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      Trump officials allowed by supreme court to resume deporting migrants to third countries – US politics live

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      Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. My name is Tom Ambrose and I’ll be bringing you the latest news lines over the next few hours.We start with news that the US supreme court on Monday paved the way for the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to countries they are not from, including to conflict-ridden places such as South Sudan.In a brief, unsigned order, the court’s conservative supermajority paused the ruling by a Boston-based federal judge who said immigrants deserved a “meaningful opportunity” to bring claims that they would face the risk of torture, persecution or even death if removed to certain countries that have agreed to take people deported from the US.As a result of Monday’s ruling, the administration will now be allowed to swiftly deport immigrants to so-called “third countries”, including a group of men held at a US military base in Djibouti who the administration tried to send to South Sudan.The court offered no explanation for its decision and ordered the judge’s ruling paused while the appeals process plays out. The three liberal justices issued a scathing dissent.The Department of Homeland Security hailed the decision as a “victory for the safety and security of the American people”.“DHS can now execute its lawful authority and remove illegal aliens to a country willing to accept them,” spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. “Fire up the deportation planes.”Read the full story here:In other developments:

      Donald Trump announced that Israel and Iran had reached a ceasefire in a post published on his social media platform. Iran and Israel had not immediately verified the deal. The news came just hours after Iran launched a retaliatory strike on a US military base in Qatar.

      CIA director John Ratcliffe and director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard will brief members of Congress today on US military action in Iran. Top Democrats began calling for a classified briefing after the United States launched military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities over the weekend. Democratic members of “the Gang of Eight” say they have not been briefed on the situation yet, although Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson was briefed this morning.

      Health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr met with major health insurers today, extracting pledges that they will take additional measures to simplify their requirements for prior approval on medicines and medical services. Kennedy, who is known for pushing anti-vaccine conspiracies, is set to speak this week at a fundraising event for Gavi, a public-private partnership which helps buy vaccines for the world’s poorest children.

      Canada signed a defense pact with the European Union – the latest sign of the North American country’s shift away reliance on the United States amid strained relations with Donald Trump. Trump is set to attend a two day Nato summit beginning tomorrow. The White House said that at the summit, Trump will push Nato members to increase defense spending. More

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      Trump is not interested in listening to US experts on Iran’s nuclear program

