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      After a bad legal week for Trump, even worse could be on the horizon

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      Donald Trump was already reeling from multiple legal setbacks when a New York judge last week handed the former president a staggering defeat in his civil fraud case, ordering him to pay roughly $450m to the state after finding him liable for conspiracy to manipulate his net worth.The decision by Justice Arthur Engoron capped a bad legal week for Trump, who had watched his lawyers attempt to get access to sealed filings in a classified documents case in Florida and then watched his lawyers lose their attempt to delay his first criminal trial in New York.There may be worse coming.The immediate priority for Trump’s legal agenda remains, according to people familiar with the matter, figuring out how to come up with $450m – a figure that includes pre-judgment interest – or finding a company prepared to help him post bond within 30 days of when the court entered the judgment, so that he can appeal the penalty.Trump saw the ruling as a two-pronged stab at his personal identity: it is likely to almost entirely drain his accounts of cash and it bars him from running the Trump Organization, the vehicle he used to attain his fame, for three years.Trump’s preference is to avoid using his own money while he appeals and his lawyers have contacted several companies to provide the bond, which essentially assures the state that Trump has the money to pay the judgment should he lose his challenge.To obtain the bond, Trump would first have to find a company willing to accept him. He would then have to pay a premium to the bond company and offer collateral, likely in the form of his most prized assets, which would accrue interest and fees.If the penalty is upheld on appeal, Trump will face a huge financial burden. In an interview under oath with the New York attorney general’s office last year, Trump said he had $400m in cash and cash equivalents, though that figure could not be verified.A proportion of that figure comes from Trump’s sales of two properties after he left the White House, as well as new ventures including a real estate branding deal in Oman.The deals were intended to give Trump a cash cushion in the event of a sudden financial setback. But even if Trump’s $400m claim was accurate, that would clearly be wiped out should the $450m penalty be largely upheld.Adding to the total sum Trump must disgorge is an $83.3m judgement entered against him last month after he lost the second defamation trial involving the writer E Jean Carroll. That figure is not payable immediately, but it is another massive figure for which he has to account.Trump may ultimately find himself without enough of a cushion and face the need to mortgage or sell some of his properties. While Trump is not expected to go bankrupt – his total holdings are in the billions – it would mark a particularly humiliating moment for the former president.The legal woes extend beyond causing him financial pain. On Thursday, it was confirmed Trump would face trial in New York on charges that he falsified business records over hush money payments to a porn star to shield himself from bad press before the 2016 election.Jury selection in the case is now scheduled for 25 March, despite a last-ditch attempt by Trump’s lawyers to stave off the trial.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBefore the hearing to affirm the trial date, people involved in the situation said, Trump’s advisers had retained some hope it might be delayed even if they believed it was the most politically advantageous case of all his four criminal indictments.If Trump must face a criminal case before the election in November, they would choose the hush money case because Trump may not face jail time even if he is convicted, an outcome that could desensitize voters to the other, federal criminal cases looming before him.But Trump may have to grapple with the fallout from another legal setback in Atlanta, after he and his co-defendants charged by the Fulton county district attorney over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election struggled to argue she should be disqualified from bringing the case.The second day of the evidentiary hearing examining whether Fani Willis’s romantic relationship with her top deputy, Nathan Wade, amounted to some sort of kickback scheme sufficient to generate a conflict of interest went sideways for the defendants.The defendants called Terrence Bradley, the former divorce lawyer for Wade, to testify that the relationship started before Willis hired Wade to work on the Trump case on 1 November 2021, in order to contradict Willis and Wade’s testimony.The objective was to have Bradley contradict under oath the testimony of Willis and Wade, in order to make the case that they committed perjury and argue the presiding Fulton county superior judge, Scott McAfee, to discredit their testimony.But Bradley was a particularly reluctant witness and testified he had privileged information about when the relationship started, but not personal knowledge he obtained separate from him representing Wade.By the end of the day, it appeared uncertain whether the defendants had met their burden of proof to force Willis off and make the criminal charges in Georgia go away. 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      Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib tells fellow Democrats: reject Biden in primary

