Half of US voters believe Trump is racist after ‘go back’ comments, poll finds

Around half of American voters believe Donald Trump is racist despite the US president saying he is the "least racist person in the world", according to a new poll. The survey was conducted by Quinnipiac University several days after Mr Trump said a group of four congresswomen of colour should "go back" to the countries they came from, even though all four are US citizens. The survey period, from 25-28 July, also included the day that Mr Trump launched a new attack on black congressman Elijah Cummings.He called Mr Cummings “a brutal bully” and described his Baltimore district as a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess”. The poll results come as Democrats seeking the party’s nomination for president enter a second round of debates. Nearly all of the 2020 candidates have roundly condemned Mr Trump’s remarks as racist and divisive.The poll found that 51 per cent of voters think Mr Trump is racist while 45 per cent do not.When separated by party, 86 per cent of Democratic voters classified Mr Trump as racist while 91 per cent of Republicans said he was not.About 88 per cent of those who said Mr Trump was racist disapprove of the job he is doing as president, while 94 per cent of those who said he was not racist approve of his performance.Other polls conducted by USA Today/Ipsos, The Economist/YouGov and Fox News in July have shown that between half and two-thirds of Americans believe that telling someone to “go back” is a racist statement and that Mr Trump’s tweets “cross the line”.The US president also attacked civil rights leader Reverand Al Sharpton earlier this week. The president denounced Mr Sharpton on Twitter as “a con man” who “Hates Whites & Cops” and doubled down on his attacks against Mr Cummings.Mr Trump also claimed he is the “least racist person in the world” following his comments attacking politicians of colour and civil rights figures.The Quinnipac poll found that 41 per cent of survey respondents believe Mr Trump’s immigration policies are motivated by “racist beliefs”, compared with 49 per cent who ascribed them to “a sincere interest in controlling our borders”. New York Times

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Health care and CNN's rules are among the winners and losers of Tuesday's Democratic debate

The bold progressives -- Sens. Sanders and Warren -- held their own. There was lots of talk about health care. CNN's ground rules seemed to get in the way. And what about Marianne Williamson?

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Italy: Teen's father says son didn't know friend had knife

Fabrizio Natale issued a statement through a lawyer after visiting his son, Gabriel Christian Natale-Hjorth at a Rome prison, a meeting Natale described as "very tough for both" of them. Prosecutors say Elder has confessed to knifing Cerciello Rega, 35, who was stabbed 11 times and died at a hospital.

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'You're wrong': Sanders, Warren open debate defending health care plan

The two progressives joined forces Tuesday night against more moderate candidates — and the moderators.

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Dubai ruler's wife seeks UK forced marriage protection order for children

The estranged wife of the ruler of Dubai has applied for a UK forced marriage protection order relating to their children, a London court heard Tuesday. Princess Haya, 45, a wife of 70-year-old United Arab Emirates Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, has applied for the order, as well as for wardship of their children, and a non-molestation order relating to herself, the High Court heard.

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Here are all the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates who have qualified for the September primary debates

The next round of debates have much more strict criteria for candidates looking to secure a spot on stage. As a result, the field could thin out fast.

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Muslim Virginia lawmaker heckles Trump at Jamestown speech

A heckler who interrupted a speech by President Donald Trump during Tuesday's commemoration of 400 years of American democracy is a new Muslim lawmaker from Virginia angered by the president's race-related rhetoric. After Samirah stood and held up his signs, he was led out of a tent where Trump was speaking at a museum near the site of the original Jamestown colony.

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What you need to know about Capital One data breach affecting more than 100 million customers

Consumers find themselves confronted with another data breach, this time involving Capital One. Here's what you need to know to protect yourself.

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Relatives gather to identify 57 victims killed Brazil prison riot

Dozens of family members of inmates killed by other detainees during a prison riot in the north of Brazil have gathered outside the local forensic institute, waiting to identify their loved ones

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Sanctions-hit Iran to cut zeros and rename plunging currency

The government in sanctions-hit Iran on Wednesday approved a plan to remove zeros from the rial and rename the currency -- something its people have long been doing to simplify transactions. "The cabinet today agreed on a bill to eliminate four zeros from the currency and that 'toman' will be our national currency," government spokesman Ali Rabiei told reporters in Tehran. The value of the Iranian rial has hit low after record low since last year.

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5 key takeaways from the Democratic debate in Detroit

An alliance from Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, Marianne Williamson shining and Steve Bullock stumbling late highlighted the first of two Democratic debates in Michigan.

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Chicago shooting deaths: Outcry as anti-gun violence mothers shot dead while campaigning

Two women who campaigned against Chicago’s infamous gun violence, have themselves been shot and killed on a street corner where activists frequently stood to keep watch.The anti-gun violence group Mothers Against Senseless Killings (MASK), confirmed Chantell Grant and Andrea Stoudemire were killed after a blue SUV pulled up to the corner, and someone in the vehicle opened fired into the crowd.“People are tired of being afraid. We’re sick of being afraid. We live in these communities and then we somehow are penalised and punished for living here. If you’re poor, you’re poor,” said MASK founder Tamar Manasseh.“But when women are killed, it’s not their fault. It’s not because they made bad decisions. It’s not they’re in the wrong place at the wrong time.”Police said the two women were killed on Friday night in South Side neighbourhood of Englewood, where members of the group often stood watch.Mr Grant, 26, was mother to three young children. Ms Stoudemire, 35, had two children. They were among a total of 48 people shot in the city over the weekend, eight of them fatally.Chicago has a reputation for some of the deadliest and most persistent gun violence in the country, though it is not evenly distributed.Most occurs in the South Side, which has had a large African American population and which has long suffered from poverty, partly the result of hosing laws that long discriminated against minority communities.MASK was founded in 2015 and works to “interrupt violence and crime, and teach children to grow up as friends rather than enemies”.NNC News said there have been more than 1,190 shooting incidents in the city so far this year, and almost 1,530 shooting victims, according to police.Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi called the murders “senseless”. He added: “We have no evidence to suggest the women were the intended targets.”

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'We're in pain': Family remembers Keyla Salazar, teen killed in Gilroy Garlic Festival shooting

Family and friends held a vigil for Keyla Salazar Tuesday evening, lamenting how a mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival ended her life at 13.

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The 2 Canadian teen fugitives were searched at an alcohol checkpoint the day they were charged with murder, but authorities let them go

Tataskweyak Cree Nation checkpoint guards stopped the pair as they entered an alcohol free county, but let them pass after no contraband was found.

