Trump urges Microsoft to fire lawyer who ran investigation into attempt to overturn 2020 US election – live | Trump administration

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Jean-Frederic Dufour, the chief executive of Rolex, admitted in a letter to Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts senator, that Donald Trump did bring up tariffs on Swiss imports, but only “in jest”, when he was a guest of the exclusive watchmaker during the US Open tennis final.

Warren had written to the Rolex CEO to ask, given “the President’s record of doling out special treatment to CEOs who are able to woo him with flattery, payoffs, or both,” whether he had invited Trump to watch the match from the Rolex box shortly after high tariffs on goods from Switzerland were announced, “to curry favor with the President in an effort to secure special-interest exemptions for Rolex products.”

“President Trump, never one to miss a rhetorical opportunity, did ask in jest whether he would have been invited had it not been for the tariffs—a moment that brought a round of laughter all around,” Dufour told Warren in a letter sent on Thursday.

“Corruption is not a laughing matter,” Warren said in a statement on Friday. “While families are getting crushed by Trump’s chaotic tariffs, Donald Trump and his rich friends are laughing about tariffs in a fancy box sponsored by a luxury watch brand. How much more out of touch can Trump be?”

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Kamala Harris on Comey indictment: ‘Are you fucking kidding me?’

The former vice-president, Kamala Harris, weighed in on the indictment of James Comey in blunt terms on Friday during an interview with CNN.

Asked to reflect on Trump’s second term so far, Harris replied: “It’s painful to see. I mean, what’s happening with Comey: Are you fucking kidding me? The United States Department of Justice?”

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Updated at 20.30 EDT

Laura Loomer takes credit for Trump’s effort to get Lisa Monaco fired by Microsoft

Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist and social media influencer who serves as an adviser to Donald Trump, has taken credit for the president demanding on Friday that Microsoft fire Lisa Monaco, the former deputy attorney general who coordinated investigations into Trump’s attempt to stay in power after losing the 2020 election.

“After I alerted President Trump to the fact that (Microsoft) has hired Lisa Monaco to be their new President of Global Affairs, he has just called on Microsoft to terminate her employment,” Loomer wrote on X.

She then tagged the Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella and asked him: “are you going to comply?”

When Loomer first drew attention to Monaco’s hiring by Microsoft in July, she also noted that Reid Hoffman, the billionaire LinkedIn founder and Democratic donor she described as a “Jeffrey Epstein associate” is “on the board of Microsoft.”

When Trump was asked on Thursday in the Oval Office to name some of the “wealthy people” he was accusing of hiring “professional agitators” to carry out political violence, he said: “I hear names of some pretty rich people that are radical-left people… I hear about a guy named Reid Hoffman.”

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Updated at 20.47 EDT

Pentagon prepares for possible military strikes on drug targets inside Venezuela – report

Days before hundreds of top US military commanders have been ordered to gather at a marine corps base in Virginia next week, Pentagon officials are preparing for possible strikes on suspected drug traffickers inside Venezuela in the coming weeks, NBC News reports, citing unnamed sources.

Critics of Donald Trump have already accused him of seeking to use military strikes against suspected drug traffickers off the coast of Venezuela in recent weeks as a distraction from the clamor over his administration’s decision not to release files from the investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender Trump socialized with for more than a decade.

If US strikes escalate to targets inside Venezuela, Democrats could echo the claims made by Republicans in 1998 when Bill Clinton fired dozens of Tomahawk missiles at a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan and a training camp in Afghanistan associated with Osama bin Laden.

Those 20 August 1998 strikes were launched two weeks after al-Qaida had killed 224 people in bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, but also just three days after Clinton had admitted to an inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky.

A chorus of Republicans quickly accused Clinton of trying to create a foreign crisis to distract attention away from the sex scandal, and the accusation was reflected on the banners and signs of Sudanese protesters who marched in Khartoum that weekend holding up a large, handmade sign with an image of Lewinsky emblazoned with the slogan: “No War for Monika.”

At a Pentagon news conference after the strikes aimed at the then relatively unknown bin Laden, one reporter asked Clinton’s defense secretary, William Cohen, about suggestions that the timing of the attack bore “a striking resemblance to Wag the Dog”, the 1997 film about a White House that hires a Hollywood producer to create a fake war to divert the public from a sex scandal involving the president.

“The only motivation driving this action today was our absolute obligation to protect the American people from terrorist activities,” Cohen replied. “That is the sole motivation.”