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      The progressive US congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has called on her fellow Michigan Democrats to vote “uncommitted” in the state’s presidential primary election – at the expense of the party’s incumbent, Joe Biden – in late February.Appearing in a video posted to X on Saturday by Listen to Michigan, a political campaign to encourage the state’s voters to vote “uncommitted” in the 27 February primary, Tlaib justified her stark display of displeasure with Biden by alluding to Israel’s military strikes on Gaza, which local authorities say have killed nearly 29,000 Palestinians since last October.Tlaib – Congress’s only Palestinian American lawmaker – also criticized the Biden White House’s support for Israel, which launched its military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October Hamas attacks that killed about 1,200 Israelis.Speaking in front of the Ford Community & Performing Arts Center in Dearborn, which has one of the US’s largest populations of Arab Americans, Tlaib said: “It is important … to not only march against the genocide, not only make sure that we’re calling our members of Congress and local elected [officials], and passing city resolutions all throughout our country. It is also important to create a voting bloc, something that is a bullhorn to say, ‘Enough is enough.’”Tlaib added: “We don’t want a country that supports war and bombs and destruction. We want to support life. We want to stand up for every single life killed in Gaza … This is the way you can raise our voices. Don’t make us even more invisible. Right now, we feel completely neglected and just unseen by our government.“If you want us to be louder, then come here and vote uncommitted” rather than in support of Biden, the Democratic party’s presumptive nominee for November’s presidential election.The congresswoman’s message echoed the calls of Listen to Michigan, whose campaign manager is Tlaib’s sister Layla Elabed.Speaking to Business Insider, Elabed said: “Voting uncommitted is our way of demanding change, and this is going to be our vehicle to return political power back to us.”More than 30 elected officials across south-east Michigan have already pledged to vote “uncommitted” in the state’s 27 February primary elections. Those officials include the Dearborn mayor, Abdullah Hammoud, along with city council members and state representatives.A statement released by Listen to Michigan earlier in February said, “Let us be clear: we unequivocally demand that the Biden administration immediately call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. We must hold our president unaccountable and ensure that we, the American taxpayers, are no longer forced to be accomplices in a genocide that is backed and funded by the United States government.”It also said: “Therefore, we pledge to check the box for ‘uncommitted’ on our ballots in the upcoming presidential primary election. These are not empty words; they signify our steadfast commitment to justice, dignity, and the sanctity of human life, which is greater than loyalty to any candidate or party.”With the 81-year-old president facing increasing pressure over his handling of Israel’s military strikes in Gaza, as well as scrutiny over his age, Arab and Muslim Americans across multiple swing states – including Michigan – have organized campaigns under the slogan #AbandonBiden.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTlaib’s latest video announcement has received mixed responses.The former Ohio Democratic state senator Nina Turner tweeted, “Arab Americans do not want their tax dollars going to kill their family members. It’s unnerving to see the liberal response to that demand. Rashida Tlaib is absolutely justified to endorse this.”Meanwhile, in response to Tlaib’s endorsement of Listen Michigan, the conservative group Republicans Against asked on X who among Democrats would run against the congresswoman ahead of her running for re-election in November.Tlaib last year was censured by the Republican-led US House over her criticisms of Israel. She responded to the censure measure by saying that she would “not be silenced” and that “Palestinian people are not disposable”. More

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      Ronald Reagan’s daughter says he would be ‘appalled’ by current political tenor

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      The daughter of former president Ronald Reagan has hit out at contemporary White House politics, saying she thinks her late father would be “appalled” by the personal tenor of current political discourse.“I think he’d be appalled … it was just more civilized,” Patti Davis told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “He didn’t understand lack of civility. He didn’t understand attacking another person. … He didn’t understand cruelty. And that’s what we’re dealing with now.“I think he would be really scared for our democracy,” Davis added.Davis, 71, supposed that her father – a former Republican California governor who served two terms as president beginning in 1980 and gained a reputation as “the great communicator” – would have sought to address voters rather than opposing candidates.“I think he would address the American people at what has divided us,” Davis – the author of a new book, Dear Mom & Dad – told Meet the Press. She added that she thought Reagan would interpret contemporary political division as fear that had translated into anger.“There are people on the public stage and on the political front who understand very well that synergy between fear and anger and who are masterful at exploiting it,” Davis remarked.Reagan was 69 when he took office and 77 when he stepped down – four years younger than Democratic incumbent Joe Biden and the same age as the presumptive Republican nominee to challenge him, former president Donald Trump.Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 1994 but may have been suffering from aspects of dementia during his second term.Davis said that cognitive tests for presidential candidates was “probably” appropriate.Her comment on cognitive tests came as the Biden White House continued to push back on a special counsel Robert Hur, who assessed the president to be a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory” in a report declining to prosecute Biden over his retention of some classified documents before his presidency.Trump, too, has faced questions about his mental acuity after, for instance, confusing Biden with Barack Obama as well as his fellow Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley with former Democratic US House speaker Nancy Pelosi.Davis said: “We know about what age can do. It doesn’t always do that, but it would probably be a good idea.” More

