Closing summary
This concludes our live coverage of another day in the life of the second Trump administration, with Donald Trump once again stepping before the cameras, but still hiding his bruised right hand beneath a layer of makeup. We will be back on Wednesday. Here are the latest developments:
The Republican-led House oversight committee released more than 33,000 pages of documents related to the federal investigation of Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender whose long friendship with Donald Trump has raised questions about what the president knew and when he knew it.
Democrats called the limited release a ruse by Republicans, given that 97% of the Epstein records posted online were already public, and renewed their calls for all of the Epstein files to be released.
In a post on his social network on Tuesday, Donald Trump wrote that the US military killed 11 members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua in a strike on a boat in international waters.
While the White house shared video of the US military strike on a small speedboat off the coast of Venezuela, the administration offered no evidence that the 11 passengers who were killed were smuggling drugs, and there were questions about what legal authority licensed the use of lethal force.
A US appeals court reinstated Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter on Tuesday, ruling that her attempted firing by Trump was unlikely to survive her legal challenge.
Trump announced that he is moving US Space Command headquarters from Colorado to Alabama, and then offered false of misleading answers to questions from reporters on court rulings that his use of troops for law enforcement in Los Angeles was illegal, and so are most of his tariffs.
The president claimed that video of a garbage bag being tossed out a White House window must have been “AI-generated” even though his aides had already acknowledged that the video was genuine.
Trump miffed by China's massive military parade to mark 80th anniversary of Japan's surrender ending second world war
Watching from afar, Donald Trump channeled his bitterness at not being present for China’s huge military parade, to mark the surrender of Japan 80 years ago, ending the second world war, into a post on his social network.
As President Xi Jinping of China oversaw a celebration that downplayed the role of the United States in defeating imperial Japan, Trump posted: “The big question to be answered is whether or not President Xi of China will mention the massive amount of support and ‘blood’ that The United States of America gave to China in order to help it to secure its FREEDOM from a very unfriendly foreign invader.”
The US president added a somewhat confusing reference to the leaders of Russia and North Korea, Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, who were greeted as honored guests.
“May President Xi and the wonderful people of China have a great and lasting day of celebration”, Trump wrote. “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un, as you conspire against The United States of America.”
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Was lethal US strike on accused drug traffickers illegal?
While the White House, the president, the secretary of state, the defense secretary and the deputy chief of staff have all shared video of the US military strike on a small speedboat off the coast of Venezuela on Tuesday, with barely suppressed glee, the administration has offered no evidence that the 11 passengers who were killed were smuggling drugs, or cited any clear legal authority for the use of lethal force.
“Drug trafficking is not a capital crime; it doesn’t carry a death sentence”, Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a lawyer at the American Immigration Council, observed. “I genuinely cannot think of anything under U.S. law that would permit premeditated government assassination of people suspected of drug trafficking.”
“Even if they had ironclad proof, the fact that they had the boat under clear surveillance means they could have stopped it in U.S. waters, arrested the people on board, and tried them in a court of law”, he added. “What legal excuse could they have for killing them? Can’t think of one!”
“There is zero evidence of self-defense here. Looks like a massacre of civilians at sea. Even if they had drugs aboard, that’s not a capital offense”, Adam Isacson of the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights group, noted on Bluesky in response to the video of the attack.
“Lethal force against a civilian vessel in international waters is a war crime if not in self-defense”, he added. “If not in self-defense, only non-lethal actions, such as warning shots or disabling fire, are allowed. ‘Not yielding to pursuers’ or ‘suspected of carrying drugs’ doesn’t carry a death sentence.”
Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, described the strike against suspected members of a transnational gang, Tren de Aragua, which the administration added to a list of terrorist groups in February, as an act of war. “We are going to age combat against drug cartels that are flooding American streets and killing Americans”, he told reporters, while referring questions about the legal authority for the strike to the White House counsel’s office.
A senior defense official likewise told The Intercept that “the U.S. military conducted a precision strike against a drug vessel operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization.”’
During his first term and then again during his campaign to return to office, Donald Trump repeatedly called for “everyone who sells drugs, gets caught selling drugs, to receive the death penalty for their heinous acts”.
Tuesday’s extrajudicial execution of the suspected drug smugglers comes decades after Trump loudly campaigned for the execution of five young men of color, who were wrongly accused of raping a female jogger in New York’s Central Park.
