Key events
As we wait for the president to begin his press conference, we’re seeing images and video from local news outlets who report that hundreds of people have gathered in Lafayette Square – which sits just north of the White House – to protest the president’s plans for DC.
Trump begins press conference on ending crime and homelessness in DC
Donald Trump is now addressing the press in the White House briefing room about his plans to tackle crime and homelessness in Washington DC, and make the nation’s capital “safer and more beautiful than it ever was before”.
He’s flanked by attorney general Pam Bondi, defense secretary Pete Hegseth, as well as other members of his cabinet.
The president said that DC would be “LIBERATED today!” in a post on Truth Social.
He’s also expected to discuss plans to deploy the DC National Guard to help local law enforcement, despite a notable drop in violent crime compared to this time last year.
Federal judge rules that Ghislaine Maxwell grand jury transcripts will remain sealed
Today, a federal judge rejected a request from the justice department to unseal the grand jury transcripts relating to the criminal investigation of Ghislaine Maxwell – Jeffrey Epstein’s former girlfriend, who is currently serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking.
In his ruling, Judge Paul A Engelmayer of the southern district of New York wrote:
Its entire premise – that the Maxwell grand jury materials would bring to light meaningful new information about Epstein’s and Maxwell’s crimes, or the Government’s investigation into them – is demonstrably false.
In July, Donald Trump directed attorney general Pam Bondi to release any relevant grand jury testimony related to Epstein, and the justice department later filed a motion in federal court in New York to release the transcripts.
Ed Pilkington
Four days after JD Vance reportedly asked top Trump administration officials to come up with a new communications strategy for dealing with the scandal around the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, he appears to have put his foot in it, sparking a new round of online outrage even as he tried to defuse the furor.
In an interview with Fox News broadcast on Sunday, the vice-president tried to deflect criticism of the administration’s refusal to release the Epstein files by blaming Democrats. He accused Joe Biden of doing “absolutely nothing” about the scandal when he was in the White House.
“And now President Trump has demanded full transparency from this. And yet somehow the Democrats are attacking him and not the Biden administration, which did nothing for four years,” he said.
If Vance’s attempt to switch public blame on to Democrats was the big idea to emerge from his strategy meeting with attorney general Pam Bondi and FBI director Kash Patel, which according to CNN he convened at the White House last week, then their labours appear to have backfired. (Vance denied to Fox that they had discussed Epstein at all, though he did acknowledge the meeting took place.)
Within minutes of the Fox News interview being broadcast, social media began to hum with renewed cries of “release the files!”
Read more on the fallout here:
Trump administration to reassign FBI agents to DC night patrol – reports
According to reports from the New York Times and the Washington Post, the Trump administration is planning to reassign FBI agents to assist night patrol duty in DC, and help local law enforcement deal with street crime.
Sources, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Times that most of the agents will be pulled from their regular duties at the FBI’s Washington field office.
Federal trial on Trump’s use of National Guard begins today
In court later today, the Trump administration and California governor Gavin Newsom will fight out the president’s use of the National Guard, to quell the protests over the Trump immigration agenda in Los Angeles earlier this year.
Judge Charles Breyer will hear arguments about whether the Trump administration violated a 19th-century law, known as the Posse Comitatus Act, which inhibits the president from using the military as a ‘domestic police force’.
The trial’s outcome could ultimately set a precedent for how the president federalises the National Guard moving forward.
On a related note, Trump has threatened to deploy the National Guard in DC before, and multiple reports this morning state that he is considering the move. A reminder, DC doesn’t have control over its own National Guard, unlike other states. Instead, the troops are under the command of the president.
In her interview with MSNBC on Sunday, Mayor Muriel Bowser was concerned about the possible use of the Guard in DC.
“They’re not law enforcement officials,” she said. “I just think that’s not the most efficient use of our guard.”
Trump promises that DC will be ‘liberated’ ahead of press conference
Donald Trump said on Truth Social today that DC “will be LIBERATED today”.