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Escape bids by rebel princesses throw spotlight on UAE rights

Princess Haya, who is battling her husband Dubai's ruler Sheikh Mohammad bin Rashid Al-Maktoum in a UK court, is the third princess who has sought to escape the Gulf emirate in recent years. Activists say the attempts by Haya and two of Sheikh Mohammed's daughters to escape the United Arab Emirates (UAE) throw a harsh spotlight on the country's rights record, even as it tries to present a glitzy and modern image to the West. In 2000, Sheikha Shamsa bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum tried to escape the family's entourage during a holiday in England, but was reportedly picked up two months later and forcibly returned to Dubai.

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Marianne Williamson explains the need for slavery reparations: 'A debt that is owed'

The self-help author helped herself Tuesday with a stirring answer on the question of slavery reparations.

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Mom of slain Navajo girl urges tribes to use Amber Alerts

The mother of a Navajo girl who was kidnapped and killed in 2016 urged tribal officials and children's advocates Tuesday to take advantage of tools and funding under a law that expands access to the nation's Amber Alert system. Pamela Foster spoke during a training at Isleta Pueblo, south of Albuquerque, for tribes seeking to implement the alert system. Despite a 2007 pilot project, it was not in place on the Navajo Nation when her daughter Ashlynne Mike was abducted near Shiprock, a town in northeast New Mexico.

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Taking Nasa's space buggies for a spin

BBC Click's Spencer Kelly takes a ride in some in some of Nasa's latest vehicles.

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Tim Ryan: Democrats will 'lose 48 states' on a 'Medicare for All' platform

Ryan called the "Medicare for All" proposals a "potential disaster" for the party.

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3-year-old Chinese boy falls from six stories, gets saved by blanket-wielding crowd below

A three-year-old boy who fell from the sixth floor of a building on Monday wassaved after a crowd of bystanders used a blanket to catch him, China's CCTVreported

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‘Disgruntled’ Employee Kills Two Co-Workers Inside Mississippi Walmart: Police

Joe Raedle/Getty ImagesA “disgruntled employee” at a Mississippi Walmart killed two co-workers and wounded a police officer in a deadly Tuesday shootout inside the superstore, authorities said.Martez Abram, 39, a recently-terminated employee of the Southaven store, was charged with two counts of murder Tuesday afternoon, DeSoto County District Attorney John Champion said. The deadly incident began around 6:30 a.m., when Southaven police responded to reports of an active shooter at a Walmart near the Tennessee border. Abram “senselessly murdered” two store employees and wounded an officer before he was injured and apprehended, authorities said. The victims have been identified as Anthony Brown, 40, and Brandon Gales, 38, the DeSoto County Coroner’s Office confirmed to The Daily Beast. “These people were doing the same thing you and I do everyday, showing up to work in an attempt to provide for their families, then became victims of a senseless violent act,” Moore told reporters at a Tuesday press conference. Bernie Sanders Confronts Walmart Over ‘Starvation Wages’ at Shareholder MeetingSouthaven Mayor Darren Musselwhite told reporters that Abram, who is currently in surgery at Regional Medical Center, was a former “disgruntled employee who had a personal grievance with employer.” Champion said Abram was terminated on Monday after showing another employee a knife in his belt. While the prosecutor did confirm that authorities are reviewing video evidence of the incident, he did not provide further details. Authorities said there were 60 employees inside the megastore, which is about 13 miles from Memphis, Tenn., when the gunfire started early Tuesday. When officers arrived, they found Abram in the parking lot and exchanged fire, Moore said.“One of our officers was shot at this time. He was saved by his vest," Moore said, adding that the officer was taken to another nearby hospital. “At this point, Abram was engaged by another officer. He was struck twice by gunfire from our officer. He was taken into custody.”6-Year-Old Boy Among 3 Killed at Gilroy Garlic Festival Mass ShootingGales’ father told local station FOX13 that the father of three was a Walmart employee for almost over 15 years and was recently promoted to department manager. Brown, a father of two and Mississippi native, was the store manager, his family told the local news station. Phil Cox,  a 70-year-old Walmart customer, told NBC News he had just left the store when he heard gunshots near him. Turning around, Cox said he saw a man sprinting into the store. “We were within milliseconds of being very close to him, coming right at him, and maybe being in the line of fire,” Cox said. “Now that we’ve had some time to think about it, it’s alarming we were that close.”Minnesota Father Charged With Murder After Setting House Fire That Killed Daughter: ProsecutorsRead more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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Ancestry will let you search online for relatives who were displaced by the Holocaust

Ancestry is digitizing millions of Holocaust persecution records and making them searchable online for free.

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Wikipedia article of the day for August 1, 2019

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 1, 2019 is Touch Me I'm Sick.
"Touch Me I'm Sick" is a song by the American alternative rock band Mudhoney. It was recorded in March 1988 at Seattle's Reciprocal Recording studio with producer Jack Endino and lead vocals by Mark Arm (pictured). The song was released as Mudhoney's debut single by independent record label Sub Pop on August 1, 1988, with "Sweet Young Thing Ain't Sweet No More" as the B-side. "Touch Me I'm Sick" has darkly humorous lyrics with a sarcastic take on issues including disease and violent sex. When it was first released, the song was a hit on college radio. Its heavily distorted and fuzzy guitars, snarling vocals, blunt bass line and energetic drumming contributed to a dirty sound that influenced many local musicians, and helped develop the nascent Seattle grunge scene. According to AllMusic, "the song's raw, primal energy made it an instant anthem which still stands as one of [grunge's] all-time classics". A staple of Mudhoney's live shows, it remains the band's most recognizable song.