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Appeals court reinstates federal trade commissioner removed by Trump
A US appeals court reinstated Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter on Tuesday, ruling that her attempted firing by Donald Trump was unlikely to survive her legal challenge.
The court said that FTC members may not be fired by a president without cause, saying that the law on this point has been clear for nearly a century.
“The government is not likely to succeed on appeal because any ruling in its favor from this court would have to defy binding, on-point, and repeatedly preserved Supreme Court precedent,” two judges wrote in the majority opinion.
Judge Neomi Rao, who was nominated by Trump, dissented, arguing that federal courts likely have no authority “to order the reinstatement of an officer removed by the President.”
“Amid the efforts by the Trump [administration] to illegally abolish independent agencies, [including] the Federal Reserve, I’m glad the court has recognized that he is not above the law”, Slaughter posted in response. “I’m eager to get back first thing tomorrow to the work I was entrusted to do on behalf of the American people.”
The FTC enforces consumer protection and antitrust laws.
Trump himself had appointed Slaughter to her first term on the FTC in 2018. Joe Biden then made her the FTC’s acting chair in January 2021, and appointed her to a second term in 2023, which is to end in September 2029.
Under the FTC’s bipartisan structure, no more than three of the five commissioners can come from the same party. Congress placed restrictions on the hiring and firing of commissioners in an effort to insulate the agency from partisan politics.
Trump fired the two Democratic commissioners on the FTC in March, in a major test for the independence of regulatory agencies.
The dispute over Trump’s firing of Slaughter and fellow commissioner Alvaro Bedoya will likely end up before the US supreme court, which ruled 90 years ago that FTC commissioners may be dismissed only for good cause, such as neglecting their duties. Bedoya formally resigned in June to take another job and is not part of the case.
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House Democrats say 97% of Epstein records released by Republicans are not new and demand release of full Epstein files
After meeting on Tuesday with some of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, Democrats on the House oversight committee called for the release of all of the files on the late sex offender in possession of the federal government, and described the release of 33,295 pages of documents related to the late sex offender by Republicans a ruse, given that 97% of the records were already public.
After the committee met with the survivors of Epstein’s abuse, Robert Garcia, a California Democrat, posted: “Release all the files NOW.”
“Most of the documents that were sent to our committee,” Garcia explained, were the same previously released records “given to rightwing influencers back in February”, in what was widely viewed as a stunt to create the appearances of transparency.
“Today we heard from some of the women and girls who survived Epstein’s abuse,” Summer Lee, a Pennsylvania Democrat, said after the roundtable with the survivors. “It is clear the government has failed these survivors. Now it’s our responsibility to deliver justice and the peace and healing they deserve. We need the full files and accountability now.”
“We cannot powerful abusers to account without centering those survivors and doing it on the Congressional record to give that transparency to the public as well,” Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley said. “And then, finally, this discharge petition does need to come to the floor so that we can get all of the files.”
“One of the things that was said over and over again today was that the investigation is not complete,” she added. “The investigation is not even done, so we need all of this.”
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House committee releases tranche of Epstein records as White House fights petition to release all Epstein files
The Republican-led House oversight committee has released more than 33,000 pages of documents related to the federal investigation of Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender whose long friendship with Donald Trump has raised questions about what the president knew and when he knew it.
The records were posted online as the White House urged Republican lawmakers not to support a discharge petition from Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, and Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, which would force the release of all of the Epstein files.
Asked by Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, whether or not he supports the discharge petition, James Comer, the Republican chair of the committee, said on Tuesday that there was no need for that vote since the committee had now subpoenaed the records. The question of how many of those files were obtained by the committee, and how many will be released by the committee remains unanswered.
However, Massie told Axios on Tuesday that the selection of documents released by the committee would not stop him from trying to get a majority of House members to sign his petition to force a vote for the release of all of the files. “My staff has done a quick look at it and it looks like a bunch of redacted documents and nothing new, so it’s not going to suffice,” the congressman said.
The Massie and Khanna petition would require the attorney general, Pam Bondi, to publicly release all unclassified Epstein records in the possession of the justice department, including the FBI and US attorneys’ offices.
Massie and Khanna have scheduled a news conference with some of Epstein’s victims on Wednesday.
Reporters reviewing the files released by Comer’s committee agreed that so far, they appear to mostly contain information that was already publicly known.
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Trump says US military killed 11 members of Tren de Aragua in international waters off Venezuela
In a post on his social network on Tuesday, Donald Trump wrote that the US military killed 11 members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua in a strike on a boat in international waters.
