DC national guard to begin deploying on Tuesday night
The DC national guard will begin deploying on the city’s streets Tuesday night, the White House confirmed to the Guardian, a day after Donald Trump ordered their arrival and took control of the city’s police force, calling Washington DC a “lawless” city, despite official crime statistics saying otherwise.
A White House official told the Washington Post that the national guard is expected to “begin being on the streets starting tonight”. Defense officials said a small number of the roughly 800 guard members planned for the mission had already been mobilized by Tuesday afternoon, with more expected to arrive in the coming days.
The New York Times reports that about a dozen national guard members have appeared in five military vehicles across from the Washington Monument.
Earlier today, DC mayor Muriel Bowser said she expected members of the national guard to be deployed on federal property in the nation’s capital.
“My expectation, though it can change, is that they will deploy the guard on federal properties, that includes parks, monuments, federal buildings,” Bowser said on a community chat on X.
Key events
Closing summary
Our live coverage is ending now. In the meantime, you can find all of our live US politics coverage here. Here is a summary of the key developments from today:
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The DC national guard will begin deploying on the city’s streets Tuesday night, the White House confirmed to the Guardian, a day after Donald Trump ordered their arrival and took control of the city’s police force, calling Washington DC a “lawless” city, despite official crime statistics saying otherwise. A White House official told the Washington Post that the national guard is expected to “begin being on the streets starting tonight”. Defense officials said a small number of the roughly 800 guard members planned for the mission had already been mobilized by Tuesday afternoon, with more expected to arrive in the coming days.
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About 850 officers and agents took part in a “massive law enforcement surge” across Washington DC on Monday night and made nearly two dozen arrests, the White House has said. The show of force came after Donald Trump announced he was sending the national guard into the capital and putting city police under federal control, even though the violent crime rate is at a 30-year low. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Tuesday: “As part of the president’s massive law enforcement surge, last night approximately 850 officers and agents were surged across the city. They made a total of 23 arrests, including multiple other contacts.”
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A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to immediately improve conditions at a New York City immigration holding facility, acting on mounting complaints from detainees that the cells are overcrowded, unsanitary and inhumane. Judge Lewis A Kaplan issued a temporary restraining order requiring US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to limit capacity, ensure cleanliness and provide sleeping mats, beds, toiletries and access to attorneys for migrants held in holding rooms at 26 Federal Plaza, a government building in lower Manhattan.
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The Texas Senate approved a GOP-drawn congressional map that would give Republicans five more House seats ahead of the 2026 midterms. But since House Democrats continue to break quorum, the legislation isn’t going anywhere. Speaker Dustin Burrows said today that the House will adjourn until Friday 15 August, at which point the legislature will attempt to reach quorum one more time. If this fails they will move to end this month’s first special session days early, and Texas governor Greg Abbott will immediately call a second.
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California governor Gavin Newsom says the state will draw new electoral maps after Donald Trump “missed” a deadline on Tuesday night in an ongoing redistricting battle between Democratic and Republican states. Several states have waded into the redistricting wars, where Newsom and other Democratic state leaders had threatened to draw retaliatory maps if Texas were to move ahead with its redistricting scheme.
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The Trump administration is evidently extending its control of cultural representation at the Smithsonian, the world’s largest museum and research complex. In a letter posted on the White House website, the administration told the Smithsonian that it plans a wide review of exhibitions, materials and operations ahead of the US’s 250th anniversary celebrations in 2026.
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The press secretary Karoline Leavitt characterised Friday’s upcoming meeting between Trump and Vladimir Putin as a “listening exercise” for the president, confirming that Volodymyr Zelenskyy would not be in attendance, but the president has hopes for a trilateral meeting in the future.
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Zelenskyy said today that Ukraine could not agree to a Russian proposal to give up more of his country’s territory in exchange for a ceasefire, because Moscow would use it as a springboard to start a future war. Speaking to journalists a day before a virtual meeting with US and European leaders, Zelenskyy said he believed Putin wanted to dominate his country because he “does not want a sovereign Ukraine”.
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The latest inflation data released today showed that the Consumer Price Index held steady at 2.7 percent. “Core” inflation – which leaves out volatile goods like food and energy to track how prices are increasing – rose by 0.3 percent. This marks a 3.1 percent increase over the course of a year – and the highest level in five months.
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In response, Donald Trump wasted no time calling out Jerome Powell on social media, continuing his long-running campaign against the chair of the Federal Reserve. “The damage he has done by always being Too Late is incalculable,” the president wrote. He also said that he was considering allowing a lawsuit – focused on Powell’s renovation of the fed’s headquarters– to proceed.
