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      Gunman in CDC attack fired over 180 shots at building and broke 150 windows

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      The man who attacked the CDC headquarters in Atlanta on Friday fired more than 180 shots into the campus and broke about 150 windows, with bullets piercing “blast-resistant” windows and spattering glass shards into numerous rooms, according to information circulated internally at the agency.It may take weeks or even months to replace windows and clean up the damage, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention personnel said.A Georgia man who had blamed the Covid-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal opened fire late on Friday, killing a police officer. No one at CDC was injured.The shooter was stopped by CDC security guards before driving to a nearby pharmacy and opening fire late Friday afternoon, a law enforcement official has told the AP. The official wasn’t authorized to publicly discuss the investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity. The 30-year-old man, Patrick Joseph White, later died, but authorities haven’t said whether he was killed by police or killed himself.The US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, traveled to Atlanta and on Monday met with the agency’s director, Susan Monarez.Monarez posted a statement on social media on Friday night that said at least four CDC buildings were hit in the attack.The extent of the damage became more clear during a weekend CDC leadership meeting. Two CDC employees who were told about what was discussed at the meeting described details to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to reveal the information. Details also were also in an agency memo seen by an AP reporter.Building 21, which houses Monarez’s office, was hit by the largest number of bullets. CDC officials did not say if her office was hit.CDC employees were advised to work from home this week.Kennedy issued a statement on Saturday that said “no one should face violence while working to protect the health of others,” and that top federal health officials were “actively supporting CDC staff”.He did not speak to the media during his visit on Monday.A retired CDC official, Stephan Monroe, said he worried about the long-term impact the attack would have on young scientists’ willingness to go to work for the government.“I’m concerned that this is going to be a generational hit,” said Monroe, speaking to a reporter near the corner where a poster had been set up in honor of David Rose, the officer who was killed.Kennedy was a leader in a national anti-vaccine movement before Donald Trump selected him to oversee federal health agencies, and has made false and misleading statements about the safety and effectiveness of about Covid-19 shots and other vaccines.Years of false rhetoric about vaccines and public health was bound to “take a toll on people’s mental health”, and “leads to violence”, said Tim Young, a CDC employee who retired in April.Dr Jerome Adams, the US surgeon general during President Trump’s first administration, said on Sunday that health leaders should appreciate the weight of their words.“We have to understand people are listening,” Adams told Face the Nation on CBS. “When you make claims that have been proven false time and time again about safety and efficacy of vaccines, that can cause unintended consequences.” More

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      ‘Red meat to throw to his base’: DC residents on Trump’s police takeover

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      As Donald Trump convened reporters at the White House on Monday morning to announce his plans for sending the national guard on to Washington DC streets and taking over the police department, protesters gathered a block away to denounce what they saw as his plans to put the federal district under his thumb.“Nothing Trump is doing right now is about our safety,” Keya Chatterjee, executive director of Free DC, a group advocating for the city’s autonomy, told the 200 or so people gathered on a block of 16th Street Northwest that had once been called Black Lives Matter Plaza, before the city government ordered the name stripped shortly after Trump’s inauguration this year.“What we know from history is that authoritarians always want to control the capital and the people in the capital city. It’s because it’s the fastest way to silence dissent and to accelerate their agenda. And I want to be clear, this is not about crime. This is about what Trump is trying to do to DC in order to take over DC and silence us.”Lamont Mitchell was not so sure. A lifelong Washingtonian who resides among the poorer and more crime-stricken neighborhoods east of the Anacostia river, he regarded Trump’s plans for the homeless as “inhumane”, but was open to his ideas for making the city’s streets safer. Mitchell described how he avoids certain areas on drive way home for fear of being struck by a stray bullet, no longer walks down certain blocks, had his RV stolen and plans to buy a gun.“As a senior in Washington, I need to feel safe,” said 69-year-old Mitchell, who chairs the Anacostia Coordinating Council community organization. “We gotta take drastic action when drastic action is called for.”The overwhelmingly Democratic federal district is the latest American city to which Trump has deployed troops since taking office, after sending active-duty marines and national guard into Los Angeles in June to quell protests over immigration enforcement. This time, the foe is crime that the president argues is “out of control”, and the catalyst is the attack of a staffer from the “department of government efficiency” in a relatively safe neighborhood earlier this month.Mayor Muriel Bowser has called Trump’s intervention “unsettling and unprecedented”, as well as unwarranted. City leaders have pointed to statistics that show crimes such as robbery, homicide and assault with a deadly weapon are down, and violent crime hit a 30-year low in 2024.Yet Washington continues to struggle with rates of violent crime that are higher than cities with similar populations, according to the Real-Time Crime Index from AH Datalytics. Residents are used to hearing reports of violence, though much of it occurs in the city’s poorer, majority Black eastern third, far from the museums and monuments of the National Mall.They are also used to seeing a lot of police – about 50 law enforcement agencies are already in Washington DC, ranging from the citywide Metropolitan police department (MPD) to the obscure zoo police, FBI police and Federal Reserve police, which provide security around specific agencies.National guard troops and agents from the FBI and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (Ice) are now expected to be on the streets along those officers, but residents are unsure whether they will make much difference.“I tend to be pretty cynical about what the Trump administration is doing right now. This seems pretty clearly just like red meat to throw to his base, this announcement on a Monday,” said Brian Strege, a neighborhood commissioner in Navy Yard, where mobs of juveniles have appeared repeatedly over the summer, shooting off fireworks and harassing bystanders.“I get the sense it’s just going to be a lot of bored national guard troops wandering around the city.”Trump made mention of the disturbances in Navy Yard during his White House press conference, but Strege said the city had already taken steps to stop the disorder, including by instituting a nighttime curfew this summer for people under 18. Trump plans to take over the police department for 30 days – right around the time schools resume, and Strege said the teenagers typically stop showing up.View image in fullscreen“Thirty days from now is going to be September. Our juvenile crime is likely to decrease, because it always does. So, it sounds like they’re going to pretend that it went down because they did this big deployment,” he said. “I don’t see it helping really at all. I think our police force has actually been doing a pretty good job over the past few years.”Last Saturday night saw more teenagers flood Navy Yard, as well as a shooting. The following day, Edward Daniels, another neighborhood commissioner in the area, saw Ice agents patrolling the street, and at one point stopping some teenagers from riding bikes, which others had used in the past to harass people.Their presence, he said, didn’t make him feel safe, but rather concerned – did these agents know how to patrol a city? Were they coordinating with the police department?“It’s going to make things even more chaotic here and cause what I believe to be even more dangerous situations than what we’ve seen here on the ground,” he said.Across the Anacostia river, Sandra Seegars, a longtime anti-crime activist, welcomed Trump’s announcement. Her Congress Heights neighborhood has one of the highest homicide rates in the city, according to police data, and she was pleased to hear from a friend that federal agents had been spotted in a nearby park.“He’s going to make me feel safer,” Seegars said of Trump’s deployment. “I think he’s doing the right thing. He should have done it before now.” More