The post was illustrated by what appeared to be video of the strike, marked “unclassified”, which was quickly picked up and broadcast by the Colombian news network Noticias Caracol.
Trump’s post described the gang members as “terrorists” who were “transporting illegal narcotics, heading to the United States” at the time. He offered no evidence for that claim.
The president also described the gang as a “Foreign Terrorist Organization, operating under the control of Nicolas Maduro”, the president of Venezuela.
Although the Trump administration invoked the claim that Tren de Aragua is directed by Venezuela’s government to justify its use of the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport men it claims were members of the gang to a high-security prison in El Salvador earlier this year, the New York Times reported in March that a US intelligence community assessment concluded that the gang, Tren de Aragua, is not controlled by Maduro’s government.
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The US military has conducted “a lethal strike” against an alleged “drug vessel” from Venezuela, the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has announced amid growing tensions between Washington and Caracas.
Donald Trump trailed the announcement during an address at the White House on Tuesday afternoon, telling reporters the US had “just, over the last few minutes, literally shot out … a drug-carrying boat”.
“And there’s more where that came from. We have a lot of drugs pouring into our country,” the US president added. “We took it out,” he said of the boat.
Shortly after, Rubio offered further details of the incident on social media, tweeting that the military had “conducted a strike in the southern Caribbean against a drug vessel which had departed from Venezuela and was being operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization”.
It was not immediately clear what kind of vessel had been targeted, or, crucially, if the incident had taken place inside the South American country’s territorial waters.
John Thune, the Republican Senate majority leader, has warned Democrats that he may move to change the chamber’s rules around confirmations if they do not agree to more quickly approve Donald Trump’s nominees.
With the exception of secretary of state Marco Rubio, Democrats have forced time-consuming roll call votes on every single executive nominee Trump has made since taking office in January. Under previous administrations, including Joe Biden and Trump’s first term, senators from both parties agreed to confirm some nominees, typically for less controversial positions, by unanimous voice votes.
In a floor speech on Tuesday, Thune warned that he may go ahead with plans to change Senate rules to prevent the Democrats from forcing votes on every nominee.
“I’m here to tell my Democrat colleagues that their historic obstruction cannot continue”, he said, adding that 302 nominees were awaiting confirmation.
“If Democrats continue to obstruct, if they continue to drag out confirmation of every single one of the nominations of a duly elected president, if they continue to slow the Senate’s business to such a drastic degree, then we’re going to have to take steps to get this process back on a reasonable footing”.
Democrats have countered by arguing that Trump’s appointees are not qualified, and that they will not support a president who has tried to usurp Congress’s authorities on matters such as spending since taking office.
“Historically bad nominees deserve a historic level of scrutiny by Senate Democrats”, minority leader Chuck Schumer said last month.
Back in front of the cameras, Trump misleads on tariffs, viral video and judge's ruling troops in LA broke the law
Following Donald Trump’s announcement that he is moving US Space Command headquarters from Colorado to Alabama, in part, he suggested, to punish Colorado for using vote-by-mail, the president took questions from reporters in the White House pool for the first time in a week. Several of his answers were false or misleading.
Asked to comment on the federal appeals court ruling last week that most of his tariffs are illegal, Trump falsely claimed that the US has taken in trillions of dollars” because of the tariffs. Actual tariff revenue in 2025 is about $115bn, as the economist Justin Wolfers has pointed out, which has been paid by American importers, not, as Trump claims, other countries. The president said that the administration will be asking the supreme court to issue an expedited ruling to reverse the appeals court finding that he exceeded his authority under the 1977 International Economic Emergency Act by imposing tariffs without the consent of Congress.
While dismissing rumors about his health, prompted by his sudden lack of public appearances, and a persistent bruise on his right hand that was again covered by makeup on Tuesday, Trump was shown video of a garbage bag being tossed out of an upper floor of the White House over the weekend and claimed that it must have been “AI-generated”, since, he said, the windows are too heavy to lift and “sealed”. But the White House has already acknowledged that the video was genuine and said that contractors had thrown the material out the window.
On his deployment of troops in Los Angeles, Trump was asked to respond to the ruling from a federal judge in California on Tuesday that the use of troops to enforce the law was illegal and must stop. He bristled at the question, accusing the reporter who asked him of making “a statement”, and of leaving out what he said was an important detail. “The judge said that you can leave the 300 people that you already have in place. They can stay. They can remain. They can do what they have to do”, the president claimed.
