Trump news: President shrugs off White House shooting mid-briefing as he doubles down on wild Covid claims and attacks Biden's faith
Secret Service reportedly shoots suspect as president repeats false claim about children and coronavirus
Sign up for the daily Inside Washington email for exclusive US coverage and analysis sent to your inbox
Get our free Inside Washington email
Donald Trump was whisked out of his daily weekday press briefing by a Secret Service officer following a shooting outside the White House on Monday.
The US Secret Service confirmed that law enforcement had shot a person blocks away from the White House, prompting the president to abruptly end a press briefing as he was escorted to the Oval Office.
He returned several minutes later announcing that a person had been shot and sent to a nearby hospital
The president continued to falsely claim that children are nearly immune from coronavirus, despite a new report that found nearly 100,000 young people were infected within the last two weeks of July alone, as schools prepare to open across the US.
Last week, Facebook and Twitter removed videos shared by the president in which he claimed that children are "virtually immune" from Covid-19, though Centres for Disease Control and Prevention reports show that children are as vulnerable to being able to transmit the virus as adults.
As lawmakers debate additional emergency relief legislation for millions of Americans during a looming eviction crisis and mass unemployment, the president has faced intense scrutiny from Democrats challenging the constitutionality of a series of executive orders that undermine congressional efforts.
Treasury Secretary told reporters that states can access extended unemployment relief "in the next week or two" despite governors signalling that the federal government, not the states, should be responsible for the additional funds.
Secretary Mnuchin also said he has not met with Democrats to repair the stalled emergency relief funding talks, despite House Democrats authoring and passing legislation to do so and meeting Republican resistance, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's accusation that Democrats are "obstructing" relief efforts.
"If they want to meet and want to negotiate and have a new proposal, we'll be happy to meet," Mr Mnuchin said.
Follow live coverage as it happened
Please allow a moment for our liveblog to load
Mnuchin says TikTok cannot continue in current form
The Trump administration will not allow TikTok to continue its current tactics of collecting sweeping amounts of data about Americans, said treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin, who warned the Chinese-owned firm his department has the power end the practice.
Donald Trump "has made perfectly clear, it's not going to continue with this in this form," Mr Mnuchin said of the US president, who has threatened to shut down TikTok's American operations.
The Treasury chief, however, declined to comment on Microsoft's efforts to buy the social media application during a CNBC interview on Monday morning.
Here's the latest:
Hilary Clinton says Trump executive action is 'a stunt'
The 2016 presidential candidate laid into Donald Trump on Sunday over his executive orders on coronavirus relief - warning that the possibly unconstitutional actions are a signal of something worse to come.
“It’s a stunt,” Mr Trump’s former presidential rival told MSNBC. “There’s no doubt about it, it’s most likely, as even Republican senators have said, unconstitutional, bypassing the Congress, trying to spend money that he has no authority to direct.
“But it’s also meant to be a big diversion from the hard work that Congress should be engaged in to provide the kind of relief that tens of millions of Americans need.”
Andrew Naughtie reports:
Twitter interested in TikTok
Chinese video app TikTok could be brought by Twitter, according to a Wall Street Journal report this weekend.
TikTok, who is currently in talks with Microsoft about a possible merger in the US, now appears to have another possible buyer in an attempt to avoid being banned
The report said the companies have held preliminary talks over a possible tie-up but it remains unclear if a deal will be pursued.
It comes after Mr Trump's announcement last week that the US would ban TikTok on September 15 unless Microsoft or "somebody else" bought it.
Twitter previously bought a similar app, Vine, which also allowed users to create short video clips that regularly became popular across the rest of the internet. Vine was shut down after it was bought.
Andrew Griffin reports:
Election commissioner says "substantial chance" results will take time
According to Federal Elections Commission (FEC) commissioner Ellen Weintraub on Monday, there is a "substantial chance" that results for November's presidential election may not be known on election night, as voters turn to mail-in ballots amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Let me just tell everybody, we’re all going to need to take a deep breath and be patient this year because there’s a substantial chance we are not going to know on election night what the results are,” Ms Weintraub said on CNN’s “New Day.”
