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      Biden urges US to reject ‘extremism and fury’ after Trump assassination attempt

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      Joe Biden on Sunday forcefully condemned political violence and appealed to a nation still reeling from the attempted assassination of Donald Trump to reject “extremism and fury”.In a primetime address from the Oval Office, Biden said Americans must strive for “national unity,” warning that the political rhetoric in the US had gotten “too heated” as passions rise in the final months before the November presidential election.“There is no place in America for this kind of violence – for any violence. Ever. Period. No exception,” the president said. “We can’t allow this violence to be normalized.”Biden’s plea for Americans to “cool it down” came as Trump said that he would use his speech at the Republican national convention to bring “the whole country, even the whole world, together.”“The speech will be a lot different than it would’ve been two days ago,” Trump told the Washington Examiner, adding that the reality of what had happened was “just setting in.”Biden ordered an independent review into how a gunman was able to get on to a roof overlooking a Trump campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday, and fire multiple shots at the former president from an “elevated position” outside of the venue. The FBI warned on Sunday that online threats of political violence, already heightened, had spiked since the shooting.The attack, which is being investigated as an attempted assassination and a potential act of domestic terrorism, left Trump injured at the ear, but it killed a spectator, identified as a former fire chief, and critically injured two others.“We cannot, we must not go down this road in America,” Biden added, citing a rising tide of political violence that included the assault on the US Capitol, the attack on the husband of the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, and a kidnapping plot against Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan.Biden also praised Corey Comperatore, the 50-year-old former fire chief who was killed as he dove to shield his wife and daughter. Comperatore, Biden said, was a “hero” and extended his “deepest condolences” to his family.Investigators were still searching for the motive of the 20-year-old suspect, identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.More than 24 hours after the attack, the investigation into how Crooks managed to open fire, reportedly using a AR-15 bought legally by his father, at the rally remained fluid. Investigators have seized several of Crooks’s devices and are starting to piece together his communications before the event. Authorities said they had discovered potential explosive devices in Crooks’s car.Meanwhile, details have begun to emerge about the suspect, who was shot and killed by Secret Service counter-snipers.As a junior in high school, Crooks donated $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a political action committee aligned with the Democratic party, but eight months later he registered to vote as a member of the Republican party.Former classmates described the man as a smart, and quiet student. One former classmate told Reuters that Crooks had not shown a particular interest in politics in high school, and would rather would discuss computers and games.“He was super smart. That’s what really kind of threw me off was, this was, like, a really, really smart kid, like he excelled,” the classmate told Reuters. “Nothing crazy ever came up in any conversation.”Another young man who described himself as a former classmate of Crooks at Bethel Park high school spoke with reporters on Sunday, recalling how his ex-companion “was bullied almost every day” on campus.View image in fullscreenThe president, who was at church in Delaware during the time of the shooting, cut short his weekend and returned to Washington to confront the situation, arriving at the White House after midnight. He and Trump spoke late on Saturday.Biden spoke briefly from the White House earlier on Sunday, delivering a similar message from the Roosevelt room after receiving a briefing on the investigation in the Situation Room.In those comments, Biden asked the public not to “make assumptions” about the shooter’s motives or affiliations, as conspiracy theories and misinformation swirl online.The Republican national convention will begin on Monday in Milwaukee, where Trump is expected to receive a hero’s welcome by the party’s rank and file, rattled but defiant. Trump, who arrived in Milwaukee on Sunday evening, is not scheduled to address the convention until Thursday evening, after he is formally nominated as the party’s nominee.Speaking to the New York Post while en route to Milwaukee, Trump said he was “supposed to be dead”, adding: “The doctor at the hospital said he never saw anything like this, he called it a miracle.”Biden’s remarks came at a fragile moment in the election, a re-match between the president and Trump already defined by exceptional tumult and deep political polarization.For weeks, the president has been fighting calls from elected officials in his own party to abandon his re-election campaign after a disastrous debate performance last month that underscored concerns about his age and fitness for office. The 81-year-old Biden has insisted he will not be pushed out as the party’s nominee, but has done little to quell the swirl of doubt that he is the best candidate to defeat Trump in November.Trump earlier this year became the first former president to be convicted of felonies, and faces several more legal challenges related to his role in the 6 January Capitol attack and efforts to overturn the results of a lost election. At least one Republican senator, Mike Lee of Utah, has called for the criminal cases against Trump to be dropped in light of the assassination attempt.In his remarks on Sunday evening, Biden was realistic about the challenge of heeding his words, accepting that national unity was “the most elusive of goals” in an America deeply divided into camps. Already, Republicans were blaming the violence on the president, arguing that Biden’s attempts to portray Trump as a threat to American democracy helped fuel a toxic political environment.Yet the attack has drawn condemnation from Republican and Democratic officials across the country as well as world leaders.“We need to turn the temperature down,” House speaker Mike Johnson said on Sunday, in an interview on CNN.The president acknowledged that he and Trump offer drastically competing visions, and that their supporters diverged sharply. In Milwaukee, Republicans would offer sustained critiques of Biden’s record, the president said, while he planned to travel on Monday to Nevada, where he would rally supporters around his agenda. Because of the attack, he postponed a trip to Texas, where he was scheduled to speak at the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act at the Lyndon B Johnson presidential library.“We debate and disagree. We compare and contrast the character of the candidates, the records, the issues, the agenda, the vision for America,” he said, arguing that the contest should be settled at the “ballot box” and “not with bullets”.After the attack on Saturday night, the Biden campaign reportedly moved to pull down its television ads “as quickly as possible” and pause all “outbound communications”.“Politics must never be a literal battlefield or, god forbid, a literal killing field,” Biden emphasized in his address on Sunday night. He urged Americans to “get out of our silos” and echo chambers where misinformation is rampant.“Remember: though we may disagree,” he said, “we are not enemies.” More

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      Trump, Don Jr and Maga mania: your guide to the Republican convention