How to Stop Iran’s Maritime Misadventures

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- European nations, alarmed by Iran’s capture of a British oil tanker, are mounting a response to protect their commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and Persian Gulf. The Royal Navy has started to escort British ships, and a plan for a European naval mission has been endorsed by Denmark, France and Italy.It’s a promising start. But effectively curbing Iran’s misbehavior and safeguarding ships in the region will require a more ambitious —and truly international — effort. Most important, it needs to involve the U.S. Navy.The Europeans are wary of combining their fleets with a nearby American operation for fear of being identified with President Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran. France’s foreign minister says a separate effort is needed to reduce tensions and “create the conditions for inclusive regional talks on maritime security.”This is both naïve and shortsighted. A disjointed naval effort increases the likelihood of accidents and miscalculations. It might leave open gaps that could be exploited by the marauding speedboats of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. And it creates unnecessary quandaries for ship captains: If, say, an American tanker with British nationals aboard were attacked while under U.S. Navy protection, would the HMS Duncan not respond to a call for assistance, for fear its intentions might be misconstrued by the Iranian regime?QuicktakeThe World’s Oil FlashpointFar better to present a united front. By fully joining their resources, the Americans and Europeans would be better able to police sea lanes and respond to provocations. In fact, they should be working together to recruit other countries — India, for instance — into a unified coalition, akin to the multinational task force formed to counter Somali pirates a decade ago. That effort, first headed by the U.S., drastically reduced attacks, helped strengthen local navies and coast guards, and safeguarded commercial traffic and humanitarian missions.Mounting such a response in the Gulf may sound politically difficult. But Europe should remember that the capture of the British ship, the Stena Impero, had essentially nothing to do with the nuclear deal: It was retaliation for the British Navy’s seizure of a vessel carrying Iranian crude to Syria, in contravention of European Union sanctions. Iran should’ve contested the seizure through legal processes. Instead, it’s holding the British ship hostage and demanding as ransom the release of its own tanker — and the freedom to keep sending oil to Syria, in support of the dictator Bashar al-Assad.It’s yet another reminder of how Iran’s misconduct threatens the entire region, and part of a disturbing pattern. In recent weeks, the regime has attacked ships and oil installations, shot down an American drone, restarted its uranium enrichment program, and even test-fired a ballistic missile, all while refusing good-faith efforts at mediation. It’s lashing out in the hopes that it can intimidate the world into doing what it wants.The U.S. and Europe shouldn’t give in to this kind of aggression. They should instead be united in opposing it. The waters of the Persian Gulf would be a good place to start.—Editors: Bobby Ghosh, Timothy Lavin.To contact the senior editor responsible for Bloomberg Opinion’s editorials: David Shipley at davidshipley@bloomberg.net, .Editorials are written by the Bloomberg Opinion editorial board.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

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'Passive aggression. It's a lifestyle': Ocasio-Cortez responds to a GOP congressional critic

Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga., accused Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of having "deliberately misled the American people" about the treatment of migrants in detention.

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The Latest: Relative identifies 3 of 5 killed in Wisconsin

The father of two of five people found dead in two houses in northwestern Wisconsin has identified two sons and a grandson as among the dead. Authorities say a man shot and killed four people and wounded two others wounded at a home in Lake Hallie on Sunday night and a home in the town of Lafayette on Monday. Ritchie German Sr. of North Prairie, Wisconsin, tells the Star-Tribune of Minneapolis-St. Paul that adult sons Ritchie German Jr. and Douglas German were among the dead, along with Douglas' 8-year-old son, Calvin German.

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Tip on Canada murder suspects turns up empty: police

Canadian police on Monday said they have not found two murder suspects in an area of northern Manitoba they had searched for 24 hours after receiving a tip on the teenagers' possible location. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police on Sunday announced they had sent numerous officers to the indigenous community of York Landing to investigate a possible sighting of Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, who are suspects in three murders. The Royal Canadian Air Force also assisted, but "after a thorough & exhaustive search, #rcmpmb has not been able to substantiate the tip in York Landing," Manitoba RCMP said on Twitter.

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Democratic Debate Warning: Former Obama Chief of Staff Says to Avoid 1 Thing

Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel warned Democratic presidential contenders Monday not to “win the nomination in a way that forecloses a path to victory in the general election.”Emanuel, former President Barack Obama’s ex-chief of staff, criticized the candidates’ performances in the first round of Democratic debates in Miami in June.“There’s a reason [President Donald] Trump gleefully tweeted ‘That’s the end of that race!'” Emanuel wrote in a Medium post Monday.“Too often, you succumbed to chasing plaudits on Twitter, which closed the door on swing voters in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. If you win the nomination in a way that forecloses a path to victory in the general election, we will lose, and your name will go down in infamy,” he continued.Emanuel’s criticism comes as former Vice President Joe Biden fends off attacks from people even farther to the left accusing him of being weak on civil rights and too tough on crime in the past. But the former mayor warned that the progressive wing of the Democratic Party is being unrealistic in its proposals.

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Water meant for Puerto Rican hurricane victims dumped on farmland

Tens of thousands of water bottles destined for desperate Puerto Ricans after devastating back-to-back hurricanes slammed into the US island territory remain unopened on farmland almost two years later, emergency aid officials confirmed Monday. Aerial images captured by AFP show a sea of water bottles, packaged into massive bundles, heaped on what appears to be a private estate in the Higuillar neighborhood in Dorado, 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of San Juan. A spokesman for the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) confirmed it had provided the water bottles as part of relief efforts for Hurricane Maria, which occurred in September 2017.

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North Carolina school bus driver suspected of setting up hit on student, police say

Durham police said they believe a school bus driver may have ordered someone to shoot a 17-year-old Northern High School student.

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New York state decriminalizes pot, stops short of Cuomo's legalization call

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Jeffrey Epstein served with fresh court documents alleging rape of 15-year-old girl

Disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein found out he was facing further legal peril last week, the day before he was found unconscious in his cell with neck injuries. Epstein, 66, was presented with court documents relating to accusations made by Jennifer Araoz, who claimed he raped her when she was 15. Miss Araoz, now 32, made her accusations on July 10 – shortly after Epstein was arrested by police on charges filed by New York prosecutors. She claimed that, in the autumn of 2002, when she had been visiting his New York home for a year, he raped her after she gave him a massage. Last week, on July 22, Qin Zhang, deputy sheriff, handed Epstein the documents in his cell in the Manhattan Correctional Center, where he is awaiting trial. Jeffrey Epstein awaiting his bail decision on July 15. The judge ultimately denied bail. Miss Araoz’s documents sought to depose Epstein, to learn the identity of the young woman who allegedly recruited her outside the Talent Unlimited High School and took part in his “grooming” of her “to be sexually assaulted by Epstein.” Miss Araoz has described the woman as a brunette in her 20s. Daniel Kaiser, Miss Araoz’s lawyer, said that Epstein or his lawyer will have to appear before a judge on August 27, to fight her wish to have him deposed and produce all evidence. Miss Araoz plans to sue both Epstein and the recruiter, Mr Kaiser said, but has to wait until August 14 under terms of the state Child Victims Act. The law, which Andrew Cuomo, governor of New York state, signed in February, lifted a statute of limitations that barred victims of childhood sexual abuse from suing their attackers more than three years after turning 18. The new law allows for criminal charges against sexual abusers of children to be filed until their victims turn 28 for felony cases. Jeffrey Epstein, 66, is facing up to 45 years in prison on charges of sex trafficking of minors It also allows for civil charges to be brought against their abusers - and institutions that enabled them - until they turn 55. Finally, it enacted a one-year, one-off period of grace, allowing all victims to seek civil action, regardless of how long ago the abuse occurred. That period begins on August 14. The day after the court papers were served, Epstein - who’s being held without bail on conspiracy and child sex trafficking charges - was found nearly unconscious on the floor of his cell, law enforcement sources have said. Based on the appearance of the marks on his neck, investigators suspect he was choked by someone else, The New York Post reported, and they questioned his cellmate, a former policeman awaiting a death penalty trial in four drug-related killings.

