Maine: ‘No official withdrawal notice has yet been received’ from Graham Platner
The Maine department of the secretary of state has said that as of Thursday morning, “no official withdrawal notice has yet been received” from Graham Platner.
“As of now, no official withdrawal notice has yet been received from Mr. Platner,” Jana Spaulding, Maine’s deputy secretary of state for communications, said in a statement to the Guardian. “A public declaration is not an official withdrawal, and a candidate must formally withdraw to the Elections office in writing, including signature.”
Spaulding added that the notice may be received by email, such as a scanned letter attached as a PDF, but must include a signature.
In order for Democrats to finalize an alternative Senate nominee in Maine, Platner needs to officially withdraw from the race by 13 July at 5pm ET, according to state law. This would then grant Democrats a two-week window, until 5pm ET on 27 July, to pick a replacement.
Key events
Ro Khanna, a Democratic representative from California who formerly endorsed Graham Platner, is endorsing Troy Jackson for US Senate in Maine.
“I am all in for Troy Jackson to continue the populist progressive movement in Maine,” Khanna said in a statement shared by a spokesperson for the Congressman. “He’s for Medicare for All, opposes foreign wars, and will be for workers over billionaires.”
New Mexico’s attorney general, Raúl Torrez, has sent a letter to the justice department demanding that they turn over unredacted records related to Jeffrey Epstein, arguing that the materials are needed “to identify survivors, witnesses, and co-conspirators” as the state conducts its criminal investigation into Epstein’s activities at the ranch Epstein formerly owned in Santa Fe county.
In a letter on Thursday, Torrez said that “despite verbal assurances of cooperation from the USDOJ, access to the requested records has not been granted, no substantive response has been provided, and more than 130 days have now elapsed since the NMDOJ’s initial request”.
“The NMDOJ views this length of time as an unreasonable delay under any rule of reason,” he added.
“The NMDOJ’s criminal investigation is once again active and is ongoing,” Torrez wrote. “The USDOJ’s continued withholding of unredacted records is causing real and escalating harm to the NMDOJ’s criminal investigation.”
Without unredacted records, Torrez said: “The identities of those who suffered abuse at the hands of Epstein’s network in New Mexico remain hidden behind government redactions – survivors who may not know that New Mexico is actively seeking to find them, hear them, and pursue justice on their behalf. Investigators cannot identify corroborating witnesses – the staff, the associates, the individuals present at Zorro Ranch – whose accounts are essential to substantiating survivor testimony and constructing the evidentiary foundation any prosecution requires.”
“Every day that the USDOJ withholds these records, the foundation upon which a New Mexico prosecution could be built erodes,” Torrez said. “Witnesses relocate and become unreachable. Memories, already strained by years of trauma, fade further. Physical and documentary evidence degrades, is lost, or is rendered more difficult to authenticate with the passage of time.”
The justice department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Erika Kirk asks for all exhibits linked to husband’s killing to be made public
Richard Luscombe
Erika Kirk, the widow of the far-right activist Charlie Kirk, has asked a judge in Utah to allow the open courtroom display of every exhibit relating to her husband’s killing, saying she fears the proliferation of conspiracy theories.
Kirk’s motion came on the third day of a preliminary hearing in Provo at which the district judge Tony Graf will decide if there is sufficient evidence to move ahead with a trial for Kirk’s alleged murderer, Tyler Robinson, in a shooting at Utah Valley University last September.
In the three-page filing, Erika Kirk complained that some items of evidence were admitted into court but not made available for viewing, which her lawyer Jeffrey Neiman said breached a Utah law affording crime victims and their lawful representatives certain rights.
Richard Luscombe
The air force has canceled the promotions of dozens of service members after discovering what it said was a grading error in a test of their security knowledge.
The “isolated and highly unprecedented anomaly” was announced in a press release on Tuesday, which said 135 airmen and women had been awarded incorrect scores on the security forces specialty knowledge test (SKT) and been wrongly informed they had earned promotion.
Senior officers blamed the error on an “outdated scoring key”, and said the group that was subsequently told they had not made the cut would be replaced by 135 others after the service completed a rescore of all 2,285 candidates who sat the exam.