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      The Republican national convention begins on Monday in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with Donald Trump expected to be officially nominated as the Republican party’s candidate for president during the four-day event.It marks a key point in the election calendar. The closely watched convention is a chance for Trump and Republicans to lay out their vision for the US, less than four months from November’s presidential election.Trump’s yet-to-be-announced vice-presidential candidate will also speak at the convention, making the case to voters for a second Trump presidency.What’s the point of all this?Officially, the main reason is for Republican party delegates to anoint Donald Trump as their party’s candidate for president.But the convention is much more than that. It’s a chance to rally supporters, to bring in donations, to get television airtime, and also a chance for Republicans to just have a good time.The convention starts on Monday and runs until Thursday night, which is when Trump is expected to take the stage, accept the nomination, and speak to the crowd and TV cameras.Where is the convention being held?At Fiserv Forum, in downtown Milwaukee. The sprawling arena, home to the Milwaukee Bucks NBA team, opened in 2018. According to Fiserv Forum’s own website, the building is “designed to reflect the heritage, history and personality of Milwaukee”.Fiserv was due to host the 2020 Democratic convention, but Covid-19 meant that event was drastically downsized and moved elsewhere. It’s no coincidence that both parties have sought to hold their flagship events here in recent years: Wisconsin is an important swing state that Biden won by just 20,000 votes four years ago, and it is expected to play a key role in November.How does nominating Trump work?About 2,500 delegates from 50 states and territories will cast their vote. Each state has a certain number of delegates based on its population, and Trump and his opponents won delegates through the Republican primaries. Trump needed 1,215 delegates to win, which he already has, but his nomination isn’t official until the delegates cast their vote at the convention.Who will be at the convention?About 50,000 people are expected to attend the convention across the four days. That includes the delegates, but also other supporters, elected officials and members of the media.Lara Trump, the ex-president’s daughter-in-law, has said “unlikely people” will speak at the convention, including celebrities. Given Trump has few celebrity backers – he has Kid Rock, Dennis Quaid and Dean Cain, a former actor who played Superman in the 1990s TV series Lois and Clark – it will be interesting to see who Lara Trump is talking about.We do know that Donald Trump Jr, who has become a popular figure among the far right, will speak on Wednesday night. Trump’s oldest son is scheduled to introduce Trump’s vice-presidential candidate. Ron DeSantis, who became embroiled in a bitter war against Trump after he ran against him for the nomination, will speak, as will Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor and one-time rising star who faced criticism after she wrote about shooting dead her family dog.Nikki Haley, who also challenged Trump for the nomination, has not been invited to attend.How can I follow it?The Guardian will have live coverage every day, as well as pieces on key issues and performances. C-Span, the non-profit political broadcast service, will broadcast live, and live feeds are also expected to be available on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. News channels will cover plenty of the events too.When should I tune in?Donald Trump will give his address on Thursday night. His son Donald Trump Jr will speak on Wednesday night. Trump’s oldest son is scheduled to introduce Trump’s vice-presidential candidate – that will probably be the first chance to hear them speak to a wide audience.Apart from nominating Trump, what else happens?Each day has a theme based on the ‘Make America great again’ slogan. Monday is “Make America wealthy once again”, Tuesday is “Make America safe once again”, Wednesday’s theme is about making America strong and Thursday’s comes full circle: Make America great once again”.There will be various speakers each day on the convention floor, and there are events elsewhere in Milwaukee. According to the convention calendar the European Union is holding a “Europe night” at the city’s Harley-Davidson museum, while the Heritage Foundation – which is behind Project 2025 – is hosting a “policy fest” on Monday. There are also film screenings, pro-gun workshops and plenty of drinks events.Can we expect any protests?Yes. There is a March on the convention organized for Monday, with about 100 activist groups expected to participate. Organizers say they aim to support immigrants’ rights and LGBTQ+ freedoms, and draw attention to the overturning of Roe v Wade. According to Wisconsin public radio that up to 5,000 people could take part in the march. More

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      Welcome to the Trump show: Republican convention to resemble coronation

