26 h. ago Trump signs executive orders to spur US ‘nuclear energy renaissance’

President aims to construct new nuclear reactors as he implements his own energy policies and undoes Joe Biden’sDonald Trump signed a series of executive orders on Friday intended to spur a “nuclear energy renaissance” through the construction of new reactors he said would satisfy the electricity demands of data centers for artificial intelligence and other emerging industries.The orders represented the president’s latest foray into the policy underlying America’s electricity supply. Trump declared a national energy emergency on his first day in office over and moved to undo a ban implemented by Joe Biden on new natural gas export terminals and expand oil and gas drilling in Alaska. Continue reading...

Politics

34 h. ago Trump vowed to help US farmers. These four say his policies are ‘wreaking havoc’

Farm country voted for Trump in 2024, but many of his actions – from tariffs to federal cuts – are hurting growersDonald Trump may have won the votes of the US’s most farming-dependent counties by an average of 78% in the 2024 election. But the moves made by his administration in the past few months – imposing steep tariffs, immigration policies that target the migrant labor farmers rely on, and canceling a wide range of USDA programs – have left many farmers reeling.“The policies of the Trump administration are wreaking havoc on family farmers. It’s been terrible,” said John Bartman, a row crop farmer in Illinois. Bartman is owed thousands of dollars for sustainable practices he implemented on his row crop operation as part of the USDA’s Climate-Smart program. Continue reading...

Politics

52 h. ago Trump administration seeks to end protections for immigrant children in federal custody

The Trump administration is seeking to end an immigration policy cornerstone that since the 1990s has offered protections to child migrants in federal custody, a move that will be challenged by advocates

Events

59 h. ago Nearly 2,000 Afghan children living in hotels, military bases and other temporary accommodation in UK

Afghan families are being temporarily housed in army bases and Home Office hotels around the UK

Events

3 d. ago A huge Democratic victory in Omaha offers a lesson for the party | Katrina vanden Heuvel

The Nebraska city swung by 43 points to elect John Ewing Jr. Democrats should pay close attention to the model he embracedFor the last several months, the Trump administration’s reckless use of executive power, trade policy, gutting federal agencies, and defying court orders has gone largely unchecked. National Democrats have limited means of opposition – so the best hope for accountability will be electoral accountability.This may help explain why last Tuesday’s election results in America’s 41st biggest city generated such outsized excitement from progressives. John Ewing Jr, a longtime county treasurer, was elected the first Black mayor of Omaha, defeating the incumbent Jean Stothert, who was seeking a fourth term after holding that office since 2013. More than that, Ewing won big, by nearly 13 points, marking a huge shift after Stothert won her last race by 30.Katrina vanden Heuvel is editorial director and publisher of the Nation, she is a member of the Council on Foreign Relat...

Politics

3 d. ago German finance minister calls for swift resolution to Trump tariff wars as G7 finance ministers meet in Canada – Europe live

Finance ministers are meeting in Banff, Alberta to discuss Ukraine and Trump’s trade policy Finance ministers of the world’s seven largest economies – G7 – are meeting in Banff, Alberta in Canada to discuss their ideas on Ukraine and concerns about disruptions resulting from Donald Trump’s unorthodox trade policy.Before the meeting, German finance minister Lars Klingbeil warned that trade disputes with the US should be resolved as soon as possible, as he stressed they were a burden on the economy and job security. Continue reading...

Politics

4 d. ago White House says Trump is reviewing IVF policy recommendations promised in executive order

A White House official says the Trump administration is reviewing a list of recommendations to expand access to in vitro fertilization

Events

4 d. ago Three men on trial in Germany accused of Russian sabotage plot

German-Russian dual citizens allegedly spied for Kremlin and planned bomb attacks on buildings and infrastructureWar in Ukraine – live updatesThree German-Russian dual citizens have gone on trial in Munich accused of spying on behalf of the Kremlin and planning attacks on critical military infrastructure and industry.The alleged spies are said to have found code words for military goods and gathered confidential information about an oil refinery in Bavaria and a US military training area near the town of Grafenwöhr in the east of the state. The men are also said to have made plans to carry out bomb attacks on buildings and infrastructure used to support Ukraine. Continue reading...

Politics

4 d. ago Zelenskyy urges more pressure on Russia after no ceasefire agreed in Trump

Ukrainian president says ‘pressure on Russia will push it toward real peace’Trump and Putin hold phone call but Kremlin refuses ceasefireEU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas on Tuesday called for the United States to take “strong action” against Russia if Moscow does not agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine.“America said that if Russia doesn’t agree on an unconditional ceasefire, then there are going to be consequences. So we want to see those consequences, also from the US side,” Kallas said at a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels.Putin is clearly playing for time, unfortunately we have to say Putin is not really interested in peace. Continue reading...