In fact, Judge Charles Breyer ruled that the troops Trump ordered to Los Angeles had clearly violated the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act, prohibiting the military from being used for law enforcement, and issued an injunction blocking them from carrying out any such activities from now on.
Referring to the Trump administration, the judge wrote: “at Defendants’ orders and contrary to Congress’s explicit instruction, federal troops executed the laws. The evidence at trial established that Defendants systematically used armed soldiers (whose identity was often obscured by protective armor) and military vehicles to set up protective perimeters and traffic blockades, engage in crowd control, and otherwise demonstrate a military presence in and around Los Angeles. In short, Defendants violated the Posse Comitatus Act.”
The 300 National Guard troops who remain stationed in Los Angeles, the judge wrote: “have already been improperly trained as to what activities they can and cannot engage in under the Posse Comitatus Act. Further, President Trump’s recent executive orders and public statements regarding the National Guard raise serious concerns as to whether he intends to order troops to violate the Posse Comitatus Act elsewhere in California.”
As a result, Breyer ordered, the administration is now “enjoined from deploying, ordering, instructing, training, or using the National Guard currently deployed in California, and any military troops heretofore deployed in California, to execute the laws, including but not limited to engaging in arrests, apprehensions, searches, seizures, security patrols, traffic control, crowd control, riot control, evidence collection, interrogation, or acting as informants”.
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No Kings mass protests set for 18 October
The coalition behind the “No Kings” rally has announced another mass protest set for 18 October.
The nationwide protest that turned out hundreds of thousands of people is rooted in Trump’s threats to send militarized forces into different American cities and his detention and encampment of immigrants, the organizers say.
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“I would love to receive calls from governors and mayors saying they need help” Trump said about deploying national guard across the country while in the Oval Office. “We’ll help them, we have a lot of people, we have a great military force.”
Trump: 'Would be honored' to get a call from Illinois governor for national guard
Trump said “he would be honored” to take a call from Illinois governor JB Pritzker to send national guard to his state.
“I would love to have governor Pritzker call me”, Trump said. I’d gain respect for him and say we do have a problem, and we’d love to send in the troops, because you know what the people they have to be protected.”
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Trump said because of the national guard roaming around DC, new restaurants will open up in the city.
“Washington DC is a safe zone right now, it’s a safe city” he said. “This took place in 12 days, now it’s 15 days, but three days ago it became what’s known as a safe zone”.
“We took 1,600 people out,” Trump said.
Pool reporters asked Trump about the latest on Russia-Ukraine talks, and the president shared that both countries had 7,313 soldiers killed over the last week. “For no reason whatsover” Trump said.
The president didn’t comment on a potential meeting between Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Canada wants in on Golden Dome, Trump says
Speaking about the newly relocated Space Command in Huntsville, Alabama, Trump shared the latest on an ambitious missile defense system he dubbed the “golden dome”.
The “golden dome” is Trump’s gold-plated take on Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, though his version would apparently be so impressive that “everybody wants to be a participant in it.”
Canada, according to Trump, has already come calling.
“Canada called they want to be a part of it, and that’ll be great”, he said. “Canada wants very much to be included in that. Then we’re going to work something out with them.”
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Trump also took a parting swipe at Colorado, which was hosting Space Command as a temporary headquarters.
“I want to thank Colorado. The problem I have with Colorado, one of the big problems, they do mail in voting. They went to all mail in voting. So they have automatically, crooked elections.”
Trump says the Space Command relocation promises 30,000 jobs and economic investment that Trump inflated in real-time from “hundreds of millions” to “billions and billions of dollars” because, as he explained, “it can’t be millions”.
Trump justified the move by saying it would help America “defend and dominate the high frontier as they call it”.
Trump announces Space Command will move from Colorado to Alabama
Donald Trump announced that US Space Command headquarters will officially move from Colorado to Huntsville, Alabama.
The president declared Huntsville would “forever be known from this point forward as Rocket City” – apparently unaware the Alabama city has held that title since the 1950s thanks to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Trump couldn’t resist linking the decision to his electoral performance. “I only won it by about 47 points,” he said about Tennessee, before adding: “I don’t think that influenced my decision, though, right?”
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Republican senator Joni Ernst won't run for re-election
Two-term Iowa Republican senator Joni Ernst has decided to officially bow out of a re-election bid.