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      When Donald Trump ordered the US military to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities over the weekend, the debate among intelligence officials, outside experts and policymakers over the status of Tehran’s nuclear program had largely been frozen in place for nearly 20 years.That prolonged debate has repeatedly placed the relatively dovish US intelligence community at odds with Israel and neoconservative Iran hawks ever since the height of the global war on terror.For nearly two decades, the US intelligence agencies have concluded that while Iran has a program to enrich uranium, it has never actually built any atomic bombs. It is an assessment that has been at the core of its intelligence reporting on Iran since at least 2007. This has led to constant debates over the years over the significance of Iran’s uranium enrichment program versus “weaponization” or bomb-building.Israel and the Iran hawks have repeatedly said that the debate over enrichment versus weaponization is not significant, because Iran could build a bomb relatively quickly. But Iran suspended its weaponization program in 2003 and hasn’t tried to build a bomb since; it’s been clear for decades that the Iranian regime has seen that its own interests are better served by maintaining the threat of having a nuclear weapon rather than actually having one.Iran’s reluctance to build a bomb while still maintaining the threat of a nuclear program has clear parallels with the way that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein handled his supposed weapons of mass destruction program. Hussein got rid of his programs to develop nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the 1990s, following the first Gulf War, but never divulged that to the United States or the United Nations.He wanted other countries, particularly his regional enemy Iran, to think that he still had the weapons. US officials couldn’t understand that kind of thinking, and so badly miscalculated by assuming that Hussein still had a WMD program. That mindset led to the intelligence community’s greatest debacle – its false pre-war reporting that Hussen still had a WMD program, flawed intelligence which helped the George W Bush administration justify the 2003 invasion of Iraq.In the past, the US intelligence community’s assessments on the state of the Iranian nuclear program – developed in the aftermath of its failures on the Iraqi WMD issue – acted as a restraint on the actions of successive presidents, from Bush through Obama and Biden. All of them faced pressure from Israel to take action against Iran, or at least to let Israel bomb the country.The difference today is not that the intelligence reporting has significantly changed.It is that Trump is now more willing to listen to Israel than his predecessors and is also deeply suspicious of the Central Intelligence Agency. And by firing so many staffers at the National Security Council and conducting an ideological purge throughout the rest of the national security community since he returned to office, Trump has made it clear that he is not interested in listening to the experts on Iran and the Middle East. Trump underscored his skepticism of the experts when he recently told reporters that “I don’t care” about the US intelligence community’s latest assessment that Iran still wasn’t building a bomb.Without any evidence that Iran has actually been “weaponizing”, the arguments over Iran’s nuclear program have descended over the last two decades into a series of almost theological disputes over the significance of each change in the Iranian uranium enrichment program.This debate first flared into the headlines in 2007, at a time when the Bush administration – already mired in wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan – was considering bombing Iran to halt its nuclear program. In the midst of this debate, the key findings of the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear program were made public. The NIE – a report designed to provide the consensus view of the US’s 18 spy agencies on a major subject – found that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and had never built a bomb. While it found that Iran could still develop a bomb by 2010, it determined that its commercial nuclear fuel cycle – its enrichment program – was not part of an ongoing nuclear weapons program.In 2011, the findings of another NIE were made public, which slightly altered the intelligence community’s assessment. It said that Iran’s uranium enrichment program was probably being upgraded and could eventually be used to create weapons grade uranium. But the NIE also found that Iran had still not tried to build a bomb. The 2011 NIE broke with the 2007 NIE by not making a distinction between Iran’s uranium enrichment for commercial purposes and potential nuclear weapons work. Still, the new NIE found that there was not enough evidence to show that Iran had made a decision to restart its nuclear weaponization program and build a bomb.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionToday, the US intelligence community is still basically in the same place: Iran has an enrichment program but has not built a bomb. Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, testified to Congress in March that while Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium was at its highest levels, the intelligence community “continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and [Iran’s] supreme leader Khamenei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003”.(After Trump ordered the Iran bombing, Gabbard rushed to defend his actions, even though there had still been no change in the intelligence agencies’ assessments.)And while Israel and the hawks continue today to insist that Iran could build a bomb quickly, the US intelligence community has long maintained that it could detect the effort in its earliest stages, long before it succeeded.After the weekend strike, Congressional Democrats focused on the fact that there was no new intelligence to justify Trump’s action, and no new intelligence showing an imminent threat to the United States.Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat from Virginia and the ranking Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, said Trump had bombed Iran “without regard to the consistent conclusions of the intelligence community”. 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      Trump news at a glance: Supreme court hands Trump immigration victory as president declares Iran-Israel ceasefire

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      The US supreme court on Monday paved the way for the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to countries they are not from, including to conflict-ridden places such as South Sudan.In a brief, unsigned order, the court’s conservative supermajority paused the ruling by a Boston-based federal judge who said immigrants deserved a “meaningful opportunity” to bring claims that they would face the risk of torture, persecution or even death if removed to certain countries that have agreed to take people deported from the US.The court ruling was handed down as Donald Trump claimed Israel and Iran had agreed to a “Complete and Total CEASEFIRE” and that in the future the conflict would be known as the “THE 12 DAY WAR”.Here are the key stories at a glance.US supreme court rules in favor of Trump in deportations caseThe US supreme court cleared the way on Monday for Donald Trump’s administration to resume deporting migrants to countries other than their own without offering them a chance to show harms they could face, handing him another victory in his aggressive pursuit of mass deportations.The justices lifted a judicial order that required the government to give migrants set for deportation to so-called “third countries” a “meaningful opportunity” to tell officials they are at risk of torture at their new destination, while a legal challenge plays out.Read the full storyTrump says Israel and Iran have negotiated ‘complete’ ceasefireDonald Trump claimed that Israel and Iran had negotiated a ceasefire, halting a two-week war that has killed hundreds in tit-for-tat strikes by Israeli warplanes and Iranian ballistic missiles.The ceasefire was set to begin late on Monday, Trump said, with Iran halting its attacks first and then Israel set to cease offensive operations in the coming hours.Read the full storyHouse Democratic veterans back moves to limit Trump’s military authorityA group of 12 House Democratic military veterans have thrown their weight behind efforts to constrain Donald Trump’s military authority, announcing they will support a War Powers Act resolution in response to the US president’s go ahead for airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.The veterans – some of whom served in Iraq and Afghanistan – were strongly critical of Trump’s decision to launch what they called “preventive airstrikes” without US congressional approval, drawing explicit parallels to the run-up to some of America’s longest recent wars.Read the full storyGOP-proposed Medicaid cuts threaten red statesAdvocates are urging Senate Republicans to reject a proposal to cut billions from American healthcare to extend tax breaks that primarily benefit the wealthy and corporations. The proposal would make historic cuts to Medicaid, the public health insurance program for low-income and disabled people that covers 71 million Americans, and is the Senate version of the “big beautiful bill” act, which contains most of Donald Trump’s legislative agenda.Read the full storyWhatsApp banned on all US House devicesThe WhatsApp messaging service has been banned on all US House of Representatives devices, according to a memo sent to House staff on Monday.Read the full storyMamdani appears ahead of Cuomo in new pollZohran Mamdani, a Democratic candidate for mayor of New York City, has drawn level with Andrew Cuomo in the city’s primary, according to a new poll, as voters brave record-breaking temperatures to cast their ballots.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      New York governor Kathy Hochul announced plans to build a nuclear-power plant, the first major US plant in over 15 years.