“I don’t think any president, regardless of party, would ever take military action to distract from personal problems,” Dee Dee Myers, Clinton’s former press secretary, told Jay Leno that week in an appearance on the Tonight Show. “Most of the Congress, most of the American people I think, will say: ‘I don’t believe that our president, regardless of how bad things are, would do that.’”

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Updated at 20.22 EDT

Trump backs away from claim that deal to end the war in Gaza is close

Donald Trump appeared to admit on Friday evening that his optimism about a deal to end the war in Gaza, expressed on Friday morning, had been premature.

“I am pleased to report that we are having very inspired and productive discussions with the Middle Eastern Community concerning Gaza,” the president wrote on his personal social media platform, hours after Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, told the United Nations that Israel’s military was “no done yet.”

“Intense negotiations have been going on for four days, and will continue for as long as necessary,” Trump added.

Hours earlier, as he left the White House to cheer on the American Ryder Cup golf team, Trump told reporters: “It’s looking like we have a deal on Gaza.”

“I think it’s a deal that will get the hostages back, it’s going to be a deal that will end the war,” he added. “It’s going to be peace. I think we have a deal.”

By nightfall in Washington however, Trump had retreated to merely claiming that there was “Enthusiasm for getting a Deal done”.

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Lauren Aratani

Local TV conglomerate Sinclair Broadcast Group and Nexstar Media Group said their ABC-affiliate stations will start airing Jimmy Kimmy Live! again on Friday night, ending their preempting of the show.

Sinclair and fellow station owner Nexstar had continued to preempt Kimmel’s late-night talkshow even after ABC had put Kimmel back on air.

Together, Sinclair and Nexstar’s preemption of the show left about 25% of TV viewers in the US unable to watch it, with the two companies owning 70 ABC-affiliate stations combined.

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Trump urges Microsoft to fire Lisa Monaco, who coordinated investigation of Trump’s effort to overturn 2020 election

After a frustrating morning of watching American golfers lose three of the first four Ryder Cup matches to their European rivals, Donald Trump got back to work on Friday, by posting a lengthy screed on social media in which he demanded that Microsoft fire its head of global affairs, Lisa Monaco.

Monaco is the former deputy attorney general who oversaw the justice department’s investigation into Trump’s effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election and the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot.

In March, Trump signed an executive order rescinding Monaco’s security clearance, along with those of Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Liz Cheney and others.

In his social media post, Trump wrote that it was shocking that Monaco, who was Barack Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser before later becoming Merrick Garland’s second in command at the justice department during the Biden administration, had been hired for “a very senior role with access to Highly Sensitive Information”.

“Monaco’s having that kind of access is unacceptable, and cannot be allowed to stand,” the president added. “She is a menace to US National Security, especially given the major contracts that Microsoft has with the United States Government.”

“It is my opinion that Microsoft should immediately terminate the employment of Lisa Monaco,” Trump concluded.

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Updated at 18.10 EDT

Supreme court rules that Trump administration can withhold $4bn in foreign aid

The US supreme court on Friday extended an order that permits the Trump administration to not spend more than $4bn in congressionally appropriated foreign aid money that it is seeking to cancel.

The unsigned order from the court’s conservative majority, over the objections of the court’s three liberals, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, lifted a lower court’s order that the administration was obliged to spend funds appropriated by Congress.

Late last month, Trump informed the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, that he would not spend $4.9bn in foreign aid that Congress had previously approved, decrying it as “woke, weaponized and wasteful spending”. The money was to go to United Nations organizations and peacekeeping operations, as well as development assistance and democracy-promotion projects.

The court’s majority wrote that Trump’s authority over foreign affairs weighed heavily in its decision, while cautioning that it was not making a final ruling in the case.

“The effect is to prevent the funds from reaching their intended recipients — not just now but (because of their impending expiration) for all time,” Kagan wrote in her dissent, joined by Sotomayor and Jackson. “Because that result conflicts with the separation of powers, I respectfully dissent.”

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Updated at 17.58 EDT

‘It’s hard to see how we get blamed for it,’ says Democratic congressman on looming shutdown

Shrai Popat

I’ve just spoken with Glenn Ivey, the Maryland Democratic congressman, who took part in the House Democrats’ virtual caucus meeting today. He noted that lawmakers were “resolute” on the call, but ultimately since both sides are “dug in” he expects a government shutdown next week.

However, Ivey said that he finds it “hard to see” how Democrats get blamed for it.

