DC national guard will start deploying on streets of Washington DC, says White House – as it happened

The US government’s gross national debt has climbed past $37tn, a record milestone that points to the rapid growth of federal borrowing and the mounting cost burden for taxpayers.

According to the treasury department’s latest report, released today, the debt reached this level years earlier than expected. In January 2020, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that gross federal debt would not top $37tn until after fiscal year 2030.

The faster-than-anticipated increase stems largely from the economic fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic, which shut down much of the country’s economy. In response, the federal government took on massive borrowing to stabilize the economy and aid recovery efforts.

The treasury department’s report comes just weeks after the CBO estimated that Trump’s new tax bill will add $3.4tn to the national debt over the next decade.

Reuters is reporting that the Trump administration’s flagship Golden Dome missile defense system will include four layers – one satellite-based and three on land – with 11 short-range batteries located across the continental US, Alaska and Hawaii.

A US government slide presentation on the project showed slides tagged “Go Fast, Think Big!”. They were presented to 3,000 defense contractors in Huntsville, Alabama, last week and reveal the unprecedented complexity of the system, which faces an ambitious 2028 deadline set by Donald Trump.

The system is estimated to cost $175bn, but the slides show uncertainties still loom over the basic architecture of the project because the number of launchers, interceptors, ground stations, and missile sites needed for the system has yet to be determined.

“They have a lot of money, but they don’t have a target of what it costs yet,” a US official told the news wire.

So far Congress has appropriated $25bn for Golden Dome in Trump’s tax-and-spend bill passed in July. Another $45.3bn is earmarked for Golden Dome in his 2026 presidential budget request.

California governor Gavin Newsom kept taking a jab at President Donald Trump on X today, announcing a “BIG PRESS CONFERENCE” this week with “POWERFUL DEMS AND GAVIN NEWSOM” as the ongoing redistricting battle between Democratic and Republican states ensues.

“DONALD ‘TACO’ TRUMP, AS MANY CALL HIM, ‘MISSED’ THE DEADLINE!!!”, Newsom’s office wrote on X. “CALIFORNIA WILL NOW DRAW NEW, MORE ‘BEAUTIFUL MAPS,’ THEY WILL BE HISTORIC AS THEY WILL END THE TRUMP PRESIDENCY (DEMS TAKE BACK THE HOUSE!)”.

“BIG PRESS CONFERENCE THIS WEEK WITH POWERFUL DEMS AND GAVIN NEWSOM — YOUR FAVORITE GOVERNOR — THAT WILL BE DEVASTATING FOR ‘MAGA.’ THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER! — GN,” reads the post on the social media platform.

The post follows a series of snarky, all-caps tweets meant to mimic Trump’s social media style.

Newsom was mocking Trump’s moniker, “TACO”, short for “Trump Always Chickens Out”, prompted by his flip-flopping deadlines.

Following the increase in tariffs by the US on Brazilian imports (from 10% to 50% earlier this month), Brazil’s president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva announced that his government will provide 30 billion reais ($5.55bn) in credit to support exporters affected by the steeper levies.

In an interview with local news outlet BandNews, Lula said this initial package will also include support through government purchases.

Some Brazilian products, including orange juice and aircraft, were exempted from the recent US tariff increase.

This boost comes as Lula has remained in the public eye for his fierce criticism of Donald Trump’s tariffs, which the Brazilian president sees as a political move interfering with Brazil’s sovereignty, especially since the tariffs are linked to ongoing legal proceedings against former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, often described as the “Trump of the tropics”.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation confirmed today that the man who opened fire at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters last week, killing a police officer, died by suicide.

The shooter “died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound”, the bureau’s director, Chris Hosey, said at a news conference today.

“Evidence in this event indicates that the shooter had recently verbalized thoughts of suicide, which even led to law enforcement being contacted several weeks prior to the incident,” Hosey said.

The shooter has been identified by authorities as 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White. He had blamed the Covid-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal, which has led the union representing CDC employees to demand that the federal government condemn vaccine misinformation.

The Trump administration sanctioned an armed group accused of illegally trading minerals in eastern Congo, as Washington seeks to lead peace efforts in the region while securing US access to its mineral resources.

A senior US government official told the AP that the state and treasury departments are targeting the Codeco armed group, which controlled the key coltan mining site of Rubaya from 2022 until early 2024.