      Three years after the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade, the number of abortions performed in the US is still rising – including in some statesthat ban the procedure.

      A federal judge on Monday blocked Donald Trump’s administration from implementing his plan to bar foreign nationals from entering the United States to study at Harvard University.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 22 June 2025. More

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      US judge blocks Trump plan to bar international students from Harvard

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      A federal judge on Monday blocked Donald Trump’s administration from implementing his plan to bar foreign nationals from entering the United States to study at Harvard University.US district judge Allison Burroughs in Boston issued an injunction barring Trump’s administration from carrying out its latest bid to curtail Harvard’s ability to host international students amid an escalating fight pitting the Republican president against the prestigious Ivy League school.The preliminary injunction extends a temporary order the judge issued on 5 June that prevented the administration from enforcing a proclamation Trump signed a day earlier that cited national security concerns to justify why Harvard could no longer be trusted to host international students.The proclamation prohibited foreign nationals from entering the US to study at Harvard or participate in exchange visitor programs for an initial period of six months, and directed Marco Rubio to consider whether to revoke visas of international students already enrolled at Harvard.Almost 6,800 international students attended Harvard in its most recent school year, making up about 27% of the student population of the university in Cambridge, Massachusetts.Trump signed the proclamation after his administration had already frozen billions of dollars in funding to the oldest and wealthiest US university, threatened Harvard’s tax-exempt status and launched several investigations into the school.Trump on Friday said his administration could announce a deal with Harvard “over the next week or so” to resolve the White House’s campaign against the university, which has waged a legal battle against the administration’s action.Harvard alleges that Trump is retaliating against it in violation of its free speech rights under the US constitution’s first amendment for refusing to accede to the administration’s demands to control the school’s governance, curriculum and the ideology of its faculty and students.The university has filed two separate lawsuits before Burroughs seeking to unfreeze around $2.5bn in funding and to prevent the administration from blocking the ability of international students to attend the university.The latter lawsuit was filed after Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, on 22 May announced that her department was immediately revoking Harvard’s student and exchange visitor program certification, which allows it to enroll foreign students.Noem, without providing evidence, accused the university of “fostering violence, antisemitism, and coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party”.Her action was temporarily blocked by Burroughs almost immediately. While the Department of Homeland Security has since shifted to challenging Harvard’s certification through a months-long administrative process, Burroughs at a 29 May hearing said she planned to issue an injunction to maintain the status quo, which she did officially on Friday.A week after the hearing, Trump signed his proclamation, which cited concerns about Harvard’s acceptance of foreign money including from China and what it said was an inadequate response by the school to his administration’s demand for information on foreign students.His administration has accused Harvard of creating an unsafe environment for Jewish students and allowing antisemitism to fester on its campus. Protests over US ally Israel’s treatment of Palestinians during its war in Gaza have roiled numerous universities’ campuses, including Harvard’s.Rights advocates have noted rising antisemitism and Islamophobia in the US due to the war. The Trump administration has thus far announced no action over anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate.Harvard’s own antisemitism and Islamophobia task forces found widespread fear and bigotry at the university in reports released in late April. More

