civil case brought by author E Jean Carroll, in which a Manhattan jury last month found the former US president liable for sexually abusing and defaming the writer and awarded her $5m in damages, Reuters reports.This according to a new court filing. More on this asap.Smoke gets in your eyes. Sadly, the White House has had to postpone a party due for this evening at the White House, where thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer-plus (LGBTQ+) people were invited to a celebration and, essentially, a political defiance event at the White House.The smoky air drifting south from the Canadian wildfires that’s been causing havoc on the eastern seaboard and further inland has put paid to tonight’s party.BUT in better news, it is currently rescheduled for Saturday.NBC reports that the event was/is designed as:
      A high-profile show of support at a time when the community feels under attack like never before and the White House has little recourse to beat back a flood of state-level legislation against them.
      Biden is also announcing new initiatives to protect LGBTQ+ communities from attacks, help youth with mental health resources and homelessness and counter book bans, White House officials said.
      The event is a:
      Picnic featuring food, games, face painting and photos. Queen HD the DJ was handling the music; singer Betty Who was on tap to perform.
      Karine Jean-Pierre, the first openly gay White House press secretary, said Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and their spouses are strong supporters of the LGBTQ+ community and think that having a celebration is an important way to “lift up” their accomplishments and contributions.
      She said LGBTQ+ people need to know that Biden “has their back” and “will continue to fight for them. And that’s the message that we want to make sure that gets out there.”
      FYI Harris is in the Bahamas today on business and is expected back in DC tonight. Biden’s meeting Rishi Sunak at the White House and holding a presser soon.You can follow all the latest developments on the Canadian wildfires and the smoke impact on the US in our dedicated live blog:There’s some context on the relationship between House speaker Kevin McCarthy and his chamber GOP No. 2, Steve Scalise, the House majority leader, from the Punchbowl report, prior to the hardliners’ spat now rippling out on Capitol Hill.The outlet points out that a captain having friction with his supposed wingman “is a tale as old as time in House leadership” and these two have known each other for decades.Punchbowl reports:
      The pair met as young College Republicans and their interactions have always been professional. But there’s no doubt some bad blood between the two men.
      Scalise considered running against McCarthy for Republican leader in 2019, but ultimately decided against it — something we cataloged at length in a book we wrote. And again, McCarthy tapped [Louisiana congressman Garrett] Graves and [North Carolina congressman Patrick] McHenry for the most sensitive negotiations of the last few months, leaving Scalise aside.
      Scalise said in the interview that McCarthy is still viable as speaker of the House. But the House majority leader noted repeatedly that there is “a lot of anger on a lot of sides of our conference.”
      An old article from Politico notes that McCarthy and Scalise’s “parallel rise” dates to the late 1990s. McCarthy was national chairman of the Young Republicans and Scalise was an up and coming Louisiana politician and their friendship developed from that time.British prime minister Rishi Sunak, from the Conservative Party, is in Washington DC, this week and is meeting right now with Joe Biden at the White House.The premier and the US president are due to hold a press conference at 1.30pm US east coast time. Our colleagues in London are focusing on this and will be covering it as it happens via the UK politics blog, with a live stream of the event.You can keep up with that blog here.Selma native and Alabama congresswoman Terri Sewell just hopped on the phone for a live interview with CNN on air to express her relief and delight about the supreme court decision on voting rights and the relevant district maps in her state.“This is so exciting, it’s really amazing … it’s an amazing victory for Alabama Black voters, for the Voting Rights Act, for democracy,” she said.She tweeted about a “historic victory”.Sewell said the ruling reflected the legacy of the long legacy of fighting for civil rights for Black voters in Alabama and elsewhere and she was “reeling” from the good surprise.“And to have the supreme court give us this huge win, it’s historic,” she told CNN.She noted this would have implications more widely and was a closely watched case by legislatures creating voting maps, especially in states such as North Carolina and Ohio. “Everyone is looking at this decision,” she said, adding “it will have a positive ripple effect.”She noted that the late civil rights activist, champion and congressman John Lewis “must be smiling” and that those who challenged Alabama’s discriminatory voting rights did was Lewis always encouraged people do to: “we got into some good trouble.”This is Sewell’s pinned tweet: More

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      The Guardian view on the Republican primary: leader of the unappetising pack | Editorial