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Whither Evangelical Purity Culture? Thoughts on the Legacy of a Lost Pastor

If you don’t live in Evangelical-world, you probably missed this news. An influential Evangelical author and pastor named Joshua Harris announced on Saturday that he was in the process of “deconstruction.” His statement was clear. “By all the measurements I have for defining a Christian,” he said, “I am not a Christian.” He apologized to the LGBT community for not affirming gay marriage and for the ways that his writing and speaking “contributed to a culture of exclusion and bigotry.”For Christians, it’s a sad statement, but it’s also full of real integrity. Rather than try to jam Christianity into his evolving worldview, he respects orthodoxy by opting out.Harris burst into prominence as a young Christian with every author’s dream: a giant, influential first-book bestseller. It was called I Kissed Dating Goodbye, and it sold almost a million copies. If anything, however, the sales numbers understated its influence. It was part of the foundation of Evangelical “purity culture,” and it revolutionized parenting and dating for countless Christian parents and families.I remember it well. I was a youth pastor for a few memorable months at the height of the courtship craze. The year was 1998, I was a youth volunteer at a small church in Georgetown, Ky., when our youth pastor left. Until we could find a new youth pastor, I was in charge. I preached the youth service every week, I led the youth Sunday school, and I led the youth prayer groups. I was also a commercial litigator in a big law firm, and suddenly I had two full-time jobs. It was one of the best times of my life.But we also had a problem. The youth ministry had gone all-in on purity culture. The previous youth pastor had even declared “no date ’98,” placing a moratorium on every kid in the youth group: not even a single date for the entire year. When it came to relationships, it would be “courtship” (tersely defined as parental-supervised visits and outings) or nothing.This wasn’t wanton repression or cruelty. Many parents had entered adulthood wounded by past broken relationships. They regretted the mistakes of their youth and desperately wanted their kids to avoid similar heartbreak. Also — and this is crucial for understanding purity culture — they fervently believed in a specific earthly reward for their child’s youthful obedience. Courtship represented the best method of ensuring a healthy, sexually vibrant marriage to a faithful spouse.This is what writer Katelyn Beaty called the “sexual prosperity gospel,” an “if/then” transactional relationship with God that manufactures a series of promises from scripture and then creates a form of Christian entitlement and expectation. “I did what you asked, Lord, now may I see my reward?”Beaty’s critique is well taken, and it’s certainly true that purity culture built a series of (often wildly unrealistic) expectations about the marriage relationship that awaited kids who courted. But I think it did something even darker — in its effect (if not its intent), it reversed the gospel message, teaching Christian kids that they risked being defined by their sins, not by Christ.It worked like this — sexual sin stained young persons, even if Christ forgave them. They would walk into marriage diminished in some crucial ways. The white dress, fundamentally, was a lie. And the message wasn’t confined to sexuality. Did you drink? Did you smoke a joint? Each one of those things altered a person’s self-definition. They were no longer “pure.” They could never be “pure” again.All too many times, I saw the despair. A young person would come to me and say, “I screwed up.” They would really mean, “I’m ruined.” Their storybook dreams were dead. A 17-year-old with (God willing) 70 years of life ahead of him would approach me carrying the awful burden of thinking that he had defined his life forever. He was no longer — and never would be — the person he wanted to be.Sometimes the despair would trigger wild rebellion. If they’re “ruined,” then why should they care about obedience? There are two states of being — virgin or not, teetotaler or not — and if you’re not, then you might as well indulge yourself. Other times the despair would trigger constant, nagging guilt and regret. A girl would walk down the aisle to marry a man who loved God and loved her, and she’d feel a shadow on her soul.In point of fact, the gospel message rests first on bad news, then on indescribably good news. The bad news is simple: You were never “pure.” It’s not as if sex or drink or drugs represent the demarcation line between righteous and unrighteous. They are not and were never the “special” sins that created particularly acute separation from God. Yes, they could have profound earthly consequences, but they did not create unique spiritual separation.The indescribably good news is that from the moment of the confession of faith, believers are not defined by their sin. They’re not defined even by their own meager virtues. They’re defined by Christ. Moreover, they find that “for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” This does not by any stretch mean that past sin wasn’t sin — one of my best friends is an eleven-years-sober addict who did dreadful things during his worst days — but it does mean that their past now gives them a unique ability to reach suffering people. Their terrible stories and past pain have been redeemed, transformed into instruments of grace and mercy.One of my first acts as youth pastor was to lift the ban on dating. Ending legalism is not the same thing as sanctioning sin, and I have no idea if there was more or less extramarital sex as a result of the dating ban or the purity rings. But it was incumbent upon me — in the limited time that I had in leadership — to tell the truth, and the truth was that legalism is its own kind of sin. To create burdens where Christ did not is an act of arrogance. It’s deeply harmful. And, sadly, it’s a way of life in all too many Christian churches.Harris has famously repented of his past legalism, and that makes his departure from the faith particularly poignant. He helped define young people by their sin, and then he left. He separated from his wife, and he rejected Christianity itself. He is like an inadvertent arsonist, who flees the burning house rather than helping fight the fire he helped ignite. I’m sad to see him go. I’m sadder still to see the pain he caused when he was present.

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Ten Democrats line up in second presidential TV debate

The party's most progressive candidates, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, take centre stage.

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Ten Democrats line up in second presidential TV debate

The party's most progressive candidates, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, take centre stage.

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California has strict gun laws. Here's how the Gilroy gunman evaded them