Ahead of his press conference, in just over an hour, the president said that “crime, savagery, filth, and scum will disappear” from the city.
He added:
I will, MAKE OUR CAPITAL GREAT AGAIN! The days of ruthlessly killing, or hurting, innocent people, are OVER! I quickly fixed the Border (ZERO ILLEGALS in last 3 months!), D.C. is next!!!
Important to note that the DC violent crime rate dropped to a 30-year-low in 2024, and was by down 35% compared to 2023, according to a report by the justice department released in January.
In an interview with MSNBC on Sunday, DC’s mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, pushed back against the president’s persistent claims on social media that the capital is inundated with violent crime.
“It is true we had a terrible spike in crime in 2023, but this is not 2023, this is 2025,” Bowser said.
“I suspect that his announcement is that he is surging federal law enforcement and he may talk about even larger numbers or longer periods of time,” Bowser added. But she expressed concern about the use of the national guard in DC. “I’m concerned about them not being used efficiently, and I just think that’s not the most efficient use of our guard,” she said.
Bowser also took aim at Trump’s deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller – who called DC “more violent than Baghdad” last week.
“Any comparison to a war-torn country is hyperbolic and false,” she said.
Aaron Glantz
The Department of Veterans Affairs has lost thousands of healthcare professionals deemed “core” to the system’s ability to function and “without which mission-critical work cannot be completed”, agency records show.
The number of medical staff on hand to treat veterans has fallen every month since Donald Trump took office. The VA has experienced a net loss of 2,000 registered nurses since the start of this fiscal year, the data shows, along with approximately 1,300 medical assistants, 1,100 nursing assistants and licensed practical nurses, 800 doctors, 500 social workers and 150 psychologists.
The numbers are at odds with claims by the VA secretary, Doug Collins, that veterans’ healthcare would not be affected by an agency-wide reduction of 30,000 workers to be completed this year through a combination of attrition, a hiring freeze and deferred resignation program.
The reduction in medical staff is also feeding fears that the Trump administration is seeking to transform the VA, which currently operates the largest integrated healthcare system in the United States, into a private voucher program.
“It’s a betrayal,” said Manuel Santamaria, 42, a disabled veteran who served as a US army medic and paratrooper in Iraq and Afghanistan. “It takes away the government’s accountability to veterans who have sacrificed for them.”
The VA said in a statement to the Guardian that the fear of privatization “is a far-left canard” and that “anyone who says VA is cutting health care and benefits is not being honest”.
Rebecca Ratcliffe
Villagers whose farms in Vietnam will be bulldozed to make way for a $1.5bn golf resort backed by the Trump family have reportedly been offered rice provisions and cash compensation of as little as $12 for a square metre of land by state authorities.
Thousands of villagers will be offered compensation based on land size and location, according to a report by Reuters. The agency spoke to elderly farmers who said they feared they would struggle to find a stable livelihood.
The sprawling golf resort, the first project by the Trump Organization in Vietnam, broke ground as the country scrambled to reach a crucial trade deal with the US.
Vietnam, which is heavily dependent on exports, was facing the threat of a 46% tariff in April, which has since been reduced to 20% for many goods.
Vietnam’s prime minister said the project played an important role in deepening the country’s relationship with the US and that villagers would be reimbursed. Pham Minh Chinh added that he hoped the development would create jobs and improve livelihoods.
The project will include a 54-hole VIP golf course, luxury resorts, high-end villas and a modern urban complex, according to state media. Reactions among local people have been mixed, with many farmers suggesting the compensation rates are too low.
Michael Sainato
The Trump administration’s immigration policies are affecting workers and driving, in part, a decline in tourism, including international tourists, to Las Vegas, according to workers and the largest labor union in the state of Nevada.
Visitors to Las Vegas overall dropped 11.3% in June 2025, compared to the same month last year. According to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, international visitors to one of the world’s largest tourist destinations dropped 13% in June.