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      US supreme court allows Trump administration to deport migrants to countries other than their own – live

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      The US supreme court has ruled that the Trump administration can continue deporting migrants to countries that are not their homeland and without giving them an opportunity to share the dangers they might face.The decision ended an injunction on such deportations issued by US District Judge Brian Murphy, who ordered the Department of Homeland Security to provide written notice to migrants explaining where they would be sent and stop deporting migrants to countries like South Sudan where the state department warns of “crime, kidnapping and armed conflict”, Reuters reports.The court’s three liberal justices – Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson – dissented.House Speaker Mike Johnson says a war powers resolution is not necessary and dismissed efforts to advance such legislation, Reuters reports.Last week, Republican representative Thomas Massie and Democratic representative Ro Khanna introduced a war powers resolution, which would prohibit US armed forces from taking direct action against Iran without explicit authorization from Congress or a declaration of war. Democratic senator Tim Kaine introduced a similar resolution in the Senate.Massie and Khanna have both said the United States’ strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities this weekend require congressional authorization.“I don’t think this is an appropriate time for a war powers resolution, and I don’t think it’s necessary,” Johnson told Reuters.Florida has asked the Supreme Court to grant the state an emergency appeal to enforce a law making it illegal for undocumented immigrants to enter the state, Politico reports. The news comes as the New York Times reports Florida is also building a migrant detention facility nicknamed “Alligator Alcatraz”.US District Judge Kathleen Williams issued a stay on the state law in April. Although Florida attorney general James Uthmeier has appealed her ruling, he filed an emergency appeal with the Supreme Court to halt that stay while the case proceeds.At the same time, Florida is constructing a tent facility on a remote airfield in the Everglades to aid the Trump administration in its proposed mass deportations. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security told the New York Times that the facility will cost $450mn per year to operate, but that Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) funds could be directed to reduce those costs.The US supreme court has ruled that the Trump administration can continue deporting migrants to countries that are not their homeland and without giving them an opportunity to share the dangers they might face.The decision ended an injunction on such deportations issued by US District Judge Brian Murphy, who ordered the Department of Homeland Security to provide written notice to migrants explaining where they would be sent and stop deporting migrants to countries like South Sudan where the state department warns of “crime, kidnapping and armed conflict”, Reuters reports.The court’s three liberal justices – Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson – dissented.Top Democrats are calling for a classified briefing on Iran after the United States launched military strikes on the country’s nuclear facilities, the Washington Post reports. Democratic members of “the Gang of Eight” – eight congressmembers who the president must brief on classified intelligence – say they have not been briefed on the situation yet, although Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson was briefed this morning.“I’ve asked the Trump administration to give me a classified briefing to lay out the full threat picture, the intelligence behind Iran’s retaliation, and the details, scope, and timeline of any U.S. response,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement. “Most importantly, I’ve demanded they lay out exactly what measures they’re taking — right now — to keep our servicemembers safe.”“I asked for a Gang of Eight briefing. It has yet to occur, and it’s not clear to me what the administration is hiding from the Congress and from the American people,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries also said Monday.All members of Congress will receive a classified briefing tomorrow.Attorney General Pam Bondi appeared open to investigating threats against lawmakers, but also called Democrats incompetent during an appearance before the House Appropriations Committee today.In the aftermath of shootings targeting two Minnesota state lawmakers, Bondi said she would be willing to provide more prosecutorial assistance to investigate similar threats against members of Congress, the New York Times reports.Yet, when pressed on other Department of Justice policies, including proposed funding cuts and January 6 pardons, by Democrats, Bondi was confrontational, the Associated Press reports.After Democratic congresswoman Madeleine Dean called the “three hallmarks” of the Trump administration “incompetence, corruption and cruelty”, Bondi responded: “You want to talk about in incompetence? You’re the one that said Joe Biden on PBS was competent. You had to retract those words. So don’t talk to me, don’t insult me publicly.”Trump has publicly addressed Iran’s strike on the US military base in Qatar, calling the response “very weak” and saying that it was “very effectively countered.” The president also thanked Iran for giving the US notice ahead of time of the attack, which Trump says “made it possible for no lives to be lost.”Trump wrote:“Iran has officially responded to our Obliteration of their Nuclear Facilities with a very weak response, which we expected, and have very effectively countered. There have been 14 missiles fired — 13 were knocked down, and 1 was “set free,” because it was headed in a nonthreatening direction. I am pleased to report that NO Americans were harmed, and hardly any damage was done. Most importantly, they’ve gotten it all out of their “system,” and there will, hopefully, be no further HATE. I want to thank Iran for giving us early notice, which made it possible for no lives to be lost, and nobody to be injured. Perhaps Iran can now proceed to Peace and Harmony in the Region, and I will enthusiastically encourage Israel to do the same. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”Trump added in another post that no Qataris were killed or wounded in addition to no Americans being harmed.CIA director John Ratcliffe and director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard will brief members of Congress tomorrow on US military action in Iran.General Dan Caine, Christopher Landau and Steve Feinberg will also attend. Both the House and Senate will receive classified briefings.The briefings will come as many lawmakers have demanded answers about the intelligence ahead of Trump’s decision over the weekend to strike Iranian sites.Robert F Kennedy Jr, known for pushing anti-vaccine conspiracies, is set to speak this week at a fundraising event for Gavi, a public-private partnership which helps buy vaccines for the world’s poorest children, Reuters reports.Trump reportedly asked the health secretary to represent the US at the conference in Brussels on Wednesday, where Gavi will secure funding for its operations for the next five years. The Trump administration has previously indicated that it planned to cut its funding for Gavi, representing around $300 million annually.The source told Reuters that it was unlikely Kennedy would commit any new US funding contribution and would most likely discuss “the restructuring of foreign assistance.”Trump has cut foreign aid programs by around 80% since taking office in January, as part of his “America First” policy agenda.Health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr met with major health insurers today, extracting pledges that they will take additional measures to simplify their requirements for prior approval on medicines and medical services.Insurers including UnitedHealth Group Inc’s UnitedHealthcare, CVS Health Corp’s Aetna, Cigna Group, Blue Cross Blue Shield Association and Kaiser Permanente met with Kennedy along with Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator Mehmet Oz.The insurers announced they plan to reduce the scope of health care claims subject to prior authorization, standardize parts of the process and expand responses done in real time.“There shouldn’t be paper, there shouldn’t be faxes, there shouldn’t be letters being sent. They should all be done digitally and automatically, and 90-day continuity should exist for authorizations when patients switch insurers, so you never fall through the cracks again,” Oz said.“If the insurance industry cannot address the needs of pre-authorization by themselves, there are government opportunities to get involved,” he added.Federal officials are increasingly concerned about the possibility of retaliation from Iran on American soil, the New York Times reports.In an internal email, top officials at the FBI warned that Iran and its proxies have “historically targeted US interests in response to geopolitical events, and they are likely to increase their efforts in the near term”.The email urged field offices to monitor their collection platforms and stay in close contact with the defense department, including the national guard, “who may be targeted for retaliation” while “specific attention should be paid to” US military facilities connected to the strikes in Iran.House speaker Mike Johnson dismissed efforts by lawmakers to advance a measure to check Trump’s use of military force against Iran, after Tehran said it carried out a missile attack on the al-Udeid US airbase in Qatar.When asked whether he would allow the House of Representatives to vote on a bipartisan resolution, Johnson told reporters: “I don’t think this is an appropriate time for war powers resolution, and I don’t think it’s necessary.”Republican representative Thomas Massie and Democratic representative Ro Khanna introduced their resolution days before Trump ordered US strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities on Saturday and have since claimed that the president’s actions require congressional authorization.Iran’s military said today that it carried out a missile attack on US forces in Qatar, where explosions were heard across the capital.Democratic senator Tim Kaine has introduced a similar resolution in the Senate that he said lawmakers could vote on as early as this week.“Our War Powers Resolution has 57 cosponsors. Whether you like it or not, Congress will be voting on U.S. hostilities in Iran,” Massie said in a post on social media earlier today.Johnson and other Republicans insist that Trump had the authority to take unilateral action against Iran to eliminate a potential nuclear threat to the US and other countries.“The President made an evaluation that the danger was imminent enough to take his authority as commander in chief and make that happen,” the speaker said.Canada and the US could agree to a new economic and defense relationship soon but nothing is assured, Canadian prime minister Mark Carney said today.“We’re working hard to get a deal, but we’ll only accept the right deal with the United States. The right deal is possible, but nothing’s assured,” he told a televised news conference in Brussels after talks with senior European Union officials.Last Monday, Carney said he had agreed with Trump that their two nations should try to wrap up talks on a new deal within 30 days.France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, called for a return to diplomacy to end what he called “the spiral of chaos” after Iran targeted a US military base in Qatar.Macron wrote on X:“I express France’s solidarity with Qatar, which has been struck by Iran on its soil.I am in close contact with the country’s authorities and our partners in the region.I call on all parties to exercise the utmost restraint, de-escalate, and return to the negotiating table. This spiral of chaos must end.”Before Macron’s social media post, foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot told France 2 television that the missile strikes, which had not caused any casualties, were a “dangerous escalation” and he urged all sides to show restraint.Trump is attacking members of the media, several by name, on Truth Social. He appears angry over reports from several news outlets that the facilities struck in Iran may not have been completely destroyed by the US attacks.Trump wrote:“The sites that we hit in Iran were totally destroyed, and everyone knows it. Only the Fake News would say anything different in order to try and demean, as much as possible — And even they say they were “pretty well destroyed!” Working especially hard on this falsehood is Allison Cooper of Fake News CNN, Dumb Brian L. Roberts, Chairman of “Con”cast, Jonny Karl of ABC Fake News, and always, the Losers of, again, Concast’s NBC Fake News. It never ends with the sleazebags in the Media, and that’s why their Ratings are at an ALL TIME LOW — ZERO CREDIBILITY!”Trump’s media company plans to buy back up to $400m of its stock, which is down 46% this year.Trump Media and Technology Group, the parent company of Truth Social, says that the acquisition will improve its financial flexibility. Trump is the largest stakeholder in Trump Media, with about 114m shares.The Florida-based company, which trades under the ticker DJT on both Nasdaq and NYSE Texas, saw shares rise just over 1%. But the shares appeared to peak about a month after the company went public in late March. Shares have been on a steady, downward trajectory since. More