US lawmakers renew calls for federal gun reform after shooter purchased weapon legally in NevadaPolice officers escort people from Christmas Hill Park following the shooting. Photograph: Noah Berger/APCalifornia has some of the most stringent gun laws in the country, including a ban on the type of rifle that a shooter used to kill three and wound 15 at the garlic food festival in Gilroy on Sunday.But the gunman had legally purchased the “assault-type rifle”, in the style of an AK-47, from the neighboring state Nevada on 9 July before carrying it illegally over state lines into California, highlighting what some gun control advocates say is a loophole in the way laws operate, state by state.The suspect, 19, opened fire in the last hours of the three-day garlic festival, a beloved annual tradition that draws thousands of attendees of all ages. He injured 15 people and killed three – a six-year-old boy, a 13-year-old girl and a man in his 20s – before being shot dead by police officers, who rushed him within a minute of bullets being heard.> Just days ago, a California judge upheld that state’s assault weapons ban. > > Yesterday, a murderer who acquired an assault weapon legally in Nevada shot more than a dozen people in Gilroy in less than one minute. THIS is why we need a national ban. NoRAhttps://t.co/CCVonmecqL> > — NoRA (@NoRA4USA) July 29, 2019The Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence ranks California first in the nation for having the strongest gun laws.California raised the minimum age to purchase a rifle to 21 in 2018. And last week, a federal judge upheld California’s ban on owning, manufacturing or selling semiautomatic rifles and so-called “bullet buttons”, rifle attachments that allow shooters to reload more quickly. The state has banned semi-automatic weapons for 20 years. The bullet button ban dates from 2016.Nevada, on the other hand, is ranked 25th in the Giffords Center’s ranking.Big Mikes Gun and Ammo, the Nevada store where the gunman bought his weapon, said in a statement on its Facebook page that the shooter had bought the rifle off of the store’s internet page.“The reach of the California law ends at our border,” California’s attorney general, Xavier Becerra, told the San Francisco Chronicle, “and so we cannot control what other states do, and that’s what makes it so tough. We may have progressive gun laws, but if other states don’t match us, we have to rely on the ability to catch” the person.Several lawmakers have pointed at Sunday’s shooting to once again call for a federal law that would close this cross-state loophole.“The gun used by the Gilroy shooter was an AK-47 type assault rifle. This weapon is illegal to buy or possess in California, which appears to be why the shooter crossed into Nevada to buy the gun,” said Senator Dianne Feinstein in a statement. “The assault weapons ban legislation I introduced earlier this year would have prevented that sale from happening. It’s time for Congress to debate this bill and vote on it.”Feinstein continued: “There are other bills out there that deserve to see the light of day including bills to require comprehensive background checks, help establish extreme-risk laws, prohibit the purchase of high-capacity magazines and eliminate loopholes that allow prohibited individuals [to acquire] guns.”“This loss cannot be in vain,” tweeted the California congresswoman Jackie Speier early Monday.Speier is looking to close the gap, as one of 190 members of the House who co-sponsored a bill that would ban the import, sale, manufacturing or possession of semiautomatic assault weapons and large capacity ammunition feeding devices on the federal level.> I worked to pass the state law banning assault weapons in the 90’s. We need to buy back the ones still in people’s possession & throw the book at those who defy the law! We must also pass H.R. 1296, the Assault Weapons Ban, to ban military-style assault weapons across the U.S.> > — Jackie Speier (@RepSpeier) July 29, 2019The California representative Eric Swalwell, who campaigned briefly for the Democratic 2020 presidential nomination and was the only one of two dozen candidates to focus his platform primarily on stronger gun control, was another one of the bill’s co-sponsors.> My heart breaks for all of our Bay Area neighbors who attended the GilroyGarlicFestival. We need gun reform and we need it now. EnoughIsEnough> > — Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) July 29, 2019Senator Kamala Harris, who represents California, has called for a renewal of a federal assault weapons ban as well. She has stated that should she be elected, she will give Congress 100 days to take legislative action on gun violence, and if lawmakers cannot reach a consensus, she will take executive action.> Simply horrific. I'm grateful to the first responders who are on the scene in Gilroy, and my thoughts are with that community tonight. Our country has a gun violence epidemic that we cannot tolerate. https://t.co/WqWNxGAQnA> > — Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) July 29, 2019The gun laws differ so vastly from state to state that a small California city located near the Nevada and Arizona borders voted this month to ask state legislators to allow gun owners from other states to carry registered firearms in the town.> Our thoughts are with the families of those lost last night in Gilroy, CA, as well as the survivors facing a tough road ahead. But thoughts are not enough — action must be taken to EndGunViolence. Every day the Senate refuses to act is a stain on the conscience of our nation.> > — Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) July 29, 2019

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Death toll in Brazil prison massacre rises to 57 with over a dozen decapitated

SAO PAULO/RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - A bloody clash between two prison gangs on Monday left at least 57 inmates dead with 16 of them decapitated, authorities in the state of Para said, the latest deadly clash as Brazil's government struggles to control the country's overcrowded jails. Prisoners belonging to the Comando Classe A gang set fire to a cell containing inmates from the rival Comando Vermelho, or Red Command, gang, Para's state government said in a statement. "It was a targeted act," state prison director Jarbas Vasconcelos said in the statement, adding there was no prior intelligence that suggested an attack would take place.

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Police investigate after man says he found baby in freezer

A St. Louis man says a box that had been in his mother's freezer for decades contained the mummified remains of a newborn baby, which he discovered while cleaning out her home after she died. Adam Smith told St. Louis media outlets that he opened the cardboard box Sunday expecting to find something like the top of his mother's first wedding cake or money because she never had a bank account. St. Louis police confirmed that they are investigating a "suspicious death" involving an "unknown infant" found inside the home and that autopsy results were pending.

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Andrew Yang's campaign blasted the DNC for not allowing him to use 2 polls from same source for fall Democratic debates

The Yang campaign was unhappy the DNC only let them use either an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll or an NBC/SurveyMonkey poll but not both.

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'Stay inside and lock your doors': Tiny Canadian village on lockdown as teenage murder spree suspects spotted scavenging for food

A massive police manhunt has been launched in a remote part of northern Canada for a pair of teenager double murder suspects.The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been chasing Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, for weeks since the pair were connected to two separate killings in British Columbia earlier this month.The teenagers have been tracked in a series of stolen cars as they have travelled thousands of miles across Canada, from its Pacific coast in the west all to the way east to rural Manitoba.Police helicopters, a plane, drones, dog units and armed officers have flooded the area around York Landing, a small village in remote northern Manitoba, where a local indigenous neighbourhood watch group had spotted the duo.Officers tweeted residents in York Landing should stay inside and lock all their doors and windows while the heavy police presence searched their community.James Favel from the Bear Clan Patrol, the First Nations group which reported the sighting, said some of his volunteers spotted two young men who matched the description of Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky.The pair immediately stood out in the small, close-knit village while scavenging for food near a dump and ran away as soon as they realised they had been seen, he added.RCMP units had already been searching the nearby town of Gillam and believe the pair have been cornered in this region of rural Manitoba.But the intense police presence was leaving its mark on the locals. “Up here, all the towns and communities, they look like ghost towns,” said Wade Taylor, another volunteer with the Bear Clan Patrol.“Like, everyone’s inside. There’s a high level of stress, anxiety and fearfulness because they’re being kept in their houses.“Some of the people, you can tell by their voice that they’re almost at the point of breaking down crying. You could say it’s traumatic.”The manhunt saga began on 12 July when Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky, childhood friends, left their home in Port Alberni on Vancouver Island and travelled 1,500 miles north to Whitehorse, in the Yukon, to look for work.But on 15 July police discovered the bodies of a young couple near Liard Hot Springs, back in British Columbia and the RCMP has said the teenagers are suspects in the case and wanted for questioning.A few days later a burnt-out truck driven by the pair was discovered, along with the body of Leonard Dyck. Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky have been charged with his murder and chased across Canada by the RCMP ever since.The duo are believed to be armed and the public has been warned not to approach them.The father of Mr Schmegelsky has told reporters he believes his son is on a “suicide mission” and expects him to eventually die in a confrontation with the police. “A normal child doesn’t travel across the country killing people,” he said. “A child in some very serious pain does.”

