Man charged with murder of Sarah Montgomery in Co Down
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Spectator
16 minutes ago
- Spectator
No, British trans people aren't at risk of ‘genocide'
The Supreme Court judgment on the definition of a woman on 16 April restored a degree of sanity to a world that was in danger of going mad. Even Keir Starmer now knows that a woman is a matter of biology rather than ideology. Can somebody please tell the Americans? Or, more precisely, those progressive types over the pond who like to concern themselves with other people's business. The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention and Human Security is an American non-profit organisation that started out to address concerns about the situation in Iraq in the wake of Isis. The institute claims to connect 'the global grassroots with the tools of genocide prevention', and generally to do a bit of good in the world. How effective their campaigns might be in a world where aggression remains rife is for others to judge. Their latest red flag alert, however, homed in on the United Kingdom and, in particular, the experiences of transgender and intersex people. They saw 'evidence of genocidal intent and actions targeting these communities'. According to them, 'this hostile environment is a subtle, pernicious and clear attempt to eradicate transgender and intersex people from British life.' The hyperbole is so far from my experiences as a trans person that it is ridiculous, and such deluded campaigners from afar should merit no further discussion. What bothers me more are people closer to home who ought to know better. Last week, Victoria McCloud – a former judge, who also happens to be trans – announced: I now see it as my sad duty to make an evidence-based report to Genocide Watch and The Lemkin Institute requesting investigation into the systematic oppression of the trans community of the UK. Perhaps we now know why the Americans suddenly poked their noses in? And that wasn't a one-off. The BBC recently reported McCloud's fear that 'someone's going to get killed' because of the Supreme Court ruling. My view of the situation is rather more mundane. Could it be that some people don't like the judgment and fear being called to account for their actions? It was never right for male transitioners to assume that they could co-opt themselves into the rights of women simply by uttering the magic words 'I identify as a woman'. We now live in a saner – and better – world where everybody knows that other people's rights matter too. McCloud needs to get over it. My fear is the genuinely vulnerable will be put at risk, not from some genocidal mob but from fear itself. As trans people, we are told regularly about that 'systematic oppression'. When there is power in being a victim, claims of persecution can attract benefits and rewards. For over a decade, the trans community has drawn in vulnerable youngsters with promises that can never be delivered. Now I sense that the carnival is moving on: the Cass Review put the brakes on the chemical castration of children; the Supreme Court gave women the confidence to object to people they perceived to be men in their spaces; and Pride has lost its grip on our public institutions – at least in councils run by Reform UK. But while society moves on, some youngsters risk being left to flounder. Some never experienced puberty, others were led to believe that they were the opposite sex at unknown cost to their psychological development. Rather more were told that they had a gender identity that set them apart from mere muggles. Life might be far more complicated for them in the coming years and decades. They need to be helped to focus on the things that really matter – building committed relationships, finding productive employment, and taking up their place in society. It helps nobody to ruminate on the fiction that they are hated for claiming a transgender identity. The reality is that few people even care. The world of their future will have its challenges, but genocidal mobs trying to eradicate trans people from the UK are hardly likely to feature – whatever a former judge might like to believe.
The Guardian
18 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Trump's ‘Alligator Alcatraz' tour was a calculated celebration of the dystopian
Donald Trump's tour of the bloodcurdlingly-monikered – and hastily-constructed – 'Alligator Alcatraz' migrants detention center in Florida's Everglades had the hallmarks of a calculatedly provocative celebration of the dystopian. Accompanied by Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, the Florida governor Ron DeSantis and a phalanx of journalists, the US president saw only virtue in the vista of mesh fencing, barbed wire and forbidding steel bunk beds. 'Between Kristi and Ron, it's really government working together,' he said. 'They have done an amazing job. I'm proud of them.' Not that Trump was blind to the intimidating nature of the facility his long crusade against undocumented people had willed into existence in this hot, steamy part of southern Florida, prized by environmentalists as a crucial nature preserve but now redesigned to be a location of dread to those lacking documentary proof of their right to be in the US. 'Biden wanted me in here,' he said, snidely referring to his predecessor in the White House, who he accuses – without evidence – of orchestrating criminal prosecutions against him. 'It didn't work out that way, but he wanted me in here, the son of a bitch.' Tuesday's visit seemed to represent a new landmark in the administration's embrace of unabashedly authoritarian solutions to meet what has been Trump's defining issue since even before his first term: migration. Recent weeks have seen several escalations as the White House and law enforcement agencies have sought to project an ever more draconian approach. Deaths have been recorded of several detainees who had been taken into custody by Immigration, Customs and Enforcement (Ice) officials. Footage of masked officers without insignia arresting people in the streets has sent shockwaves through immigrant communities nationwide. National guards troops and marines have been deployed against demonstrators protesting migrant roundups on the streets of Los Angeles, even as local authorities and California's Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, insisted they were not needed. In what has seemed like performative acts of political intimidation, several Democrats have been arrested and handcuffed by Ice and FBI agents near detention facilities or immigration courts. Senator Alex Padilla of California was pinned to the ground and handcuffed after trying to ask a question of Noem at a press conference, even after identifying himself. The administration's schtick was clear when Nayib Bukele, the president of El Salvador and self-proclaimed 'world's coolest dictator', was feted in the White House in April days after more than 200 Venezuelan alleged gang members were summarily deported from the US to the sprawling Cecot facility in El Salvador. Shortly afterwards, Noem compounded the message by traveling to the center – said to have capacity for 40,000 prisoners – where she posed outside a cell into which large numbers shaven-headed detainees were herded. All of the this has drawn howls of condemnation from critics as signaling red flags for the state of US democracy and constitutional guarantees. Tuesday's event indicated the strength of the administration's contempt for such concerns. It was case of all-in on the Bukele approach, at least in imagery if not in scale. Enough beds have been installed in two separate areas of the facility to house 5,000 prisoners. Seized from its owners, Miami Dade county, by DeSantis using emergency powers as governor, the setting has drawn accusations of cruelty from immigrants rights organizations who point to the area's extreme heat and humidity and surrounding marshlands, which contains alligators, Burmese pythons and swarms of mosquitoes. Trump seemed to revel in the potential for detainees' misery at what was termed a round-table discussion but which devolved into fawning praise of his leadership from administration and state officials and obsequious questions from journalists representing friendly rightwing news outlets. 