California To Change Election Maps To Counter Texas, Governor Says
Governor Gavin Newsom said he would ask voters to approve new maps that would effectively neutralize changes Texas is planning that are expected to give Republicans more seats in the House of Representatives.
"Today is Liberation Day in the State of California," Newsom told supporters at the Democracy Center in Los Angeles.
"Donald Trump, you have poked the bear, and we will punch back," he said, a reference to the animal that symbolizes the 39-million strong state.
The move came after weeks of maneuvering in Texas, where Governor Greg Abbott -- acting at Trump's behest -- is trying to redraw electoral districts to benefit his Republican Party, a process known as gerrymandering.
Districts are usually redrawn every ten years after the national census and are supposed to be based on its findings, so that districts accurately represent the people who live there.
The mid-decade effort to change the boundaries is seen by Democrats as a naked attempt to bolster the GOP, and to help it retain its narrow House majority in next year's mid-terms.
Dozens of Texas Democrats have fled the state in an effort to block the passage of the proposed blueprint during a special legislative session, even as Republicans have threatened to arrest them.
Newsom said a special ballot on November 4 would ask California voters to create temporary congressional districts for the next two elections, with power to set boundaries returned to an independent commission thereafter.
"We're doing this in reaction to a president of the United States that called a sitting governor of the state of Texas and said, 'find me five seats.'
"He is, once again, trying to rig the system. He doesn't play by a different set of rules; he doesn't believe in the rules.
"We have got to recognize the cards that have been dealt, and we have got to meet fire with fire."
Newsom, who is believed to harbor Oval Office ambitions, has emerged as a leading anti-Trump voice from a Democratic Party still floundering after last year's ballot box drubbing.
The two men have frequently locked horns, including over aggressive immigration enforcement raids the administration ordered in Los Angeles.
In June, after thousands took to the streets to protest seemingly indiscriminate arrests by masked and unidentified agents, Trump sent in the National Guard and the Marines, claiming it was necessary to restore order.
On Thursday, masked Border Patrol agents were seen outside the Democracy Center, part of a museum in the Little Tokyo district of Los Angeles, despite there being no obvious presence of their usual arrest targets.
Newsom's press conference came after he had trolled Trump for days on social media, aping the president's instantly recognizable style.
A series of all-caps posts from Newsom's official account have employed Trumpian language and been sprinkled liberally -- if not logically -- with punctuation, as well as nicknames, boasts and silly-sounding threats.
"DONNIE J. AND KaroLYIN' LEAVITT WILL HAVE THEIR (LITTLE) HANDS "FULL" TODAY," read one tweet on Thursday, referring to the president and his press spokeswoman.
"I, GAVIN CHRISTOPHER NEWSOM, AMERICA'S FAVORITE GOVERNOR (MANY SAY), WILL HOST THE GREATEST PRESS CONFERENCE OF ALL TIME. AFTER THAT -- "THE MAPS" WILL SOON BE RELEASED. VERY MUCH ANTICIPATED."
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DW
2 hours ago
- DW
Trump, Putin summit on Ukraine underway in Alaska – DW – 08/15/2025
Trump described Putin as a "smart guy" while teasing the meeting as "high stakes!" Ukrainian President Zelenskyy said a trilateral meeting with Kyiv's involvement must follow. Follow DW for more. US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are meeting at a military base in Alaska Trump greeted Putin with a handshake on a red carpet laid out on the tarmac Zelenskyy says summit should "open up a real path toward a just peace" Yulia Navalnaya calls for the release of political prisoners from Russia and UkraineDonald Trump and Vladimir Putin sat together in a room at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson after their arrival in Alaska. Against a backdrop bearing the slogan "Pursuing Peace," the US and Russian presidents sat with members of their respective delegations without taking any questions from reporters or making any statements. Donald Trump has greeted Vladimir Putin with a handshake on the red carpet in Alaska. The two leaders met on the tarmac before briefly posing for photos standing side-by-side. After not taking any questions from reporters, they left the stage and got into a waiting car together, and could be seen smiling and chatting to each other in the backseat as the vehicle drove off. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has said the previously planned one-on-one meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will now be a three-on-three session. The US president is to be joined by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy Steve Witkoff. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who arrived in Alaska earlier, is likely to be one of the team alongside Putin. According to the Kremlin, the meeting will be followed by talks between the full delegations and continue over lunch. The two leaders are expected to hold a joint press conference. Donald Trump has landed in Alaska for the highly anticipated summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump and Putin are expected to discuss Russia's invasion of Ukraine and US-Russia on Friday, several hundred people had gathered in Anchorage, the state capital, to show their support for Ukraine. A rally outside Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, where the Trump-Putin summit is being held, however, was much smaller. Only a handful of protesters turned out to denounce Russia's invasion of its neighbor. As US and Russian leaders meet to discuss peace in Ukraine, key voices are missing — Ukraine and Europe. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz warns that any deal must include Kyiv and begin with a ceasefire. Though Europe's influence is limited, Merz could emerge as a key figure, urging President Trump to protect European and Ukrainian interests. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 videoA Russian government aircraft has landed in Alaska ahead of the talks between the Russian and US presidents, according to flight tracking site Flightradar24. It was unclear whether Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin was on board. The plane departed from Magadan in Russia's Far East, where the Russian president had been earlier on Friday. The Kremlin said the summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska is expected to last six to seven hours. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian state television the meeting will begin with a personal conversation involving advisers, followed by delegation-level talks that could take place over a working lunch. He said the two leaders would later meet privately again before holding a joint press conference. Putin left for Alaska from Russia's Magadan region in the Far East. Peskov said the Russian leader was expected to arrive on time at 11 a.m. local time (1900 GMT/UTC) in Anchorage, where the meeting will take place at a US military base. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that Moscow was continuing to kill people and showing no intention of ending the war, just hours before the Russian and US presidents meet in Alaska "There is no order, nor any signals from Moscow that it is preparing to end this war... they are also killing on the day of the negotiations," Zelenskyy said in a video address posted on social media. Separately, in his nightly video address, the Ukrainian leader reiterated his call for a trilateral meeting with himself, US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video "It is precisely in this format that real solutions are possible," Zelenskyy said. A Friday night in mid-August is usually the peak of the European Union's sleepy summer political recess. But tonight, officials are glued to their phones, waiting for any clue on whether their bid to influence US President Donald Trump ahead of his talks with Putin has worked. European leaders said their virtual meeting with the US president and his Ukrainian counterpart earlier this week went well — and there's no doubt the trans-Atlantic mood music is better now than back in February when President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was booted out the White House, and Europe was left looking powerless. A European Commission spokesperson told reporters on Thursday their "understanding" is that Trump will "debrief" Zelenskyy and European leaders following his tete-a-tete with Putin. "We don't have a timeframe on this," she added. Until then, it's a case of putting on a brave face and watching from afar. You can read all about Europe's hopes and fears in this analysis by my colleague Anchal Vohra. On his way to the summit with US President Donald Trump in Alaska, Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the Magadan region of his country, some 6,000 kilometers (about 3,750 miles) east of Moscow. According to state media, Putin's scheduled included a visit a fish oil capsule factory and cultural centers in the Russian Far East region's capital, also called Magadan. The city was a major transit centre for political prisoners during the Stalin era and was the administrative centre of a forced labor gold mining operation. The sparsely populated wider Magadan region, on the Sea of Okhotsk, today relies on mining and fishing. After his visit, Putin was expected to review materials on Ukraine, bilateral tensions, and economic cooperation on his 3,000-kilometer journey to the summit in Donald Trump is rolling out the red carpet for Vladimir Putin, not everyone is pleased with the visit. Several hundred people have expressed their protests by waving yellow and blue flags in support of Ukraine. Their main concern is that Zelenskyy is not participating in the meeting. Many of the protesters have voiced their opposition to having an alleged war criminal on American soil. The International Criminal Court in The Hague has issued a warrant for Putin's arrest. Conversely, some Alaskans we met at a golf course expressed pride in having the president here, stating that they would prefer him to meet his Russian counterpart on American soil rather than in Russia. US President Trump is expected to greet Russian President Putin on the plane upon his arrival in Anchorage, Alaska, the Kremlin has said. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Russian state TV that the Russian president was due to arrive at 11:00 am local time (1900 GMT). The meeting between US President Trump and Russian President Putin in a few hours in Alaska should " open up a real path toward a just peace and a substantive discussion between leaders in a trilateral format," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. In a Friday post on X, Zelenskyy said he expected an intelligence report on Russia's intentions and preparations for the meeting. "It is time to end the war, and the necessary steps must be taken by Russia," Zelenskyy wrote. "We are counting on America. We are ready, as always, to work as productively as possible."