The New York Times reports that national guard troops have left the area of the Washington Monument, about two hours after they arrived.
“We just did a presence patrol to be amongst the people, to be seen,” master Sgt Cory Boroff told reporter Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs.
Boroff said he did not know where the troops would be headed next.
The US government’s gross national debt has climbed past $37tn, a record milestone that points to the rapid growth of federal borrowing and the mounting cost burden for taxpayers.
According to the treasury department’s latest report, released today, the debt reached this level years earlier than expected. In January 2020, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that gross federal debt would not top $37tn until after fiscal year 2030.
The faster-than-anticipated increase stems largely from the economic fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic, which shut down much of the country’s economy. In response, the federal government took on massive borrowing to stabilize the economy and aid recovery efforts.
The treasury department’s report comes just weeks after the CBO estimated that Trump’s new tax bill will add $3.4tn to the national debt over the next decade.
Reuters is reporting that the Trump administration’s flagship Golden Dome missile defense system will include four layers – one satellite-based and three on land – with 11 short-range batteries located across the continental US, Alaska and Hawaii.
A US government slide presentation on the project showed slides tagged “Go Fast, Think Big!”. They were presented to 3,000 defense contractors in Huntsville, Alabama, last week and reveal the unprecedented complexity of the system, which faces an ambitious 2028 deadline set by Donald Trump.
The system is estimated to cost $175bn, but the slides show uncertainties still loom over the basic architecture of the project because the number of launchers, interceptors, ground stations, and missile sites needed for the system has yet to be determined.
“They have a lot of money, but they don’t have a target of what it costs yet,” a US official told the news wire.
So far Congress has appropriated $25bn for Golden Dome in Trump’s tax-and-spend bill passed in July. Another $45.3bn is earmarked for Golden Dome in his 2026 presidential budget request.
California governor Gavin Newsom kept taking a jab at President Donald Trump on X today, announcing a “BIG PRESS CONFERENCE” this week with “POWERFUL DEMS AND GAVIN NEWSOM” as the ongoing redistricting battle between Democratic and Republican states ensues.
“DONALD ‘TACO’ TRUMP, AS MANY CALL HIM, ‘MISSED’ THE DEADLINE!!!”, Newsom’s office wrote on X. “CALIFORNIA WILL NOW DRAW NEW, MORE ‘BEAUTIFUL MAPS,’ THEY WILL BE HISTORIC AS THEY WILL END THE TRUMP PRESIDENCY (DEMS TAKE BACK THE HOUSE!)”.
“BIG PRESS CONFERENCE THIS WEEK WITH POWERFUL DEMS AND GAVIN NEWSOM — YOUR FAVORITE GOVERNOR — THAT WILL BE DEVASTATING FOR ‘MAGA.’ THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER! — GN,” reads the post on the social media platform.
The post follows a series of snarky, all-caps tweets meant to mimic Trump’s social media style.
Newsom was mocking Trump’s moniker, “TACO”, short for “Trump Always Chickens Out”, prompted by his flip-flopping deadlines.
DC national guard to begin deploying on Tuesday night
The DC national guard will begin deploying on the city’s streets Tuesday night, the White House confirmed to the Guardian, a day after Donald Trump ordered their arrival and took control of the city’s police force, calling Washington DC a “lawless” city, despite official crime statistics saying otherwise.
A White House official told the Washington Post that the national guard is expected to “begin being on the streets starting tonight”. Defense officials said a small number of the roughly 800 guard members planned for the mission had already been mobilized by Tuesday afternoon, with more expected to arrive in the coming days.
The New York Times reports that about a dozen national guard members have appeared in five military vehicles across from the Washington Monument.
Earlier today, DC mayor Muriel Bowser said she expected members of the national guard to be deployed on federal property in the nation’s capital.
“My expectation, though it can change, is that they will deploy the guard on federal properties, that includes parks, monuments, federal buildings,” Bowser said on a community chat on X.
Following the increase in tariffs by the US on Brazilian imports (from 10% to 50% earlier this month), Brazil’s president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva announced that his government will provide 30 billion reais ($5.55bn) in credit to support exporters affected by the steeper levies.
In an interview with local news outlet BandNews, Lula said this initial package will also include support through government purchases.
Some Brazilian products, including orange juice and aircraft, were exempted from the recent US tariff increase.
This boost comes as Lula has remained in the public eye for his fierce criticism of Donald Trump’s tariffs, which the Brazilian president sees as a political move interfering with Brazil’s sovereignty, especially since the tariffs are linked to ongoing legal proceedings against former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, often described as the “Trump of the tropics”.