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      The political iconography was instant and indelible. His face bloodied, his fist raised, Donald Trump stood defiant as Secret Service agents scrambled around him against the backdrop of the Stars and Stripes and a brilliant blue sky.The apparent attempt to assassinate the former president at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday shook the American political kaleidoscope once again. It cast a shadow over the Republican national convention, due to start in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Monday – but potentially handed Trump and his allies a political opportunity.Trump’s allies will probably praise Trump as a strongman who is quite literally bulletproof – and blame his opponents for the explosion of violence.“Today is not just some isolated incident,” tweeted JD Vance, an Ohio senator widely tipped to be name as Trump’s running mate at the convention. “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.”Host city Milwaukee, in the battleground state of Wisconsin, has sudden historical resonance. It was here in 1912 that Theodore Roosevelt, a former president seeking to regain the White House, was the victim of a would-be assassination. The bullet was slowed by a steel case for his glasses and a manuscript of his 50-page speech, ultimately lodging in his chest. Roosevelt went on to deliver the speech while bleeding through his shirt.Steve Schmidt, a former Republican strategist, wrote on X: “The political consequences of this assassination attempt will be immense, and they will benefit Donald Trump, who just responded to being shot in the exact same way that Teddy Roosevelt did.”Even before Saturday’s shooting, the convention was set to be a coronation of Trump as Republicans’ presidential nominee, throwing in sharp relief the Democratic discord over Joe Biden’s viability as a candidate.Republicans have nominated Trump for the presidency twice before. But in 2016 and even 2020 he faced critics inside his own party and was the underdog in the race for the White House. This time, however, Trump has the edge in opinion polls following Biden’s calamitous debate performance. And his takeover of the Republican party is complete.Dissenters have been purged, losing their congressional seats to Trump allies or quietly fading into retirement. The Republican National Committee co-chair is Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara. This week Nikki Haley, who was Trump’s closest challenger in the Republican primary election, released the delegates she won so that they are free to support him at the convention.Haley herself will not be there. Nor will Mike Pence, the former vice-president who was a key figure at the past two conventions. Nor will Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, the Republican ticket that took on Democrat Barack Obama in the 2012 election.But delegates will hear from Tucker Carlson, a broadcaster who promotes white nationalism; Franklin Graham, a Christian evangelical who has called Islam “wicked” and “evil”; Tom Homan, an immigration hardliner who has vowed to run the biggest deportation force in American history; Charlie Kirk, a far-right activist and election denier; and Vivek Ramaswamy, a biotech entrepreneur who wants to increase fossil fuel production. All are sure to play their part in the Trump show.Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said: “Trump’s coronation will for once put British ceremony to shame. You will see speaker after speaker, delegation after delegation, trying to top one another in their superlatives about the greatest president, not just in American history but in world history.”Delegates will hear from Trump, 78, and ratify the Republican policy platform that he personally approved. They will be introduced to Trump’s vice-presidential running mate. They will hear speakers mock Biden as a weak, 81-year-old failure who is facing calls from fellow Democrats to exit the race.Michael Steele, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said: “The Democrats have spent the last 10 days giving them soundbites to talk about. The Republicans are going to take four days and everything coming out of their mouths will be a reminder that Joe Biden is old, Democrats don’t want him, why should you?”Republicans have been given a gift, Steele added. “Democrats are too stupid to realise what the gift is, and they keep giving it. Just shut the hell up, get behind the man like the Republicans have gotten behind their criminal and run the race. Because the American people are going to line up with Joe Biden if you give them a reason to do that.”Convention delegates, numbering almost 2,400, are sure to approve a policy platform that ranks among the most extreme in American history. Echoing Trump talking points, it backs the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants, calls for an end to “the weaponisation of government” and demands election integrity – code for Trump’s false assertion that the 2020 election was stolen.The 16-page platform is heavily influenced by Christian nationalism and shares significant ideological DNA with Project 2025, a 922-page plan from a conservative thinktank that outlines a dramatic expansion of presidential power and a plan to fire as many as 50,000 government workers to replace them with Trump loyalists.Biden’s re-election campaign has worked to turn Project 2025 into an electoral liability for Trump, which may explain why last week he sought to distance himself from it. “I know nothing about Project 2025,” Trump posted on his social media website, adding that “some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal”.View image in fullscreenBut both Russ Vought, the Republican National Convention’s platform committee’s policy director, and his deputy, Ed Martin, have strong connections to Project 2025. Both men have also previously taken a hard line against abortion rights.Martin has advocated for a national ban without exceptions for rape or incest and entertained the idea of imprisoning women and their doctors. He once said: “If you ban abortion in Louisiana, is a doctor who has an abortion breaking the law? Yes. Should he be punished? Yes – I think that seems obvious. What is the punishment? Not sure yet. Could be criminal, could be a jail sentence, I suppose.”The platform committee is packed with other anti-abortion extremists including David Barton, a Christian nationalist who has called the separation of church and state a “myth”, Kimberly Guilfoyle, fiancee of Donald Trump Jr, Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, and Chad Connelly, a former chairman of the South Carolina Republican party who has described abortion as “murder of an innocent child”.Weighing the political risks, Trump intervened to ensure that, for the first time in 40 years, the party platform omits the explicit basis for a national abortion ban, leaving the policy to state governments instead. But the compromise remains fragile: if dissenting voices are raised at the convention, it will fuel Democrats’ argument that Republicans’ true intentions are as extreme as ever.Emilia Rowland, national press secretary of the Democratic National Committee, said: “The reality is that Trump literally put architects of Project 2025 in charge of the Republican platform, and the result is not only the most extreme platform in GOP history but one containing lie after lie after lie.“The American people know that Trump wants a nationwide abortion ban and they know the only thing standing in the way of Trump’s terrifying second-term agenda is re-electing President Biden and Vice-President Harris in November.”Delegates will also formally designate the presidential ticket: Trump and his yet-to-be-named running mate. The leading contender is Vance, followed by the North Dakota governor, Doug Burgum, and Florida senator Marco Rubio. All three are expected to address delegates along with the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, who challenged Trump for the nomination and later endorsed him.To critics, the vice-presidential pick is irrelevant. Steele, a broadcaster and former lieutenant governor of Maryland, said: “To be honest, I couldn’t care less who his running mate is. It is a mindless zombified politician who has given up his soul to Donald Trump for the chance that Donald Trump will smile at him and pat him on the head.“It doesn’t matter to me. It will be an unprincipled individual. That’s all I know. They could take a stick figure and stand it next to Donald Trump. Folks in that hall would applaud it, lap it up, nominate it and call it vice-president.”Trump family members will also address the convention, organisers announced on Saturday. The former president’s sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump, will both have speaking slots, along with their partners Kimberly Guilfoyle and Lara Trump. The former first lady Melania Trump is expected in Milwaukee but she is not listed among the speakers. She has been notably absent from the 2024 campaign – a stark contrast to the first lady Jill Biden’s prominent role at her husband’s side.Trump’s campaign has outlined daily messaging with themes that riff on his signature “Make America great again” slogan. Monday’s theme is economics: “Make America wealthy once again.” Trump has outlined an agenda of sweeping tariffs and accelerated production of oil and gas, even though it already hit a record under Biden.On Tuesday the theme is immigration and crime: “Make America safe once again.” Trump and Republicans believe the border debate is among their strongest issues. They have arranged speeches for the family members of people killed, allegedly by undocumented immigrants, as part of Trump’s broader attempts to blame crime on border policies.Wednesday will be national security day: “Make America strong once again.” Delegates and the viewing audience can expect to hear arguments that Biden is a “weak” and “failed” commander-in-chief and head of state. This is the day, typically, that the vice-presidential nominee addresses the convention.Thursday will culminate with Trump himself: “Make America great once again.”His speech accepting the party nomination will be watched closely for the tension between red meat for the base and outreach to swing state votes. His 2016 address included the memorable line “I alone can fix it” and drew comparisons with the trappings of fascist rallies.Frank Luntz, a political consultant and pollster, said: “The question is whether he goes 80% Maga, 90% Maga or 100% Maga. They would be best off with low-fat milk rather than the 2%, because 2% just goes overboard. He has four days of unchallenged, uninterrupted messaging, and there’s usually a bounce.“He’s going into his convention so strong and with curiosity over who his VP candidate is going to be. If they have discipline and they can exercise it then their their lead will grow. But there’s only so many votes available among the undecideds.”Protesters are expected but will not be permitted inside the security zone established around the convention arena by the Secret Service. Principles First, which describes itself as a nationwide grassroots movement of pro-democracy, anti-Trump conservatives, is holding a rally on Wednesday with Steele among the speakers.The Democratic National Committee is also holding events in Milwaukee, promising daily press conferences, counter-programming and voter engagement in the Democratic stronghold. But the Republican mood inside the arena is likely to be triumphant, lavishing praise on Trump as a great survivor while hammering Democrats over their uncertainty about BidenMonika McDermott, a political science professor, at Fordham University in New York, said: “That’s a winning point for the Republicans after the debate and they’re going to continue to run with it. The Democratic party has been showing such cracks in their support behind President Biden at this point that it would be smart to stick a crowbar in there to make those cracks larger.” More