DW
4 hours ago
- DW
Fact check: Trump's false claims about Washington, D.C. – DW – 08/15/2025
US President Donald Trump has deployed the National Guard in Washington, D.C. He declared that crime in the capital was "out of control" — but is this really true? DW checks the facts. Two months after deploying the National Guard in Los Angeles, US President Donald Trump has sent 800 National Guard troops into the American capital. On Monday, he placed the city's police department under federal control, and announced that he would bring in the military if necessary. He justified the move by saying that Washington had a very high level of violent crime, and quoted various statistics to support this. Claim: "Crime is out of control in the District of Columbia. […] The magnitude of the violent crime crisis places the District of Columbia among the most violent jurisdictions in the United States," Trump declared in an official White House statement on August 11, reiterating a claim he had posted on his Truth Social platform on August 5. "In 2024, the District of Columbia averaged one of the highest robbery and murder rates of large cities nationwide. Indeed, the District of Columbia now has a higher violent crime, murder, and robbery rate than all 50 States, recording a homicide rate in 2024 of 27.54 per 100,000 residents." DW Fact check: Misleading At first glance, it would appear that Trump is right. Crime rates in the US capital are indeed high [see table]. According to the FBI, the National Center for Health Statistics, and the Center for Public Safety Initiatives, in 2023, compared to the 50 US states, Washington, D.C., was one of the most dangerous territories in the US, with a murder rate of 39 for every 100,000 inhabitants. However, if the numbers for the same year are compared to other major US cities, rather than US states, Washington, which currently has a population of around 684,000, is not the worst offender. Top of the chart, with homicide rates of more than 50 per 100,000 inhabitants, were the cities of New Orleans and St. Louis (Missouri), whose populations are only about half the size. Washington, D.C., is not actually a state, which makes the city comparison more apt. Trump also fails to mention in his statement that the homicide rate in Washington, D.C., has dropped significantly, from 39 per 100,000 in 2023 to 27 in 2024, which is the figure Trump is quoting. This puts Washington in fourth place in the most recent national statistics of cities with the most homicides per 100,000 residents. According to Washington, D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department, there was a 32% decrease in the number of recorded murders in 2024 — down to 187 from 274 cases in 2023. And a comparable annual period of August 2024 to the present (August 2025) has seen a 26% reduction in reported violent crime. The mayor of Washington, Muriel Bowser, spelled this out earlier this week. "It is […] true that we experienced a crime spike post-COVID," she said. "But we worked quickly to put laws in place, and tactics, that got violent offenders off our streets and gave our police officers more tools. Which is why we have seen a huge decrease in crime, because of those efforts. We have been able to reverse that 2023 crime spike." Trump supporters are claiming in various online media — as here and here — that the Washington, D.C., Police Department's statistics have been falsified. And yet statistics published by the independent Council on Criminal Justice also confirm that crime in Washington has in fact decreased. The FBI statistics Trump is using also attest that crime is going down all across the US. According to FBI Data Explorer, there was a reduction in all forms of violent crime in the US in 2024 compared to the previous year. The number of murders dropped by 14.9%, robbery by 8.9%, rape by 5%, and aggravated assault by 3%. Recent data show that this positive trend has continued in 2025. Unlike the president himself, the new AI bot on Trump's Truth Social network gives a nuanced response to the question "Is crime out of control in Washington, D.C.?" "D.C. had a severe crime peak in 2023, but 2025 data show significant declines so far," it says. "Describing crime as 'out of control' today overstates the current downward trend while accurately reflecting the recent high-water mark and ongoing public concern." Trump has also said that his intervention in Washington is "only the beginning." He mentioned the cities of Chicago, New York, Baltimore, and Oakland as places where he might also deploy the National Guard. During his first term in office, Trump mobilized the National Guard in more than half of the US states following the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in May 2020. The troops were sent in to confront the mass protests by the Black Lives Matter movement.
Int'l Business Times
4 hours ago
- Int'l Business Times
Falsehoods Swirl Around Trump-Putin Summit
From false claims of a Ukrainian assassin shot dead in Alaska to baseless reports of Russia declaring the sale of the territory to the United States illegal, misinformation has swirled around the summit between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. The online falsehoods spreading across tech platforms were muddying the waters around Friday's closely watched Alaska summit, a test of the US president's pledge to end the three-year bloody war in Ukraine. "Malign actors (have) flooded the internet and social media with falsehoods and distortions" that were "circulating from across the political spectrum and across the globe," disinformation watchdog NewsGuard said in a report. Among them was the unfounded claim that American soldiers had recently shot and killed a Ukrainian assassin named Stefan Orestovych, a supposed trained sniper for Ukraine's special forces, in the Alaskan city of Wasilla. There was no evidence that an assassin by that name even exists. The falsehood, which circulated on X, Instagram, a QAnon conspiracy theory platform as well as a Sri Lankan news website, originated on Real Raw News, according to NewsGuard. A self-proclaimed "humor, parody, and satire" site, Real Raw News is often mistaken as a legitimate news outlet and has repeatedly been called out by researchers for publishing fabricated claims about the Russia-Ukraine war as well as American officials and politicians. Trump critics online have also falsely claimed that Putin signed a decree in January last year declaring Russia's sale of Alaska to the United States "illegal," while mocking the US president for hosting a leader who purportedly rejected American sovereignty over the territory. Putin was "preparing the future annexation of Alaska and Trump fell for it," one user wrote on X, an unfounded claim that has also spread across Bluesky and TikTok. The United States bought Alaska in 1867 from Russia, and there was no evidence that Putin had signed such a decree. Meanwhile, pro-Kremlin nationalist accounts on social media were circulating an image of a fake "People's Republic of Alaska" flag, using the summit to assert that the territory rightfully belonged to Russia. The images were being spread online by Russian nationalist media outlets as well as the Pravda network, a well-resourced Moscow-based operation known to circulate pro-Russian narratives globally. "The fake flag is the latest instalment in a decades-old narrative pushed by ultra-nationalists in Russia, framing the Nineteenth Century sale of Alaska as a national betrayal," NewsGuard report said. The swirling misinformation underscores how easily online falsehoods can originate and spread around a high-profile event, especially across tech platforms that have largely scaled back content moderation. Trump extended the invitation for the summit at the Russian leader's suggestion. The meeting will be closely followed by European leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was not included and has publicly refused pressure from Trump to surrender territory seized by Russia.