State department softens human rights criticisms of Trump-allied countries
Donald Trump’s administration has significantly changed a key US government report on human rights worldwide, dramatically softening criticism of some countries that have been strong partners of the Republican president, such as El Salvador and Israel, which rights groups say have well-established histories of abuses.
Instead, the US state department sounded an alarm about what it said was the erosion of freedom of speech in Europe and ramped up criticism of Brazil and South Africa – both of which Washington has clashed with over a host of issues.
Criticism of governments over their treatment of LGBTQ+ rights, which appeared in Biden administration editions of the report, appeared to have been largely omitted. Washington referred to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine mainly as the “Russia-Ukraine war”.
The report’s section on Israel was much shorter than last year’s edition and contained no mention of the severe humanitarian crisis or death toll in Gaza. About 61,000 people have died, according to the Gaza health ministry, as a result of Israel’s military operations in response to an attack by Hamas in October 2023.
The report was delayed for months as Trump appointees altered an earlier state department draft dramatically to bring it in line with “America First” values, according to government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. The report introduced new categories such as “Life”, “Liberty” and “Security of the Person”.
Read the full story here:
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation confirmed today that the man who opened fire at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters last week, killing a police officer, died by suicide.
The shooter “died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound”, the bureau’s director, Chris Hosey, said at a news conference today.
“Evidence in this event indicates that the shooter had recently verbalized thoughts of suicide, which even led to law enforcement being contacted several weeks prior to the incident,” Hosey said.
The shooter has been identified by authorities as 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White. He had blamed the Covid-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal, which has led the union representing CDC employees to demand that the federal government condemn vaccine misinformation.
White House says 23 arrested after hundreds of federal officers deploy to DC
David Smith
About 850 officers and agents took part in a “massive law enforcement surge” across Washington DC on Monday night and made nearly two dozen arrests, the White House has said.
The show of force came after Donald Trump announced he was sending the national guard into the capital and putting city police under federal control, even though the violent crime rate is at a 30-year low.
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Tuesday: “As part of the president’s massive law enforcement surge, last night approximately 850 officers and agents were surged across the city. They made a total of 23 arrests, including multiple other contacts.”
The arrests consisted of homicide, firearms offences, possession with intent to distribute narcotics, fare evasion, lewd acts and stalking, Leavitt added. “A total of six illegal handguns were seized off of District of Columbia’s streets as part of last night’s effort.”
Read the full story here:
Judge orders Ice to improve conditions at New York City immigrant holding facility
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to immediately improve conditions at a New York City immigration holding facility, acting on mounting complaints from detainees that the cells are overcrowded, unsanitary and inhumane.
Judge Lewis A Kaplan issued a temporary restraining order requiring US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to limit capacity, ensure cleanliness and provide sleeping mats, beds, toiletries and access to attorneys for migrants held in holding rooms at 26 Federal Plaza, a government building in lower Manhattan.
The order follows a lawsuit filed last week by civil rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union and Make the Road New York, alleging that conditions in the holding rooms were “crowded, squalid and punitive”.
In court filings, detainees said they were forced to sleep on the floor, sometimes in rooms with up to 100 people, without mattresses or padding, and were denied soap, toothbrushes, and other hygiene products.
The Trump administration sanctioned an armed group accused of illegally trading minerals in eastern Congo, as Washington seeks to lead peace efforts in the region while securing US access to its mineral resources.
A senior US government official told the AP that the state and treasury departments are targeting the Codeco armed group, which controlled the key coltan mining site of Rubaya from 2022 until early 2024.
“During this period, Codeco generated revenue by overseeing mining operations, collecting illegal fees and taxes for miners and engaging in mineral smuggling. It also imposed forced labor and executed civilians in mining areas under its control,” the official said.
The sanctions also target the Congolese mining company CDMC, accused of selling minerals sourced and smuggled from mines near Rubaya, as well as two Hong Kong exporters, East Rise and Star Dragon, that purchased minerals from the area.
Mexico has transferred a group of imprisoned cartel members to the United States, amid growing pressure from the Trump administration to dismantle the country’s powerful drug organizations, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The group, sent on Tuesday, was roughly the same size as the 29 prisoners transferred in February.
WSJ reports:
The group sent Tuesday included members of top criminal organizations facing drug charges in the US who are being sent to locations including Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia, San Diego and New York, one of the people said.
Terry Cole, the Drug Enforcement Administration chief overseeing the federal takeover of DC police, said in an interview that, starting tonight, federal agents will be “embedded with the Metropolitan police department”.
“You will see federal agents working hand in hand on patrol with the Metropolitan Police Department, you will also see an increase of activity, patrol activity in certain sectors to go after the violent criminal offenders that are the drivers of this crime,” Cole said in an interview with Fox News.