“After a tremendous amount of prayer and reflection, I will not be seeking re-election in 2026”, Ernst said in a video announcement.
Ernst is the first woman combat veteran to serve in the Senate, where Republicans hold a narrow 53-47 majority.
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Trump team’s contentious climate report ‘makes a mockery of science’, experts say
A group of the US’s leading climate scientists have compiled a withering review of a controversial Trump administration report that downplays the risks of the climate crisis, finding that the document is biased, riddled with errors and fails basic scientific credibility.
More than 85 climate experts have contributed to a comprehensive 434-page report that excoriates a US Department of Energy (DOE) document written by five hand-picked fringe researchers that argues that global heating and its resulting consequences have been overstated.
The Trump administration report, released in July, contains “pervasive problems with misrepresentation and selective citation of the scientific literature, cherry-picking of data, and faulty or absent statistics”, states the new analysis, which is written in the style of the authoritative Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.
“This report makes a mockery of science,” said Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University.
“It relies on ideas that were rejected long ago, supported by misrepresentations of the body of scientific knowledge, omissions of important facts, arm waving, anecdotes and confirmation bias. This report makes it clear DOE has no interest in engaging with the scientific community.”
Amy Coney Barrett defends US abortion ruling in memoir
Amy Coney Barrett, the conservative supreme court justice whose controversial fast-track confirmation at the end of Donald Trump’s first presidency led directly to the panel’s vote to strike down abortion rights nationally, has expressed in a new memoir her belief that the ruling “respected the choice” of the American people.
Barrett was paid a $2m advance for her book Listening to the Law, according to CNN, which obtained a copy and published brief extracts on Tuesday, a week before its 9 September publication.
“[T]he court’s role is to respect the choices that the people have agreed upon, not to tell them what they should agree to,” Barrett writes, according to CNN. The outlet framed Barrett’s comment as reflecting her belief that her predecessors’ 7-2 vote in Roe v Wade had “usurped the will of the American people”.
Rudy Giuliani’s hospital discharge comes a day after Donald Trump said he will award him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, the Associated Press reported.
The decision places the award on a man once lauded for leading New York after the September 11, 2001, attacks and later sanctioned by courts and disbarred for amplifying false claims about the 2020 US presidential election. Giuliani, the former New York mayor, was also criminally charged in two states; he has denied wrongdoing.
Trump on his Truth Social platform called Giuliani the “greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, and an equally great American Patriot”.
Rudy Giuliani has been discharged from the hospital and is “progressing well” following a car collision in New Hampshire on Saturday, his spokesperson Ted Goodman said.
“The mayor would like to thank the New Hampshire State Police, paramedics, Elliot Hospital, and all the physicians and nurses who provided incredible care” Goodman added.
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Newsom after judge ruling on national guard in LA: 'Trump loses again'
California governor Gavin Newsom responded to his state’s federal court win that Trump’s deployment of national guard troops in Los Angeles this summer was illegal.
“DONALD TRUMP LOSES AGAIN” Newsom posted on X. “The courts agree -- his militarization of our streets and use of the military against US citizens is ILLEGAL.”
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Trump plans to move Space Command headquarters to Alabama from Colorado, sources tell Reuters
According to Reuters, the Trump administration is planning to announce that it will relocate the headquarters of US Space Command from Colorado Springs, Colorado, to Huntsville, Alabama, sources familiar with the deliberations told the outlet.
The decision is a reversal of the Biden administration’s choice in 2023, when Colorado Springs was selected as the permanent home for the military’s newest combatant command after an extensive review process.
Space Command currently operates from Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado Springs on an interim basis, where it has been headquartered since its reestablishment under Trump in 2019.
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A live streaming link ahead of the 2pm ET Trump announcement posted by the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS), the US military’s official media distribution arm, describes the event as a “US Space Command HQ Announcement”.
Trump illegally deployed national guard during LA immigration protests, judge rules
A Washington judge has found that Trump illegally deployed National Guard troops during immigration enforcement operations in Los Angeles this summer.
Judge Charles Breyer ruled that sending military personnel alongside immigration agents violated the Posse Comitatus Act, which bars the armed forces from domestic law enforcement. California brought the legal challenge against the federal government.
The Trump administration argued the troops were only protecting federal officers, not conducting arrests themselves. The judge did not order the remaining military personnel to be withdrawn.
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Nadler is one of the most influential House Democrats in office, and represents a high-profile Manhattan district steeped in prominent fundraising and media attention.