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      Donald Trump has an excess of companions in the race for the Republican nomination for 2024, but a paucity of rivals. The quantity of candidates in the presidential primary so far appears in inverse relationship to the threat they pose to him. The main question prompted by several recent declarees is not how they might win or what they might offer, but simply “why?” (Mike Pence, Chris Christie), or even “who?” (Perry Johnson).No one can predict what will happen in this race, and upsets do happen. Large fields and long shots positioning politicians for a future bid or the vice-presidential slot on the ticket are nothing new in primaries. Nor are improbable, often self-funded entrants. But the current flurry of activity – Mr Pence, former New Jersey governor Mr Christie and North Dakota’s governor Doug Burgum all announced runs this week – seems to be prompted less by the belief that Mr Trump is beatable than by the belief that Ron DeSantis isn’t the man to beat him. The Florida governor surged in polls after winning by a landslide in the midterms, while Trump-backed candidates fell short. It did not last.Mr Trump’s savaging of Mr DeSantis shows he takes nothing for granted. But he is polling more than 50% among Republicans, while Mr DeSantis is a distant second on about 20%. Mr Trump has the status of a former president, yet pitches himself as an insurgent. His personal conduct and erratic politics are already priced in, and he has delivered for his base – notably on the supreme court and, therefore, abortion. Some still like the idea of Trumpism without Trump: a more competent, less reckless version of the former president. But Mr DeSantis has appeared awkward on the campaign trail. While he counts on a hard line on social issues – including abortion and the battle with Disney – to help him regain ground, it may be unsettling donors.Mr Pence trails in distant third: though vice-presidents often win presidential nominations, he is loathed both for backing his former boss’s iniquities until the 11th hour – and for certifying 2020’s election results and rejecting the lie that Mr Trump had won. His support is in single digits, at about 5%, as is that for Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina, and Mr Trump’s ambassador to the UN. Tim Scott, also of South Carolina, and only the second black Republican senator ever directly elected, has impressed some pundits but is even further behind.The concern of anti-Trump Republicans is that the sheer number of candidates will split the votes of those pondering an alternative. While Mr Christie has laid into Mr Trump, and Mr Pence did so in his campaign launch, Mr DeSantis has vacillated before hardening his line – and still refuses to comment on Mr Trump’s claims that the last election was stolen.The others criticise him only in veiled terms. They hope to pick up Mr Trump’s supporters should he be hobbled, perhaps due to some unforeseen act or his multitude of legal woes. Prosecutors have formally notified the former president that he is a target of the criminal investigation examining the retention of national security materials. It is far from clear that any of the cases against him will obstruct his return. Yet the biggest threats to Mr Trump’s political prospects still appear to remain outside his party. More

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      Chris Christie says he’s anti-Trump – but did he secure a presidential pardon for a crony?

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      A leading US ethics expert said the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who this week launched a presidential campaign aimed at taking down Donald Trump, owes the American public an explanation of why and how he secured a pardon for a powerful New Jersey Republican, issued on Trump’s last day in the White House.“We just don’t know the answer to that,” Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew), said. “And I think we should.”Trump is the clear Republican frontrunner to face Joe Biden next year. But Christie says Trump is not fit to return to the White House, given his scandal-plagued time in office and his incitement of the January 6 Capitol attack.Christie has said he has not spoken to Trump since before 6 January 2021, the day Trump sent supporters to the Capitol in a deadly attempt to stop the certification of his defeat by Biden.But 14 days after the attack, on Trump’s last day in power, a 143-strong list of pardons and commutations included a name supported by Christie.Alongside Trump allies Steve Bannon and Ken Kurson, and the rapper Lil Wayne, was George Gilmore, a lawyer and Republican party chair in Ocean county, New Jersey.Gilmore was indicted on federal tax charges in January 2020. He denied wrongdoing, his attorney claiming his lavish spending on collectibles was evidence of a hoarding disorder. Nonetheless, Gilmore was sentenced to a year and a day in prison and three years of supervised release, a conviction upheld on appeal that December.Gilmore avoided prison time. Announcing his pardon, the White House saluted his “important civic contributions over his career in New Jersey”. It also listed his supporters. The first two named were Christie and Bill Stepien.Stepien managed