Administration

Civil rights groups say plan will make people ‘afraid to vote’ and violates the Voting Rights ActUS politics live – latest updatesA coalition of civil rights groups filed a lawsuit against Trump administration officials on Friday, seeking to stop them from threatening to deploy federal law enforcement officers to polling stations in the US midterm elections.The suit, led by the NAACP, alleges that by threatening to deploy law enforcement to survey elections and initiating new voter roll oversight, the Trump administration has violated a section of the Voting Rights Act which prohibits voter intimidation. Continue reading...

• Former President Trump attempted to restrict mail-in voting processes leading up to the midterm elections. • State election officials in Alabama, North Carolina, and Wisconsin had already begun mailing ballots before the Supreme Court ruled on the plan. • These restrictions threatened to disrupt the electoral process and create chaos for voters and administrators across the country.

• Americans expressed skepticism regarding the integration of artificial intelligence in schools according to recent reports. • House Speaker Johnson sent the House home early this week for a recess that extends past the midterm elections. • This legislative pause prevents the House from addressing warnings from companies about the dangers of accelerating AI development.

It is the second year this administration has barred the Palestinian delegation from US travel ahead of the forumThe US state department said on Wednesday that it had again denied entry visas to Palestinian officials ahead next week’s United Nations general assembly gathering in New York.The state department said in a statement that the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) had “failed to live up to their commitments”, accusing the groups of “taking actions to internationalize the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict including through the International Criminal Court (ICC) and International Court of Justice (ICJ)” and of “glorifying terrorism” among other allegations. Continue reading...

Health committee chair Bill Cassidy said fatal outbreak of disease is a ‘terrible legacy’ for Trump administrationUS politics live – latest updatesSenator Bill Cassidy, the Republican chairman of the US Senate health committee, blamed the Trump administration’s vaccine-skeptical approach for ‌recent measles deaths in Pennsylvania and challenged Donald Trump’s pick for surgeon general to directly state that vaccines do not cause autism on Wednesday.Cassidy, a Louisiana physician who chairs the panel, said three people in Pennsylvania had died of measles, with a fourth death under review, because ​of misinformation and misguided policies. His remarks come as the US grapples with its worst measles outbreak in over three decades. Continue reading...

The administration has used a list of 235 keywords – such as ‘gender’ and ‘racist’ – to prevent topics from being fundedResearchers filed a class action lawsuit against the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on Wednesday, arguing the Trump administration is blocking and cancelling scientific grants to censor topics with which it disagrees.The administration has used a list of 235 keywords – such as “gender” and “racist” – to prevent topics from health equity to climate change from being funded. The NIH is the world’s largest public funder of biomedical research. Continue reading...

CDC announces changes to how it reports measles deaths as Pennsylvania continues to confirm more casesThe Trump administration has changed the way it counts measles deaths amid an outbreak in Pennsylvania, which on Sunday saw the third apparent measles-related death in the state reported by a local coroner.The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is now using data from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), which is a way to track mortality trends over time, according to a note published to the agency’s website on 4 September. Continue reading...