Events

4 d. ago Trump alleges 'genocide' in South Africa. At an agricultural fair, even Afrikaner farmers scoff

Topping the agenda at President Donald Trump's meeting with South Africa's president at the White House this week is the extraordinary new U.S. refugee policy welcoming white Afrikaner farmers who the Trump administration claims are persecuted

Politics

5 d. ago Energy bills set to change this summer in major boost for millions of UK households

It's another knock-on effect of Donald Trump's aggressive tariff policy

Economics

7 d. ago How Trump stunned the world as he flipped America's Middle East policy on its head

President Donald Trump's trip to the Middle East provided the president with the kind of made-for-TV moments the president adores.

Politics

8 d. ago What Donald Trump did this week should terrify Benjamin Netanyahu. This is why | Jonathan Freedland

The president’s Middle East tour made one thing clear – he will betray his one-time ally in a heartbeat. He is already doing it It’s come to something when the Palestinians’ best hope for relief rests on a man who dreams of emptying Gaza of its people and turning the place into a beach resort. And yet the clearest, and perhaps only, way out of the current agony lies with Donald Trump – and his growing impatience with an ever-more isolated Israel.If this were any of Trump’s predecessors, you would be hailing the past week as confirmation of a radical, even epochal shift in US foreign policy. But because it’s Trump, you can’t be sure it’s not a passing whim that will be undone in another equally drastic shift a matter of weeks, or even hours, from now.Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Politics

8 d. ago Trump policy moves worry Afghan refugees in US military town and Christian groups that assist them

The Trump administration’s suspension of the federal refugee program has upended the lives of many Afghans who worked with the United States during wartime

Events

9 d. ago Republicans say they want more American babies – but which kind?

Trump administration policies on immigration, families, and children have been pockmarked by all kinds of contradictionsSome of the children were too young to stand on their own. Instead, they sat on their parents’ knees or in their parents’ arms, waving American flags. Many of them seemed confused about what, exactly, was even happening.But these kids were in the midst of making history: their families were among the first to take advantage of Donald Trump’s February executive order granting white South Africans refugee status in the United States, on the grounds that Afrikaner landowners – who make up just 7% of South Africa’s population yet, decades after the end of apartheid, control about half of its land – are facing persecution. While the doors to the US refugee program have been slammed shut to virtually everyone else, these Afrikaners showed up in the US earlier this week, their refugee status promising a path to US citizenship. Continue reading...

Politics

9 d. ago Potential US semiconductor manufacturing boom complicated by Trump's economic policies

Before ‘America First’ became the Trump administration’s mandate for foreign policy and trade, one sector was already working to bring business back to the United States: the semiconductor industry

Economics

1 week ago What Trump’s ‘palace in the sky’ gift from Qatar reveals | Moira Donegan

This kind of behavior from the Trump administration has gone on for so long that it is hard to rouse the media to cover itIt certainly looks as if policy is for sale in the Trump administration. After all, the president’s primary domestic policy deputy, Elon Musk, gained his position in the administration more or less by purchasing it: he is the richest man in the world, and the primary funder of Trump’s last presidential campaign, and it is seemingly by this virtue – does he have any others? – that Musk has been granted the authority to dismantle large swaths of the federal bureaucracy.This is something of a pattern for Donald Trump. In his first term, it became de rigueur for foreign dignitaries to stay at Trump’s hotel on trips to Washington, a practice long perceived to be a way of currying favor with the president by spending money at his businesses. Trump funneled money to his hotel business from domestic sources, too: when Secret Service agents were required to stay at Trump’...

Politics

1 week ago US and Saudi Arabia sign $142bn arms deal as Trump to meet Syrian leader

White House touts deal made on first stop of US president’s four-day diplomatic tour to Gulf statesUS politics live – latest updatesThe United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a $142bn arms deal touted by the White House as the “largest defence sales agreement in history” in the first stop of Donald Trump’s four-day diplomatic tour to the Gulf states aimed at securing big deals and spotlighting the benefits of Trump’s transactional foreign policy.During the trip, the White House also confirmed that Trump would meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. The informal meeting will be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva. Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Trump’s China deal leaves world exposed to trade policy lottery

Beijing and London’s pacts with US create exceedingly uncertain future

Politics

1 week ago The Guardian view on Israel and Gaza: Trump can stop this horror. The alternative is unthinkable | Editorial

The US president has the leverage to force through a ceasefire. If he does not, he will implicitly signal approval of what looks like a plan of total destructionDonald Trump would like a big foreign policy win as he embarks on his tour of the Middle East this week. He could secure one – and save lives – by demanding that Israel agree to a lasting ceasefire in exchange for the release of all hostages held in Gaza. He might prefer to avoid the issue, but no other leader has the leverage to force its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to end this war. If Mr Trump instead backs Israel’s current proposals, he will put the US imprimatur on what looks like a plan of total destruction.Israel’s attacks have already killed more than 52,000 people in Gaza, according to local health authorities – the vast majority of them civilians, many of them children. Bakeries, hospitals and schools have been obliterated. Aid has been blocked for two months. Gaza faces famine. Last week, Isr...

Politics