Analysis: Platner debacle puts Democrats in grave danger of blowing the midterms
David Smith
Two years ago Democrats had one job: stop Donald Trump from returning to the White House. It was the only thing that mattered, but with breathtaking political malpractice, they imploded.
This November Democrats have two jobs: win the House of Representatives and win the Senate to turn Trump into a lame duck president for his final two years. But once again the party, fond of warning that the stakes are existential, is in grave danger of blowing it.
On Wednesday the Democratic candidate Graham Platner said he was withdrawing from the Senate race in Maine after a woman who dated him said he drunkenly forced her to have sex despite her telling him to stop. Platner denies the allegation reported by Politico.
This is a disaster because every seat counts in the Senate, where Republicans currently hold a narrow 53-47 majority. The electoral map is not favourable to Democrats this time but, riding anti-Trump sentiment, it’s just possible they could pull it off and become a vital check on the president’s power.
Who is to blame for this debacle? The list is long.
Maine: ‘No official withdrawal notice has yet been received’ from Graham Platner
The Maine department of the secretary of state has said that as of Thursday morning, “no official withdrawal notice has yet been received” from Graham Platner.
“As of now, no official withdrawal notice has yet been received from Mr. Platner,” Jana Spaulding, Maine’s deputy secretary of state for communications, said in a statement to the Guardian. “A public declaration is not an official withdrawal, and a candidate must formally withdraw to the Elections office in writing, including signature.”
Spaulding added that the notice may be received by email, such as a scanned letter attached as a PDF, but must include a signature.
In order for Democrats to finalize an alternative Senate nominee in Maine, Platner needs to officially withdraw from the race by 13 July at 5pm ET, according to state law. This would then grant Democrats a two-week window, until 5pm ET on 27 July, to pick a replacement.
The Palm Beach international airport in Florida has officially been renamed the President Donald J Trump international airport.
On Thursday, the airport announced that the name has officially been changed, effective today and said that the airport is “officially in transition mode” and that they are “working behind the scenes to update our physical signage, terminal spaces, and digital channels to our new name”.
The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) also announced on Thursday that Palm Beach international airport’s three-letter location identifier has changed from “PBI” to “DJT” following the airport’s official renaming to “Donald J Trump International Airport.”
“FAA systems and publications reflect the new identifier,” the FAA said. “Pilots, air traffic controllers, and aviation stakeholders should use DJT for flight planning and operations.”
According to Reuters, the airport has said that the name change cost $5.5m.
Eric Trump, the president’s middle son, said on Thursday morning: “I am deeply honored that at 5:01 am, Trump Force One will be the first plane to land at the newly renamed Palm Beach International Airport – now and forever President Donald J. Trump International Airport (DJT).”
“Congratulations Dad – I’m happy to have played a big role in making this happen,” he wrote in the statement.
Jamie Raskin, a Democrat who represents Maryland’s eighth congressional district in the US House of Representatives, has released a statement in support of David Hearn, the former Olympic canoeist who was accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool.
“Davey Hearn is my constituent, a native-born resident of Montgomery county, a three-time Olympian canoeist, and a famed and celebrated teacher and coach of canoeing and kayaking in our community,” Raskin said. “He is beloved in my district as a model citizen whether on water or on dry land. He is a great guy.”
Hearn, Raskin said, “would never desecrate a federal building or landmark by writing his name on it or affixing his name illegally to it or engaging in any other kind of political graffiti, vandalism or delinquency” and would “never intentionally damage government property”.
Raskin added: “I hope – and will do everything I can to guarantee – that Davey gets true due process and a fair trial on these absurdly trumped-up charges. It is only a matter of time before an impartial judge and jury recognize that this case has been built on a Kafkaesque arrest and Orwellian charges.”
On Thursday morning, Hearn pleaded not guilty, and his next hearing is on 5 August.
Former Olympian pleads not guilty in Washington reflecting pool damage case
Former Olympic canoeist David Hearn has pleaded not guilty to vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool.
