Normal view

US supreme court allows Trump to keep building $400m White House ballroom

Justices’ 5-4 ruling permits Trump administration appeal to block lower court order halting above-ground work

A divided US supreme court has permitted Donald Trump to continue building his controversial $400m White House ballroom despite legal challenges, raising the likelihood it will be completed.

In a 5-4 ruling, the justices permitted the Trump administration’s request to ⁠block a lower court order which had halted above-ground construction of the project while a lawsuit by a historic preservation group seeks to block it.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

© Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

© Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Trump says datacenter opponents ‘want to end up being backwards and poor’

31 August 2026 at 20:32

Three-quarters of Americans said in a recent poll that they oppose datacenters being built next to their homes

Donald Trump has criticized communities pushing back against datacenter projects across the US amid a growing backlash, warning those that reject them risk becoming “backwards and poor”.

As controversy surrounding local datacenter plans continues to swirl around election campaigns nationwide ahead of November’s midterm elections, the US president declared Americans “will only have yourselves to blame” if they are canceled.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images

© Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images

© Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images

The Guardian view on Trump’s immigration crackdown: who will have fewer rights next? | Editorial

31 August 2026 at 20:04

The president’s deportation machine is creating a class of people inside the US who have fewer protections against the power of the state

Is the Trump administration creating a group in the US with fewer protections against executive power owing to their immigration status? Its often openly racist actions suggest so. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) claims to target “the worst of the worst” – undocumented migrants who commit violent crimes. Yet the Guardian reported that over half of those arrested in July had no criminal convictions or pending charges. That month, ICE made record arrests and deportations, apprehending 1,500 people and removing 1,100 daily.

When campaigning, Donald Trump falsely claimed that Haitians were “eating the pets”. In office, his administration moved to end temporary protected status (TPS) for Haitians. In June, the supreme court let the protection expire, leaving about 350,000 people at risk of deportation to a country gripped by violence and instability. The court’s decision means more than 1 million TPS holders from 13 nations previously considered too unsafe to return to are now at risk of deportation. Many have lived and worked legally in the US for years.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Al Drago/Pool/Al Drago - Pool/CNP/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Al Drago/Pool/Al Drago - Pool/CNP/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Al Drago/Pool/Al Drago - Pool/CNP/Shutterstock

Pentagon plays down report of Hegseth regularly overruling military advice

Response seeks to discredit Washington Post story that four generals and admirals advised against prolonging Iran war

Pete Hegseth regularly receives formal objections from senior commanders and proceeds anyway, the Pentagon’s top spokesman has said, as he tried to discredit a Washington Post report that four generals and admirals had advised against prolonging the war in Iran.

“Of course, we demand candid military advice,” Sean Parnell wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Non-concurs are standard. The Secretary sees them constantly. That’s how you run a real military.”

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

© Photograph: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

© Photograph: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

House lawmakers return to Capitol Hill as Republicans hope to pass stopgap spending bill – live

The US House is back after a five-week recess; government funding is guaranteed through 30 September

Chris Hippensteel

We’re watching today as Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, and Kevin Warsh, the chair of the Federal Reserve, deliver their opening remarks at the G20 meetings in Asheville, North Carolina.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Finn Gomez/Getty Images

© Photograph: Finn Gomez/Getty Images

© Photograph: Finn Gomez/Getty Images

As US-Canada tensions flare, who’s calling the shots in Trump’s trade team?

31 August 2026 at 13:00

US trade representative Jamieson Greer has a level-headed reputation but commerce secretary Howard Lutnick and White House adviser Peter Navarro also have key roles

Having reportedly read Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, in French, during a military tour of duty in Iraq, Jamieson Greer considered himself an unlikely target for accusations of francophobia.

But Donald Trump’s US trade representative, hitherto one of the president’s less high-profile cabinet members, found himself in that uncomfortable position amid the acrimonious collapse of bilateral trade talks with Canada that now threatens to degenerate into an all-out trade war between the two close trading partners whose economies are tightly intertwined.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Getty Images

© Photograph: Getty Images

© Photograph: Getty Images

Trump’s plan to sell off a part of Yosemite is what oligarchy looks like | Rebecca Solnit

31 August 2026 at 13:00

Public lands belong to all of us. No one should plunder those lands for profit

Do people still say a car was “sold for parts”? Because the US is being sold for parts or just handed over to the oligarchy. It’s a fire sale, a bankruptcy auction, it’s a planned dismantling of everything from its military to its institutions of higher education to its scientific research to its public lands.

And while the threat to sell off part of Yosemite national park is about a quarter-mile parcel on the park’s edge, Yosemite is a crown jewel in the national park system and, arguably, the world’s first national park.

Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. She is the author of Orwell’s Roses and co-editor with Thelma Young Lutunatabua of the climate anthology Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Trump’s ballroom construction can resume at White House, supreme court rules – as it happened

This live blog is now closed.

Chris Hippensteel

We’re watching today as Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, and Kevin Warsh, the chair of the Federal Reserve, deliver their opening remarks at the G20 meetings in Asheville, North Carolina.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

© Photograph: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

© Photograph: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Iranian president says he still wants diplomatic end to war after US strikes on Hormuz – Middle East crisis live

US targets Iran’s Larak Island in first exchange of fire in more than a month as Masoud Pezeshkian says America ‘has not fulfilled its commitments’

Coinciding with this week’s G20 meeting, the EU has issued a statement saying it will work with the US and other allied countries to maintain economic pressure against Iran.

“The ‌EU welcomes efforts at ensuring that Iran ceases its destabilising activities and engages in peace negotiations with good ‌faith, also through additional economic pressure, including through ​the US-led Operation Economic Outcast,” it said in reference to the pressure strategy the White House describes as “an unprecedented campaign to sever every remaining economic lifeline sustaining” the Islamic republic.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Reuters

© Photograph: Reuters

© Photograph: Reuters

Trump says US will ‘hit Iran hard’ as hostilities resume – as it happened

Iran responded to an assault on its Larak Island by targeting US bases in Jordan

Coinciding with this week’s G20 meeting, the EU has issued a statement saying it will work with the US and other allied countries to maintain economic pressure against Iran.

“The ‌EU welcomes efforts at ensuring that Iran ceases its destabilising activities and engages in peace negotiations with good ‌faith, also through additional economic pressure, including through ​the US-led Operation Economic Outcast,” it said in reference to the pressure strategy the White House describes as “an unprecedented campaign to sever every remaining economic lifeline sustaining” the Islamic republic.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Shutterstock

USDA reportedly shelves cyclospora research amid relocations and fund cuts

31 August 2026 at 00:10

Trump officials shuttering three projects on foodborne parasite, two defunded by Congress, Politico reports

The Trump administration is shuttering ⁠two of the three US Department of Agriculture research projects studying cyclospora after the foodborne parasite has ⁠sickened tens of thousands of Americans during the summer, Politico reported on Sunday.

The two projects were defunded by Congress earlier in the year, while the third is ⁠due to be moved in coming months from Maryland to Iowa as part of a broader USDA reorganization, according to the ⁠report.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: J David Ake/Getty Images

© Photograph: J David Ake/Getty Images

© Photograph: J David Ake/Getty Images

❌