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      Nikki Haley condemns Trump for not commenting on Alexei Navalny death

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      Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley on Sunday criticized her party’s leading contender for the White House nomination, Donald Trump, for avoiding meaningful comment on the death of Alexei Navalny, the imprisoned political nemesis of Russian leader Vladimir Putin.“Either he sides with Putin and thinks it’s cool that Putin killed one of his political opponents – or he just doesn’t think it’s that big of a deal,” Haley said Sunday on ABC News This Week. “Either one of those is concerning. Either one of those is a problem.”The attack which Haley aimed at Trump with respect to Navalny came six days before her home state of South Carolina was scheduled to host its Republican presidential preference primary. With the rest of the Republican field having dropped out, polls show Haley, the ex-governor of South Carolina, trails the former president by more than 30 percentage points.Haley joined other prominent US politicos – including Democratic president Joe Biden – in blaming Putin for Navalny’s death Friday at a Russian penal colony. Trump, on the other hand, has declined to directly remark on the death of Navalny, which authorities reportedly explained to his mother as occurring from “sudden death syndrome”.The former president – who once appointed Haley to serve as his ambassador to the United Nations – has only pledged on social media to “bring peace, prosperity and stability” if he is given another term in the Oval Office.Haley on Sunday said that Trump’s response had not gone nearly far enough.“I think it’s important to stand with the Russian people who believe Navalny was really talking for them,” Haley told the host of This Week, Jonathan Karl. “I mean you look at this hero – he was fighting corruption, he was fighting what Putin does. And what did Putin do? He killed him just like he does all his political opponents. And I think that’s very telling.”Haley added that the 47-year-old Navalny’s death was an opportunity for political leaders in the US “to remind the American people that Vladimir Putin is not our friend”.“Vladimir Putin is not cool. This is not someone we want to associate with,” Haley said. “This is not someone we want to be friends with. This is not someone that we can trust.”Haley’s remarks alluded to how Trump – during his presidency from 2017 to 2021 – demonstrated favor and, arguably, subservience to Putin. They also came a little more than a week after Trump caused global alarm with a campaign speech in South Carolina during which he declared that he would encourage Russia to attack any Nato allies whom he considered to have not paid enough to maintain the alliance.The former UN ambassador on Sunday called Trump’s earlier Nato comments “bone chilling”.“All he did in that one moment was empower Putin,” Haley said.Throwing in a reference to Russia’s jailing of Wall Street reporter Evan Gershkovich on espionage charges which the US have dismissed as bogus, Haley continued: “All [Trump] did in that one moment was he sided with a guy who kills his political opponents – he sided with a thug that arrests American journalists and holds them hostage.“And he sided with a guy who wanted to make a point to the Russian people: ‘Don’t challenge me in the next election, or this will happen to you, too.’”Haley said Americans needed to “start waking up to what this means”, and she called it essential for Ukraine to fend off the invasion Russia launched nearly two years earlier.Trump was entering the South Carolina primary under indictment on more than 90 criminal charges, including for trying to illegally nullify his defeat to Biden in the 2020 election. He is also faced with having to pay civil judgments in excess of half a billion dollars after being adjudicated a business fraudster as well as being found liable for sexually abusing and defaming magazine columnist E Jean Carroll.Nonetheless, polls at the moment show Trump enjoys a relatively slight advantage with the American electorate over Biden. More

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      Is Joe Biden too old to be president? – podcast

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      At 81 years old, Joe Biden has a wealth of experience to draw on. There is just four years difference between him and Donald Trump. And his rival is as well known as the president for misspeaking and making gaffes. Yet something has changed. Unease has been growing about Biden’s perceived frailty and his mental acuity – and that was before a bombshell report by the US Justice Department’s special counsel. In the report Robert Hur, the Republican special counsel, said Biden would not face criminal charges for mishandling classified documents. The ruling should have been good news for Biden, except the reason given – that Biden would appear to any jury as a “sympathetic well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory” – was so damning. Biden hit back in a press conference slamming the inference that he was old and doddery. But as he did so he managed to mix up the names of the presidents of Mexico and Egypt. Biden’s supporters argue that Trump is just as prone to making mistakes and is hardly more reliable, the Guardian’s Washington DC bureau chief, David Smith, notes. Yet somehow the mistakes Biden makes are all taken to be a sign he is losing his grip. Michael Safi asks why the same charges against Trump don’t stick and how Biden’s campaign can prove the president is fit and sharp enough for another four-year term. More

