Bondi to face closed-door questioning from House committee over Epstein files – US politics

By Tom Ambrose · The Guardian World

Lawmakers to have fresh chance to dig for information on Trump’s administration’s handling of issue by grilling former attorney-general Sign up for the Breaking News US email Republicans in Louisiana are poised to eliminate a majority-Black congressional district that elected a Democrat in response to a recent US Supreme Court ruling that its map constituted an illegal racial gerrymander. A redistricting plan passed on Thursday by the state House would give Republicans a chance at picking up an additional seat in this year’s midterm elections, AP reports. A jury in Spokane, Washington found an Afghanistan War veteran and two others guilty of federal conspiracy charges on Thursday for their part in a protest last June outside the city’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility. New Jersey’s governor, Mikie Sherrill , said that state health inspectors were denied full access to the privately run Delaney Hall immigration detention center in Newark, where detainees are staging a hunger and labor strike over health and sanitary conditions, and protesters rallying outside have been tased, pepper-sprayed and detained. At least six of the nine featured musical acts recruited to play on the National Mall in Washington DC this summer, in a concert series planned by the Trump administration to mark the nation’s 250th anniversary, have dropped out of the concert series, just one day after the lineup was announced . US vice-president JD Vance on Thursday told reporters that Washington was “not there yet” with Iran but he said the parties were close, adding that the US was in a position where it could substantially set back Tehran’s nuclear program. Earlier, Iran’s Tasnim news agency, citing a source close to the negotiating team, said the text of a potential memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the two countries had not yet been finalised or confirmed. Continue reading...