“During this period, Codeco generated revenue by overseeing mining operations, collecting illegal fees and taxes for miners and engaging in mineral smuggling. It also imposed forced labor and executed civilians in mining areas under its control,” the official said.

The sanctions also target the Congolese mining company CDMC, accused of selling minerals sourced and smuggled from mines near Rubaya, as well as two Hong Kong exporters, East Rise and Star Dragon, that purchased minerals from the area.

Mexico has transferred a group of imprisoned cartel members to the United States, amid growing pressure from the Trump administration to dismantle the country’s powerful drug organizations, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The group, sent on Tuesday, was roughly the same size as the 29 prisoners transferred in February.

WSJ reports:

The group sent Tuesday included members of top criminal organizations facing drug charges in the US who are being sent to locations including Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia, San Diego and New York, one of the people said.

Terry Cole, the Drug Enforcement Administration chief overseeing the federal takeover of DC police, said in an interview that, starting tonight, federal agents will be “embedded with the Metropolitan police department”.

“You will see federal agents working hand in hand on patrol with the Metropolitan Police Department, you will also see an increase of activity, patrol activity in certain sectors to go after the violent criminal offenders that are the drivers of this crime,” Cole said in an interview with Fox News.

Earlier today, Texas Senate Democrats staged a walkout in protest of the chamber’s proposed congressional redistricting map, which was moving forward to the Texas House.

Despite the senators’ absence, the Republican-controlled Senate approved the map in a 19-2 vote. But it cannot win final approval while the quorum is broken. Texas House Democrats have been out of state for weeks to block Republican lawmakers from conducting business.

Senate Democrats are challenging governor Greg Abbott’s decision to prioritize redistricting over urgent flood relief for the state’s affected communities.

“This special session is about one thing: flood relief,” said Texas state senator Roland Gutierrez. “Greg Abbott tried to sneak in a rigged mid-decade redistricting beneath voters’ noses. Let’s be clear, the governor can provide this relief anytime he wants. But Abbott is holding it hostage so that he has an excuse to do Trump’s bidding.”

“Texas has a long tradition of independence. But when Donald Trump tells Greg Abbott to roll over and fetch him five seats, he does it like a good lapdog,” Gutierrez added. “This governor has failed to uphold Texas values, defend the people of Texas, or make the lives of its citizens better in any meaningful way.”

Democratic senators Judith Zaffirini and Chuy Hinojosa did not participate in today’s walkout and stayed in the chamber, according to the Dallas Morning News.

Democratic representative Adam Smith, of the state of Washington, said it is “pretty clear” President Trump “wants his own domestic police force” after the president seized control of DC’s Metropolitan police department.

“Look, this president is trampling on basic freedoms of the American people to a degree we, I don’t think we’ve ever seen,” Smith said on CNN. “You see that with what the ICE agents are doing, in terms of picking people up off the streets with no evidence, no due process, locking people up.”

“This is happening all across the country,” Smith added. “Look, it’s pretty clear the president wants his own domestic police force, and step by step, he’s trying to create it, and we should be deeply alarmed by that, regardless of how you feel about crime in Washington DC, or any other city.”

Just a quick post here to sum up the latest analysis from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which breaks down the financial impact of Donald Trump’s domestic policy bill that became law last month.

The topline: the CBO estimates that the poorest 10% of Americans can expect to lose around $1200 per year due to the restrictions and cut backs in the legislation – namely when it comes to Medicaid and Snap benefits. By contrast, the richest 10% of Americans can expect to gain around $13,600 each year, due to the extension of the president’s 2017 tax cuts.

In response to Congressional Democratic leadership’s request for analysis on the distribution of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a letter from the CBO’s director noted that while, on average, American households can expect to see an increase in resources, this will not be evenly distributed.

He writes:

Resources will decrease for households toward the bottom of the income distribution, whereas resources will increase for households in the middle and toward the top of the income distribution.

The Trump administration is evidently extending its control of cultural representation at the Smithsonian, the world’s largest museum and research complex.

In a letter obtained by the Wall Street Journal, the White House told the Smithsonian that it plans a wide review of exhibitions, materials and operations ahead of the US’s 250th anniversary celebrations in 2026.