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      Find Me the Votes review: Fani Willis of Georgia, the woman who could still take down Trump

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      If this week’s hearing about Fani Willis’s affair with her assistant Nathan Wade has piqued America’s interest in the character of the Fulton county district attorney, Michael Isikoff and Daniel Klaidman have written the perfect book for this moment.Isikoff has been a dogged investigator for the Washington Post, NBC and Yahoo, while his longtime friend and collaborator Klaidman is a former managing editor of Newsweek now a newly minted investigative reporter for CBS. Together they have produced the most readable and authoritative account to date of all of Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.At its center is a nuanced portrait of Willis, who at least until a couple of days ago appeared to be Trump’s most effective nemesis, having indicted him, his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, and the former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, as well as 16 other co-conspirators.Whether Willis’s affair with one of her principal assistants is a valid reason to force the presiding judge to dismiss her from the case remains to be seen. But the revelation seems to have been as much of a bombshell for her biographers as it was for everyone else.Contacted by the Guardian, both authors declined to predict the outcome of the current proceeding. But Isikoff sounded optimistic that Willis would survive this latest assault.“How did the relationship between Willis and Wade prejudice any of the other defendants?” Isikoff asked. “There is simply no evidence that it did.”Willis is a daughter of the civil rights movement. In the 1960s, her father, John C Floyd III, migrated from the politics of John F Kennedy and the non-violence of Martin Luther King Jr to the much tougher ideology of the Black Panther Party of Los Angeles, which he co-founded in 1967. After that he became a criminal defense and civil rights lawyer.Isikoff and Klaidman say Floyd’s odyssey gives us “a glimpse into his daughter’s pugnacious personality and her deep-seated loathing of bullies” – both of which were on prominent display when she defended herself in the hearing room.While it was her personal passion that brought Willis into an unwelcome spotlight, it was her own focus on allegations of sexual harassment against her previous boss and mentor that made her election as the first woman district attorney of Fulton county possible. Paul Howard became the first Black person to hold the job of Fulton county DA in 1996, and made Willis a star by giving her some of his Atlanta office’s most famous cases. She became famous as the lead prosecutor in an indictment of 35 public school officials for alleged violations of Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (Rico) Act. The Atlanta schools superintendent, six principals, two assistant principals and 14 teachers were accused of faking students’ test scores, in response to the requirements of No Child Left Behind.That law, championed by George W Bush, put schools at risk of losing federal aid if students didn’t meet minimum standards for success on standardized tests. All but one of the defendants was Black, which made the prosecution even more controversial. By the time Howard gave Willis the case she was chief of the office’s trial division. Isikoff and Klaidman say she proved a “hands-on micromanager” who “plunged into every detail of the case”. Its complexity turned out to be the perfect training for Willis to use the same Rico statute to go after Donald Trump and his co-conspirators.One of this book’s most important contributions is to remind us of the breadth and viciousness of the president’s efforts to undermine democracy – and the horrendous effects they had on the lives of decent, honest election officials in every swing state Trump lost.After multiple lawsuits alleging voter fraud were thrown out by nearly every judge who heard them, Trump famously turned his attention to the Georgia secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, one of several Republicans whose resistance proved heroic. When Trump got Raffensperger and his assistants on the phone, they were shocked by how many QAnon conspiracy theories Trump seemed to have accepted as fact – just because so many of his supporters had retweeted them. A particular favorite of the president’s was the notion there had been 200,000 forged signatures on absentee ballots in Fulton county – even though the total number of absentee votes had been 148,319.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn the same call, Trump repeated the big lie that the Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss had run between 18,000 and 56,000 bogus ballots through election scanners. Trump said Freeman was “known all over the internet”. This was the same lie promoted by Giuliani, which ultimately cost him a richly deserved verdict of $148m for libeling the two innocent women.In one of the many telling details of Isikoff and Klaidman’s book, the authors remind us that the other hero from that phone call was the Georgia deputy secretary of state, Jordan Fuchs.“Fuchs did what was arguably the single gutsiest and most consequential act of the entire post-election battle,” the authors believe. To protect her boss, she decided to tape the phone call – without telling Raffensperger. After the tape leaked to the Washington Post, it quickly became the single most powerful piece of evidence against the ex-president in any of the four prosecutions he is still facing.When you see all of Trump’s alleged crimes piled together in a single narrative, it is beyond belief that he remains the favorite of a majority of Republican primary voters. But these same facts should surely be enough to guarantee his defeat if he actually gets the chance to face the larger electorate in November.