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Afghan soldier killed two US troops: official

An Afghan soldier was responsible for the killing of two American troops a day earlier, an official told AFP Tuesday, in what appears to be the latest example of an insider attack. The US military on Monday said two of its troops had been killed in action in Afghanistan, but did not provide any additional details, pending notification of next of kin. Mohammad Qasam, a deputy police chief in Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan, said the attack took place at an Afghan army base during a visit by US forces.

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Joint Chiefs nominee denies assault allegations, enlists key support

Sen. Martha McSally — a retired Air Force pilot who revealed this year that she was raped by a superior officer — came out with a staunch defense of Air Force Gen. John Hyten.

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The president is right about Baltimore. Are Democrats really prepared to defend failure?

Baltimore is one of the least livable, most dangerous cities in America. It's not racist to point that out.

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3 dead, including 2 children, and at least 12 hurt: What we know about Gilroy Garlic Festival shooting

A gunman opened fire at the annual Gilroy Garlic Festival on Sunday killing three people and injuring at least 12 others. Here's what we know.

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Ben Carson says President Trump would be happy to work with Elijah Cummings to bring relief to Baltimore

HUD Secretary Ben Carson praises Trump administration efforts to rehabilitate America's distressed areas.

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Wikipedia article of the day for July 31, 2019

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 31, 2019 is Henry W. Sawyer.
Henry W. Sawyer (1918–1999) was an American lawyer, civil rights activist, and Democratic politician. Born in Philadelphia, he served in World War II and attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School. After graduating, he joined the law firm of Drinker Biddle & Reath and remained with them for his entire career. Sawyer worked as a corporate lawyer but is best known for his advocacy of civil liberties, especially in First Amendment cases. In Abington School District v. Schempp and Lemon v. Kurtzman, he successfully argued cases before the Supreme Court of the United States (building pictured) that became the basis for all modern Establishment Clause jurisprudence. He pursued civil rights causes in Philadelphia and in the South during the civil rights movement of the 1960s. He also served a four-year term on the Philadelphia City Council, where he worked on civil service reform and the acquisition of public art for the city.

Gilroy garlic festival shooting: Gunman shot dead after killing at least three at California event

A six-year-old boy and 13-year-old girl were among those killed by a gunman who opened fire at a popular food festival in California on Sunday.  Santino William Legan, 19, appeared to target people randomly as he began shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival after cutting through a fence to gain entry, according to the police.  He killed three people and injured another 12 with an assault-style rifle before being fatally shot by police officers who responded to the incident in less than a minute.  Six-year-old Stephen Romero, the 13-year-old girl and a man in his 20s were killed, officials and authorities said. The motive for the attack is unclear.  Alberto Romero, Stephen's father, told the San Francisco Bay Area news station KNTV: "My son had his whole life to live and he was only 6. That's all I can say." The attack came at the end of the three-day festival in Gilroy, a city in north California known as the "Garlic Capital of the World”. The event is attended by more than 100,000 people.  Festival attendees have to pass through metal detectors and have their bags searched, but the shooter is believed to have gained access through a fence near a car park. Details of the attack are still emerging.  BREAKING UPDATE: Ambulance crews were told 11 people down in a reported shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival. https://t.co/ufzR4VllULpic.twitter.com/giApm5t2bX— Stephen Ellison (@sj_ellison) July 29, 2019 Jack van Breen, a musician playing at the festival, said he saw a man wearing a green shirt and grayish handkerchief around his neck fire into the food area with what looked like an assault rifle. He and other members of the band dove under the stage. Mr Van Breen said he heard someone shout: "Why are you doing this?" The reply was: "Because I'm really angry." Donna Carlson of Reno, Nevada, told reporters she was helping a friend at a jewellery booth when "all of a sudden it was pop, pop, pop.” She hid behind a table until police said it was safe to leave.  Donald Trump, the US president, condemned the "wicked murderer” during an event at the White House on Monday morning.  He said: "We express our deepest sadness and sorrow for the families who lost a precious loved one in the horrific shooting last night in Gilroy, California.” Police Chief Scot Smithee said police officers in the area confronted the suspect less than a minute after he opened fire, and the suspect was shot and killed. "He had some sort of a rifle," Mr Smithee said, adding they were investigating the possibility there was a second shooter. Witnesses reported confusion and panic as shots rang out at the event in the city of 50,000 located about 80 miles southeast of San Francisco.  People leave the Gilroy Garlic Festival following a deadly shooting Credit: AP Videos posted on social media appeared to show festival attendees scattering in confusion as at least one loud popping sound could be heard in the background. "What's going on?" a woman can be heard asking on one video. "Who'd shoot up a garlic festival?" Herman Solis, of Hollister, said he and his girlfriend dropped to the ground when he heard shots fired. “You could hear the bullets whizzing by,” he told the San Francisco Chronicle. “It was unreal. We ran and ducked for cover. It was chaos. At first I thought it was fireworks. Then I realised it wasn’t.” Another witness, Julissa Contreras, told NBC a white man in his 30s armed with a rifle opened fire indiscriminately. "I could see him shooting in just every direction. He wasn't aiming at anyone specifically. It was just left to right, right to left," Ms Contreras told the network. Emergency personnel stand outside Gilroy High School Credit: AP Tim Cook, the Apple CEO, shared his condolences on Twitter, saying he was "deeply saddened" by the targeting of the "beloved community tradition". Earlier Gilroy police said: “The hearts of the Gilroy Police Department and the entire community go out to the victims of today's shooting at the Garlic Festival.”