Trump’s re-election campaign. Before that, he worked in New Jersey for Christie, including when Christie narrowly won in 2009 and during his landslide re-election in 2013.By the time Christie left office, though, he and Stepien were under the shadow of the Bridgegate scandal, concerning political payback against a Democratic mayor.Notably, Christie ran for president in 2016 but failed to make an impact. Swiftly endorsing Trump, he stuck with him even after being fired from Trump’s transition, which Christie says was due to bad blood with Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser. Stepien, Politico said, saw his own career threatened by Bridgegate but “kept a lifeline of income from the [Republican] super pac GOPAC, thanks to Gilmore’s help. That connection helped secure Gilmore the Trump pardon.”Stepien also worked in the Trump White House. He is now a founding partner of a consultancy, National Public Affairs, whose website features Trump allies including Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma senator; Harriet Hageman, who defeated Liz Cheney in 2022 for her Wyoming House seat; and Ronny Jackson, a White House doctor turned Texas congressman.In February, Politico described Gilmore’s own political resurrection, including a return as Ocean county Republican chair made possible, the site said, because Gilmore “had … a key connection to Trump world”.Stepien told Politico that Gilmore would once again play a key role in elections in New Jersey: “One out of every seven votes will come out of Ocean county in the next statewide primary. So if you’re not spending time trying to build a relationship with George and his team, I have to question your strategy.”Christie, who became an analyst for ABC and wrote two books, has made his political strategy clear: he is going to take the game to Trump.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBookbinder said: “I think it’s a good thing that Christie is calling out Donald Trump on his role in inciting an insurrection and on his undercutting of democracy. For that to be coming from people who were insiders is powerful.“That said, I think Chris Christie needs to answer for his [having been] someone who was close to Trump when Trump’s abuses were very much apparent, really from the beginning, and from before Donald Trump became president, and in carrying through to the end of the presidency.“We don’t know when Christie made [or supported the pardon] request [for Gilmore]. It certainly may be that all contacts were before January 6, when Christie at least says that he cut off Trump completely. But we just don’t know the answer to that,” he added.“And I think we should, because to the extent that he is saying he was outraged by Trump’s anti-democratic abuses and had nothing to do with them, that would not be consistent with continuing to ask for favours that might seem to go around the normal pardon process. And that’s something that I think it’s appropriate for the public to have answers to.”The pardon power, Bookbinder said, is “meant to be broad, as a check on runaway prosecutorial power”. Pardons and acts of clemency as a president leaves office are common.But Trump’s pardons proved as controversial as his presidency, amid reports of aides including Rudy Giuliani seeking to profit and with those pardoned including the likes of Bannon and Roger Stone, who might otherwise have testified against Trump.Pointing to the need to lessen abuse of the pardon power, Bookbinder said: “You can’t see Donald Trump as an existential threat to democracy, which I believe he is, while also still having dealings with him and his circle. You can’t do both at once.“And so it is reasonable to ask Chris Christie if that’s what he is doing, or if that’s what he has been doing – [if he has] a good answer to that. We should, at least, have a right to know that answer.”A Christie spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. More

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      Alarm at rightwing push to reverse clean-energy success in Texas and beyond

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      In the scramble before the end of Texas’s legislative session last week, a must-pass bill was amended to impose new costs upon renewable energy. This came amid a barrage of anti-solar and wind power measures pushed forward by Republicans to reshape a state that has become the US’s powerhouse of clean energy.But the conservative lawmakers had help.Sections of the bill that impose new burdens upon clean energy providers were directly crafted and edited by the Texas Public Policy Foundation (or TPPF), a conservative group that has led the backlash to renewables and to make what it calls “the moral case for fossil fuels”, according to a copy of the draft language seen by the Guardian.Several dozen edits were made to the bill’s amendments by Brent Bennett, a TPPF policy staffer, the document shows, and Texas lawmakers subsequently passed parts of this language along with the key TPPF desires – to impose new transmission costs on renewables and require them to source fossil fuel “backup” power when the sun isn’t shining or wind isn’t blowing.The passage of the bill, which funds the ongoing operation of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, was the flagship victory for TPPF even as a raft of other Republican bills that would have “shut down the renewable energy industry in Texas”, as energy analyst Doug Lewin put it, faltered.The burgeoning influence of TPPF, an organization substantially funded by fossil fuel interests and publicly lauded by Greg Abbott, Texas’s Republican governor, is the catalyst to a rightwing attempt to crimp the stunning progress of renewable energy in the state, which now produces more than a quarter of all wind-powered electricity in the US.The group’s agenda is now extending far beyond Texas, bankrolling efforts to halt offshore wind turbines in Massachusetts and to prop up coal power on native American land in Arizona while spearheading efforts to crack down on sustainable finance in energy-producing states like West Virginia.