America

    Donald Trump has reportedly explained the reason for his numerous visits to his New Jersey golf club - the White House is a dump. The president has made at least four visits to the Bedminster club, as well as a string of visits to Mar-a-Lago, his Florida retreat. And with renovations due to take place in the West Wing this month, he is scheduled to stay at the resort a lot more. That White House is a real dump, Mr Trump told golf club members before a recent round of golf, according to Golf.com. Former first daughter Chelsea Clinton shared the account on her Twitter account, adding: Thank you to all the White House ushers, butlers, maids, chefs, florists, gardeners, plumbers, engineers & curators for all you do every day. Mr Trump was a frequent visitor to the club dur...

    If I didn’t get elected, he definitely would not be spending $10 billion, President Donald trump said Wednesday, referring to Terry Gou, chairman of Taiwanese Apple (AAPL) supplier Foxconn. That evening, Trump announced Foxconn’s plans to build a plant in Wisconsin that would produce flat-screen display panels for TVs and other products. The plant would create 3,000 jobs and represent a $10 billion investment, according to White House officials. While the investment echoed Trump’s promise to bring jobs back to the US, the president can hardly take all the credit for Foxconn’s big move. The relocation of China’s manufacturing industry has been going on for years, as the long-time cost advantage of manufacturing in China has slowly declined. Lower input costs, strong demand ...

    Donald Trump has named John F Kelly as his new White House chief of staff after sacking Reince Priebus. The President thanked Mr Priebus for his service, calling him a good man who had served his country well. The two men had travelled together earlier in the day to an appearance in Brentwood New York. Mr Priebus' future had been put into question earlier on Thursday, when comments made by Anthony Scaramucci - the new White House communications chief - were published in the American press. During a phonecall with New Yorker reporter Ryan Lizza on Wednesday night, Mr Scaramucci badmouthed the former chief of staff, saying that Mr Priebus had "c***-blocked" and orchestrated leaks against him. Reince Priebus, pictured next to Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner in June Mr...

    At the end of a Senate subcommittee hearing on Tuesday morning, someone sitting near Chairman Susan Collins (R-Maine) didn’t switch off a microphone. Collins was recorded discussing the federal budget and President Trump’s lack of familiarity with the details of governing with a colleague apparently Sen. Jack Reed (R.I.), the ranking Democrat on the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies subcommittee. After Reed praises Collins’s leadership of the hearing, she laments the administration’s handling of spending. I swear, [the Office of Management and Budget] just went through and whenever there was grant, they just X it out, Collins says. With no measurement, no thinking about it, no metrics, no nothing. It’s just incredibly irresponsible. Yes, R...

    Minneapolis police Chief Janee Harteau resigned Friday at the request of the mayor, who said she lost confidence in the chief after last weekend's fatal police shooting of an unarmed Australian woman who had called 911. In a statement released Friday, Harteau said: I've decided I am willing to step aside to let a fresh set of leadership eyes see what more can be done for the MPD to be the very best it can be. Mayor Betsy Hodges said she asked for the chief's resignation after assessing where the department needs to go. I've lost confidence in the Chief's ability to lead us further ... it is clear that she has lost the confidence of the people of Minneapolis as well, Hodges said. For us to continue to transform policing and community trust in policing we need new leadership...

    In the normal course of events, the revelation of attempted collusion with Russia to determine the outcome of a presidential election might cause an administration to overcorrect in the other direction. A president might find ways to confront the range of Russian aggression, including cyber aggression, if only to avoid the impression of being bought and sold by a strategic rival. But once again, President Trump after extended personal contact with Vladimir Putin and the complete surrender to Russian interests in Syria acts precisely as though he has been bought and sold by a strategic rival. The ignoble cutoff of aid to American proxies means that Putin won in Syria, as an administration official was quoted by The Post. Concessions without reciprocation, made against the b...

    The US Supreme Court has ruled President Trump's administration can enforce a ban on refugees. Their temporary decision means the controversial restrictions can remain in force while an appeal is considered by a federal appeals court in San Francisco. Supreme Court justices also rejected an attempt by Mr Trump to block a judge's ruling that stopped his travel ban on people from six Muslim majority countries from being applied to the grandparents of US citizens. Their decision was not unanimous, and three conservatives on the court of nine justices had noted that they would have granted the President's request in full. Other Donald Trump signs his latest executive order restricting travel by citizens of six mainly-Muslim countries. In June, the Supreme Court had ruled that ...

    President Trump, due to unveil his new strategy for fighting the war in Afghanistan, faces what some aides are calling a victory problem how to define success in America’s longest war and sell the war-weary U.S. public on the possibility of sending a few thousand more troops into the nearly 16-year-old conflict. In recent days, White House officials have declined to say whether the new approach will roll out by mid-July in keeping with a timetable Defense Secretary Jim Mattis laid out weeks ago. And they won’t say what role the commander in chief might play in selling the plan, including a potentially open ended commitment, to Americans. We have a victory problem, a senior administration official recently told Yahoo News, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe inte...

    US President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in during a meeting on trade at the White House. Mike Pence is the loyal wingman, the ever-discreet figure who rises above the Washington fray. But as the Russia scandal encroaches ever further on Donald Trump's White House, the vice president is also walking a political tightrope. The 58-year-old former governor of Indiana is currently the man closest to the US presidency -- either as Trump's immediate successor should his term end prematurely, or as his heir apparent in 2020 or 2024 elections, depending on how many terms Trump serves. As the troubles of his boss grow deeper by the day, ensnared in a widening investigation into his campaign ties to Russia, experts say the...

    Donald Trump should remove his children from the presidential administration, a congressman from his own party has said. Representative Bill Flores of Texas said: I’m going out on a limb here but I would say I think it would be in the president’s best interest if he removed all his children from the White House. Not only Donald Trump [Jr], but Ivanka and Jared Kushner, the Republican politician told Texas TV station KBTX. Mr Trump’s daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Mr Kushner both hold posts as his senior advisors. The advice comes after the release on Tuesday of an incendiary series of emails showing that Mr Trump Jr worked to arrange a meeting between Mr Kushner and a Russian lawyer who claimed to hold potentially incriminating material about Hillary Clinton. I do find iss...