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      ‘Unsettling and unprecedented’: Washington DC mayor responds to Trump’s federal takeover of city police – live

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      Bowser says that her office plans to follow the law, and cooperate with the federal government. The DC Home Rule Act requires the mayor to “provide the services” of the police department in the case of a declared emergency.Although, she notes that there is a “question about the subjectivity” of the declaration – referring to the recorded evidence of a dropping violent crime rate in DC. “While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented, I can’t say that, given some of the rhetoric of the past, that we’re totally surprised,” she adds.The mayor also says that she’s requested a meeting with attorney general Pam Bondi, who will temporarily oversee the Metropolitan police department.Bowser notes that all officers should be clearly identifiable: “a uniform, a badge, a jacket, so that people know that they are law enforcement”.The DC Council, the chief policy-making authority for the district, issued a statement calling Trump’s move to federalize the Metropolitan Police Department “unwarranted” and “a manufactured intrusion on local authority.”“Violent crime in the District is at the lowest rates we’ve seen in 30 years,” the statement said.“Federalizing the Metropolitan Police Department is unwarranted because there is no Federal emergency. Further, the National Guard has no public safety training or knowledge of local laws. The Guard’s role does not include investigating or solving crimes in the District. Calling out the National Guard is an unnecessary deployment with no real mission,” added the council.President Donald Trump said on Monday he met with Intel Corp’s chief executive Lip-Bu Tan, along with commerce secretary Howard Lutnick and treasury secretary Scott Bessent.“The meeting was a very interesting one,” Trump said on Truth Social. “Mr. Tan and my Cabinet members are going to spend time together, and bring suggestions to me during the next week.”Trump’s remarks come just days after he called on the chief executive to resign, alleging Tan had ties to the Chinese Communist party.Trump plans to impose a 100% tariff on imported computer chips, a move experts warn could lead companies to pull back on production or raise prices, but could favor Intel as a US-based semiconductor firm.Tan had invested in hundreds of Chinese firms, some of which were linked to the Chinese military, Reuters reported in April.Over the weekend, more details emerged about the fatal attack on the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that took place on Friday, killing a police officer. In case you missed it:

      We reported that the shooter had blamed a Covid-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal. The suspect’s father contacted police and said his son was upset about the death of his dog, and had also become fixated on the Covid-19 vaccine.

      A union representing CDC employees demanded that the federal government condemn vaccine misinformation after it was known that the shooter blamed the Covid-19 vaccine. The CDC workers’ union said the deadly violence was not random and “compounds months of mistreatment, neglect, and vilification that CDC staff have endured”. It said vaccine misinformation had put scientists at risk.