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      Canada and EU sign defense pact amid strained US relations and global instability

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      Canada has signed a wide-ranging defence pact with the EU, as Donald Trump and global instability prompt traditional US allies to deepen their alliances.Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, on Monday joined European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, and head of the European Council, António Costa, in Brussels, where they signed a security and defence partnership, pledged more support for Ukraine, as well as joint work on issues from the climate crisis to artificial intelligence.At a cordial press conference, Carney described Canada as “the most European of the non-European countries” that “looks first to the European Union to build a better world”.Costa spoke in kind: “The European Union and Canada are among the closest allies in the transatlantic space. We see the world through the same lens. We stand for the same values.”Not mentioned was another leader in the transatlantic space: Donald Trump, whose disrespect for old allies appears to have galvanised what was an already healthy EU-Canada relationship.The US president is expected at the two-day Nato summit in the Hague starting on Tuesday, when members of the transatlantic alliance are called to pledge to spend 5% of GDP on defence.Carney, a veteran central banker turned politician, won a stunning victory in April pledging that Canada would not become the 51st US state, a proposal often floated by Trump.He said he had a mandate “to diversify and strengthen our international partnerships” and find new means of co-operation and co-ordination. The summit took place, Carney told reporters, “we might say in a hinge moment of history, a world that is more dangerous and divided, a time where the rules-based international global order is under threat”.The EU-Canada security and defence partnership opens the door to increased Canadian participation in the EU’s fledgling €150bn defence fund, known as Safe. Von der Leyen said the defence partnership meant working on joint capabilities, interoperability and joint procurement, referencing air defence. “The access of Canada to our joint procurement in the European Union, the door is open,” she said.The security pact is a Canadian version of the agreement the EU signed with the British prime minister, Keir Starmer, last month. The bloc already had similar arrangements with six other countries including Norway and Japan, but this is the first with any country in the Americas. The defence pact includes joint work on cyber, maritime and space security, arms control and support for Ukraine.Countries that have a defence and security pact with the EU can take part in joint procurement of weapons funded by the €150bn (£128bn, $173bn) Safe programme, although must negotiate a further technical agreement. Von der Leyen pledged both sides would “swiftly launch talks” on Canadian access to the joint procurement scheme.Carney said the agreement with the EU would help Canada “deliver on our new capabilities more rapidly and more effectively”. Canada has been one of the laggards of the Nato alliance: in 2024 it spent just 1.37% of GDP on defence, well below the 2% set in 2014.The two sides have a €125bn trading relationship, underpinned by the Ceta pact signed in 2016 that abolished 98% of tariffs. The agreement, however, has yet to be ratified by national parliaments in 10 EU member states, including Belgium, France, Italy and Poland, meaning elements of the deal have yet to enter into force.In advance of the meeting Carney and his wife, Diana Fox, Carney visited Schoonselhof military cemetery in Antwerp, where 348 Canadians are buried, “brave young soldiers who ventured across the Atlantic to defend the freedom of Europe”, Carney wrote on social media.The Carneys were accompanied by Belgium’s prime minister, formerly a long-serving Antwerp mayor, Bart De Wever, where they were given a tour of the ceremony and laid wreaths on behalf of Belgium and Canada. The last post was played by one of De Wever’s sons, according to local paper Het Nieuwsblad. More