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      What we know about the shooting at a Donald Trump rally

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      A shooting occurred at a Donald Trump rally on Saturday, followed by the former president being rushed off the stage with blood around his ear. Here’s what we know about the situation so far.

      Trump was speaking at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when loud noises were heard in the crowd around 6.13pm.

      Trump appeared to have been struck by something in the area of his right ear as he was speaking, and videos show him quickly clutching his ear and then ducking down to the ground, as security agents and others leap to his aid.

      One spectator was killed and at least two were injured.

      Trump stood up with blood on the side of his face and appeared to be saying “fight, fight” while pumping his fist.

      Trump was then quickly escorted from the stage and into his vehicle.

      The rally location is now an active crime scene. The FBI has taken over the investigation.

      Trump’s team and the Secret Service confirmed that he was “fine” and being checked at a local medical facility.

      Trump later posted a statement on Truth Social, saying he was hit by a “bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear”.

      The Butler county district attorney confirmed that the suspected shooter and one rally attendee were dead. One person at the rally was in serious condition. The Secret Service later said two people were critically injured.

      The shooting is being investigated as an attempted assassination.

      The FBI later named Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, PA as the “subject involved” in the shooting. He is a registered on voter records as a Republican but also once donated $15 to a liberal voter group.

      The Secret Service shared more details on the shooter’s position and confirmed that the shooter was killed by the Secret Service. ABC News reported that law enforcement officials the suspect was perched on a rooftop and used an AR-style rifle.

      The Republican-controlled House of Representatives summoned the director of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, to testify at an Oversight Committee hearing scheduled for 22 July.

      The president, Joe Biden, said “everybody must condemn political violence” in a speech shortly after the shooting. The White House later said the president and Trump had spoken. Biden is traveling back to the White House. Trump is in New Jersey. More

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      Films, fashion, law,d politics: George and Amal Clooney’s growing global reach