      The Georgia Bureau of Investigation named Patrick Joseph White as the shooter. After firing shots at the CDC campus near Emory University on Friday, White was found dead on the second floor of the pharmacy building.
      Andriy Yermak, the chief of staff to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has recently discussed diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine with secretary of state Marco Rubio.On Monday, Yermak said in a post on X that Rubio was briefed “on active communications with our partners,” including a meeting with US vice-president JD Vance.“We coordinated our positions ahead of important diplomatic steps planned for this week,” Yermak said in the post. “For Ukraine, the priority is a just and lasting peace, which requires an unconditional ceasefire as a prerequisite for substantive negotiations, as well as increased pressure on Russia to take real steps in this direction.”The post comes after UK foreign secretary David Lammy and Vance held a meeting with Ukrainian and European partners in Britain over the weekend, where leaders discussed the drive for peace in Ukraine.Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are slated to meet on Friday in Alaska to discuss ways forward to end the years-long war.CNN is reporting that national guard troops in the nation’s capital deployed by the Trump administration are not expected to openly carry rifles.An army official told the news outlet that troops will most likely have weapons nearby, like inside their trucks, if they absolutely need to access them for purposes of self-defense.Still, the official said it is always a possibility that troops could be ordered to operate differently.Gavin Newsom tried to play nice with Maga. But then in June, Donald Trump sent the national guard to LA, to quell immigration protests following Ice raids on the city, and the California governor went scorched-earth on the new administration.Since then Newsom’s social media exchanges with Trump and his White House have taunted and trolled, factchecked and alarm-sounded.Following Trump’s announcement on Monday that he’s activating the National Guard in the nation’s capital and taking over Washington’s police department, Newsom’s social media team set to work.Newsom warned in one post that other cities were next (and reminded followers that he had predicted this might happen back in June.)His press office grabbed a screenshot of the Trump officials looking bewildered.The team continued its full-frontal social assault, peppering Trump with tweets on the DC takeover, tariffs and his partisan redistricting plan. They deployed a Taco tariffs meme (Trump always chickens out) in response to the news that Trump and China extended their truce for another 90 days. They questioned how Attorney General Pam Bondi, who they said “couldn’t find the Epstein files” might fare as the head of the newly installed DC police department.They even fired off a Trump-style all-caps missive warning that California would redistrict if he did not call on Texas to stand down.

      Donald Trump is launching a federal takeover of DC Metropolitan police department (MPD), and deploying 800 national guardsmen to assist local law enforcement. He declared crime in the city “public safety emergency” in a press conference earlier, invoking a section of the DC Home Rule Act which places MPD under federal control. It’s expected to last 30 days, according to the White House.

      DC’s mayor Muriel Bowser said today that her office plans to comply and cooperate with federal government, but noted there are questions about the “subjectivity” of the emergency declaration. DC has seen a notable drop in violent crime, and even saw a record 30-year low in 2024, according to the justice department.

      Beyond Washington, Trump also previewed his Friday meeting with Vladimir Putin in Alaska, claiming he will know “probably in the first two minutes” whether a peace deal can be made. Trump confirmed that while Volodymyr Zelenskyy wouldn’t be a part of the summit, he would call him first as soon as he saw a “fair deal” for a ceasefire emerge. He also didn’t rule out the possibility of a future trading relationship with Russia.