A member of the progressive caucus, the 78-year-old built a reputation as a reliable voice on issues like abortion rights, LGBTQ rights, and government accountability.
Unlike Democratic party leaders and New Yorkers Hakeem Jeffries and senator Chuck Schumer, Nadler endorsed Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani ahead of the general election.
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Democratic representative Jerry Nadler won't seek re-election
New York representative Jerry Nadler officially announced that he will relinquish his seat next election after serving over three decades in Congress.
“This decision has not been easy” he wrote in the statement. “But I know in my heart it is the right one and that it is the right time to pass the torch to a new generation”.
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There are murmurs that instead the “exciting announcement” will be about renaming the Department of Defense to the “Department of War” – it’s former name previously discontinued in 1947.
A number of news outlets reported ahead of Labor Day that the White House had been working up plans for the reverted name, citing a White House official.
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In his latest posting on Truth Social, Trump wrote: “CHICAGO IS THE MURDER CAPITAL OF THE WORLD!”
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In late August, Pentagon sources told the Washington Post and Rolling Stone that planning was actively underway for a national guard operation in Chicago, though no final decision had been announced.
When asked at the time, a Pentagon official told the Guardian “we won’t speculate on further operations” and that the department is “continuously working” with other agencies on “plans to protect federal assets and personnel”.
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It’s still unclear what the announcement will touch on, but the White House rapid response team shared a Trump post from Truth Social this morning saying that “Chicago is the worst and most dangerous city in the World, by far’” and added “[governor JB] Pritzker needs help badly, he just doesn’t know it yet”.
“I will solve the crime problem fast, just like I did in DC”, he wrote.
Trump's 'exciting announcement' will be related to the Pentagon, White House says
Donald Trump’s “exciting announcement” expected at 2pm ET will be “related to the Department of Defense”, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said.
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Representatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna plan to hold a news conference tomorrow with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse as the political fallout from the saga continues to engage Congress on several fronts.
The two lawmakers hope to receive the necessary signatures on their discharge petition to force a floor vote on a measure compelling the release of the Epstein files.
Democrats are eager to keep pressing on the Epstein files, especially after the Trump administration reneged on pledges for transparency, AP reports.
The case for years has been the subject of online conspiracy theories and speculation about who may have been involved or aware of the wealthy financier’s abuse.
The House left Washington in July in the midst of disagreements among Republicans about whether they should force the Trump administration to release more information on the sex trafficking investigation into the late Epstein.
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The arrest of a US army veteran who protested against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown has raised alarms among legal experts and fellow veterans familiar with his service in Afghanistan.
Bajun Mavalwalla II – a former army sergeant who survived a roadside bomb blast on a special operations mission in Afghanistan – was charged in July with “conspiracy to impede or injure officers” after joining a demonstration against federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) in Spokane, Washington.
Legal experts say the case marks an escalation in the administration’s attacks on first amendment rights. Afghanistan war veterans who know him say the case against Mavalwalla appears unjust.
“Here’s a guy who held a top secret clearance and was privy to some of the most sensitive information we have, who served in a combat zone,” said Kenneth Koop, a retired colonel who trained the Afghan military and police during Mavalwalla’s deployment. “To see him treated like this really sticks in my craw.”
The 11 June protest against Ice that led to Mavalwalla’s arrest was confrontational, leaving a government van’s windshield smashed and tires slashed, but Mavalwalla was not among the more than two dozen people arrested at the scene. More than a month passed before the FBI arrived at his door on 15 July.
The 35-year-old, who used his GI Bill to earn a degree in sustainable communities from Sonoma State University, was set to move into a 3,000-sq-ft house that day, which he had bought with his girlfriend, a nurse and fellow Afghanistan war veteran, with the help of a loan backed by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Woody Allen has said he was impressed by the acting abilities of Donald Trump when he directed the now-president in the 1998 film Celebrity.
Speaking on Bill Maher’s Club Random, Allen said Trump was “a pleasure to work with and a very good actor”.
He continued: “He was very polite, hit his mark, did everything correctly and had a real flair for show business. I could direct him now. If he would let me direct him now that he’s president, I think I could do wonders.”
In Allen’s ensemble film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Trump has a fleeting scene in which he’s interviewed about his forthcoming projects by a TV reporter.
In a rare – scripted – instance of irony and deprecation, Trump replies that he’s “working on buying St Patrick’s Cathedral. Maybe doing a little rip-down job and putting up a very, very tall and beautiful building.”