The letter to Lonnie Bunch, the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, from Trump administration officials said the White House wants the museums’ program to reflect “unity, progress, and enduring values that define the American story” in keeping with an executive order issued in March that ordered the elimination of “improper, divisive or anti-American ideology” from the Smithsonian and its museums.

Donald Trump’s order from March, titled Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History, said the president “aims to ensure that the Smithsonian is an institution that sparks children’s imagination, celebrates American history and ingenuity, serves as a symbol to the world of American greatness, and makes America proud”.

But Monday’s letter to the institution, according to the Journal, places the institution under curatorial scrutiny ranging from public-facing exhibition text and online content to internal curatorial processes, exhibition planning, the use of collections and artist grants.

The White House heralded today’s Consumer Price Index report as an clear picture of inflation remaining stable.

But another notable exchange in the press briefing was a reporter’s question about why the public should trust the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ inflation data report, given the administration undermining the jobs data released earlier this month. This led to the firing of former commissioner Erika McEntarfer, and yesterday’s announcement that the president is nominating EJ Antoni, chief economist at the conservative Heritage Foundation, to replace her. Antoni is a longtime critic of the BLS.

“The jobs data has had massive revisions,” Leavitt said, referring to the routine practice of issuing revisions to provide a more accurate picture of data. “We want to ensure that all of the data, the inflation data, the jobs data, any data point that is coming out of the BLS, is trustworthy and is accurate”.

When asked in today’s press briefing, the White House offered little clarity on administration’s view of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Gaza City takeover.

This is, of course, an incredibly complex and complicated situation. The administration has made our goal clear. We want to see this conflict end. We want to see the hostages released…the President and his national security team has given extensive effort and time in doing that.

Leavitt is talking about the perception of crime in Washington DC. She is referring to polling that shows an increase in residents feeling that crime is a serious problem in the city.

However, violent crime is on the decline at the moment, and reached a 30-year low last year.

Soon, we can expect the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt to hold a briefing. We’ll bring you the latest as that gets going.

Per my last post, in the letter sent to university George Washington University president Ellen Granberg today, assistant attorney general Harmeet Dhillon said the justice department found members of the university community engaged in “antisemitic, disruptive protests”, including by establishing an encampment at University Yard.

Dhillon said these efforts were meant to “frighten, intimidate, and deny” Jewish, Israeli, and American Israeli students access to the university environment.

“The Department finds that despite actual notice of the abuses occurring on its campus, GWU was deliberately indifferent to the complaints it received, the misconduct that occurred, and the harms that were suffered,” Dhillon’s letter said.

Dhillon said the justice department intends to proceed with enforcement, but is offering the university the opportunity to resolve the matter through a voluntary resolution agreement. The university has until 22 August to indicate whether it has “interest in such a dialogue”, according to the letter.

GWU is the latest university to be targeted by the Trump administration, which has threatened to cut federal funds for universities over pro-Palestinian protests as the US continues to defend its ally Israel’s military assault in Gaza.

Protesters, including some Jewish groups, say the Trump administration wrongly equates their criticism of Israel’s military assault in Gaza and its occupation of Palestinian territories with antisemitism, and advocacy for Palestinian rights with support for extremism.

We’re getting an update that Stephen Miran – Donald Trump’s nomination for the vacant seat on the Federal Reserve board – arrived at the White House. It also looks like he appeared on CNBC as short while ago.

This comes as the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the latest Consumer Price Index report earlier today. In Miran’s interview he said that there “continues to be no evidence whatsoever of tariff-induced inflation”.

The latest numbers show that core inflation, which excludes the volatile energy and food industries, went up 3.1% over the last month – a higher pace than what was seen in June.

European Union leaders made a rallying call to defend Ukraine’s freedom to decide its own future in advance of their virtual summit with Donald Trump.

With the exception of Hungary, all EU leaders signed a joint statement, with Kaja Kallas, the EU foreign policy chief, also calling for the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to attend the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska on Friday.

Trump insists his meeting with Putin is a “feel-out” to gauge the Russian leader’s willingness to compromise, but European leaders fear Trump will be lured into a joint declaration with Moscow that involves irretrievable concessions before substantive talks between Ukraine and Russia.