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      It took a famous TV doctor to diagnose the patient. After two weeks of turmoil in the US Democratic party over President Biden’s re-election bid, it was ER’s Doug Ross, AKA George Clooney, who wrote up a devastating evaluation of the incumbent president.The 63-year-old actor was not in theatrical mode when he wrote a more-in-sorrow letter published by the New York Times last week that called on Biden to withdraw from the presidential race that the White House reportedly begged him not to submit, coming three weeks after Clooney helped raise $30m for the Biden-Harris ticket at a lavish Hollywood fundraiser.But Clooney’s bedside manner was impeccable: “I love Joe Biden. As a senator. As a vice-president and as president. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him,” he wrote. “But the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time. None of us can.”Clooney was speaking for ­himself – and for a large swathe of liberal-leaning Hollywood donors angry at what they see as White House deception over the apparent decline of Biden’s health. Clooney said the man at the fundraiser “was the same man we all witnessed” in his debate performance two weeks later.In the current spirit of panic and recrimination, with a White House press corps turning every Biden appearance into a test of competence, Democrat money bundlers, including co-chair of Biden’s re-election campaign and movie producer Jeffrey Katzenberg, are under suspicion of helping to cover up Biden’s apparent health issues.Clooney’s letter has put the Ocean’s Eleven actor out of political harm’s way. The Democratic party may not be so lucky. Democrats, says James Carville, the Clinton strategist who last week called for a blitz primary to select a new candidate, “are hellbent on a mission to force the American people to do something they don’t want to do – to vote for Joe Biden”.“George has come out, [former house speaker] Nancy Pelosi has come out – I don’t know what else people can do,” Carville told the Observer. “Other than a few people in Congress, everybody thinks this is a terrible idea [for Biden to run]. But you’re up against a guy who doesn’t want to leave, and that’s just where we are.”View image in fullscreenGeorge Clooney is not the only Clooney making waves on a global stage. Last month his wife Amal Clooney was revealed to have played an important role in making the case for arrest warrants to be issued by the international criminal court (ICC) to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, defence minister Yoav Gallant and three top Hamas leaders.Biden called the ICC move “outrageous” and said that whatever the ICC prosecutor might imply, “there is no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas”. According to the Washington Post, George Clooney called Steve Ricchetti, counsellor to the US president, to protest about the administration’s willingness to impose sanctions in which his wife could get caught.This week, the Biden-Harris campaign attempted to blame Clooney’s letter on “pre-existing tensions” – hinting at the ICC dust-up. A Hollywood producer familiar with the couple told the Observer that the White House’s explanation for the letter was “bullshit” and the lawyer had been smeared because her work is on human rights irrespective of political division.“George has power in Hollywood. Amal doesn’t, except as George’s wife,” they added. “Her power is in the UK, at the Hague and on the pages of Vogue.”The lawyer has not commented on her husband’s political intervention, which may have come with Barack Obama’s tacit approval. But after 10 years together, George and Amal Clooney are seen as one of the most stable couples in Hollywood.View image in fullscreenThey’d met at the actor’s home in Lake Como, Italy, when a mutual friend brought her by. Clooney’s agent had also got wind of the ­introduction, the actor later revealed. “My agent said: ‘I met this woman who is coming to your house, who you’re going to marry.’ It really worked out that way.”“It felt like the most natural thing in the world,” Amal said. “I always hoped there could be love that was overwhelming and didn’t require any weighing or decision-making.”A safari in Kenya to see giraffes sealed the deal. In 2014 he proposed, they married in Venice and now have twins.The political instinct which had surfaced in Clooney films including Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) and The Ides of March (2011), soon took flight. By 2016 the couple were meeting with then-German chancellor Angela Merkel to talk refugee policy; that year they were at a UN refugee summit and soon after established the Clooney Foundation for Justice, which focuses on legal rights for those targeted by oppressive governments, tracking the money of human rights abusers and those profiting from war crimes.“We’re both inspired by the young people out there challenging injustice in their communities, a new generation that won’t accept the status quo,” the actor said in an awards acceptance speech two years ago.But Clooney’s intervention comes with potential costs. The Bidens, like the Clintons and Obamas, may see themselves as benefiting from rubbing shoulders with celebrities, but the intersection of entertainment and politics, and the money and ideologies that underpin it, is repulsive to many outside political-entertainment enclaves. In an echo of Trump, Biden now says the rising chorus against him is coming from members of “the elites”, despite the bad timing of first lady Dr Jill Biden appearing on the cover of the August US Vogue.The tradition of celebrity-political endorsements goes back to Frank Sinatra, who organised his friends, the Rat Pack, to campaign for John F Kennedy. Two decades later, disagreements over Ronald Reagan forced celebrities to choose where they belonged.“That’s where we are still,” explains veteran Democrat strategist Hank Sheinkopf. “Celebrities see themselves as an important part of the Democratic fundraising and thought-based operation, which a lot of Americans would not agree with.”View image in fullscreenSheinkopf says that the fight over Biden’s future is as much about the future of the Democratic party as it is about Biden’s health – and Clooney’s intervention will make Maga Republicans fight harder for candidate Trump.“Democrats are the party of the elites despite the fact that they see themselves as the party of the non-elites,” he says. Regardless of who is writing the cheques – Hollywood celebrities or a rightwing Texas industrialist – “what all elites want is a party that does what they want because they think it’s right”.“But that’s not who Joe Biden is. He represents the old pro-union, almost colour-blind left, but that’s not who the operators behind the scenes are,” he adds.Peter Bart, previous editor of the Hollywood trade bible Variety, wrote in a Deadline column that he had “great respect for Clooney’s decision” but it was also one that “will cost him”.He recalled other Hollywood stars who had mixed politics with entertainment, including Jane Fonda, Charlton Heston and John Wayne. “Apart from potential career damage, Clooney must confront donors who have spent millions at his ­urging to support a ticket he now renounces,” Bart, 91, warned.He recalled a conversation he’d had with Ronald Reagan about Nixon. “I want people to like me, even voters who vote against me,” Reagan told him. “Nixon doesn’t seem to care, but I’m still an actor.”Still, Clooney’s intervention has set him up for criticism. The progressive left and African-American voters, both voting blocs Biden is courting to firm up his support, slammed the actor for taking a position afforded him by being famous, white and male.Others have implied that perspectives are different from the window seat of a Gulfstream jet flying between homes in Los Angeles, England, France and Italy. (Besides being a successful actor, known for pranking friends, Clooney and partner Rande Gerber, husband of Cindy Crawford, split up to $1bn from the sale of their tequila brand Casamigos.)Clooney has been criticised, too, from the other side. Trump weighed in, saying Clooney “turned on Crooked Joe like the rats they both are”, and some have questioned why Clooney, and Hollywood more broadly, waited until after the debate to disclose what they had witnessed at the fundraiser.Still, the New York Times letter establishes the Kentucky-born actor as a modern-day Warren Beatty, the actor who made his political beliefs part of his public image. Beatty never ran for office and quipped it would be “more like running for crucifixion”, nor has Clooney, allowing both to ride over the humdrum day-to-day of retail politics.“George’s op-ed was provocative, well done, but voters don’t want this anyway: 73% of the voting public say they want something different,” says Carville. “They’re not asking for anything difficult – just a different nominee. We’re in a crisis.” More

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      Will the Republican convention be good for Milwaukee businesses?