Hearn, 67, from Maryland, was arrested last month after stopping by the pool on a bike ride. He told several outlets that he was detained for almost five hours after he reached into the water to inspect what he described a piece of the blue liner that was partially detached from the bottom of the pool as he was curious what it felt like.
“I didn’t destroy or break or peel anything,” he told the Washington Post after his arrest.
The arrest came amid controversy over Trump’s $14.7m renovation project of the reflecting pool, which he pitched as a bid to turn it “American flag blue” ahead of the country’s 250th birthday.
But just days after the project was completed, an algae bloom turned the water green, prompting National Park Service crews to work to remove algae from the site, including adding hydrogen peroxide to the water in an effort to improve the water quality. Large flakes of the new blue coating were later seen peeling away from the basin and floating on the surface.
Trump subsequently blamed unidentified “vandals” for the damage. According to NBC News, Hearn is one of at least four people who is facing charges over alleged tampering of the coating on the pool.
Hearn was indicted last week on a single felony count of property destruction and on Thursday, during his arraignment, he pleaded not guilty. He was released on his own recognizance, with a status hearing scheduled for 5 August.
Jeanine Pirro, US attorney for the District of Columbia, has accused Hearn of “forcefully and violently pulling up and removing the bottom liner” but his lawyers have said the charges against him are based on a “concocted narrative” and “should be alarming to every American”.
Jordan Wood announces bid for Senate after Platner suspends campaign
Jordan Wood – who initially ran as a challenger to Graham Platner in the Senate race in Maine before switching to, and losing, the Democratic primary for the state’s second congressional district – announced on Thursday that he is running to replace Platner.
“I have been told that I am too progressive, too young, that a gay man can’t win,” Wood said in his announcement. “These cynics are wrong. They have been wrong all our lives … I am asking for your support to take back control of our party, and our country.”
Wood called out Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, and insisted that the new nominee should not be picked by “Washington insiders” and it is ultimately “a decision for the people of Maine”.
“Our campaign will continue to build on the powerful populist movement Graham started,” Wood, also a former congressional staffer, added. “And I welcome every Mainer who believed in his vision to continue to build that better world.”
Tom Lutz
Eleven Republican politicians have written to the WNBA asking the league to protect the Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark from “multiple attacks” on court.
Clark has been on the receiving end of hard fouls since she entered the league in 2024 after a stellar college career with Iowa. Recently, the Phoenix Mercury forward Alyssa Thomas hit Clark in the throat during a game. Thomas was not called for a foul at the time but the WNBA later suspended her for one game. Thomas and her family received racist abuse and death threats after the incident.
In the letter, the Republican politicians, led by Congressman August Pfluger, praise Clark as “the face of your league” and someone who is bringing renewed interest to the WNBA, which has experienced a surge in popularity in recent years. The lawmakers say they are worried by reports that “attacks against Clark may be racially motivated”. Clark is white and most players in the WNBA are Black.
The letter asks the league to clarify how it addresses “physical hostility and violence on the court”, how the league disciplines “overly aggressive acts on the court”, and how the WNBA is dealing with online harassment of its players.
The Fever said on Wednesday that they were unaware of the letter.
Few in the league believe the attacks on Clark are racially motivated, and star players in the WNBA and NBA are often the subject of physical play, particularly at the start of their careers. Black players in the league are routinely racially abused online.
Clark has long been a lightning rod for people to express their views on race and gender in the US.
Nirav Shah, former Maine CDC director, announces candidacy to replace Platner
Nirav Shah, the former director of Maine’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention, announced his candidacy for Senate, after the beleaguered nominee, Graham Platner, suspended his campaign amid allegations of sexual assault.
“We must defeat Susan Collins, hold Donald Trump accountable, and fight for a government that delivers for everyday Mainers, not the privileged few,” Shah said in a statement. “We need an outsider who is not afraid to take on the broken system she has spent decades upholding.”
The runner-up in the Democratic gubernatorial primary added: “I’m proud to have dedicated my career to public service, and to have delivered for Mainers in our darkest times. Now, in this unprecedented moment, I’m ready to unite our party and fight for you once again.”