The EU leaders said: “Meaningful negotiations can only take place in the context of a ceasefire or reduction of hostilities,” adding: “We share the conviction that a diplomatic solution must protect Ukraine’s and Europe’s vital security interests.

“A Ukraine capable of defending itself effectively is an integral part of any future security guarantees.” They added that EU nations were ready to contribute further to security guarantees.

Our colleagues are bringing you the latest developments here

As Donald Trump begins his federal takeover of DC police, and deploys National Guard troops, among some of the most ardent members of the president’s base, this move is both a long-time coming and an opening to renew the push to repeal the DC Home Rule Act of 1973.

One lawmaker who has been particularly vocal is Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah. On Monday, Lee posted a video on X pushing his legislation that would strip DC of it’s limited powers of self-governance, and for Congress to reassume complete control of the city. Online, Lee has wasted no time espousing how the BOWSER Act – a bill he introduced earlier this year – will grant Americans a “capital city that they can be proud of, not one that they’re afraid of”.

This effort is, however, unlikely to move forward. It would need 60 votes in the Senate, and require several Democrats to pass.

A newly appointed official at the US Department of Labor hired by the Trump administration has a recent history of racist, sexually graphic, and conspiratorial posts on social media.

Jessico Bowman announced last week that she was appointed deputy chief of staff of the Bureau of International Labor Affairs at the labor department. According to the bureau’s website, its job is to lead “the US Department of Labor’s efforts to ensure that workers around the world are treated fairly and are able to share in the benefits of the global economy”.

Bowman has deleted her account on X and Facebook accounts since announcing her hiring.

In posts seen by the Guardian, Bowman falsely claimed on X in June 2024 that the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol was “a Democrat plot”, adding: “there was a war game simulation and a transition integrity project that planned this out. They thought Trump would win. They stole the election and then created violence and gas lit, jailed us, without due process, and or financially drained us into a silent acceptance.”

Bowman had previously worked as national secretary for the Republican Liberty Caucus, a libertarian-leaning political action organization.

Her posts include several sexually graphic posts about Kamala Harris during the 2024 election, including claiming Harris had “hawk tuah experience” and “hawk tuah’d her way to the White House”, tying the presidential candidate to a viral video referencing oral sex.

Read more about the new Trump labor official’s social media history here

Later on, we’ll hear from the Trump administration for the second day in a row. The president won’t make an appearance, but press secretary Karoline Leavitt will hold a White House briefing at 1pm ET.

Defense secretary Pete Hegseth says he’s proud to be part of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, an archconservative network of Christian congregations.

Hegseth recently made headlines when he shared a CNN video on social media about CREC, showing its pastors arguing women should not have the right to vote.

AP reports:

Pastor Doug Wilson, a CREC co-founder, leads Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, the network’s flagship location. Jovial and media-friendly, Wilson is no stranger to stirring controversy with his church’s hard-line theology and its embrace of patriarchy and Christian nationalism.

Wilson told The Associated Press on Monday he was grateful Hegseth shared the video. He noted Hegseth’s post was labeled with Christ Church’s motto: “All of Christ for All of Life.”

“He was, in effect, reposting it and saying, ‘Amen,’ at some level,” Wilson said.

Hegseth, among President Donald Trump’s most controversial Cabinet picks, attends Pilgrim Hill Reformed Fellowship, a CREC member church in a suburb outside Nashville, Tennessee. His pastor, Brooks Potteiger, prayed at a service Hegseth hosted at the Pentagon.

CREC recently opened a new outpost in the nation’s capital, Christ Church DC, with Hegseth attending its first Sunday service.

Pentagon chief spokesman Sean Parnell confirmed Hegseth’s CREC affiliation and told the AP that Hegseth “very much appreciates many of Wilson’s writings and teachings.”

Meanwhile, the European Union was unable to say when a joint statement on tariffs with the United States will be ready nor when it expects the White House to issue an executive order on European car import duties, a European Commission spokesperson said on Tuesday.

“It is an agreement that we believe is strong and the best we could have ... Of course, we expect the US to take further steps that are part of this agreement but I don’t believe at this stage we can put a timeline on these engagements,” the spokesperson said.

Texas Democrats once again stymied a Republican effort to redraw the state’s congressional maps at the behest of Donald Trump, and Gavin Newsom, the California governor, urged the president to stand down and defuse the redistricting arms race that has spread across the country.

