Trump news: President praises ‘great people’ shouting ‘white power’ as Pelosi brands his alleged inaction over Russia-Taliban reports ‘as bad as it gets’
Lindsey Graham joins president on golf course as officials take aim at reported Russian plot to kill US troops
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Donald Trump has praised “great people” in footage he shared of furious protesters clashing over his presidency outside a Florida retirement home, in which one apparent supporter repeatedly shouts “white power” from a golf buggy.
The only black Republican senator Tim Scott urged him to remove the “indefensible” footage, which he later did. The White House claimed he did not hear the racist chant.
A White House spokesperson claimed that the president "did not hear the one statement made on the video" and that "what he did see was tremendous enthusiasm from his many supporters."
While the president was on the golf course for a second consecutive day, this time with Senator Lindsey Graham, the administration faced intense scrutiny over allegations that it was warned about Russian bounties placed on US troops in Afghanistan in an alleged secret deal between Russian intelligence services and Taliban militias. The White House was warned by intelligence officials as early as January about the threat, according to reports.
Joe Biden accused the president of betraying “the most sacred duty we bear as a nation” after reports suggested he had been briefed months ago yet did “worse than nothing” in response. Mr Trump denied having been briefed or "told about" the reports, crying “fake news”, while the Kremlin dismissed the allegations as “nonsense”.
The president's former national security adviser John Bolton said the allegations are among "the most serious matters that has arisen in the Trump administration" and was "puzzled" by the president's apparent inaction and denial, as he pivoted to attacks on his Democratic opponent.
"What would motivate the president to do that?" Mr Bolton told CNN. "Because it looks bad if Russians are paying to kill Americans and we're not doing anything about it. So what is the presidential reaction? It's to say 'it's not my responsibility, nobody told me about it.' And therefore to duck any complaints that he hasn't acted effectively."
While the president Covid-19 infections soared by more than 40,000 for the third consecutive day.
Vice president Mike Pence has been forced to call off upcoming campaign events in Florida and Arizona amid coronavirus spikes in the Republican-governed states, which have pushed to abandon lockdowns in order to restart the economy. But he appeared at a Texas megachurch on Sunday to announced that "each day we are one day closer to putting this pandemic in the past" despite climbing case rates.
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No need for all-encompassing UK-US trade deal, Trump Cabinet member says
Asked by the BBC whether, in his opinion, a UK-US trade deal should have to cover every single sector all at once, US Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson said: "I don't see any reason that it does.
"There are areas where president Trump and prime minister Johnson have a lot of agreement and there are some areas where there needs to be further discussion.
"I don't see why you can't work on the areas where you have agreement, get that done, with an eye to solving the other problems subsequently," he said, adding that he was not in charge of the negotiations.
On the prospect of an EU travel ban for Americans due to the US's high coronavirus infection levels, Mr Carson said: "I think they have to do what they have to do. I'm very hopeful that we can get people to really listen and to pay attention.
"I get the impression that in some other parts of the world, people have been very serious about the social distancing, about the wearing of masks, and about the sanitation, and we just have to become that serious again.
"We did it once and then I think people were cooped up for such a long time they just said 'Oh it's over. Life is good' but of course it's not. You really do have to exercise some discipline."
Sacha Baron Cohen 'dupes far-right militia' into singing along with racist performance
A figure who many believe was the satirist turned up at an Olympia rally of the Washington 3% militia, having reportedly disguised himself as a PAC leader wishing to sponsor the event, booking in as a last-minute performer and bringing his own security.
The security then reportedly stopped organisers from stopping the figure singing a lengthy song about chopping up journalists, the WHO and Fauci "like the Saudis do", injecting them with the "Wuhan flu", or "nuke[ing Chinese people] up like in World War II", which prompted singalongs and cheers from the crowd.
“He came on stage disguised as the lead singer of the last band, singing a bunch of racist, hateful, disgusting shit,” Yelm City Councilman James Blair wrote on Facebook. “His security blocked event organisers from getting him off the stage, or pulling power from the generator.”
He added: “After the crowd realised what he was saying, and turned on him, his security then rushed the stage and evacuated them to a waiting private ambulance that was contracted to be their escape transport.”
Footage on social media shows the crowd singing along and cheering for several minutes.
Princeton to remove former president Woodrow Wilson’s name from international affairs school
The board of trustees decided that Wilson’s “racist thinking and policies make him an inappropriate namesake for a school or college whose scholars, students, and alumni must stand firmly against racism in all its forms”, Christopher Eisgruber said in a statement.
The university will also retire the name of Wilson College, a move that was already in the works, but will now be accelerated, Oliver O'Connell reports.
Two new residential colleges are currently under construction and the new name will be First College in recognition of its history as the first residential college at the university.
“Wilson’s racism was significant and consequential even by the standards of his own time,” said Mr Eisgruber. “He segregated the federal civil service after it had been racially integrated for decades, thereby taking America backward in its pursuit of justice.
“He not only acquiesced in but added to the persistent practice of racism in this country, a practice that continues to do harm today.”
A previous petition to remove Wilson’s names was considered in November 2015. This led to the formation of the Wilson Legacy Review Committee, which conducted a thorough, deliberative review.