Allen went on to say that Trump had a “charismatic quality” in front of the camera, was “pleasant, very professional, very polite” and that he was “surprised he wanted to go into politics”.
Nine former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said that Robert F Kennedy Jr’s leadership of the US health and human services department is “unlike anything our country has ever experienced” and “unacceptable”.
They also warned that Kennedy’s leadership “should alarm every American, regardless of political leanings”.
In a guest essay for the New York Times, the former CDC leaders said Kennedy’s actions were “unlike anything we have ever seen at the agency”.
The letter comes days after Kennedy sought to dismiss Susan Monarez, the CDC director he appointed just months earlier. Monarez refused to leave her post, and was later fired by Donald Trump. Monarez said through lawyers the clash came after she refused to sign off on Kennedy’s directives.
In the essay, titled We Ran the C.D.C.: Kennedy Is Endangering Every American’s Health, the former leaders, including Rochelle P Walensky, Mandy Cohen and Tom Frieden, said they were concerned Kennedy is “focusing “on unproven ‘treatments’ while downplaying vaccines” and cancelling medical research “that will leave us ill prepared for future health emergencies”.
The former officials accused Kennedy of replacing “experts on federal health advisory committees with unqualified individuals who share his dangerous and unscientific views”.
Representative Jerry Nadler, a Democrat from Manhattan who played a major role in both impeachments of president Donald Trump, will not seek re-election in 2026 after holding his seat for 34 years, the New York Times reported on Monday, citing an interview with Nadler.
His office did not immediately respond to a Reuters request to confirm the report.
Nadler, 78, a liberal voice in Congress since 1992, said he believed it was time for a younger generation of Democrats to emerge.
Questions surrounding leadership age and generational change rocked the Democrats in 2024, when president Joe Biden, then 81, stepped down late in the presidential campaign amid concerns about his age.
“Watching the Biden thing really said something about the necessity for generational change in the party, and I think I want to respect that,” Nadler told the Times.
Trump says he will award Rudy Giuliani the Presidential Medal of Freedom
Donald Trump said on Monday he would award Rudy Giuliani the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, two days after his longtime political ally was seriously injured in a car crash.
The decision places the award on a man once lauded for leading New York after the September 11, 2001, attacks and later sanctioned by courts and disbarred for amplifying false claims about the 2020 US presidential election. Giuliani, the former New York mayor, was also criminally charged in two states; he has denied wrongdoing.
Trump on his Truth Social platform called Giuliani the “greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, and an equally great American Patriot”.
For much of the past two decades, Giuliani’s public life has been defined by a striking rise and fall. After leading New York through the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, he mounted a brief campaign for the Republican presidential nomination and became one of the most recognizable political figures in the country.
But as Trump’s personal lawyer, he became a central figure in efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Courts repeatedly rejected the fraud claims he advanced, and two former Georgia election workers won a $148m defamation judgment against him.
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Trump to make Oval Office announcement at 2pm ET today
Donald Trump is scheduled to make an announcement from the Oval Office on Tuesday afternoon at 2pm ET, according to the White House, which has yet to release further information.
Some speculation suggests the announcement could be to do with plans to send national guard troops to Chicago.
The Department of Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, and the border tsar, Tom Homan, have both said Ice raids will intensify nationwide starting this week, possibly including staging operations from the Great Lakes naval station near north Chicago.
The city’s mayor said his office is preparing for the deployment of federal officers by the end of the week.
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As Labor Day rallies took place across the US, the Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson sharply denounced the Trump administration’s threat to deploy federal troops to the city as part of an immigration crackdown.
“No federal troops in the city of Chicago,” said Johnson on Monday to a gathered crowd at the “Workers over Billionaires” demonstration in Chicago’s West Loop neighborhood.
Johnson added: “We’re going to defend our democracy … we’re going to protect the humanity of every single person in the city of Chicago.”
Johnson later led the crowd in chants of “No troops in Chicago” and “Invest in Chicago”, the New York Times reported, amid speculation that national guard troops could be deployed as early as this week.
Protesters also met outside the Trump Tower in the city’s River North neighborhood, carrying anti-Trump posters and chanting “Lock him up”, according to footage posted to social media.
Monday’s rally in Chicago was one of hundreds of protests organized across the country as part of the national “Workers Over Billionaires” effort, a mass action calling for the protection of social safety nets such as Social Security; the funding of public schools, healthcare, and housing; amid other demands.
