Good morning, I’m Tim Walker with today’s headlines. If you’d like to receive this briefing by email, sign up here.
Top story: Kavanaugh to face accuser amid new allegations
Brett Kavanaugh’s path to the supreme court is strewn with obstacles today, as his accuser Christine Blasey Ford prepares to give her account of an alleged sexual assault to the Senate judiciary committee, after a third woman made sexual misconduct claims against him. Julie Swetnick says she witnessed the young Kavanaugh and friends being “abusive and physically aggressive… towards girls”, and that Kavanaugh was present at a party where she was gang-raped. Kavanaugh denies all the allegations against him, and called the latest claims “ridiculous and from the Twilight Zone”.
- Identity politics. In her prepared remarks before Thursday’s hearing, Ford calls Kavanaugh “the boy who sexually assaulted me”, ruling out the suggestion - made by several Republicans - that she has confused him with someone else.
- History repeating. When Anita Hill accused Clarence Thomas in 1991, she faced an all-male committee. Although all 11 Republicans today are male, Ford will be questioned by Rachel Mitchell, a Republican prosecutor who specialises in sex crimes.
Trump freewheels at UN press conference
Trump covered the Kavanaugh hearings, North Korea, China and Elton John in a rambling press conference at the UN in New York on Wednesday. Admitting that his view of the Kavanaugh controversy was coloured by his own experience of sexual assault accusations, Trump said he believed the claims against his nominee were “all false” but could yet be “persuaded” otherwise.
- Fine China. Trump said he considered the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, a friend, despite accusing China of meddling in the US midterms. He claimed the Chinese respect his “very, very large … [long pause] brain”.
- Nuclear drawdown. North Korea can take as long as it wants to dismantle its nuclear arsenal, an unusually laid-back Trump suggested, saying: “I’ve got all the time in the world.”
President would ‘prefer not’ to fire Rosenstein
At the same press conference, Trump said he would “much prefer keeping” deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, in his post, despite reports earlier this week that Rosenstein had resigned or been fired. The two men are due to meet at the White House today to discuss Rosenstein’s future, but Trump added that he might delay their appointment so as not to “compete” with the Kavanaugh hearings.
- Rod almighty. Rosenstein is responsible for overseeing Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, which could be jeopardised by his departure.
- Rod, forgive me. His position became tenuous following a New York Times report that he had discussed invoking the 25th amendment.
Novichok attack suspect identified as decorated Russian spy
One of the men suspected of carrying out a nerve agent attack in Salisbury, England, has been identified as a decorated colonel in Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU. Two investigative websites, Bellingcat and the Insider, said that the man named originally as a cathedral-loving tourist, Ruslan Boshirov, was in fact Col Anatoliy Chepiga, a veteran of the country’s special forces.
- In absentia. Boshirov and a man named as Alexander Petrov were charged in the UK over the plot to poison Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, which led to the death of Wiltshire resident Dawn Sturgess.
Crib sheet
- The world is “nowhere near on track” to avoid global warming of more than 1.5C above the pre-industrial period level, the author of a hotly-anticipated UN climate report has said.
- Argentina has received a $57bn loan from the IMF, the largest in the organisation’s history, just as a book about high-level political corruption tops the country’s bestseller lists.
- JK Rowling has defended the decision to cast a South Korean actor as Nagini, a woman cursed to become a snake, for the latest instalment of the Fantastic Beasts franchise.
- A fur seal appeared to throw an octopus at a passing kayaker, in a bizarre multi-species encounter captured on camera in New Zealand.
Must-reads
The inside story of Trump’s shambolic presidential transition
Moneyball author Michael Lewis looks behind the curtain of Trump’s chaotic 2016 transition, and finds him utterly unprepared for the responsibilities of the presidency. Which might explain why, two years later, so much of the US government remains chronically understaffed.
The global effort to save coral from climate change
Coral reefs are the canary in the climate change coalmine, bleached or killed off entirely by pollution and other man-made environmental crises. Now scientists are growing coral “nurseries” in hopes of repopulating the reefs. Oliver Milman reports from Florida.
Confessions of an international blood smuggler
Kathleen McLaughlin spent years smuggling American blood plasma into China, to treat her own chronic nerve disease in a nation where foreign blood was banned and to trade in native plasma was potentially deadly.
How a German city transformed when the US army left
Heidelberg was home to the US army’s European HQ from the end of the second world war until 2009, when the Pentagon decided to reduce US troop numbers in Europe – and pulled out of the German city altogether. Matt Pickles went to hear what happened next.
Opinion
When Kavanaugh and Blasey Ford appear before the Senate judiciary committee today, we’ll find out just how much the Republican party in particular – and the US in general – has learned from the #MeToo movement, Rebecca Solnit writes.
The way the all-white, all-male senators treated Anita Hill is now widely regarded as despicable; that three of them – Orrin Hatch, Chuck Grassley, Patrick Leahy – are still on the committee is dismaying.
Sport
The Ryder Cup, which starts on Friday, provides Europe an opportunity for soft power diplomacy with a US president who loves the links. But which side cares most about golf’s biggest contest?
Chelsea’s Eden Hazard scored what Jürgen Klopp called “a wonderful goal” to knock the German’s Liverpool team out of the Carabao Cup on Wednesday night.
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