      Find Me the Votes is published in the US by Twelve More

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      With business empire on brink of abyss, tycoon Trump recasts himself as victim

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      From Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue to the Trump Building on Wall Street, the Trump World Tower by the United Nations to the Trump International overlooking Central Park, Donald Trump has stamped his name in golden letters on skyscrapers across New York City.This real estate empire was the springboard for Trump’s ascent from tabloid fodder to reality TV stardom, and ultimately the presidency, all built on his self-projected image as America’s most famous businessman.While the reality of Trump’s business acumen – and the true extent of his wealth – have long been questioned, on Friday a New York judge forever tarnished his gilded image, finding Trump and his allies guilty of frauds that “shock the conscience” and a “lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological”.Trump was ordered to pay $354.9m and was banned from leading a New York business for three years after a court found that he and his associates fraudulently overstated his net worth. The Trump Organization was wrenched from his family’s control – and its future looks far from certain.For decades, the former president has portrayed himself as a brash, bronzed, brilliant businessman who ruled the Manhattan skyline. Whether lecturing Apprentice contestants, charming voters, or bragging to fellow world leaders, he could point to more than a dozen Trump-branded towers as evidence of all he had achieved.Trump is “the archetypal businessman – a dealmaker without peer”, with a name “synonymous with the most prestigious of addresses”, according to his own company: the “very definition of the American success story”.View image in fullscreenBut Judge Arthur Engoron’s ruling is a shocking blow to this image. The same buildings which once embodied the former president’s fame and fortune will, for years, remain supervised by court-appointed monitors. For now, Trump has lost control of the corporation which once provided a stage for his persona.And yet, just as he is separated from his business empire, his political machine is gearing up to propel him back into the Oval Office.Trump has marched closer to the Republican nomination amid – not despite – these legal woes. He has tried to utilize this trial, and the others he faces, to bankroll his comeback campaign. They amount to politicized “witch-hunts”, he tells loyal supporters, suggesting that they, rather than he, are the true targets.Minutes after Trump left the first day of his civil fraud trial in October, his machine sent out a fundraising email. “I just left the courthouse,” it began, claiming that politicians were “weaponizing the legal system to try and completely destroy me” and requesting contributions “of ANY amount – truly, even just $1 – to peacefully DEFEND our movement from the never-ending witch hunts”.View image in fullscreenOver 11 weeks in a Manhattan courtroom, the Trump Organization was publicly exposed to forensic scrutiny for the first time. This is a business that says it has “set new standards of excellence”, affording Trump “the designation of arguably being the preeminent developer of luxury real estate” in the world. Engoron took an altogether different view.Before the trial had even started, he ruled that the former president had committed fraud for years by exaggerating the value of his assets.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionNow, having heard the evidence, Engoron has imposed an eyewatering financial penalty. How Trump foots this bill is an open question. While his fortune has been pitted at around $2.3bn, the majority of this is tied up in the very business empire at the heart of this case.The money is still coming in. Trump has proven to be a highly effective fundraiser. His campaign raised about $44m in the second half of last year. His legal battles appear to have provided an additional boost.View image in fullscreenBut beyond his race to regain the presidency, Trump is now grappling with legal penalties that could destroy the personal cash pile he has said is at his disposal. Even before Friday’s decision, he had been ordered to pay $83.3m to E Jean Carroll. The former president claimed in a deposition last year to have “substantially in excess” of $400m – a huge sum, but one that would be wiped out by these bills.But this process has a long way left to run. “There’s enough uncertainty that it’s not an immediate concern,” said Gregory Germain, professor of law at Syracuse University. Trump, who has already appealed Engoron’s initial ruling, and is widely expected to do the same with this decision.View image in fullscreenOn the campaign trail and social media, in the courtroom and the inboxes of supporters, the former president has repeatedly pledged to fight what he argues is a gross injustice. On Friday Trump once again attacked the “tyrannical Abuse of Power” he claims is arrayed against him and the “liquid and beautiful Corporate Empire that started in New York, and has been successful all around the world.”In November, the American people will deliver their verdict on whose story they believe. More

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      Donald Trump banned from running businesses in New York for three years – live