      And while the ongoing redistricting battle across the US wasn’t the main story of the day, California governor Gavin Newsom said that he will be “forced to lead an effort to redraw the maps in California to offset the rigging of maps in red states” in a letter to Donald Trump. Newsom said he would be left with no choice if the president can’t get governor Greg Abbott to drop his push to redraw Texas’ congressional maps mid-decade.
      In a statement, Democratic congressman Hakeem Jeffries of New York, who serves as the House minority leader, said that the president’s plan to federalise the DC police department and deploy the National Guard had “has no basis in law and will put the safety of the people of our Nation’s capital in danger”.He added:
      The violent crime rate in Washington DC is at a 30-year low. Donald Trump doesn’t care about public safety. On his first day in office, he pardoned hundreds of violent felons – many of whom brazenly assaulted law enforcement officers on January 6. We stand with the residents of the District of Columbia and reject this unjustified power grab as illegitimate.
      On the president’s statements earlier that he would be comfortable bringing the military into DC if he deems it necessary, Muriel Bowser says that “we don’t believe it’s legal to use the American military against American citizens on American soil”.Trump did, however, bring in out-of-state, unfederalised national guard troops during the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.Bowser does note that she suspected that the national guard would be deployed, but had no prior knowledge of the federal takeover of the Metropolitan police department.Donald Trump has once again delayed implementing sweeping tariffs on China, announcing another 90-day pause just hours before the last agreement between the world’s two largest economies was due to expire.On Monday, Trump signed an executive order extending the deadline for higher tariffs on China until 9 November, officials confirmed to Reuters.Chinese officials said earlier in the day they hoped the United States would strive for “positive” trade outcomes on Monday, as the 90-day detente reached between the two countries in May was due to expire.“We hope that the US will work with China to follow the important consensus reached during the phone call between the two heads of state … and strive for positive outcomes on the basis of equality, respect and mutual benefit,” a foreign ministry spokesman, Lin Jian, said in a statement.Bowser says that her office plans to follow the law, and cooperate with the federal government. The DC Home Rule Act requires the mayor to “provide the services” of the police department in the case of a declared emergency.Although, she notes that there is a “question about the subjectivity” of the declaration – referring to the recorded evidence of a dropping violent crime rate in DC. “While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented, I can’t say that, given some of the rhetoric of the past, that we’re totally surprised,” she adds.The mayor also says that she’s requested a meeting with attorney general Pam Bondi, who will temporarily oversee the Metropolitan police department.Bowser notes that all officers should be clearly identifiable: “a uniform, a badge, a jacket, so that people know that they are law enforcement”.The Democratic mayor of Washington DC, Muriel Bowser, is now addressing the president’s actions today.“I’ve said before, and I’ll repeat, that I believe that the president’s view of DC is shaped by his Covid-era experience during his first term,” she says. “It is true that those were more challenging times related to some issues. It is also true that we experienced a crime spike post-Covid, but we worked quickly to put laws in place and tactics that got violent offenders off our streets, and gave our police officers more tools.”In a letter to the president, California governor Gavin Newsom has asked Donald Trump to call on Texas governor Greg Abbott – and other red states who are acting under the president’s direction – to end the ongoing efforts to redraw their states’ congressional maps mid-decade.This comes as the redistricting battle in Texas enters its second week. State Democrats broke quorum again on Friday in protest of a gerrymandered GOP-drawn map – that could lead Republicans to pick up five extra seats in the US House ahead of the 2026 midterms.In his letter Newsom said that he will be “forced to lead an effort to redraw the maps in California to offset the rigging of maps in red states”, if Trump does not stand down. “You are playing with fire, risking the destabilization of our democracy, while knowing that California any gains you hope to make,” he wrote.We’re seeing a number of reactions from DC city leaders on the president’s move to deploy the National Guard to the city, and federal takeover of the Metropolitan police department (MPD).DC’s attorney general Brian Schwalb wrote in a post on X that “the administration’s actions are unprecedented, unnecessary, and unlawful”. He added that “Violent crime in DC reached historic 30-year lows last year, and is down another 26% so far this year”.Similarly, DC congressional delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton said that the president’s actions are “a counterproductive use of DC’s resources to use for his own purposes”.By contrast, the DC Police Union, which represents more than 3,000 officers in the MPD, said in statement that it “acknowledges and supports” Donald Trump’s decision to federalise the department. “The Union agrees that crime is spiraling out of control, and immediate action is necessary to restore public safety”. The statement did underscore that the measure should be temporary, with “the ultimate goal of empowering a fully staffed and supported MPD to protect our city effectively”.The US conference of mayors has issued a statement that pushes back against the administration’s deployment of DC national guard troops.
      Crime rates are plummeting in cities across the United States, including in Washington, D.C., as documented in the FBI’s national crime rate report released just last week…America’s mayors never see takeovers by other levels of government as a tactic that has any track record of producing results. Local control is always best.
      But the conference’s president, Republican David Holt, mayor of Oklahoma City, did add that “we do see great value in partnership between levels of government, and we can imagine value in such partnerships in our nation’s capital”, in his statement.A White House official confirms to the Guardian that the federal takeover of the DC Metropolitan police department is expected to be in effect for 30 days.The official added that this would be “subject to change” consistent with the taskforce’s operations.Section 740 of the DC Home Rule Act stipulates that this would be the maximum length for a federal takeover, before requiring a joint resolution in Congress to extend the 30-day limit.A trade truce between the US and China was set to expire on Tuesday, threatening an escalation of economic tensions between the world’s two largest economies.Chinese officials said they hoped the United States would strive for “positive” trade outcomes on Monday, as the 90-day detente reached between the two countries in May was due to expire.“We hope that the US will work with China to follow the important consensus reached during the phone call between the two heads of state … and strive for positive outcomes on the basis of equality, respect and mutual benefit,” a foreign ministry spokesman, Lin Jian, said in a statement.Chinese and US officials said they expected the pause to be extended after the most recent round of trade talks held last month in Stockholm. Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, said last week the US had “the makings” of a trade deal with China and that he was optimistic about a path forward.Donald Trump has yet to confirm any extension to the pause. “We’ll see what happens,” he told reporters on Monday. “They’ve been dealing quite nicely — the relationship is very good with President Xi and myself.”Failure to reach a deal would have major consequences. Trump had threatened tariffs on China as high as 245% with China threatening retaliatory tariffs of 125%, setting off a trade war between the world’s largest economies.The New York Times is reporting that the federal takeover of the Metropolitan Police Department is intended to last for 30 days, citing a White House official.Here is the full text of Donald Trump’s presidential memorandum “Restoring Law and Order in the District of Columbia”.
      Section 1. Background. As President of the United States and Commander in Chief of the District of Columbia National Guard, it is my solemn duty to protect law-abiding citizens from the destructive forces of criminal activity. That obligation applies with special force in our Nation’s capital, where, as Commander in Chief of the District of Columbia National Guard, I must also ensure that all citizens can avail themselves of the right to interact with their elected representatives, and that the Federal Government can properly function, without fear of being subjected to violent, menacing street crime.
      The local government of the District of Columbia has lost control of public order and safety in the city, as evidenced by the two embassy staffers who were murdered in May, the Congressional intern who was fatally shot a short distance from the White House in June, and the Administration staffer who was mercilessly beaten by a violent mob days ago. Citizens, tourists, and staff alike are unable to live peacefully in the Nation’s capital, which is under siege from violent crime. It is a point of national disgrace that Washington, D.C., has a violent crime rate that is higher than some of the most dangerous places in the world. It is my duty to our citizens and Federal workers to secure the safety and the peaceful functioning of our Nation, the Federal Government, and our city.
      Sec. 2. Mobilizing the District of Columbia National Guard. Pursuant to my authority under the Constitution and laws of the United States and the District of Columbia, I direct the Secretary of Defense to mobilize the District of Columbia National Guard and order members to active service, in such numbers as he deems necessary, to address the epidemic of crime in our Nation’s capital. The mobilization and duration of duty shall remain in effect until I determine that conditions of law and order have been restored in the District of Columbia. Further, I direct the Secretary of Defense to coordinate with State Governors and authorize the orders of any additional members of the National Guard to active service, as he deems necessary and appropriate, to augment this mission.
      Sec. 3. General Provisions. This memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
      DONALD J. TRUMP More