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Trump’s Racist Tweets Don't Break Any Rules, Twitter Says

Photo Illustration by Kelly Caminero/The Daily BeastPresident Donald Trump’s spree of tweets attacking black political figures over the weekend do not violate Twitter’s rules prohibiting dehumanizing language, the company said. Trump wrote that Rep. Elijah Cummings’ (D-MD) congressional district, a majority-black area that includes part of Baltimore, was a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” and that “no human being” would want to live there. He further retweeted a British conservative commentator who called Baltimore “a proper shithole.” A day later, the president said there was “nothing racist” about his tweets, turning his criticism toward longtime Democratic political operative Rev. Al Sharpton, who he called a conman.In early July, Twitter announced new rules disallowing tweets that deny the humanity of religious groups after nearly a year of deliberation and public comment. The company considered banning all dehumanizing speech, including attacks on geographic origin, reportedly using the president’s “shithole countries” remark as an example, but narrowed the policy to encompass religion and groups explicitly protected by civil rights laws.Cummings, chair of the House Oversight Committee, has been investigating Trump and recently decried detention conditions at the Southern U.S. border. Last week the president made similar attacks against four newly minted Representatives, all women of color, telling them to go back to their countries. Three of four were born in the U.S. The comments also did not run afoul of Twitter’s rules.Whether Trump’s racist tweets violate Twitter’s rules has long been a subject of debate, and Twitter has often fallen back on the defense that, as the U.S. president, his remarks are newsworthy and should remain visible. Under a policy announced in late June, however, Twitter said it will label tweets by prominent figures that break the social network’s abusive behavior rules when it's “in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain available.” Twitter opted not to give Trump’s latest set of tweets that label. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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US senator helps pregnant migrant with life-threatening condition apply for asylum at US-Mexico border

A pregnant Mexican woman suffering complications was told by immigration officers that they couldn’t process her family’s asylum claim at the US border on Saturday before a US senator intervened to persuade the officers to take the woman to a Texas hospital.While visiting a migrant shelter on Saturday, Ron Wyden grew concerned about a woman who was 38 weeks pregnant and suffering from pre-eclampsia and other complications.The senator and his staff decided to take the woman, her husband and 3-year-old son to a port of entry to make their asylum claim.At the Paso del Norte Bridge linking Juárez and El Paso, the family approached two US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers, presented their identification and said they wanted to request asylum.They then heard the words that tens of thousands of asylum seekers have been told for more than a year at the US-Mexico border: “We’re full,” a CBP officer told them.Mr Wyden, who had followed behind the family along with an entourage of staff members and friends from Oregon, then stepped forward and identified himself.He told the officers that Mexicans are exempt from the “metering” programme CBP has used to strictly control the number of people allowed to request asylum at ports of entry.He also told the officers the woman was late term in her pregnancy and suffering complications.The officers called a supervisor, who arrived minutes later, and allowed the family to go to the port of entry to make their asylum claim.Mr Wyden was clearly shaken by his two-day visit to the border, which included a tour of CBP holding cells and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility.At the Juárez shelter, he met a 3-year-old boy who had stopped speaking after being held with his father by the US Border Patrol and then sent back to Mexico.Mr Wyden spoke with families who were required to stay in Mexico for six months before their first US immigration court hearing.“These policies that I’ve seen are not what America is about. And in fact what we saw with respect to the woman who is here today is just a blatant violation of US law,” Mr Wyden said, referring to the pregnant woman.He said he believed the CBP agents would have turned away the family if he had not intervened, a sentiment echoed by Taylor Levy, an El Paso immigration attorney who took Mr Wyden and his staff to Juárez.“I feel very confident that if the family had tried to present alone, they would not have been allowed in,” Ms Levy said.A CBP spokesman said the officer would not have told the family that asylum processing was at capacity if they had explained that they were Mexican and that the mother was pregnant.However, the family gave the officer, whose uniform identified his last name as Loya, a folder that contained their Mexican birth certificates and identification.Shaw Drake, the policy director for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Border Rights Centre in El Paso, Texas, said he asked the officer afterward if the family had identified themselves as Mexican asylum seekers, and the officer said they had.Mr Wyden was also critical of a CBP officer who told the senator’s staff they were not allowed to take photos or video on the bridge.The ACLU’s Mr Drake said the officer, whose name tag identified him as Castro, was wrong, and he told the staff they could continue to record.“Certainly it looked like it had the potential for not going well. The ACLU folks talked about their legal rights to be able to record the [processing], and one of the officers said, ‘We have a situation’,” Mr Wyden said.“So having done this for a while, those are the kinds of things that concern you and might suggest it’s not going well.”Metering is used as a way to cap the number of people allowed to apply for asylum at ports of entry.Mexicans are supposed to be exempt from metering under US asylum laws, Mr Drake said. He said he had seen CBP agents turning back Mexican asylum seekers before.“If someone arrives on our border and expresses a fear of return to their home country, the government is barred from returning that person to their home country until a process has been followed to determine whether they have the right to remain in the United States as an asylee or a refugee,” he said.“And so turning a Mexican away at the border, back into Mexico, is directly returning an asylum seeker to the country from which they’re fleeing persecution with no process to determine whether they have a fear of returning to that country.”Mr Wyden met the family, who asked not to be identified, at a shelter that houses about 250 migrants in Juárez. They were sharing a small room with 11 other migrants.They said they were from the Mexican state of Guerrero and wanted to seek asylum because they feared violence from drug cartels and their government allies.“There’s a lot of insecurity, and the government is involved and corrupted with the cartels. There’s just no way to survive,” the father told Mr Wyden.The family showed Mr Wyden their number for the metering list, which is kept by the Chihuahua State Population Council in Juárez.The number 17,647 was handwritten on a slip of paper. More than 5,000 people were ahead of them on the list, meaning they faced a four- or five-month wait before being allowed to come to a US port of entry and seek asylum.The family said they had not previously gone to a port of entry because they thought they had to get on the metering list.Lauren Herbert, an Oregon paediatrician who accompanied Mr Wyden on the border tour, said she became concerned when talking to the mother.“She had a previous diagnosis of preeclampsia, which already places her at high risk,” Herbert said after the family crossed the border.“And then she described two days of leaking fluid,” which could indicate a ruptured membrane that threatened the life of mother and unborn child. “This is a high-risk pregnancy, and she needs to be seen by a doctor. Now.”After Mr Wyden met the woman and her family, Ms Levy, the immigration attorney, and Mr Drake urged the senator to push CBP to get the woman to a hospital as soon as possible.“The US government keeps saying that they don’t put Mexicans on the metering list and that Mexicans will always be accepted because they’re fleeing Mexico,” Ms Levy said. She suggested Mr Wyden approach the border officers along with an ACLU representative and lawyers.“That’s what we’re going to do,” Mr Wyden said.About an hour later, the family was undergoing initial processing by CBP to begin their asylum claim. CBP officials told Mr Wyden that the mother would quickly be taken to a hospital for evaluation. Their status was not clear on Saturday night.Ian Philabaum, programme director for the legal group Innovation Law Lab who accompanied the senator on his two-day border tour, said the family’s plight would have been much different without Mr Wyden’s assistance.“If not for the presence of a US senator, another asylum-seeker would have been sent back to dangerous conditions in Mexico, the same country she is fleeing, and despite the fact that she is pregnant and in dire need of medical attention,” he said..Washington Post