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      The New York fraud case ruling is a massive blow to Trump and his business empire and a big win for New York attorney general Leticia James, who is expected to speak on the ruling at a press conference this afternoon.In addition to the big fine and ban on doing business, Trump also is barred from obtaining loans from New York banks for three years.Trump’s conduct in the case entered into the judge’s opinion.“Overall, Donald Trump rarely responded to the questions asked, and he frequently interjected long, irrelevant speeches on issues far beyond the scope of the trial,” Judge Engoron wrote. “His refusal to answer the questions directly, or in some cases, at all, severely compromised his credibility.”Buried in the middle of judge Arthur Engoron’s almost-100 page judgement in the Trump family business fraud case is a smoothly-delivered but absolutely stinging rebuke of Ivanka Trump’s truthiness.Ivanka was a witness not a defendant in the Trump Org civil case in New York and she took the stand last November, testifying in a calm and orderly manner most memorable for the infamous little phrase “I don’t recall”.Well it didn’t fool Engoron. On Page 45 of his ruling today he excoriates the former president’s older daughter thus: “Ivanka Trump was a thoughtful, articulate, and poised witness, but the Court found her inconsistent recall, depending on whether she was questioned by OAG [Office of the Attorney General] or the defense, suspect.”Ivanka Trump, 42, left her fashion business, which is now discontinued, while she was working as an unpaid senior adviser in the White House for the Trump administration. She’s also been an executive vice president in the Trump Organization and a judge on her dad’s television show The Apprentice.Judge Engoron completed his trump hand today thus: “In any event, what Ms Trump cannot recall is memorialized in contemporaneous emails and documents; in the absence of her memory, the documents speak for themselves.”But the judge canceled his prior ruling from September ordering the “dissolution” of companies that control pillars of Trump’s real estate empire, Reuters reports.Engoron said on Friday that this was no longer necessary because he is appointing an independent monitor and compliance director to oversee Trump’s businesses.Trump’s legal team has responded to the massive fine and three-year ban. Via Reuters:Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba said in a statement that the ruling was a “manifest injustice” and “culmination of a multi-year, politically fueled witch-hunt” against him.“This is not just about Donald Trump – if this decision stands, it will serve as a signal to every single American that New York is no longer open for business,” Habba said, adding that she plans to appeal.The New York fraud case ruling is a massive blow to Trump and his business empire and a big win for New York attorney general Leticia James, who is expected to speak on the ruling at a press conference this afternoon.In addition to the big fine and ban on doing business, Trump also is barred from obtaining loans from New York banks for three years.Trump’s conduct in the case entered into the judge’s opinion.“Overall, Donald Trump rarely responded to the questions asked, and he frequently interjected long, irrelevant speeches on issues far beyond the scope of the trial,” Judge Engoron wrote. “His refusal to answer the questions directly, or in some cases, at all, severely compromised his credibility.”The New York attorney general Leticia James secured a fine of more than $350m against Trump, his eldest sons and their associates after a judge found them guilty of intentionally committing fraud by falsifying government disclosures.Judge Arthur Engoron also banned the former president from serving as an officer or director or any New York corporation or entity for three years. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr were issued two-year bans.The full ruling can be found here. We’re reading through it now.The ruling in the New York fraud case against former president Donald Trump has been released, banning Trump from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or other legal entity in New York for three years.The New York attorney general’s office sued Trump for inflating the value of his assets on government financial statements in the case, which also includes Trump’s adult sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump, and two former Trump Organization executives, Allen Weisselberg and Jeff McConney, as defendants.The stakes in the case relate to Trump’s businesses, but his political career could be affected by the case as well. It’s factored into his 2024 campaign, where he talks about the “witch hunt” he’s facing across multiple court cases.Lawyers who’ve been watching the hearings in the Fulton County case against Trump where defense attorneys are trying to get DA Fani Willis and special prosecutor Nathan Wade removed from the case have said there’s been little evidence offered of any potential conflict – though the salacious nature of the allegations have done damage to Willis and potentially the case in the court of public opinion.Friday’s hearings have not been as heated or sordid as yesterday’s, instead probing the people surrounding the relationship who may have some information on it. It’s been, at times, tedious and wonky, and the defense hasn’t gotten any kind of smoking gun to prove its claims of a conflict.Terrance Bradley, Wade’s former law partner and onetime divorce attorney, is on the stand now and not offering much to help the defense’s case that the relationship is a conflict of interest or that the timeline of the relationship Willis and Wade have put forward isn’t accurate.Robin Yeartie, a former employee in the DA’s office, had testified that Willis started her relationship Wade before he was hired on the Trump case, but she also affirmed she had been ousted over performance. Other witnesses have not shown evidence of a different timeline, nor did Yeartie.On the southern border of the US and Mexico, the Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, said he’s going to build a military “base camp” in Eagle Pass, the city where there’s an ongoing standoff between