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      US judge hears if Trump team broke law during LA Ice protests

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      A federal judge in San Francisco on Monday began hearing evidence and arguments on whether the Trump administration violated federal law when it deployed national guard soldiers and US marines to Los Angeles after protests over immigration raids this summer.The Trump administration federalized California national guard members and sent them to the second-largest US city over the objections of the California governor, Gavin Newsom, and city leaders, after protests erupted on 7 June when Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) officers arrested people at multiple locations.California is asking Judge Charles Breyer to order the Trump administration to return control of the remaining troops to the state and to stop the federal government from using military troops in California “to execute or assist in the execution of federal law or any civilian law enforcement functions by any federal agent or officer”.“The factual question which the court must address is whether the military was used to enforce domestic law, and if so, whether there continues to be a threat that it could be done again,” Breyer said at the start of Monday’s court hearing.The 1878 Posse Comitatus Act prevents the president from using the military as a domestic police force. The case could set precedent for how Trump can deploy the guard in the future in California or other states.Trump’s decision to deploy the troops marked the first time in 60 years that a US president had taken such a step without a governor’s consent. Critics say that Trump’s actions in many ways reflect a strongman approach by a president who has continuously tread upon norms and has had a disregard for institutional limits.“This is the first, perhaps, of many,” Trump said in June of the deployment of national guardsmen in Los Angeles. “You know, if we didn’t attack this one very strongly, you’d have them all over the country, but I can inform the rest of the country, that when they do it, if they do it, they’re going to be met with equal or greater force.”Many of the troops have been withdrawn, but Rob Bonta, California’s attorney general, said on Sunday that 300 national guard troops remain in the state. The Trump administration last week extended the activation of troops in the LA area through 6 November, according to a court filing by Newsom.“The federal government deployed military troops to the streets of Los Angeles for the purposes of political theater and public intimidation,” Bonta said in a statement. “This dangerous move has no precedent in American history.”The hearing comes the same day Trump placed the DC Metropolitan police department under federal control and deployed the national guard by invoking section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act.The US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has said national guard units would take to the streets of DC over the coming week.The Department of Defense ordered the deployment of roughly 4,000 California national guard troops and 700 marines. Most of the troops have since left but 250 national guard members remain, according to the latest figures provided by the Pentagon. The remaining troops are at the Joint Forces training base in Los Alamitos, according to Newsom.Newsom won an early victory from Breyer, who found the Trump administration had violated the 10th amendment, which defines power between federal and state governments, and exceeded its authority.The Trump administration immediately filed an appeal arguing that courts cannot second guess the president’s decisions and secured a temporary halt from the appeals court, allowing control of the California national guard to stay in federal hands as the lawsuit continues to unfold.After their deployment, the soldiers accompanied federal immigration officers on immigration raids in Los Angeles and at two marijuana farm sites in Ventura county while marines mostly stood guard around a federal building in downtown Los Angeles that includes a detention center at the core of protests.The Trump administration argued the troops were needed to protect federal buildings and personnel in Los Angeles, which has been a battleground in the federal government’s aggressive immigration strategy. Since June, federal agents have rounded up immigrants without legal status to be in the US from Home Depots, car washes, bus stops and farms. Some US citizens have also been detained.Ernesto Santacruz Jr, the field office director for the Department of Homeland Security in Los Angeles, said in court documents that the troops were needed because local law enforcement had been slow to respond when a crowd gathered outside the federal building to protest against the 7 June immigration arrests.“The presence of the national guard and marines has played an essential role in protecting federal property and personnel from the violent mobs,” Santacruz said.After opposition from the Trump administration, Breyer issued an order allowing California’s attorneys to take Santacruz’s deposition. They also took a declaration from a military official on the national guard and marines role in Los Angeles.The Trump administration’s attorneys argued in court filings last week the case should be canceled because the claims under the Posse Comitatus Act “fail as a matter of law”. They argued that there is a law that gives the president the authority to call on the national guard to enforce US laws when federal law enforcement is not enough.Trump federalized members of the California national guard under Section 12406 of Title 10, which allows the president to call the national guard into federal service when the country “is invaded”, when “there is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government” or when the president is otherwise unable “to execute the laws of the United States”.Breyer found the protests in Los Angeles “fall far short of ‘rebellion”.“Next week’s trial is not cancelled,” he said in a ruling ordering the three-day, non-jury trial.During the month the protests took place, tensions heightened between Trump and Newsom. The California governor compared the president with failed dictators and Trump entertained the idea of having Newsom arrested. More