The Maine Democratic party has said it would hold a nominating convention to select a replacement, which would consist of about 600 people.
As we reported on Wednesday, former state senate president Troy Jackson and brewery owner Dan Kleban have both said they would also run for the nomination.
Donald Trump is back in Washington today, and he’ll spend most of the day in closed door meetings.
We’ll be keeping an eye on whether the president takes to Truth Social to provide any updates on the latest strikes on Iran, and the state of any ongoing negotiations about a tenuous peace deal.
As my colleagues report, on Thursday, US strikes killed at least 14 people, while Tehran responded by hitting Gulf countries in the most intense exchange of fire since a shaky ceasefire was extended last month.
Tom Perkins
The number of US chemical accidents is rising just as the Trump administration guts protections against the disasters, a new analysis of federal data by the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (Peer) non-profit found.
The report found the number of chemical accidents, explosions, fires and other emergencies that release chemicals into the atmosphere was up by at least 51% since 2021. Deaths and injuries were up at least 20%.
The report comes on the heels of two high-profile emergencies, including a malfunctioning chemical tank in Garden Grove, California, which caused the evacuation of more than 40,000 residents. The recent collapse of another chemical tank at a plant in Longview, Washington, killed 11 workers.
Under the Clean Air Act, the US Environmental Protection Agency’s response management program (RMP) requires more than 12,500 high-risk facilities to develop protocols to prevent catastrophes, or limit fallout, and was largely designed to protect workers, first responders and fence-line communities.
The Biden administration strengthened the protections in 2024, but, despite the increase in disasters and two high-profile emergencies, the Trump administration is pressing on with its controversial plans to dismantle the federal disaster management system.
Melody Schreiber
The Trump administration may remove the temporary protected status (TPS) of Haitians and Syrians in the US, the US supreme court ruled in late June – a move that will worsen America’s growing caregiver shortage, experts say.
The US is now experiencing its fastest increase in the aging population in more than a hundred years, and more than 20% of the US population will be 65 or older by 2030. But the population of caregivers has not grown at the same pace, leading to staffing shortages.
Immigrants account for about one in six workers in the US – but they comprise about 30% of caregivers in longterm settings. The caregivers, often nurses and aides in hospitals, facilities, and homes, come from at least 163 countries, and Haitian immigrants are strongly represented at 7% of that workforce, according to a report from LeadingAge, the national association of non-profit and mission driven providers of aging services.
“Foreign-born staff are significant contributors to care and services our members provide, and that older adults and their families rely on,” said Lisa Sanders, vice-president of communications and media relations at LeadingAge. “Without staff, there is no care.”
Sophie Sullivan and Pablo Iglesias Maurer
The French men’s national soccer team, whose star Kylian Mbappé is one of the world’s most outspoken athletes against far-right politicians, has been using a charter airplane company that is at the heart of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign.
Images of the team posted on social media and flight tracking data show the French team have used Global Crossing Airlines (GlobalX) for at least three domestic flights between their World Cup games and base camp in Boston. That same airline charter company has operated more than half of ICE’s removal flights in 2024 and 2025.
A 2025 Guardian investigation into the Trump administration’s deportation program, which closely examined five-months worth of leaked GlobalX data, revealed the extent to which the company served as the vehicle to move thousands of detainees – domestically and internationally – without notice, to locations far from their families, communities and legal counsel, leading to what experts have called violations of constitutional due process rights. Among other destinations, the company has flown detainees to El Salvador’s Cecot, a notorious mega-prison. Many onboard have described being kept in the dark about where their plane was headed or being shackled at their hands and feet.
GlobalX has not responded to requests for comment. Representatives for the French national team did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Maine contenders: the Democrats who could replace Graham Platner
Joseph Gedeon
A month after he won Maine’s Democratic primary, Graham Platner, the oyster farmer turned insurgent candidate has suspended his campaign after being accused by a former girlfriend of severely sexually assaulting her in 2021 – an allegation he denies as “categorically untrue”.