“What are the Democrats doing that they’re going to see as obstructing?” he said. “It’s holding out for healthcare … We’re trying to keep grandma in the nursing home, keep your monthly payments from tripling in January. I mean, they’re really going to be mad at us for that?”

Donald Trump and congressional Republicans have said, repeatedly, that since Democrats aren’t budging on accepting the GOP’s “clean” continuing resolution, they would be responsible for government shutdown at the end of September.

Currently, the Republican-written bill is languishing in the Senate, and the House speaker, Mike Johnson, has vowed to not call the lower chamber back until after funding lapses in just a few days.

After the office of management and budget sent out a memo this week to federal agencies, telling them to brace for more layoffs in the event of a government shutdown, Ivey (whose district borders Washington DC and includes many federal workers) said that many of his constituents have already felt the impact of reductions in force since Trump returned to the White House.

“(The administration) has done everything they can to get rid of as many federal employees as possible,” Ivey said. “So they’re not, they’re not really seeing how things would be different.”

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Updated at 17.24 EDT

New Arizona congresswoman suggests her swearing-in might be delayed because she is key vote to release Epstein files

Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva, an Arizona Democrat who just won a special election to replace her late father, Raúl Grijalva, in Congress, suggested on Thursday that her swearing-in might be delayed by Republican House leaders because she has promised to sign a discharge petition calling for the release of files on the federal investigation of Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender who socialized with Donald Trump for over a decade.

Grijalva told the MeidasTouch Network, a liberal podcast, that she intends to be in Washington on Monday but has been told that she will have to wait for official results to be certified before being sworn in. She noted that this is a departure from procedure, as just a few weeks ago another Democrat, James Walkinshaw, was sworn in the day after his election. Two Republicans who won special elections earlier this year were also sworn in the day after their victories.

“Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I’m number 218,” Grijalva said, meaning that her signature on the discharge petition would mean that a majority of the House backed the measure to compel the justice department to release all of the Epstein files, against the wishes of the president.

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Updated at 17.02 EDT

Senate Democrats say DoJ has been weaponized in letter to Bondi, demand information and interviews with officials

Democrats on the Senate judiciary committee sent a letter to the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, today, accusing the justice department of being weaponized by Donald Trump.

They cite recent examples, including Thursday’s indictment of James Comey, and the president’s move to force out Erik Siebert from his role as the US attorney for the eastern district of Virginia and replace him with a White House staffer and Trump ally.

“Our justice system operates on the principle that the president cannot demand the prosecution of an individual to settle personal scores, let alone when there is no credible evidence that a person engaged in any wrongdoing,” the lawmakers wrote.

The senators, led by the committee’s ranking member, Dick Durbin, are demanding that the Department of Justice provide documentation into several ongoing investigations, and interviews with several officials, including Ed Martin – a Trump loyalist who is now in charge of the DoJ group investigating the “weaponization” of the justice system.

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Updated at 17.25 EDT

Democrats on House oversight committee release new Epstein records, including diaries and flight logs

Democrats on the House oversight committee have released a tranche of partial records from Jeffrey Epstein’s estate, which include flight logs, diary appointments and a financial ledger.

In the partially redacted documents, there are several emailed schedules over the years, which include:

A 2019 breakfast with former White House adviser Steve Bannon.

Lunch in 2017 with billionaire and Trump ally Peter Thiel.

A potential visit from Elon Musk to Epstein’s island in 2014.

There is also a flight log from 2000, which lists Prince Andrew as a passenger on Epstein’s private plane.

“It should be clear to every American that Jeffrey Epstein was friends with some of the most powerful and wealthiest men in the world,” said oversight spokesperson Sara Guerrero. “Every new document produced provides new information as we work to bring justice for the survivors and victims. Oversight Democrats will not stop until we identify everyone complicit in Epstein’s heinous crimes.”

However, the committee’s Republican leadership said the records were “old news”, and that the members in the minority were “conveniently withholding documents that contain the names of Democratic officials”.

“Once again they are putting politics over victims,” Republicans said. “We are releasing them all soon.”

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Updated at 16.51 EDT

Coral Murphy Marcos

Nineteen people detained at an immigration detention center that the Trump administration opened within Louisiana’s infamous Angola prison were entering their fifth day on hunger strike on Sunday, according to advocacy groups.

Those striking at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) processing center set up at Angola’s former Camp J are demanding access to medical and mental health care – including prescription medications, according to the Southeast Dignity Not Detention Coalition (SEDND) and the National Immigration Project (NIPNLG).