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      Judge rejects Trump administration request to unseal Ghislaine Maxwell grand jury transcripts

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      Dismissing it as little more than a “diversion,” a federal judge in New York has formally rejected the Trump-led US justice department’s request to release transcripts of pre-indictment, grand jury interviews with witnesses in the case of Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted sex trafficker and associate of Jeffrey Epstein.Judge Paul Engelmayer wrote that the transcripts could not be released publicly – “casually or promiscuously” – as Donald Trump’s government had pushed for because it would risk “unraveling the foundations of secrecy upon which the grand jury is premised”.Nonetheless, while Engelmayer said that releasing the transcripts would jeopardize the confidence of people called to testify before grand juries, he also made it a point to write that the transcripts were “redundant of the evidence at Maxwell’s trial”.Engelmayer also said that the government did not identify information of consequence in the record that was not already public in its request to release the Maxwell case’s grand jury testimony.That observation raises questions about whether the Trump administration meant to substantially address the bipartisan calls for transparency in Epstein’s case through its move for the transcripts’ release.And Engelmayer sought to answer those questions in his ruling.“A member of the public, appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials do not contribute anything to public knowledge, might conclude that the government’s motion for their unsealing was aimed not at ‘transparency’ but at diversion – aimed not at full disclosure but at the illusion of such,” he wrote.“Contrary to the government’s depiction, the Maxwell grand jury testimony is not a matter of significant historical or public interest,” he added. “Far from it. It consists of garden-variety summary testimony by two law enforcement agents.”Brad Edwards, a Florida lawyer who has represented nearly two dozen Epstein accusers, told the Associated Press that he did not disagree with the the Engelmayer’s ruling Monday.“Our only concern was that if materials were released, then maximum protection for the victims was essential,” he said. “The grand jury materials contain very little in the way of evidentiary value anyway.”Trump’s administration had requested the release of grand jury transcripts in July amid intense political heat around the investigation of Epstein – the late financier and convicted pedophile – and his co-conspirator Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence.Members of the president’s Republican party joined the calls for his administration to resolve questions about the scandal, some of which center on him.Maxwell recently was interviewed by the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, and soon after was moved from a prison in Florida to a lower security prison in Texas, prompting accusations that a cover-up of evidence linking Epstein to Trump was in progress.An attorney for Maxwell says she spoke truthfully to Blanche. The lead prosecutor in the 2022 case against Maxwell, Maurene Comey, was dismissed from the southern district of New York federal prosecutor’s office before the interview took place.The request to unseal the testimony has been seen as an incremental measure: the government has acknowledged they contain no testimony from witnesses who weren’t members of law enforcement.But thousands of other documents and electronic files are in the government’s possession. In early July, the US justice department and FBI released a memo stating they found no evidence of an Epstein “client list” or blackmail – and that no further materials would be released to protect victims.Yet the fight over Epstein-Maxwell grand jury testimony is not complete. A federal judge in Florida is looking at releasing transcripts from the grand jury testimony that led to an earlier federal indictment against Epstein – from 2006 – that was later shelved.To resolve that case, Epstein pleaded guilty to Florida state charges of soliciting minors and entered into a non-prosecution agreement to protect himself and four named others from future prosecution. Maxwell has appealed her conviction to the US supreme court, claiming she should have been shielded under that earlier agreement.But a number of avenues remain open. The Republican-led House oversight committee has subpoenaed the justice department and issued subpoenas to Bill Clinton, ex-secretary of state and Hillary Clinton – whom Trump defeated in 2016 to secure his first presidency – and eight former top law enforcement officials to appear before the committee in the fall. More

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      John Oliver on Ice’s crackdown: ‘Trying to drive up arrests at all costs’

