Trump news: Public impeachment hearings set to begin within weeks, as president travels to Mississippi for rally
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The House impeachment inquiry is zeroing in on two White House lawyers who allegedly played a role in the moving of a memo of Donald Trump’s controversial phone call with the leader of Ukraine to a highly-restricted computer system.
Investigators are seeking further details from John Eisenberg and Michael Ellis after two witnesses suggested officials took extraordinary steps to shield access to the memo.
Meanwhile, Mr Trump has announced he will be moving his permanent residence to Florida after leaving office, complaining that he has been “treated very badly” by political leaders in New York.
In response, New York governor Andrew Cuomo said: “Good riddance. It's not like Donald Trump paid taxes here anyway…”
In New York, The Independent visited Trump Tower, took a stroll through Central Park, and visited other hotspots in the city to find out if anyone was offended that Mr Trump had moved his permanent residence — and got a resounding, metaphorical shrug.
We also learned on Friday that a key Ukrainian official who was on the 25 July phone call with between Mr Trump and the Ukrainian president had been told not to discuss the call with anyone, after he raised concerns.
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It’s a good thing that the president doesn’t have to organise his own travel because Mr Trump seems to have forgotten where he is campaigning tonight.
The president has a rally in Mississippi tonight but in a since-deleted tweet, he accidentally announced that he would be having a big rally in Louisiana instead.
Luckily, CNN’s Daniel Dale got a screenshot of it.
The Washington Nationals, the 2019 World Series champions, will be welcomed to the White House by Mr Trump on Monday.
That meeting could be awkward as Nationals fans loudly booed the president when he made an appearance at the Washington baseball park on Sunday night.
For anyone who's forgotten, this is what happened during Mr Trump's appearance on Sunday.
In more serious news - The Trump administration will look “very carefully” at the planned merger between Fiat Chrysler and Peugeot owner PSA, according to White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow.
The deal, which was announced on Thursday, would create the world’s fourth-largest auto maker.
Mr Kudlow told Bloomberg:
“We will obviously look at it very, very carefully. The president has not commented on the deal... We're not afraid of doing business with international companies, Lord knows.”
Joe Biden’s campaign have gone on the offensive against Elizabeth Warren’s Medicare for All plan – an issue that is set to be one of the big policy battles of the 2020 Democratic primary.
Despite Ms Warren’s insistence that her plan would not raise taxes on the middle class, Mr Biden’s team is claiming it would place a new tax of “nearly $9 trillion” on American workers.
The Biden campaign has also dismissed the proposal as “unrealistic”.
Here’s a weird incident from last night…
When Don Young, a Republican representative for Alaska, was pressured by activists to answer a question about Mr Trump’s conduct with Ukraine, he came up with an unusual answer – he headbutted the camera.
Words don’t really do it justice, so you can watch the interaction below:
The World Trade Organisation has said China can impose sanctions on up to $3.6bn worth of US goods, AP reports.
The ruling is due to the US government’s failure to abide by anti-dumping rules with regard to Chinese products.
Although the decision is a new development in the US-China trade war, it originated before Mr Trump came to office – beginning with a Chinese complaint filed nearly six years ago seeking over $7bn in retaliation.
Tom Vilsack, the former Democratic governor of Iowa, has called Ms Warren’s Medicare for All plan “unrealistic” because it claims taxes on wealthy Americans can fund the healthcare system.
Mr Vilsack, who led the influential state for eight years, said: “One sliver of society isn't going to pay for the rest of us.”
The former governor has not endorsed a Democratic presidential candidate but Ms Warren has been leading in Iowa in recent polls.
He also cast doubt on support in the Senate for the plan, suggesting Ms Warren had not considered “the practical application of getting 60 people in the Senate who are going to vote for this.”
BREAKING: House speaker Nancy Pelosi has told Bloomberg that she expects the impeachment inquiry to begin public hearings this month.
She added that any case for impeaching Mr Trump “has to be ironclad”
Some interesting US Border Patrol apprehension numbers right here:
On the 2020 campaign trail, at least one state is taking election security into their own hands.
Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf, a Democrat, signed a law allocating $90 million to replace outdated and non-secure voting machines before 2020. The new law also marks a change in the voting system by cutting the deadline to register form 30 days before the election to 15. The period allowed for mail-in voting has also been expanded.
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