“Together we will demand a country that puts workers over billionaires,” said the May Day Strong group, a coalition to labor unions, in a statement about the event.
Congress returns with less than a month to avoid government shutdown
Hello and welcome to the US politics liveblog. I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.
We start with the news that Congress returns from a month-long summer break on Tuesday with less than a month left for lawmakers to agree on a deal to keep the government funded past 30 September.
Failure to do so would trigger a part-shutdown and amid deep partisan divisions, as well as Democratic anger over the Trump administration’s decision not to spend some congressionally approved funds, tempers have reached boiling point.
The annual spending battle will dominate the September agenda, along with a possible effort by Senate Republicans to change their chamber’s rules to thwart Democratic stalling tactics on nominations, AP reports.
In the House, Republicans will continue their investigations of the former president Joe Biden while the speaker, Mike Johnson, navigates a split in his conference over whether the Trump administration should release more files in the Jeffrey Epstein investigation.
But the most urgent task for Congress is to avoid a government shutdown at the end of the month, when federal funding runs out, and it’s so far unclear if Republicans and Democrats will be able to agree on how to do that. “Trump is rooting for a shutdown,” senator Chris Murphy posted on social media on Friday.
Congress will have to pass a short-term spending measure to keep the government funded for a few weeks or months while they try to finish the full-year package. But Republicans will need Democratic votes to pass an extension, and Democrats will want significant concessions.
The Trump administration’s efforts to claw back previously approved spending could also complicate the negotiations. Republicans passed legislation this summer that rescinded about $9bn in foreign aid and public broadcasting funds and Trump notified Congress again on Friday that he will block $4.9bn in congressionally approved foreign aid.
In other developments:
President Donald Trump is scheduled to make an announcement from the Oval Office on Tuesday afternoon at 2pm ET, according to the White House, which has yet to release further information.
Some speculation suggests the announcement could be to do with plans to send national guard troops to Chicago. The Department of Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, and the border tsar, Tom Homan, have both said Ice raids will intensify nationwide starting this week, possibly including staging operations from the Great Lakes naval station near north Chicago. The city’s mayor said his office is preparing for the deployment of federal officers by the end of the week.
Representatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna plan to hold a news conference tomorrow with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse as the political fallout from the saga continues to engage Congress on several fronts. The two lawmakers hope to receive the necessary signatures on their discharge petition to force a floor vote on a measure compelling the release of the Epstein files, ABC News reports.
Missouri Republicans are poised to redraw their state’s congressional lines to help maintain the Republican majority in the House. Governor Mike Kehoe announced a special legislative session to draw a new voting map would start on Wednesday.
Trump’s attempt to influence the US Federal Reserve could pose a “very serious danger” for the world economy, the head of the European Central Bank has warned. Christine Lagarde, the president of the ECB, said Trump undermining the independence of the world’s most powerful central bank would have an impact for the US and other countries.
Nine former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said that Robert F Kennedy Jr’s leadership of the US health and human services department is “unlike anything our country has ever experienced” and “unacceptable”. They also warned that Kennedy’s leadership “should alarm every American, regardless of political leanings”.
Guatemala is ready and willing to receive about 150 unaccompanied children of all ages each week from the US, the country’s president has said, a day after a US federal judge halted the deportation of 10 Guatemalan children. Those children had already boarded a plane when a court responded to an emergency appeal on Sunday. They were later returned to the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
The president said on Monday he would award Rudy Giuliani the nation’s highest civilian honour, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, two days after his longtime political ally was seriously injured in a car crash. The decision places the award on a man once lauded for leading New York after the 11 September 2001 attacks and later sanctioned by courts and disbarred for amplifying false claims about the 2020 US presidential election. Giuliani, the former New York mayor, was also criminally charged in two states; he has denied wrongdoing.
Hundreds of protests organised as part of the national “workers over billionaires” effort – a mass action calling for the protection of social safety – were held in cities large and small across the country, including New York, Houston, Washington DC and Los Angeles on Monday. As the Labor Day rallies took place, Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson sharply denounced the Trump administration’s threat to deploy federal troops to the city as part of an immigration crackdown.
Woody Allen wants Donald Trump to star in another of his films, apparently. Trump shared the Variety story on Truth Social. “I’m one of the few people who can say he directed Trump. I directed Trump in [‘Celebrity’],” Allen said. “He was a pleasure to work with and a very good actor.”
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