Here's the Russian foreign ministry's response to reports that its secret services struck secret deals with Taliban-backed militias to target US troops.
"This unsophisticated plant clearly illustrates the low intellectual abilities of the propagandists of American intelligence, who instead of inventing something more plausible have to make up this nonsense," it said.
Meanwhile, the White House denied that Donald Trump had been briefed, but did not deny the validity of the reports of Russian bounties.
"This does not speak to the merit of the alleged intelligence but to the inaccuracy of the New York Times story erroneously suggesting that President Trump was briefed on this matter," press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a statement.
Expiring UN weapons embargo on Iran must remain in place, US diplomat urges
A United Nations weapons embargo on Iran due to expire in October must remain in place to prevent it from "becoming the arms dealer of choice for rogue regimes and terrorist organisations around the world," the US special representative to Iran has said.
Brian Hook told The Associated Press that the world should ignore Iran's threats to retaliate if the arms embargo is extended, calling it a "mafia tactic." It is reported that Iran could expel international inspectors monitoring Iran's nuclear programme in response, deepening a crisis created by Donald Trump unilaterally withdrawing from Tehran's 2015 atomic accord with global powers.
The UN arms embargo so far has stopped Iran from purchasing fighter jets, tanks, warships and other weaponry, but has failed to halt its smuggling of weapons into war zones. Despite that, Mr Hook argued both an import and export ban on Tehran must remain in place to secure the wider Mideast.
"If we let it expire, you can be certain that what Iran has been doing in the dark, it will do in broad daylight and then some," Mr Hook said.
Iran's mission to the UN did not immediately respond to an AP request for comment on Hook's remarks.
AP
US Cabinet member indicates misgivings with Trump's response to George Floyd protests
Asked by Andrew Marr if he is happy with how Donald Trump has dealt with the crisis on the streets of America, the only black member of the US Cabinet replied: "It's an area of ongoing discussion and ongoing activity in an effort to resolve and come to a better place."
Ben Carson added: "I think we're all making progress. I don't know that I would be completely happy with the way anybody is handling any aspect of it, but working together, we'll get there."
On the Black Lives Matter movement, Mr Carson told the BBC: "I would much rather see the focus on places like Chicago, you know, where we frequently have a dozen or two dozen black lives snuffed out in one weekend, and nobody seems to care. That bothers me quite a bit."
Asked if his comment about people not caring is because it is "black people killing black people", he replied: "I don't know exactly why no-one cares. I care a lot about it. It seems to me that it doesn't really matter, you know, who's committing the crime, we're losing a lot of precious lives and that's what we need to be concerned about."
He added: "Having grown up in Detroit and in Boston, where there was a lot of racial prejudice, I can tell you categorically that it is much better now than it was then.
"People who say things haven't changed are not being realistic at all, but that doesn't mean that we don't need to make more progress.
"But we also need to recognise that, you know, there are rogue policemen, there are rogue doctors, there are rogue politicians, there are even rogue reporters, and it doesn't mean that the whole profession is rotten and needs to be changed.
"It means you need to put in place those kinds of safeguards to make sure that you weed out those rogue individuals."
Biden presidency a 'scary proposition', Trump-allied economist says
“We have to make the case to the American people that this isn’t just about Donald Trump," right-wing economist Stephen Moore said on billionaire John Catsimatidis’s radio show. It’s also about what you get if you vote against Donald Trump. And that is a scary proposition."
Mr Moore said Biden will bring a “very left-wing economic agenda” if elected, Mr Moore said - a claim most left-wing Democrats would surely challenge - adding: “If Biden were to win the election, your voting not just for Joe Biden, but for a very left-wing economic agenda that would potentially do serious harm."
Acknowledging Mr Trump's low polling in several key swing states this week, the Trumponomics author asserted: “I still think Trump is going to win."
Democratic senators express hope for winning Senate amid low polling for Trump
Senator Chris Murphy told The Hill that he feels “better than I have in the last year and a half” about the party’s chances of re-taking the Senate.
“The playing field is getting bigger, Trump’s numbers continue to be in free fall, our candidates are outraising Republican incumbents everywhere. I don’t know that we could be better in a position than we are today,” he said.
Asked about his party's chances, senator Tim Kaine replied: “I feel good about them, I do. I mean certainly better than a year ago", adding that while the months prior to November would be full of “twists and turns ... if the elections were today I would feel ... good.”
Trump says nobody briefed him on alleged Russian bounties on US troops in Afghanistan
Donald Trump has issued an early morning rebuttal to the explosive New York Times reports suggesting he had failed to take action in the months after being briefed on alleged Russian incentives to Taliban militia for targeting US soldiers in Afghanistan.
Four US soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan in 2020, The Times reported. Several others have been wounded.
Biden campaign is 35% people of colour and 53% women, new data shows
Here's more detail on the new demographics figures released by Joe Biden's campaign after months of pressure to release them.
Aimee Allison, the founder of She the People, a group that promotes women of colour in politics, gave a lukewarm response, saying: "That’s not terrible."
“I’d love to see a staff that reflects the base,” she said, adding that the Biden campaign will be “more successful having a set of top advisers who relate to and can connect with the very communities they are dependent on to win”.
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