'It might be as good as the real Alcatraz site,' he said. 'That's a spooky one too, isn't it? That's a tough site.' As if in confirmation that this was an event designed to showcase ruthlessness, Trump handed the floor to Stephen Miller, the powerful White House deputy chief of staff and widely-acknowledged mastermind of the anti-immigrant offensive, calling him 'our superstar'. Sign up to This Week in Trumpland A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration after newsletter promotion Miller responded with a pithy summation of the policy's raison d'être. 'What you've done over the last five months [is] to deliver on a 50-year hope and dream of the American people to secure the border,' he said. 'There's a 2,000 mile border with one of the poorest countries in the world, and you have open travel from 150 countries into Central America and South America. 'There are 2 billion people in the world that would economically benefit from illegally coming to the United States. Through the deployment of the military, through … novel legal and diplomatic tools, through the building of physical infrastructure, through the empowering of Ice and border patrol and the entire federal law enforcement apparatus, President Trump achieved absolute border security.' And there would be more to come – courtesy of funds secured for deportations in Trump's sweeping spending bill, which secured narrow Senate passage during Trump's visit to the facility. 'Once this legislation is passed, he will be able to make that, with those resources, permanent,' Miller said. PBS reported that the bill envisions roughly $150bn being spent on the administration's deportation agenda over the next four years. Taking the soft cop line, Noem on Tuesday told undocumented people that it didn't have to be this way; they could still, to use the administration's terminology, take the 'self-deport' option by returning voluntarily to their home countries – where she said the governments were waiting with open arms. 'Anybody who sees these news clips should know you could still go home on your own, you can self-deport,' she said, adding that they could apply to return to the United States 'the right way'. A more telling attitude to accountability was displayed by Trump himself at the end of the media question and answer session when a Fox News reporter asked how long detainees could expect to spend at the Florida facility – days, weeks or months. After clarifying the question, Trump seemed – or perhaps decided – to misunderstand it. 'This is my home state,' he said. 'I love it … I'll spend a lot of time here. I'll be here as much as I can. Very nice question.'
The Guardian
29 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Mayors sue over Trump's efforts to restrict Obamacare signups
New Trump administration rules that give millions of people a shorter timeframe to sign up for the Affordable Care Act's health care coverage are facing a legal challenge from Democratic mayors around the country. The rules, rolled out last month, reverse a Biden-era effort to expand access to the Affordable Care Act's health insurance, commonly called 'Obamacare' or the ACA. The previous Democratic administration expanded the enrollment window for the coverage, which led to record enrollment. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rolled out a series of new restrictions for Obamacare late last month, just as Congress was weighing a major bill that will decrease enrollment in the health care program that Donald Trump has scorned for years. As many as 2 million people – nearly 10% – are expected to lose coverage from the health department's new rules. The mayors of Baltimore, Chicago and Columbus, Ohio, sued the federal health department on Tuesday over the rules, saying they will result in more uninsured residents and overburden city services. 'Cloaked in the pretense of government efficiency and fraud prevention, the 2025 Rule creates numerous barriers to affordable insurance coverage, negating the purpose of the ACA to extend affordable health coverage to all Americans, and instead increasing the population of underinsured and uninsured Americans,' the filing alleges. Two liberal advocacy groups – Doctors for America and Main Street Alliance – joined in on the complaint. The federal health department announced a series of changes late last month to the ACA. It will shorten the enrollment period for the federal marketplace by a month, limiting it to 1 November to 15 December in 2026. Income verification checks will become more stringent and a $5 fee will be tacked on for some people who automatically re-enroll in a free plan. Insurers will also be able to deny coverage to people who have not paid their premiums on past plans. The rules also bar roughly 100,000 immigrants who were brought to the US as children from signing up for the coverage. The new rules 'safeguard the future of the marketplace', and will lower premiums for those who remain in the program, HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon said in a statement. 'The rule closes loopholes, strengthens oversight, and ensures taxpayer subsidies go to those who are truly eligible – that's not controversial, it's common sense,' Nixon said. But the three mayors argue that the polices were introduced without an adequate public comment period on the policies. 'This unlawful rule will force families off their health insurance and raise costs on millions of Americans. This does nothing to help people and instead harms Americans' health and safety across our country,' said Skye Perryman, the president of Democracy Forward, which is representing the coalition of plaintiffs in the lawsuit. The lawsuit does not challenge the Trump administration's restriction on immigrants signing up for the coverage. The Biden administration saw gains in Obamacare enrollment as a major success of the Democratic president's term, noting that a record 24 million people signed up for the coverage, thanks to generous tax breaks offered through the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. But the program has been a target of Trump, who has said it is riddled with problems that make the coverage unaffordable for many without large subsidies. Enrollment in the program dipped during his first term in office.