“A lot of departments are having a lot of layoffs,” said Norma Torres, a housekeeper for eight years at Mandalay Bay and a member of the Culinary Union, who has worked in the hospitality industry since she was 18 years old. “In the housekeeping department, the people on call are barely called into work.”
Canada is Nevada’s largest international market. Flair Airlines, a Canadian airline, reported a 55% drop in passengers compared to last year. Air Canada reported a 13.2% drop in passengers from May to June this year to Las Vegas, and one third lower compared to last year.
Trump administration officials have reportedly pushed for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents to arrest 3,000 people a day as part of their anti-immigration agenda. They have subsequently denied that those quotas exist. But they have continued to revoke immigration statuses, delayed action for childhood arrivals, and other humanitarian immigration programs.
“If you tell the rest of the world you’re not welcome, they are going to listen. Our members are telling us that they’re quite nervous, and that’s why they’re calling it a Trump slump,” said Ted Pappageorge, secretary treasurer of Culinary Workers Union Local 226.
But the Ice raids, trade wars with trading partners and fears that rising tariffs will hit the finances of potential visitors are all having an impact on Sin City tourism.
Nvidia and AMD have agreed to give the US government 15% of revenue from sales to China of advanced computer chips, a US official said on Sunday, in an unusual move likely to unsettle US companies.
President Donald Trump’s administration halted sales of H20 chips to China in April, but Nvidia announced last month that Washington had said it would allow the company to resume sales and it hoped to start deliveries soon.
Another US official said on Friday that the Commerce Department had begun issuing licenses for the sale of H20 artificial intelligence chips to China.
Poland’s prime minister said on Monday he felt a mixture of fear and hope ahead of a Russia-US summit on the war in Ukraine this week, but added that Washington had pledged to consult its European partners before the talks.
US president Donald Trump will meet his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Alaska on 15 August, and Kyiv fears that the two leaders may try to dictate terms for ending the war.
“The American side has promised that it will consult with European partners on its position before the meeting in Alaska,” Donald Tusk told a news conference.
“I will wait… for the effects of the meeting between presidents Trump and Putin – I have many fears and a lot of hope.”
He said that Trump’s recent comments on the war in Ukraine could give the impression the US president was increasingly understanding Ukrainian and European arguments regarding the conflict, but that he was not 100% sure that this position would be lasting.
French, Italian, German, Polish, British, Finnish and European Commission leaders on Saturday welcomed Trump’s efforts to try to end the war, but emphasised the need to pressure Russia and provide security guarantees for Kyiv.
Trump to speak about effort to ‘stop violent crime’ in Washington DC
President Donald Trump’s news conference is due to take place in about three-and-a-half hours and it follows his Truth Social promising the new measures “will, essentially, stop violent crime” in the capital district, without explaining how.
In a subsequent post, he said that the news conference at 10am on Monday, “will not only involve ending the Crime, Murder, and Death in our Nation’s Capital, but will also be about Cleanliness”.
The District of Columbia, established in 1790, operates under the Home Rule Act, which gives Congress ultimate authority but allows residents to elect a mayor and city council. Trump said last week that lawyers are examining how to overturn the law, a move that would likely require Congress to revoke it and him to sign off.
Trump has cited a recent assault on a federal staffer and viral videos of youth crime to argue the nation’s capital is in crisis. His response marks a renewed focus on crime as a political priority and grounds for increased federal intervention, which could challenge Washington’s autonomy and reshape the balance of local and federal power.
While details of the plan remain unclear, the administration is preparing to deploy hundreds of National Guard troops to Washington, a US official told Reuters, a controversial tactic Trump used recently in Los Angeles to tackle immigration protests over the objections of local officials.