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      For Ricky Ramirez, posting “stupid shit” on the Facebook page of his bar, the Mothership, is one way he draws in customers to taste the clever cocktails he crafts in Milwaukee’s trendy Bay View neighborhood.Yet a March post that Ramirez wrote in his typically profanity-laced, punctuation-free style declaring that the bar would close over the period of the Republican national convention, which begins in Wisconsin’s most populous city next week, brought him the sort of attention he never wanted.“Sup idiots we haven’t lost a lot of followers in a while so here we go … as everything gets amplified with like the RNC shitshow coming to town lmao I would like to formally state that we’re shutting bar down during the week of because fuck that noise,” Ramirez wrote.“I’m not trying to get involved with or actively take money or rent the space out to that tomfoolery.”The announcement of the temporary closure, which Ramirez wrote out of dissatisfaction with what both political parties have to offer ahead of the November election, attracted hundreds of likes and comments, and was written up by several major media outlets. But not long after, angry emails and messages began arriving, as well as outright threats, one of which was mailed from Florida, and which Ramirez said the police are investigating.“There’s a lot of things that happen that I don’t agree with and I don’t ever want to like, you know, ruin someone’s life over it,” Ramirez said in an interview. “But people are really into this.”Ramirez’s experience is the exception in a city where many businesses were hoping for a surge in bookings and reservations connected to the four-day convention, during which the GOP is expected to formally nominate Donald Trump as their presidential candidate.Yet he is not alone in finding the RNC to be a confounding experience, even before its Monday opening. While many restaurants, bars and venues have indeed seen a flood of business connected to the convention, others have seen a mere trickle, or nothing at all.“The whole big promise of what the RNC said it was going to be is not shaking out to be that way,” said Adam Siegel, the James Beard award-winning chef-owner of Lupi & Iris, a Mediterranean restaurant in downtown Milwaukee.He had expected that one of the many organizations or businesses that sets up shop on the sidelines of the convention would book out his whole restaurant, which lies outside the convention’s security perimeter, and is regarded as one of Milwaukee’s finest eateries.Instead, his only firm booking so far is a small dinner in one of his private rooms, and though he has received more inquiries lately, Siegel has put up signs reminding customers that they will remain accessible during the convention, in hopes of maintaining steady business.Victor Matheson, an economics professor at College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, who has studied the impact of political conventions on cities and their businesses, said conventions, with their crowds, security and road detours, can undercut other industries.Bookings at Broadway theaters were down 20% compared with a typical summer week when Republicans held their convention in New York City in 2004, his research found. And unlike an event that brings similar demands on a city’s downtown, such as a city hosting the Super Bowl, political conventions don’t do much for civic pride, at least not in the current era of hyper-partisanship.“These conventions are disruptive without any kind of glow associated with them,” Matheson said.Milwaukee was initially supposed to host the Democratic national convention in 2020 until the party dramatically downsized that event and held much of it virtually due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Now it will play host to Trump’s coronation, while the Democrats are expected to renominate Joe Biden later on in August, in Chicago.“If you go back to when the DNC was going to be here in 2020, I mean, we saw inquiries, bookings, conversations about catering, stuff like that,” said Dan Jacobs, co-owner of American-Chinese restaurant DanDan. “This definitely doesn’t have the same feel whatsoever.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe tourism bureau, Visit Milwaukee, estimates that 50,000 people will come to town for the convention, 16,000 hotel room nights will be booked and the total economic impact could rise to $200m. Venues as large as the American Family Field, where the Milwaukee Brewers baseball team plays, have reportedly been booked for parties connected to the convention.The RNC could also give heightened prominence to GOP candidates in a swing state that is crucial to Trump’s hopes of retaking the White House, and where the party hopes to oust the Democratic senator Tammy Baldwin, who is up for re-election in November.“It is a state that’s certainly in play politically. So if that drives people to come here to see our city, I just hope that the entire city views this as an opportunity to show off Milwaukee and Wisconsin in the best light possible,” said Paul Bartolotta, the chef and owner of the Bartolotta Restaurants, who said he had been “exceedingly pleased” with bookings for everything from buffet lunches to hors d’oeuvres receptions at his restaurants and catering venues.“It’s an incredibly charged political environment, and you just need to let that noise go away and focus on taking care of your employees and making sure that we’re taking care of our guests.”Gary Witt, president and CEO of the Pabst Theater Group, is bracing for a week in which he expects to lose about $100,000 since five of his six venues have no bookings connected to the convention, and many touring acts are avoiding the city. He wonders if things might have been different had Trump not staged a controversial takeover of the Republican National Committee earlier this year, or if the GOP had nominated a different candidate who would have attracted more donor support for the convention.“Once the candidate was announced, there were tremendous changes that were placed that impacted the RNC by the candidate, and that created a lot more confusion and disorganization within the RNC, and probably added to the delays of getting anything done,” Witt said.The former president did not help matters by reportedly calling Milwaukee a “horrible city” in a closed-door meeting with Republicans in Washington DC, though he tried to control the damage by declaring “I love Milwaukee” days later during a rally in nearby Racine. The predominantly Democratic city’s leaders are nonetheless rolling out the welcome mat, knowing that the convention could be a boon to its economy.“I welcome those types of comments from a guy who has extremely bad taste,” Milwaukee’s Democratic county executive, David Crowley, said in an interview on the sidelines of an event hosted by the Biden-Harris campaign in Milwaukee, two weeks before the convention was to start.“Our expectation is we’re going to have thousands of people descending on Milwaukee county, and it is our job to make sure that they have the greatest party that they have,” he said.“Even though I don’t agree with any of their policies or their nominee, for us, it’s about how do we make sure that we can showcase our community, so in the future, we can bring more conventions and conferences to Milwaukee.” More

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      The far right’s crusade against porn is a crusade against progress | Arwa Mahdawi