“We are very influential, we are meeting with policymakers to share recommendations and we’re having success around the country,” said Jason Isaac, a former state representative and now director of TPPF’s energy initiatives. Isaac said that TPFF regularly helped craft “certain aspects” of bills in Texas related to the state’s electricity grid or environmental, social, and corporate governance (or ESG) issues.“I think conservatives are slowly but surely moving away from variable generation and towards reliable generation,” he said of the group’s quest against renewables. Isaac claimed renewables have been unfairly propped up by a “cult-like fascination” among politicians who have pursued what he called a “dangerous and deadly” agenda to reduce planet-heating emissions.The aggressive push against renewables in Texas has alarmed environmentalists who fret it will undermine the state’s nation-leading wind industry and threaten the revenues solar and wind generates for local communities and farmers. More broadly, the template used by TPPF in Texas could hobble efforts by Joe Biden’s administration to tackle the climate crisis.“We are seeing a rush of these bills attempting to wind the clock back on renewables and TPPF really are at the point of the spear on this,” said Luke Metzger, executive director of Environment Texas. “They are transparent advocates for the fossil fuel industry and I think they pose an incredible threat to renewables. TPPF have gained incredible traction, they really are shifting the narrative in Texas.“They’ve won over the top politicians in the state, which is very dangerous. Texas is going to be critical if the US going to get to net zero emissions, so we should take this threat seriously.”TPPF’s impact can now be found thousands of miles from its base in Austin, Texas, with the group filing a lawsuit in 2021 on behalf of six east coast fishing businesses – collectively called Nantucket Residents Against Turbines – targeting a major windfarm currently under construction off the coast of Massachusetts. Slated to come online by the end of the year, Vineyard Wind will be the first major offshore wind project to be built off the US east coast.The lawsuit claimed federal agencies did not sufficiently analyze how the project, which is set to deliver enough electricity to power 400,000 homes, would affect wildlife – specifically the endangered North Atlantic right whale – and thereby violated the Endangered Species Act and slew of other environmental policies.Meghan Lapp, a seafood dealer and longtime offshore wind critic who was a plaintiff in the suit, told Reuters in 2021 that TPPF got involved in the suit at her request. As it announced its involvement in the case, the thinktank also took the unusual step of releasing a trailer called “A Heavy Wind”.The case was ultimately unsuccessful after a federal judge dismissed it last month, but the idea that wind turbines kill whales has been seized upon by conservatives, especially since December, when dozens of whales began washing up on the Atlantic coast in what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) calls an “unusual mortality event”.Noaa has said there is no evidence that offshore wind power is killing off whales, with fishing practices, boat strikes and the climate crisis among the primary dangers to marine mammals, but congressional Republicans have called on the White House to pause offshore wind development, while Tucker Carlson, then of Fox News, aired a critical series of segments called “The Biden Whale Extinction”.The assault on renewables by TPPF and its Republican allies has stunned conservatives who remain supportive of the longstanding bipartisan enthusiasm for clean energy.The reversal has been particularly stark for Texas which, blessed with the capacious, flat terrain and amenable climate for abundant wind and solar energy, was championed as a bastion for renewables by previous Republican governors George W Bush and Rick Perry, even as they embraced the ubiquitous oil industry.More than 40% of Texas’s electricity came from carbon-free sources last year, with the state now producing more wind and solar than the next three states – California, Iowa and Oklahoma – combined. This imperious status now seems uncertain.“I don’t recognize the state sometimes any more from our elected leaders. It’s like we are in a twilight zone where up is down and day is night,” said Matt Welch, state director of Conservative Texans for Energy Innovation.