US Border Patrol and the Texas National Guard.Here’s more from Reuters:The facility – dubbed Forward Operating Base Eagle – will be an 80-acre complex along the banks of the Rio Grande and house up to 1,800 troops, with the ability to expand to 2,300, Abbott and state officials said at a press conference.The move is part of a broader effort by Abbott to try to stop migrants from crossing the border illegally into Texas, including a makeshift barrier of shipping containers and concertina wire in a city-owned park in Eagle Pass. The state intends to install more barriers north and south of the park, officials said on Friday.U.S. immigration enforcement historically has been the responsibility of the federal government and Abbott’s moves to secure the border have triggered legal standoffs with U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration.Back to the Fulton County hearing…Special prosecutor Nathan Wade’s former law partner who at one point represented him in his divorce proceeding is on the stand now. Terrance Bradley is testifying on some things, but is limited in what he can talk about because of attorney-client privilege, making for a stilted line of questioning for someone once called the defense’s “star witness.”Bradley may have some texts that would suggest Wade and Fulton County DA Fani Willis were in a relationship earlier than they’ve claimed, but Willis’ attorneys have disputed this and said he can’t talk about the texts anyway because of attorney-client privilege.For now, those texts are off the table in the testimony.During remarks at the White House this afternoon, President Joe Biden touched on the Russian satellite issue that’s caused some alarm over security this week.Biden said there was no sign Russia has decided to deploy an emerging anti-satellite weapon, the Associated Press reports. The White House has confirmed that U.S. intelligence officials have information indicating Russia has obtained such a capability, although such a weapon is not yet operational. Biden said Friday that “there’s no evidence that they have made a decision to go forward with doing anything in space.”“There is no nuclear threat to the people of America or anywhere else in the world with what Russia’s doing at the moment,” Biden said.The president confirmed that the capability obtained by Russia “related to satellites and space and damaging those satellites potentially,” and that those capabilities could “theoretically do something that was damaging.”But Russia hasn’t moved forward with plans yet, and, Biden added: “My hope is, it will not.”Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito on Friday temporarily halted the Boy Scouts of America’s $2.46 billion settlement of decades of sex abuse claims, which is being appealed by a group of 144 abuse claimants, Reuters reports.Alito’s brief order freezing the settlement gives the court more time to decide a February 9 request by the abuse claimants to block the settlement from moving forward.They contend that the deal unlawfully stops them from pursuing lawsuits against organizations that are not bankrupt, such as churches that ran scouting programs, local Boy Scouts councils and insurers that provided coverage to the Boy Scouts organization.NPR reported last April that the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) announced, as it was emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization, that it would establish a $2.4bn fund for those in the organization who were victims of sexual abuse. as it emerges out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy, covering more than 82,000 men who said they were victims.The BSA had urged the supreme court on Thursday not to stop the settlement from moving forward, saying that a delay could “throw the Scouting program into chaos” and “potentially destroy BSA’s ability to carry out its 114-year-old charitable mission”, Reuters further reported.Joe Biden commented briefly at the White House a little earlier about the development yesterday where a man at the center of congressional Republicans’ push to impeach the US president was arrested for lying about Joe and Hunter Biden.“He is lying and it [impeachment] should be dropped – and it’s been an outrageous effort from the beginning,” Biden said. He made the brief remark in response to the last question he took from reporters, returning to the lecturn to do so, after appearing to talk chiefly about the deal of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.The news emerged yesterday evening that an FBI informant has been charged with lying to his handler about ties between Biden, his son Hunter and a Ukrainian energy company.Alexander Smirnov, 43, falsely told FBI agents in June 2020 that executives associated with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Hunter and Joe Biden $5m each in 2015 and 2016, prosecutors said on Thursday.Smirnov told the FBI that a Burisma executive had claimed to have hired Hunter Biden to “protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems”, prosecutors said in a statement.The allegations became a flashpoint in Congress over the summer as Republicans demanded the FBI release the unredacted form documenting the allegations as they pursued investigations of Biden and his family. They acknowledged at the time that it was unclear if the allegations were true.The new development sharply undermines the thrust of congressional Republicans’ corruption accusations that the US president was making money from his son Hunter’s business dealings in Ukraine. Full story here.Incidentally, the misconduct hearing in Georgia for the leading prosecutors in the election interference case against Donald Trump and more than a dozen co-defendants has resumed after lunch. It’s in the weeds at the moment, but we’ll bring you highlights.Joe Biden, speaking at the White House moments ago about temporary ceasefire talks with Israel in its war on Hamas, reminded the public that Americans are among the hostages still held inside Gaza.