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      Project 2025’s porn problemThe lines between art and obscenity aren’t always clear; pornography can be hard to define. “I know it when I see it,” the late US supreme court judge Potter Stewart said in his famous non-definition of the term.The far-right knows it when they see it as well. And they see pornography everywhere. Experts have noted that worries about pornography among social conservatives seem to go up and down over time: right now we seem to be at a high-point of porn panic. The Republican Missouri senator Josh Hawley, for example, has repeatedly claimed that feminism has driven young men to “pornography and video games”. And the Republican party has called porn a “public health crisis that is destroying the lives of millions”.Porn also plays a big part in Project 2025: a Christian nationalist manifesto and list of desired policy proposals from the Heritage Foundation that has been described as “a wish list for a Trump presidency”. (Donald Trump has said he knows nothing about it.) The 900-page plan proposes policies like mass deportations, extreme abortion restrictions, and the dismantling of climate change protections. It also says that pornography should be outlawed.On the surface the conservative obsession with porn doesn’t seem overly problematic. There are, after all, plenty of serious issues with the porn industry. It’s often exploitative and it’s helped to normalize violent acts like strangling during sex. The problem, however, is the incredibly broad way in which Project 2025 Mandate talks about porn. No definition of porn is provided; rather, it’s talked about in the context of things like transgender rights and non-normative gender expression. Porn, we are told is “invading [children’s] school libraries”. The word has been weaponized as a useful way to attack LGBTQ+ rights. See, for example, this extract from the foreword of the Project 2025 Mandate:“Pornography, manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology … is as addictive as any illicit drug and as psychologically destructive as any crime. Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered.”What does this mean? Well it seems to mean that the far-right want to define a book that features a same-sex couple as illegal pornography and throw the author of the book and any distributors of the book in prison. It seems to mean that a book talking about sexual violence could be classified as porn and banned. It seems to mean that talking about the existence of trans people would be “porn” and criminalized. In short: anything that goes against normative gender roles and hierarchies, or interrogates those hierarchies, could be considered obscene and criminalized.Project 2025, it can’t be stressed enough, isn’t some sort of hypothetical dystopian possibility. The scariest part of all this is that it’s very much under way. Republicans are already classifying anything they don’t like as obscene pornography and finding ways to ban it. There’s been a surge in book bans in American schools, for example. From July to December 2023, PEN America found that more than 4,300 books were removed from schools across 23 states. Many of the targeted titles feature LGBTQ+ characters. Work that address rape and sexual assault are also increasingly being targeted. So don’t be fooled by Project 2025’s preoccupation with porn. The far-right aren’t interested in the exploitation of women, they’re interested in controlling exactly what it means to be a woman. This isn’t a crusade against porn, it’s a crusade against progress.Katy Perry is getting backlash for Woman’s World, her new ‘feminist’ anthemWoman’s World is Perry’s first solo single in three years and, the singer explained, the first thing she’s done “since becoming a mother and since feeling really connected to my feminine divine”. Unfortunately, however, the single isn’t getting a divine reception. The Guardian’s Laura Snapes gave it a one-star review and described it as “Bic for Her of pop, the pink Yorkie for girls (get your lips around this!), a song that made me feel stupider every sorry time I listened to it”. Perry is also facing criticism for working with the controversial producer Dr Luke on the single. In 2014 pop star Kesha accused Dr Luke of sexual assault and he then sued her for defamation. In 2023 a legal settlement was reached in the defamation suit.Elon Musk denies volunteering his sperm to help start a colony on Mars“I have not … ‘volunteered my sperm’” wrote Musk in a post on X after the New York Times reported he had. Can you imagine a planet populated entirely by mini-Musks? It would be full of so much hot air it would be unbearable.The all-women patrol team protecting Sumatra’s rainforest“We have to remember that conservation is only necessary as a result of colonialism and the forced displacement of Indigenous people who have stewarded the land for thousands of years,” says an Indigenous female ranger in this beautiful Guardian photo essay.Canadian serial killer Jeremy Skibicki given life sentence for murders of Indigenous womenSkibicki appears to have been motivated by white supremacist beliefs and targeted vulnerable women in Winnipeg’s shelter system. The “jarring and numbing” murders helped draw attention to the broader crisisof missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in Canada.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAttempt to ease Poland’s strict abortion laws defeatedIn Poland anyone convicted of aiding a woman in getting an abortion faces up to three years in jail. On Friday a slim majority rejected legislation that would have decriminalized abortion assistance.Death at US women’s prison amid heatwave sparks cries for helpThere’s no air conditioning in the cells at the California’s largest women’s prison and there are worries there may be even more preventable heat deaths.Etsy sellers say imminent ban on sex toys is a betrayal“Bans like this one also further the idea that sexual health and pleasure is somehow taboo or something to be ashamed of,” one seller said. “It has broader impacts on society as a whole.”Israeli forces used US-made bombs to murder kids playing soccer in a Gaza playgroundJust another day in the graveyard that is Gaza! Meanwhile pundits in the Western media and politicians keep saying Joe Biden is a “good man”. Biden is facilitating one of the worst atrocities we’ve seen in modern times–if you think he is a “good man” then what you’re really saying is that you don’t think Palestinians are people.The week in pawtriarchyThe latest status symbol for the paranoid 1% isn’t a bunker with a safe room, it’s a Svallin. This is a “an undisclosed mix of Dutch shepherd, German shepherd, and Belgian Malinois”, bred to be “beasts that could rip out an attacker’s trachea yet also function as pets.” The top dogs cost $150,000 each and only 20 are sold a year after an in-depth vetting process. More

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      Republicans ramp up attacks on Kamala Harris amid swirl over Biden future