Enough Texas Democrats remained outside of the state on Monday to deny the Republican-led state legislature the quorum necessary to proceed with Trump’s desired congressional map. Dozens of Democratic state lawmakers left the state last week, taking refuge in blue states such as Illinois and New York. They have spent the last week working to raise awareness and rally support for their efforts to block the Republican redistricting plan.

The standoff has widened the redistricting wars, with Newsom and other Democratic state leaders threatening to draw retaliatory maps if Texas moves ahead with its redistricting scheme.

In a letter to Trump on Monday, Newsom said the president was “playing with fire” and warned that California was prepared to consider new boundaries to “neutralize” any gains Republicans hope to achieve in Texas.

“This attempt to rig congressional maps to hold onto power before a single vote is cast in the 2026 election is an affront to American democracy,” Newsom wrote.

The governor said he would prefer to leave the matter of congressional map-making to independent commissions, not partisan legislative bodies and emphasized that he would “happily” stand down if other states abandoned their redistricting effort. But, Newsom said: “California cannot stand idly by as this power grab unfolds.”

In a snarky, all-caps tweet meant to mimic Trump’s social media style, Newsom’s office summarized the letter: “DONALD TRUMP, IF YOU DO NOT STAND DOWN, WE WILL BE FORCED TO LEAD AN EFFORT TO REDRAW THE MAPS IN CA TO OFFSET THE RIGGING OF MAPS IN RED STATES. BUT IF THE OTHER STATES CALL OFF THEIR REDISTRICTING EFFORTS, WE WILL DO THE SAME. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But when asked, Trump has defended the Texas plan, arguing that he is “entitled to five more seats” because he won the state’s popular vote in the 2024 presidential election. The argument, however, is flawed – a popular vote win does not necessarily mean a president’s party is awarded more congressional seats.

Donald Trump has announced he is nominating EJ Antoni, the chief economist at the conservative Heritage Foundation, as the next commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“Our Economy is booming, and E.J. will ensure that the Numbers released are HONEST and ACCURATE,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

The nomination comes after Trump fired the BLS commissioner, Erika McEntarfer, earlier this month following the release of a weak jobs report which he claimed, without evidence, had been “rigged”.

Antoni, a longtime critic of the agency, had previously voiced concerns about revisions to the BLS jobs data.

“There are better ways to collect, process, and disseminate data – that is the task for the next BLS commissioner, and only consistent delivery of accurate data in a timely manner will rebuild the trust that has been lost over the last several years,” Antoni posted on X earlier this month.

The Senate will have to confirm his nomination to lead the BLS, an independent agency under the labor department. The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday that former White House adviser and rightwing provocateur Steve Bannon had advocated for Antoni’s nomination.

Donald Trump has confirmed that he and Vladimir Putin will discuss “land swapping” when they meet on Friday in Alaska for a high-stakes summit on the Ukraine war. But the US president expressed frustration with Volodymyr Zelenskyy for putting conditions on such a potential agreement.

During a news conference at the White House on Monday, Trump said he was frustrated with Zelenskyy’s insistence that Ukraine would need to hold a national referendum on any peace deal that stipulated recognising Russian control over territory that it has occupied during the war.

“I was a little bothered by the fact that Zelenskyy was saying I have to get constitutional approval,” Trump said. “He has approval to go to war and kill everybody but he needs approval to do a land swap. Because there will be some land swapping going on. I know that through Russia and through conversations with everybody.”

European diplomats have been taken aback by the lack of clarity on the US side about the territories Putin is demanding from Ukraine and the terms of a ceasefire. The discrepancies within the US reporting back on what Russia is seeking has alarmed European diplomats and only added to a fear that Trump, inflating his personal relationship with Putin, could make damaging concessions.

Describing his vision for a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, Trump said an agreement would include “good stuff, not bad stuff, also some bad stuff for both”. “We’re going to change the lines, the battle lines,” he added.

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 10 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.

China’s commerce ministry, in a statement on early Tuesday, said it will suspend additional tariffs on US goods for 90 more days, after Trump signed an executive order extending the tariff truce.

China will maintain its tariffs on US goods at 10%, the statement said, and take action to address non-tariff barriers facing American products. China will also postpone for 90 days the addition of US firms it had targeted in April to trade and investment restriction lists.