“And my hope and expectation is that we will get this hostage deal, we will get these Americans home, and the deal is being negotiated now,” the US president said.At least 120 hostages are believed still to be held in Gaza by Hamas, the Islamist militant group that controls the Palestinian territory and took more than 240 hostages from southern Israel after launching a massive attack on the area on 7 October last year. Most of the hostages are Israelis.The White House said earlier this week that it was not known how many of the remaining hostages are still alive.Joe Biden has just spoken at the White House about the death of Russian activist Alexei Navalny but also discussing Nato, Israel and Burisma.The US president expressed outrage at Navalny’s death in a Russian arctic prison camp. Biden’s remarks on that are in our live blog dedicated to Navalny news, here, and his comments responding to Donald Trump’s position on Nato earlier this week will also be in the blog.But Biden also took some questions and one was about the latest on negotiations with Israel and the US demands that Israel have a credible plan for the 1.7 million people trapped in Rafah in the far south of Gaza before attacking the city in continued efforts to destroy Hamas. He said he has had “extensive talks” with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week “over an hour each” during phone calls.“I have made the case and I feel very strongly about it – there has to be a temporary ceasefire to get the hostages out. I’m still hopeful that that can be done,” he said.Biden added: “In the meantime, I do not anticipate … I’m hoping that the Israelis will not make a massive land invasion [of Rafah]. It’s my understanding that that will not happen.”Eight members of the House of Representatives have unveiled a bipartisan proposal to provide $66.3bn in military aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan as they attempt to make progress in the lower chamber amid the logjam, Politico reports today.The total is lower than the $95bn bill for similar purpose passed by the Senate earlier this week but which has shaky prospects in the Republican-controlled House.Politico writes:
      Spearheaded by Ukraine caucus co-chair Brian Fitzpatrick, Republican of Pennsylvania, the House counterproposal also includes provisions aimed at tightening border security and winning over Republicans who won’t approve Ukraine aid without addressing the border.
      The bill is sponsored by an equal number of Republicans and Democrats. In addition to Fitzpatrick, the bill is co-sponsored by GOP Reps. Don Bacon of Nebraska, Mike Lawler of New York and Lori Chavez-DeRemer of Oregon.
      Four centrist Democrats also signed on: Reps. Jared Golden of Maine, Ed Case of Hawaii, Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez of Washington and Jim Costa of California.
      House Speaker Mike Johnson opposes the Senate version, and it’s unclear how he will respond to the new bill. But the new proposal creates yet another bipartisan pressure point as Ukraine advocates look to force a vote on the House floor after months of inaction.
      Full report here.Joe Biden is due to make public remarks shortly about the death in custody of Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader and courageous critic if Russia’s president Vladimir Putin.Our Guardian colleague in Moscow, Andrew Roth, writes in this report that the death of Navalny, once Putin’s most significant political challenger, is a watershed moment for Russia’s shattered pro-democracy movement, which has largely been jailed or driven into exile since the Ukraine invasion of 2022.Navalny, 47, was being held in a jail about 40 miles north of the Arctic Circle, where he had been sentenced to 19 years under a “special regime”.We are covering developments and reaction to this tragedy in a dedicated Guardian live blog, which you can follow here.That blog will feature Joe Biden’s remarks as they happen.After Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis was not called back to the stand, the county’s hearing has continued with other witnesses, albeit much less explosive than yesterday’s testimony.
      Former Georgia governor Roy Barnes testified that he was asked to be special prosecutor, but turned it down because it didn’t pay enough and would risk his safety.
      John Floyd, Willis’ father, testified that he hadn’t met special prosecutor Nathan Wade until 2023 and didn’t know they were in a relationship until it became public. He also said he taught his daughter to keep cash on hand, something Willis said she used to pay back Wade for anything he paid for while they dated.
      More witnesses should take the stand this afternoon. You can livestream the courtroom here.
      Beyond the hearing, the big news of the day: US Sen. Joe Manchin, the Democrat from West Virginia, will not run for president, ending speculation that he could spoil the election as a third-party option. That’s a sigh of relief for President Joe Biden.We’re still keeping an eye out for the expected ruling out of New York on the Trump fraud case, which should come sometime today. Stay tuned!Joe Manchin, the Democratic senator from West Virginia, announced in a speech today that he officially will not be running for president, ending speculation that he could run as a third-party candidate and throw President Joe Biden’s reelection prospects for a loop.“I will not be a deal breaker or a spoiler,” Manchin said, according to the New York Times.Manchin had considered running under the No Labels banner, a group that’s gotten on the ballot as a party in multiple states and is trying to recruit someone to run as an alternative to Trump and Biden this year. More