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Michelle Obama issues veiled rebuke of Trump after Baltimore insults

Michelle Obama appeared to issue a veiled rebuke of Donald Trump after he lashed out at a Democratic congressman and called his district “a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess”. The former US first lady tweeted a video of a group of dancers from Elijah Cummings' Baltimore district, hours after Trump launched an attack on the congressman.“On NationalDanceDay, I’m shouting out the Lethal Ladies, a Baltimore STEP team who I saw perform back in 2017. I’m so proud of you all – and everyone who’s dancing today!” Ms Obama wrote.The video that Ms Obama shared shows a group of young women performing a routine to her slogan “when they go low, we go high”.While Ms Obama, who was the world’s most admired woman in 2019 according to a YouGov poll, did not directly reference Mr Trump, her tweet was widely regarded as a rebuke to his recent remarks. The US president attacked Mr Cummings in a series of vicious tweets on Saturday morning, which appeared to have been inspired by a Fox & Friends report that aired minutes before his outburst.Mr Trump described the Baltimore district as a “filthy” and “rat and rodent infested mess” where “no human being would want to live”.He later doubled down on his attack and shared a tweet from the far-right commentator Katie Hopkins, describing the city as a “s***hole”.> On NationalDanceDay, I'm shouting out the Lethal Ladies, a Baltimore STEP team who I saw perform back in 2017. I’m so proud of you all—and everyone who’s dancing today! pic.twitter.com/U15Be9wSMs> > — Michelle Obama (@MichelleObama) > > July 27, 2019The US president added that there was “nothing racist” about his tweets after he was widely criticised by a number of prominent Democrats including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.However, political commentators have noted that Mr Trump has used the word "infested" six times on his Twitter account – and each time it has been in reference to areas populated predominantly by people of colour. Mr Trump’s attacks on Mr Cummings are just the latest in a weeks-long series of insulting tweets against minority members of Congress. Last week, he told four Democratic congresswomen of colour - Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar \- to “go back” to their countries.However, all four congresswomen are US citizens and only Ms Omar was born outside of the country.Ms Obama appeared to weigh in on Mr Trump’s attack on the four lawmakers, tweeting that diversity is “what truly makes our country great".“Whether we are born here or seek refuge here, there’s a place for us all," she added. “We must remember it’s not my America or your America. It’s our America.”While Ms Obama did not directly reference the US president, her words appeared to echo Mr Trump’s campaign slogan “Make America great again”.

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CORRECTED-UPDATE 2-Britain tells Iran: release ship to 'come out of the dark'

Britain told Iran on Monday that if it wants to "come out of the dark" it must follow international rules and release a British-flagged oil tanker seized by its forces in the Gulf. Iranian commandos seized the Stena Impero near the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most important waterway for oil shipments, on July 19. "If the Iranians want to come of the dark and be accepted as a responsible member of the intentional community they need to adhere to rules-based system of the international community," Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told Sky News.

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'Stay inside and lock your doors': Tiny Canadian village on lockdown as teenage murder spree suspects spotted scavenging for food

A massive police manhunt has been launched in a remote part of northern Canada for a pair of teenager double murder suspects.The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been chasing Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, for weeks since the pair were connected to two separate killings in British Columbia earlier this month.The teenagers have been tracked in a series of stolen cars as they have travelled thousands of miles across Canada, from its Pacific coast in the west all to the way east to rural Manitoba.Police helicopters, a plane, drones, dog units and armed officers have flooded the area around York Landing, a small village in remote northern Manitoba, where a local indigenous neighbourhood watch group had spotted the duo.Officers tweeted residents in York Landing should stay inside and lock all their doors and windows while the heavy police presence searched their community.James Favel from the Bear Clan Patrol, the First Nations group which reported the sighting, said some of his volunteers spotted two young men who matched the description of Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky.The pair immediately stood out in the small, close-knit village while scavenging for food near a dump and ran away as soon as they realised they had been seen, he added.RCMP units had already been searching the nearby town of Gillam and believe the pair have been cornered in this region of rural Manitoba.But the intense police presence was leaving its mark on the locals. “Up here, all the towns and communities, they look like ghost towns,” said Wade Taylor, another volunteer with the Bear Clan Patrol.“Like, everyone’s inside. There’s a high level of stress, anxiety and fearfulness because they’re being kept in their houses.“Some of the people, you can tell by their voice that they’re almost at the point of breaking down crying. You could say it’s traumatic.”The manhunt saga began on 12 July when Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky, childhood friends, left their home in Port Alberni on Vancouver Island and travelled 1,500 miles north to Whitehorse, in the Yukon, to look for work.But on 15 July police discovered the bodies of a young couple near Liard Hot Springs, back in British Columbia and the RCMP has said the teenagers are suspects in the case and wanted for questioning.A few days later a burnt-out truck driven by the pair was discovered, along with the body of Leonard Dyck. Mr McLeod and Mr Schmegelsky have been charged with his murder and chased across Canada by the RCMP ever since.The duo are believed to be armed and the public has been warned not to approach them.The father of Mr Schmegelsky has told reporters he believes his son is on a “suicide mission” and expects him to eventually die in a confrontation with the police. “A normal child doesn’t travel across the country killing people,” he said. “A child in some very serious pain does.”

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Harrowing photos show Guatemalan mother begging Mexican soldiers to let her cross into U.S.

Last Monday, photographer Jose Luis Gonzalez shot photos of the moment LedyPerez begged a Mexican National Guard soldier to let her and her 6-year-oldson Anthony Diaz cross into the United States

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China to weigh in on deepening Hong Kong crisis

After weeks of increasingly violent protests, China's top policy body on Hong Kong affairs was set to hold an extremely rare press briefing Monday on the crisis engulfing the financial hub, where dozens of protesters were arrested in weekend clashes with police. What began as a mass display of opposition to an extradition bill two months ago has morphed into a wider pro-democracy movement that has thrown down the most significant challenge to Beijing's authority since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997. While China has issued increasingly shrill condemnations of the protests in the last two weeks, it has largely left the city's pro-Beijing administration to deal with the situation.

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Baltimore paper blasts Trump after his attacks on city: 'Better to have a few rats than to be one'

The Baltimore Sun editorial board lit up President Trump Saturday night for his Twitter tirade against its city and Rep. Elijah Cummings, the powerful Democrat who represents Maryland’s Seventh District.

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