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      With the state of Joe Biden’s re-election campaign in turmoil, Donald Trump and his Republican allies are stepping up attacks on a familiar and, some say, possibly more threatening, political foe: his vice-president, Kamala Harris.In the weeks since Biden’s stumbling debate performance, Republicans have intensified what many call racist and misogynistic criticism. They have questioned Harris’s competency, mocked her demeanor, and accused her of concealing concerns about the president’s health. Trump unveiled a new, derisive nickname for the vice-president, “Laffin’ Kamala”, which he tested at a campaign rally in Florida this week.In the rambling, falsehood-filled speech, Trump dedicated several minutes to assailing Harris, whose shortcomings as vice-president, he said, were in effect an “insurance policy” for the embattled incumbent.“If Joe had picked someone even halfway competent, they would’ve bounced him from office years ago, but they can’t because she’s got to be their second choice,” he said.While the Trump team insists they are not intimidated by Harris, supporters say the pre-emptive strikes against the vice-president – the highest ranking woman in American politics and the first Black and Asian American vice-president – are a reflection of her strength at a moment when concerns about Biden’s fitness to serve have thrust her into the spotlight. In response, a group of Democratic strategists and donors are amplifying their defense of the vice-president, an effort they say is necessary to win in November.“We need to have a surround sound around Kamala that promotes the best of her strength – that she fights for our freedoms, that she works for a better life for all Americans, that she is ready to challenge Trump,” said Tory Gavito, the president and co-founder of Way to Win, a Democratic donor network.Though the group has not weighed in on whether Biden should remain the nominee, Gavito said Harris is a major asset to the party – whether as his running mate or his replacement. New battleground state polling released this week by her group found Harris running strong with the parts of the Democratic coalition Biden is struggling to energize: young people and Black and Latino voters.“She brings in factions of that coalition that, right now, are a little concerned,” Gavito said. “So it’s an important moment to lift up the full ticket.”For much of Biden’s presidency, Republicans have warned that a vote to re-elect the 81-year-old president was really a vote for Harris. Nikki Haley, in her unsuccessful run against Trump for the Republican nomination, once told voters that the possibility of a Harris presidency should “send a chill up every person’s spine”.In the presently unlikely scenario Harris becomes the Democratic nominee, Republicans say they have plenty of material ready to deploy against her from her years as a vice-president and her short-lived run for president against Biden in 2020. As the other half of the Biden-Harris administration, her record is tied to the president’s, Republicans argue, which means she is equally to blame for Americans’ frustration over the economy and the border.Republicans have sought to make Harris the face of the administration’s response to record migration at the US southern border, casting her as its absentee “border tsar”. But she was never charged with overseeing US border policy; rather, she was tasked, as was Biden during his vice-presidency, with a diplomatic mission to address the root causes of migration.In a preview of what Trump’s strategy against Harris might look like, his campaign released an online ad alleging a “Great Kamala Cover-Up”. The video overlays images of Biden looking lost and disorientated with comments from Harris defending his fitness for office. “Kamala lied to us for years about Biden,” it says. Trump’s campaign also referred to the vice-president as “Low IQ Kamala” this week.View image in fullscreen“No one has lied about Joe Biden’s cognitive decline and supported his disastrous policies over the past four years more than Cackling Co-pilot Kamala Harris,” Caroline Sunshine, deputy director of communications for the Trump campaign, said in a statement to the Guardian. She also assailed the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of the economy and immigration, among Biden’s most vulnerable issues with voters.Karen Finney, a Democratic strategist who was a spokesperson for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, said the attacks by Trump and his campaign were part of an old political “playbook” used to undermine women in positions of power.“It’s things like attacking her intelligence, attacking the tone of her voice, her laugh, the othering language,” Finney said. Those are pretty common tropes that we see used against women.”Several Democratically aligned women’s organizations, including UltraViolet and Emily’s List, have joined forces to combat what they described as the “racist and sexist disinformation campaigns” against the vice-president that are proliferating online and on the campaign trail, sometimes with the explicit endorsement of Republican officials.“There’s always legitimate reasons to critique any public figure, especially politicians,” said Jenna Sherman, campaign director at UltraViolet Action. But she said many of the rightwing attacks on Harris mix personal insults with myths and falsehoods about Democrats’ positions on issues such as abortion and immigration.“This is about misogyny,” she said. “This is about the society that we live in trying to normalize, essentially, the berating of women.”Since the presidential debate last month, some surveys have found Harris performing as well as or marginally than better than Biden in a hypothetical contest against Trump, which some suspect have prompted the new wave of attacks.“Vice-President Harris is proud to be President Biden’s running mate,” Brian Fallon, Harris’s campaign communications director said in a statement to the Guardian.“As a former district attorney and attorney general, she has stood up to fraudsters and felons like Donald Trump her entire career. Trump is lying about the vice-president because she has been prosecuting the case against him on the biggest issues in the race.”The former California attorney general, elected as a senator in 2017, had a rocky start to the vice-presidency, stumbling in media appearances and struggling to stand out as Republicans relentlessly attacked her performance. But since the supreme court overturned Roe v Wade, Harris has become the administration’s lead messenger on reproductive rights, by far Democrats’ strongest issue.On the anniversary of Roe’s fall last month, Harris declared Trump “guilty” in the “case of the stealing of reproductive freedom from the women of America”. She has also been at the forefront of democracy protection efforts, rushing to Tennessee last year to stand beside Black lawmakers expelled from the state legislature for protesting against gun violence.“She is qualified to be president,” Biden said at his Nato press conference on Thursday night. “That’s why I picked her.”He praised Harris as a “hell of a prosecutor” and a “first-rate person”, casting her as fighter for reproductive rights and an agile lieutenant who has effectively managed a wide portfolio. But even as Biden promoted Harris, he mistakenly referred to her as “Vice-President Trump”, the exact type of verbal gaffe that has unnerved Democrats in recent weeks. Trump immediately seized on the misstep.“By the way: yes, I know the difference,” the president’s campaign replied later on X. “One’s a prosecutor, and the other’s a felon.”Earlier on Thursday, Harris rallied supporters in North Carolina, delivering the kind of fiery denunciations of Trump that many Democrats long for in their nominee. Ticking through the Biden administration’s legislative and foreign policy achievements, Harris warned that a second Trump term would hurt the country’s standing in the world and make Americans less safe.“As Trump bows down to dictators, he makes America weak,” Harris said, a reference to the former president’s flattery of Vladimir Putin. “And that is disqualifying for someone who wants to be commander-in-chief.”Sharing a clip from her campaign stop in North Carolina, Representative Jared Huffman, a California Democrat, said on X: “VP Harris is on fire. She’s vetted, tested, and has been Democrats’ strongest messenger throughout this campaign. She’s next up if we need her, and we might.”Biden’s insistence that he is the candidate best positioned to defeat Trump has not quelled dissent within his party. A growing number of elected Democrats have called on the president to step aside, while speculation mounts over whether Harris could realistically replace him atop the ticket.Amid the uncertainty, the New York Times reported that the Biden campaign has commissioned a survey to measure how Harris would fare in a head-to-head matchup against Trump. It comes amid a series of media reports that advisers close to the president have lost confidence in his ability to beat Trump in November, which the White House and the president’s campaign have denied.In a memo outlining the “path ahead”, Biden’s re-election campaign chair, Jennifer O’Malley Dillon, and his campaign manager, Julie Chavez Rodriguez, said there was no indication that any other candidate would fare better than Biden against Trump. It noted that an alternative Democratic nominee would face an onslaught of negative media, which is already “baked in” to his candidacy.Yet a separate memo circulating among Democrats makes a counter-argument. Titled “The case for Kamala”, the document, written anonymously by Democratic strategists, argues that making Harris the party’s nominee is the “one realistic path out of this mess”.It argues that her weaknesses are “real but addressable” and that she enjoys structural advantages over other potential alternatives: she has already been vetted on the national stage, has the highest name recognition and would have immediate access to the re-election campaign’s war chest.With just little over a month left before Democrats meet in Chicago for their convention, Harris remains the most obvious and, for now, the most popular choice to replace Biden in the apparently unlikely event he ends his run for a second term.But regardless of what happens with the ticket, attention will remain fixed on Harris as the next-in-line to a president who has raised public concern about his ability to serve another four years. That is why Democrats such as Gavito of Way to Win say it is important to defend her aggressively across all media platforms.“The anti-Maga coalition is bigger than Maga,” she said, referring to Trump’s “Make America great again” movement. “We have proven that for the last three cycles. They have lost consistently. We can prove it again. But that requires a full-throated response on every platform available that shuts down people who are afraid of strong women.” More