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      John Oliver took a hard look at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) on the latest Last Week Tonight, as more and more videos of Ice raids across US cities continue to show a brutal crackdown on undocumented people. “For all the administration’s talk of targeting dangerous criminals, the reality is very different,” Oliver started.The Trump administration has set a goal of deporting one million people a year, “which, it’s worth noting, would be more than double the previous record of 400,000 when Obama was president, which was already very high”, said Oliver. “But notably, they don’t seem to be getting near their target numbers.” As of taping, the administration had deported about 280,000 people, “so getting to a million in just six months seems very unlikely”.“And they have backed themselves into this corner, because ‘promising’ to deport a million criminal migrants is one thing, but once you’re in charge, you then have to find that many of them,” he continued, “which is going to be hard if they don’t exist in the numbers that you’re claiming, which they don’t.“It’s like promising to apprehend 10,000 Fred Dursts a day,” he added. “There just aren’t that many out there, so either you have to admit that your target number was bullshit in the first place or you have to drastically widen your definition of what a Fred Durst is until you’re eventually arresting any gen X-er wearing a hat.“But instead of conceding their numbers were inflated, the administration is trying to drive up arrests at all costs.” The Trump aide Stephen Miller has instructed Ice agents to target Home Depots and 7-Elevens, and the agency has rapidly deputized a record number of local police to function as deportation agents. They have brought in border patrol as well as the national guard; at least a quarter of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s workforce; 80% of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and even members of the US Postal Service.“This mass reallocation of resources means that other crimes are going less policed,” Oliver explained. The FBI, for example, has instructed agents to prioritize immigration enforcement at the expense of white-collar crime and investigations into sexual abuse.“I gotta say: for a guy who pandered so heavily to people convinced pedophiles, sex offenders and traffickers had infiltrated our government, Trump’s sure making the government a lot friendlier to them,” said Oliver. “Ghislaine Maxwell’s in a nicer cell now, Lawrence Taylor’s advising on kids’ physical fitness. Fuck it, at this point, if he’s willing to wear a Maga hat, I really don’t see why Roman Polanski can’t come back.”Nevertheless, “border czar” Tom Homan claimed that 70% of those arrested by Ice were criminals, while the other 30% were national security threats who “don’t have a criminal history because they try to lay low until it’s time for them to do things bad”.“Under his logic, I guess anyone could be a national security threat,” said Oliver. But “Homan’s numbers are also nowhere near Ice’s own data,” which found that only 40% of those arrested had any criminal history, including traffic infractions, and just 7% were convicted of any sort of violent crime. In fact, as of June, people with only civil or immigration violations – no criminal convictions – made up the largest percentage of arrests nationwide. “Maybe the clearest sign that this is more about pushing up numbers than catching violent criminals on the run is that one of the key places where they’re now fishing for arrests is immigration court, where people show up for their hearings,” he added.As numerous videos showed, Ice agents arrested people who showed up to process their situation legally, using a loophole that allows the government to deport people without due process if their immigration case is dismissed. “It is the laziest possible way to juice up your numbers,” said Oliver, “because you’re targeting people who are going through the system ‘in the right way’ and turning them into people you can immediately arrest and deport.”This trap was among “things the administration is doing that sure feel like they’re breaking the law” but “often aren’t”. Oliver took the “dystopian visual” of Ice agents wearing masks, which is actually legal, as no federal law prevents it. “So they can do it, but why are they?” The administration claims that it’s for their own protection, with the homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, including videotaping arrests as an act of “violence” against agents.All of this “gets even more worrying” when one remembers that Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act contains a huge surge of funding for immigration enforcement – roughly $170bn over the next few years, some of which is set aside for the hiring of 10,000 new Ice agents. “For what it’s worth, massive rapid hiring sprees never tend to work out well,” Oliver noted. Past efforts to bolster Customs and Border Protection under George Bush ended up with hiring drug cartel members and an actual serial killer. “And it’s not a great sign for who Ice is appealing to that they’re currently posting gross recruitment ads, like this fake minivan ad tagged: ‘Think about how many criminal illegal aliens you could fit in this bad boy!’” he added. “And they seem more than a little desperate already, as they’ve already removed age limits for hiring agents.”And this past week, Ice shared a video of their newest recruit: former Superman actor Dean Cain. “You know, there’s an old saying in Hollywood: ‘If all you can get is Dean Cain, you are fucked,’” Oliver joked.“Now, I’m not saying that Ice isn’t finding people,” he continued. “I’m just saying, when you are reduced to pinning a badge on the 59-year-old star of The Dog Who Saved Christmas, The Dog Who Saved Christmas Vacation, The Dog Who Saved the Holidays, The Dog Who Saved Halloween, The Dog Who Saved Easter and The Dog Who Saved Summer, maybe you are in trouble. Although, on the plus side, no need for that guy to wear a mask because the chances of anyone recognizing him are fucking zero.”So what can be done? “As powerless as this can feel, as individuals there are still actions you can take,” said Oliver, such as recording any arrest you witness involving Ice agents. Oliver also advised that if you’re approached by Ice agents, whether or not you’re a citizen, “attorneys told us the only two things you should say to them are: ‘Am I free to leave?’ And: ‘I want to speak to a lawyer.’ That’s it. You have the right to remain silent. And I recognize that in some cases you may be unable to help yourself from saying: ‘Didn’t you used to be Superman?’ ‘I thought you died.’ ‘I can’t believe I’m meeting a film-maker.’ But that really is it.”“We are still in a very grim moment,” he added. “The rightwing narrative is that most people are rabid to punish anyone who wants to become new Americans. But that is just not true,” as new polls found 80% support a pathway to legal citizenship for undocumented immigrants. “Nor are their bullshit claims about who’s being targeted and arrested.“And I’m not saying that everything Ice is doing right now is illegal,” he concluded. “What I’m saying is, a whole bunch of it feels like it really should be. And we need to change that at our earliest opportunity.” More