Now that Platner has said he will file paperwork to withdraw from the race, Maine Democrats have until 27 July to select a replacement to face Susan Collins, the Republican incumbent, in a race widely seen as pivotal to control of the Senate. The state party said on Wednesday it would hold a nominating convention to pick a new candidate.
But one complicating factor has been that Platner won more primary votes than any Democratic Senate candidate in the state’s history, and energized a coalition that the establishment favorite, governor Janet Mills, never matched. Some have suggested that his successor will need to carry forward that energy, while others are arguing the new nominee will have to be independent from him, or risk being seen as his protégé.
Whoever takes the position will have little time to prepare for a general election against Collins, a five-term incumbent. Here are the options so far:
Maine Democrats plan convention to replace scandal-hit Graham Platner
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.
The Maine Democratic party has voted to hold a convention after its Senate pick Graham Platner withdrew from the race following accusations of sexual assault.
Platner announced his decision in an 11-minute video posted to social media on Wednesday evening, in which he angrily accused the Democratic establishment and corporate media of “using these allegations to take away all of the things we need to run a campaign” and acting “as judge, jury and executioner”.
In the video, Platner vehemently stood by his assertion that the accusations were “not remotely true”, claiming they were driven by “large forces … working against [him] personally”.
Now the Maine Democratic party, which by law is responsible for naming a replacement, has said it will move forward with holding a nominating convention to choose a new nominee. Potential contenders have already started making clear their interest, with a tight deadline of 27 July in place.
An array of Democrats have already expressed interest in the nomination. Troy Jackson, a former state senator who ran for governor earlier this year, quickly announced his candidacy shortly after Platner’s campaign suspension, as did Dan Kleban, the owner of Maine Beer Company who ran in the Senate primary before dropping out before the vote.
Other possible contenders include the Maine secretary of state, Shenna Bellows; former Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention director Nirav Shah; state legislator Valli Geiger; and ex-congressional aide Jordan Wood.
“There is an unprecedented amount of energy and enthusiasm among Maine Democrats, driven in part by many of the dedicated volunteers and supporters who were inspired by Graham Platner’s campaign,” party officials said in a statement issued less than an hour before Platner suspended his campaign.
“We look forward to coming together and harnessing that energy around our new nominee as we work to defeat Susan Collins in November.”
Read the full story here:
In other developments:
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Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would ask the US supreme court to reconsider its ruling that the 14th amendment to the US constitution guarantees birthright citizenship in light of what he described as shocking new evidence: a hospital in Texas advertising its services to expectant mothers in Mexico on a pair of billboards. “Signs and Billboards are being put up all over our Southern Border, and Mexico, advertising BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP, with ‘Deliveries starting at $4000’, the president wrote on his social media platform, in what appeared to be a wild exaggeration of a Fox News report on just two billboards.
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Trump flew from Turkey to England onboard the older Air Force One on Wednesday, rather than the new, Qatari-gifted aircraft he used to travel to the Nato summit in Ankara, an unexpected change in plans that prompted questions about security fears. Trump later boarded the new plane at Mildenhall air force base in the United Kingdom for the trip back to Washington.
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Andrew Giuliani, head of the White House’s World Cup taskforce, has defended Donald Trump’s lobbying of Fifa to lift the suspension of US player Folarin Balogun for Monday’s game against Belgium. The US president claimed that Brazilian referee Raphael Claus, who showed Balogun a red card in the match against Bosnia and Herzegovina, was “a little bit suspect, if you check his past”.
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US stock markets fell on Wednesday as the US continued strikes on Iran and the Federal Reserve flagged concerns that would warrant higher interest rates. Trump’s declaration at the Nato summit in Ankara that the Iran-US ceasefire is over sent oil prices sharply higher on Wednesday. Brent crude, the global benchmark, jumped more than 5% to crest $80 a barrel.
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A Manhattan federal court judge on Wednesday ordered the release of the more than $5m Trump owes E Jean Carroll following her successful 2023 sexual abuse and defamation trial against him. Less than an hour after the judge issued his order, Trump filed paperwork indicating he was appealing the decision.