A statement from both groups says that detainees at the facility the Trump administration has dubbed “the Louisiana Lockup” are also asking for basic necessities such as toilet paper, hygiene products and clean drinking water. Further, they seek visitation from Ice officers to raise concerns about conditions inside the facility.

People with chronic health conditions are not receiving prescribed medications, according to the SEDND and NIPNLG statement, and there is no access to services such as a law library or religious programming, which are required under federal detention standards.

Angola’s official name is the Louisiana state penitentiary. The strike there comes after Louisiana’s governor, Jeff Landry, declared a state emergency in July to address what he said is a lack of capacity to house offenders at the prison.

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Sinclair says it will end Jimmy Kimmel Live! suspension

Sinclair – the company which owns more than 35 ABC affiliates– said today that it will “end its preemption of Jimmy Kimmel Live!” and the show will return tonight across its stations.

This comes after several lawmakers criticized Sinclair for deciding to keep the late-night show off the air, despite Disney’s decision to end the suspension earlier this week, following Kimmel’s criticism of the Trump administration in the wake of the Charlie Kirk shooting.

In a statement the broadcast conglomerate said:

Over the last week, we have received thoughtful feedback from viewers, advertisers, and community leaders representing a wide range of perspectives. We have also witnessed troubling acts of violence, including the despicable incident of a shooting at an ABC affiliate station in Sacramento. These events underscore why responsible broadcasting matters and why respectful dialogue between differing voices remains so important.

According to Reuters, Sinclair’s ABC stations represent about 14% of US households. Another ABC station owner, Nextstar Media Group, has kept Jimmy Kimmel’s show off the air – after Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr put pressure on ABC affiliates to suspend the show or risk losing their broadcast licenses.

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Updated at 15.13 EDT

Top House Democrat slams Trump for attending Ryder Cup with looming government shutdown just days away

In a quick press conference today on Capitol Hill, the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, scolded the president for his trip to New York today. “Donald Trump, get back to Washington DC. Why are you at a golf event right now and the government is four days away from closing?” the congressman said. “That’s outrageous. And it speaks to the fact that these extremists could care less about the health, safety and economic wellbeing of the American people. They’re on vacation right now.”

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Updated at 14.37 EDT

Here’s a recap of the day so far

Fewer than 24 hours after the indictment of James Comey, the president said that he hopes “more” political adversaries will be prosecuted. Speaking to reporters before he left DC to attend the Ryder Cup in New York, Trump maintained that the former FBI director’s prosecution was “about justice … not about revenge”. The president kicked off the day with Truth Social posts that called Comey “a dirty cop” and “destroyer of lives”.

Meanwhile, Democrats and legal experts say the indictment is latest sign Trump is turning the justice system into weapon to silence critics, as my colleague Chris Stein reports.

Trump also continued to blame Democrats for a looming government shutdown. A reminder that lawmakers have yet to pass a resolution to keep the government funded beyond 30 September. Today, the president held up his side of the blame game, telling reporters: “These people are crazy, the Democrats. So if it has to shut down, it’ll have to shut down, but they’re the ones that are shutting down.” For their part, House Democrats will meet virtually today for a caucus meeting, as they refuse to back any funding bill without several healthcare provisions.

Democrats on the House judiciary committee are asking its Republican leader to allow victims of Jeffrey Epstein and his associates to testify about “the institutional failures that enabled these horrific crimes”. The letter, signed by 17 Democrats and led by ranking member Jamie Raskin and congresswoman Deborah Ross, a leader in the Democratic Women’s caucus and longtime champion of sexual violence survivors, comes amid continued pressure for the Trump administration to authorize the release of more files related to the disgraced financier.

Congressman Raskin said that the indictment of James Comey is because the justice department is in “full cover-up mode” over the Epstein files. In an interview with CNN, the Democrat from Maryland called the prosecution an example of the “complete politicization of the Department of Justice”. He added: “We’re in the midst of trying to get this information with apparently real crimes. And we’ve got a strong, bipartisan majority saying, ‘Stop the cover-up of the Epstein files. Just go ahead and release them.’”

An federal immigration officer has been “relieved of his duties” after a video showing him pushing a woman to the floor at an immigration court in New York City spread quickly on social media. Tricia McLaughlin, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, said that the agent’s actions were “unacceptable and beneath the men and women of Ice”. McLaughlin added that the officer is “being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation”.

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Updated at 14.39 EDT