Washington DC mayor refutes Trump’s claim about city violence: ‘not experiencing a crime spike’
The Democratic mayor of Washington, Muriel Bowser, pushed back on Trump’s claims, saying the city is “not experiencing a crime spike” and highlighting that violent crime has fallen to a 30-year low.
President Trump called Bowser “a good person who has tried” but said she’s been given many chances while crime numbers continue to worsen, Reuters reported.
Violent crime fell 26% in the first seven months of 2025 and overall crime dropped 7%, according to the city’s police department. But gun violence remains an issue. In 2023, Washington had the third-highest gun homicide rate among US cities with populations over 500,000, according to gun control advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety.
Over the past week, Trump has intensified his messaging, demanding the swift eviction of homeless residents and vowing to jail offenders. He has raised the prospect of stripping the city of its local autonomy and signaled a possible full federal takeover.
The Trump administration is also preparing to deploy hundreds of National Guard troops to Washington, a US official told Reuters, a controversial tactic that Trump used recently in Los Angeles to respond to immigration protests over the objections of local officials.
Trump has not made a final decision, the official said, adding that the number of troops and the role they would play are still being determined.
Trump orders homeless he passed en route to golf course to leave Washington DC
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.
We start with news that president Donald Trump is promising new steps to tackle homelessness and crime in Washington, prompting the city’s mayor to voice concerns about the potential use of the National Guard to patrol the streets in the nation’s capital.
Trump wrote in a social media post that he planned a White House news conference at 10am today to discuss his plans to make the District of Columbia “safer and more beautiful than it ever was before”, AP reported.
“The Homeless have to move out, IMMEDIATELY,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform Sunday morning, shortly after being driven from the White House to his golf club in Virginia. “We will give you places to stay, but FAR from the Capital.”
The post was illustrated with four photographs, all apparently taken from the president’s motorcade along the route from the White House to his golf course.
Two of the images showed a total of 10 tents pitched on the grass along a highway on-ramp just over a mile from the White House. The third image showed a single person sleeping on the steps of the American Institute of Pharmacy Building on Constitution Avenue.
The fourth image showed the line of vehicles that whisk Trump to his golf course passing a small amount of roadside litter on the E Street Expressway, near the Kennedy Center.
Last week, the Republican president directed federal law enforcement agencies to increase their presence in Washington for seven days, with the option “to extend as needed.”
On Friday night, federal agencies including the Secret Service, the FBI and the US Marshals Service assigned more than 120 officers and agents to assist in Washington.
Read our full report here:
In other developments:
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Four days after JD Vance reportedly asked top Trump administration officials to come up with a new communications strategy for dealing with the scandal around the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, the vice-president appears to have put his foot in it, sparking a new round of online outrage even as he tried to defuse the furor.
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The Texas governor, Greg Abbott, has stepped up his war of words with Democratic lawmakers who have left the state to foil an aggressive redistricting plan aimed at giving his Republican party five additional seats in Congress, saying on Sunday that the fight “could literally last years”.
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Nvidia and AMD have agreed to give the US government 15% of their revenues from chip sales in China, under an unprecedented arrangement to obtain export licenses for the semiconductors, the Financial Times reported on Sunday.
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The United States, a veto-wielding permanent member of the UN security council, offered support for Israel and accused those nations who supported Sunday’s meeting of “actively prolonging the war by spreading lies about Israel”. “Israel has a right to decide what is necessary for its security and what measure measures are appropriate to end the threat posed by Hamas,” said the US envoy to the UN, Dorothy Shea.
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The United States has pledged to consult its European partners before a meeting between US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk said on Monday.
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The US and China have not yet announced an extension to their tariff deadline, with tensions flaring up again just as a fragile truce nears its expiry. Following the latest bilateral meeting in Stockholm in July, Beijing said that both sides would work toward extending the tariff truce by another 90 days.
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A federal judge in Hawaii has ruled that commercial fishing is illegal in the Pacific Islands Heritage marine national monument, a federally protected area in the central Pacific Ocean.