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      in US Politics

      Ohio requires buses for private school kids. Public school students have to find their own ride

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      For about 2,000 students attending high school in Dayton, Ohio, there won’t be a bus in sight when they walk out the door for the beginning of the school year this week.Ruben Castillo, an 11th grade student at Meadowdale Career Technology Center, is one of them.Ohio law means that public school districts such as Dayton’s are responsible for transporting students who attend private and charter schools. When they fail to do so, they risk fines of millions of dollars.A shortage of drivers and buses combined with the threat of fines, means that public school districts in Dayton and around Ohio find themselves relegating their own students to the back of the transportation line.“I’m going to have to use Uber, and it’s going to cost me $25-$30 a day to get to and from school,” says Castillo. “In wintertime, when demand is higher, it’s probably going to be more.” At 180 school days over the course of a year, that’s thousands of dollars he is set to fork out from his own pocket.For the past several years, school administrators in Dayton, Cincinnati and elsewhere have been trying to get around the problem by issuing students with bus passes for public transportation.But children riding public buses have reported being subjected to a variety of dangers. Public transportation administrators have also reported difficulties trying to serve the public and thousands of students all at once.The situation came to a tragic head on the morning of 4 April when 18-year-old Alfred Hale III was shot dead at the public bus hub in downtown Dayton while en route to class at Dunbar high school. Shortly after Hale’s killing, Ohio lawmakers introduced a law making it illegal for Dayton public schools (DPS) to buy public bus vouchers for students.The burden of getting children to school now falls on students’ parents, grandparents, local churches and charities, say officials. Families who choose to continue to have their students use public buses to get to and from school will have to fork out at least $540 per high school student a year.“There seems to be an aggressive approach to the most vulnerable families and people in America,” says DPS’s superintendent, David Lawrence.“Not only is it unfair, it’s onerous that public schools have to provide transportation to non-public school students.”What’s happening in Ohio is a result of a wider effort by conservative politicians to push for more children to attend charter and private schools, many of which are run by religious organizations.Republican politicians hold a supermajority across Ohio’s legislature and have built up a $1bn fund in the form of vouchers for families who want to send their students to private and charter schools.Ohio is not alone.Republican-dominated state legislatures have been pushing for or have already enacted laws that see billions of dollars of taxpayer money directed to funding private school voucher systems in Texas, Florida, Iowa, Tennessee and elsewhere.In Pennsylvania and Minnesota, where political control is largely split between Democrats and Republicans, public schools are required to provide transportation for students attending non-public schools. In January, Donald Trump signed an executive order steering taxpayer funds from public schools to private schools.Many in Democratic-leaning cities say they are being targeted.In Cincinnati, children as young as 13 are being forced to use public transportation to get to and from school due to funding shortages that this year will see more than 100 yellow bus routes cut.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn Columbus, where more than half of all students are African American, the public school system is required to bus students of 162 private and charter schools.About 1.8 million, or 80%, of all school-going students in Ohio attend public schools and nearly two-thirds of students attending Dayton public schools are African American. In July, the state passed a budget that saw the smallest increase in spending on K-12 public education in more than a decade.“It’s simple – if we did not have to bus non-public school students on our transportation, we could transport every single one of our K-12 students on yellow buses,” says Jocelyn Rhynard, a member of the Dayton public school board. DPS transports between 4,000 and 5,000 charter and private school students every school day.“It’s a direct result of the legislation from the extremist Republicans at the Ohio statehouse mandating that we must transport non-public students as well as public students in our district.”But Republican politicians disagree.“We had an 18-year-old get shot and killed. The environment for the students is not good down there. The NAACP interviewed the children, they don’t want to ride the public transportation buses, they want to ride the yellow school buses,” says Phil Plummer, a Republican party state representative who spearheaded the budget amendment banning DPS from giving its students public bus vouchers.Plummer says he and others “found 25 school buses” that DPS could purchase. “They decided not to transport their kids,” he says.DPS administrators, who pay drivers the highest rates in the region, say about 70 buses would be required to meet the need, a number that could take up to two years to procure. Lawrence says the process of buying buses and training drivers is not simple.“It’s an 18-month cycle. [Buses] are $150,000 to $190,000 each to buy, and ones with backup cameras and air conditioning are [even] more expensive. Then drivers have to take at least 10 tests before they become fully qualified,” he says.With the law coming into effect just months before the new school year, parents, students and public school managers have been left in a difficult situation.“I’m a single dad raising two kids on my own. We all have to be at school at the same time. That’s a big dilemma,” says William Johnson, an educator at DPS whose daughter is no longer able to get to school using a bus provided by or paid for the district.“I’m lucky that my 80-year-old father is going to help out taking them to school. But I ask the state [politicians] – please come up with a solution. We’re going to lose a whole generation of kids if this continues.” More