“I fear we’re losing our lead in the nation and the world as the source for clean energy advancement. It’s just amazing we’ve rolled up the welcome mat and told wind and solar operators they’re just not welcome here any more.”The Texas Public Policy Foundation was founded in 1989 by James R Leininger, a San Antonio-based physician who made his fortune selling hospital beds, and initially focused on the issue of charter schools before branching out into other topics such as energy. The thinktank is a member of the State Policy Network, a network of far-right non-profits across the country that fight climate-focused legislation.In 2021, the most recent year for which records are available, donations for the thinktank totaled $25.6m. Publicly available data shows that – like many State Policy Network affiliates – its largest known funder is Charles Koch, the billionaire industrialist who made his fortune from fossil fuels. Entities tied to Koch have contributed at least $8.8m to the group since 2012, according to an analysis by researcher Connor Gibson.Tax filings show that the group has received donations from fossil fuel companies including ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips and Chevron, but, as a non-profit, the full extent of TPPF’s fossil fuel funding is unknown.Issac said, however, it has been “many years” since large oil firms such as Exxon have donated to TPPF as these companies now ostensibly support decarbonization and environmentally responsible corporate governance, which conflicts with the foundation. He insisted that the foundation is committed to “free enterprise and individual liberty” and the eradication of “market distorting” subsidies, not just for renewables but also fossil fuels.But Welch said that Republican lawmakers, backed by TPPF, have ditched any ideological consistency by heaping onerous restrictions on renewable energy development on private property, in some cases attempting to impose requirements absent from oil and gas drilling, and trying to slash subsidies for the industry at the same time as offering state support for the buildout of new gas plants.One proposed bill that didn’t get sufficient backing in the latest Texas legislative session would have placed stringent new rules for wind and solar projects, including written permissions from neighboring property owners and setbacks of up to half a mile from the edge of a property for wind turbines. Another would have cut all subsidies for renewable energy.“On a Tuesday these lawmakers will be adamantly for private property rights, but on a Thursday they will want to stop the growth of renewable energy even though it’s on somebody’s private land,” Welch said, adding that TPPF was once full of “mini Milton Friedmans for years until recently, and now all of a sudden they throw that out the window.“It’s been a shocker. It’s so hypocritical,” he said. “I used to be an acolyte of TPPF but they are now driven by oil and gas billionaires who want to stop alternative forms of energy to benefit their own bottom line. They’ve sold their soul to the almighty dollar.”Renewable energy remains broadly popular with the Texas public for delivering cheap, clean power along with an injection of cash for entities such as school districts, but affection has somewhat curdled among some of the state’s Republican leadership. A devastating winter storm in 2021, which left millions of Texans without power and led to several hundred deaths, was a major accelerant of this trend.In the days following the crippling event, known as winter storm Uri, Abbott and other leading Republicans pushed the blame for the power blackouts upon renewable energy, with misleading pictures of frozen wind turbines from Europe quickly circulating social media as the supposed cause of the grid’s breakdown.Subsequent studies have made clear the primary cause of the blackouts were frozen gas pipelines and a lack of infrastructure resiliency to extreme weather, rather than renewables per se, but the perception of faulty wind and solar has stuck, eagerly fanned by TPPF.“I still believe [renewables] deserve a lot of the blame,” said Isaac. “The storm was helpful in educating people who just assumed when they flip a switch the lights come on that there are issues with grid reliability, that solar panels covered in snow don’t produce electricity.”Isaac said the foundation accepts that the climate is changing but disputes that this is harmful to people, claiming that the benefits of burning of fossil fuels “far outweighs” any negatives, including deadly air pollution, which he asserts isn’t an issue for the US and its “near natural” air quality. Scientists have, in fact, found that the climate crisis poses huge and growing risks to humanity, with airborne pollutants from burning coal, oil and gas linked to an array of different health problems.While the most severe of the anti-renewables bills pushed forward in Texas didn’t pass the legislature this year, Isaac said that TPPF remains undaunted and will continue to agitate against what he called “the false panacea of variable power”. Supporters of clean energy said they expect further battles ahead to prevent Texas’s progress in solar and wind from being unwound.“With the growth trajectory of renewable energy, TPPF can either get on the train or lay down in front of the tracks,” said Welch. “I suspect they won’t rest on their laurels. They’re going to come for renewables again and again and again.” More