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      Socialist Zohran Mamdani could be New York’s next mayor. This is what the western left could learn from him | Owen Jones

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      The Zohran Mamdani phenomenon should not be happening, if received wisdom is a reliable predictor of events. He’s the 33-year-old Muslim leftist and Queens assemblyman running for the New York mayoralty with the support of the Democratic Socialists of America, and the vitriolic campaign against him suggests his momentum has caused panic in gilded circles. His chief opponent for the Democratic nomination, Andrew Cuomo, could not scream party establishment more loudly: he’s New York state’s former governor – just like his father was – and a former cabinet secretary. He married into that classic Democratic royalty, the Kennedys; his endorsements include the former president Bill Clinton; and billionaires such as Mike Bloomberg are pouring millions into his Super Pac.In another age, someone like Mamdani would have been a no-hoper. What changed was the 2016 presidential campaign of the long-marginalised socialist senator Bernie Sanders, which re-energised the US left. But Donald Trump’s recent victory on a more extreme platform led to predictions of a general rightwing lurch in US politics, with progressive positions scapegoated for the Democratic loss (even though Kamala Harris ran on a squarely corporate, “centrist” ticket). I was scheduled to interview Mamdani on the night of the US presidential election, but his campaign asked to postpone as results started to come in suggesting a Trump victory was likely. Presumably, they wanted to reassess strategy in the coming US political winter.But just a few months later, Mamdani is surging, and his campaign offers lessons for the western left in an age of chronic economic insecurity, rising far-right authoritarianism, war and genocide. The primary election vote is tomorrow, but a poll released during crucial early voting shows Mamdani overtaking Cuomo in “ranked choice” voting: it’s within the margin of error, but five months ago the insurgent candidate was polling only 1% support. In only a month, Mamdani has leapt from 22% to 32%, particularly powered by a 2:1 lead among the under-50s.Yes, the millennial has been helped by Cuomo’s chronic liabilities – the former governor resigned in disgrace after an investigation by the state attorney general found that he had sexually harrassed several women – but rival candidates with bigger profiles and more political experience could have gained from that instead. The New York Times pleaded with readers not to rank Mamdani in the preferential voting system, rich New Yorkers are threatening to flee the city if he wins, he’s been attacked for inexperience, and smeared over his championing of Palestinian rights. “Zohran Mamdani is a public menace,” screeches rightwing magazine the National Review.So what’s the universal lessons for the western left? Three Ms are key: messaging, medium and movement. Grace Mausser is the co-chair of New York City Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). When I suggested that Mamdani’s campaign would surely originally have been driven by revitalising the left, rather than the prospect of an actual election victory, she disagrees.“When we started, we knew the path to victory was narrow,” she conceded. But, she emphasised: “We don’t run races for purely moral reasons or to make a point like the Green party in the US which has failed in their project.” Indeed, the DSA played a pivotal role in Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s shock defeat of another Democratic luminary, the former chair of the House Democratic Caucus Joe Crowley back in 2018. In turn, Ocasio-Cortez has bolstered Mamdani with her endorsement, underlining how progressive victories feed off one another.“Super-clear messaging” is how Mausser sums up the Mamdani strategy. The early campaign settled on three main messages: “Fast and free buses, freeze the rents, free childcare. That’s so easy to remember. People know it, and it’s said over and over and over again.” Mamdani has other pledges, too – such as launching publicly run grocery stores – but key to his success are core, endlessly repeated commitments focused on a cost of living crisis triggered by a broken economic system.This strategy is essential in combating a “culture war” designed to force leftists into a defensive posture. It doesn’t mean abandoning marginalised minorities – Mamdani has unequivocally committed to transgender rights, for example. It just means emphasising unifying economic messages. Anger is redirected from the disenfranchised to thriving economic elites, whom Mamdani seeks to tax to fulfil his pledges. The campaign has settled, too, on not backing down to bad faith attacks: Mamdani has not given an inch in his pro-Palestinian advocacy.View image in fullscreenThen there’s the medium. What Mausser calls “high-quality video production” has been pivotal. Across the west, the far right has proven adept at using platforms such as TikTok to radicalise supporters, with the left mostly not even playing catch-up. Mamdani’s campaign made slick videos that are witty, sassy and snappy, communicating its messages to wide audiences. “All the conversations after the election [were] about needing a ‘Joe Rogan of the left’, how people aren’t getting their news from traditional media, how they’re getting their news from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube,” says Democratic strategist Waleed Shahid. “And that is exactly the story of Zohran.”When Sanders endorsed Mamdani, he declared how he was “very impressed by the grassroots movement that he has put together”. Mamdani’s campaign has an army of door-knockers, often visiting districts traditionally ignored by Democratic machine politicians. For many of these canvassers, this is their first political experience. Mausser reports: “If you ask them, ‘How did you hear about Zohran?’, it’s like: ‘Oh, I saw his video on Instagram or TikTok.’” The message and the medium raised an army. There’s another factor, too: Mamdani, like Ocasio-Cortez, is charismatic and telegenic. It’s not fashionable to discuss this on a left which prioritises the collective over the individual, but we need compelling communicators who look the part.Mamdani may not win the Democratic nomination. Even if he does, Cuomo will stand as an independent candidate, although the socialist challenger may do this, too. His campaign’s weaknesses reflect those of the wider US left: too little inroads among Black and older voters, as well as those with little online political engagement. But Mamdani’s against-the-odds success underlines why the far-right surge doesn’t have to weaken the left – far from it. Indeed, Mamdani positions himself as best-placed to resist Trump, rather than kowtow to his agenda. When the Republicans won, one of Mamdani’s first viral videos was visiting local districts where Trump enjoyed his biggest swings.Whatever happens, Mamdani shows that the US left lives on after what Shahid calls “a shitty year”: along with Trump’s triumph, there have been dispiriting primary defeats of progressive representatives Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush at the hands of notorious pro-Israel lobbyists Aipac. Mamdani has built a movement in New York, but his campaign has also given a shellshocked western left a gift: a strategy to take on the establishment even in adverse circumstances.

      Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

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      WhatsApp messaging app banned on all US House of Representatives devices

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      The WhatsApp messaging service has been banned on all US House of Representatives devices, according to a memo sent to House staff on Monday.The notice to all House staff said that the “Office of Cybersecurity has deemed WhatsApp a high-risk to users due to the lack of transparency in how it protects user data, absence of stored data encryption, and potential security risks involved with its use.”The memo, from the chief administrative officer, recommended use of other messaging apps, including Microsoft Corp’s Teams platform, Amazon.com’s Wickr, Signal, Apple’s iMessage, and Facetime.Meta, which owns WhatsApp, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.The Signal app – which like WhatsApp uses end-to-end encrypted messaging – was at the center of a recent controversy in which Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, sent detailed information about planned attacks on Yemen to at least two private Signal group chats.One of the chats was created by Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, and included top US security officials as well as, inadvertently, the Atlantic magazine journalist Jeffrey Goldberg. The other Hegseth created himself, including his wife, his brother and about a dozen other people.The Pentagon had previously warned its employees against using Signal due to a technical vulnerability, according NPR, which reported that an “OPSEC special bulletin” seen by its reporters and sent on 18 March said that Russian hacking groups could exploit the vulnerability in Signal to spy on encrypted organizations, potentially targeting “persons of interest”.The Pentagon-wide memo said “third party messaging apps” like Signal are permitted to be used to share unclassified information, but they are not allowed to be used to send “non-public” unclassified information.Reuters contributed to this report More