“Probably for the presidency, but maybe for many other races that are important to people, and that's OK. If it takes a little bit longer to count all the votes accurately, that's what we need to do in order to ensure that everyone's vote counts,” she continued.
Ms Weintraub said you could "absolutely" have an "honest election with mail-ballots", and told the show's host that "the military's been doing it since the Civil War, there are many states that have robust mail-in voting systems already in place."
She added that in 2016, some 25 per cent of votes came from mail-ballots, and in an apparent swipe at Donald Trump, said "voting experts do not really distinguish between absentee voting, which the president and the vice president have endorsed, and mail-in voting".
Trump hits-out at Republican criticism
Donald Trump has criticised a Republican senator who he said had "gone rogue", after criticising the president's recent executive orders providing coronavirus relief.
Mr Trump used a Monday morning tweet to call Nebraska GOP Senator Ben Sasse a "RINO," short for "Republican in name only," and mocked him over his last Senate campaign.
Mr Sasse, in a weekend statement, called Mr Trump's coronavirus relief-themed orders "unconstitutional slop."
He and other GOP lawmakers, like Mr Trump, were sharply critical of former president Barack Obama's second-term use of executive orders.
Here's the latest:
Trump calls for National Guard to go into Portland
Donald Trump has targeted Portland again in a tweet about the nightly protests.
After sending in federal agents, the president was now pushing for the National Guard to come into the liberal city.
Portland's mayor and governor have both been outspoken against the federal government getting involved in the nightly protests. They've asked for the federal agents to be removed, so calling in the National Guard would be an unlikely move by the state legislators.
Treasury secretary says Trump administration willing to 'put more money on the table' for stimulus negotiations
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin addressed the failed stimulus negotiations between Congress and the White House in an interview with CNBC.
"We're prepared to put more money on the table," he said, "We're not stuck at the $1tn, but we're not going to go to unlimited amounts of money that don't make sense."
Last week the White House failed to reach an agreement with Democrats about what should be included in the stimulus package. This gap was fuelled by Republicans who think the federal government has already spent too much money and want to keep the bill under $1tn.
President Donald Trump then signed executive orders on Saturday night that would provide relief now for Americans, though many don't know how these executive orders will be carried out.
Mr Mnuchin declined to comment on when negotiations could resume between the White House and Democrats, but he said he heard from both House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer over the weekend.
"if we can get a fair deal, we'll do it this week." he said.
The Trump admin added that he did admit to Ms Pelosi that the White House went low on specific aspects of the deal, one relating specifically to food assistance for children. "I listened to the speaker over the weekend. She's right. We started low on food. We realise there's a lot of kids out there and that there is an issue," he said.
Mr Mnuchin reiterated, though, that the Trump administration still held firm on being against providing more assistance to state and local governments, a position the Democrats are also not willing to budge on. How the two sides will be able to negotiate with each other on this position remains to be seen.
Trump administration antagonises China by sending cabinet member to praise Taiwan's democracy and coronavirus response
The Trump administration's increasingly belligerent China policy has taken another turn with Alex Azar's visit to Taiwan -- the first such engagement by a top-level US official since the 1970s.
At a meeting with president Tsai Ing-wen on Monday, the health and human services secretary heaped praise on the democratic island country, which China considers a breakaway province.
"Taiwan's response to Covid-19 has been among the most successful in the world," Mr Azar told his host, "and that is a tribute to the open, transparent, democratic nature of Taiwan's society and culture."
Andrew Naughtie reports:
President praises politician for siding with his administration on executive orders
Donald Trump tweeted praise for Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy for his support of the administration after the president signed multiple executive orders over the weekend regarding the coronavirus stimulus package.
The senator has been one on Capitol Hill who supported the president in taking action over the weekend after stimulus negotiations fell apart between the White House and Democrats.
Mr Trump has experienced criticism on both sides of the aisle for deciding to sign multiple executive orders.
Democrats called the move unconstitutional, adding it was not clear how these executive orders would be carried out. One executive order Mr Trump signed gave employers permission to halt payroll taxes through the end of the year, but Congress has the power to control taxes, not the president.
Republicans have also criticised the move. Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse said the orders were "unconstitutional slop" and Senator Lindsey Graham said he wanted Congress to reach an agreement instead of the president turning to executive orders.
'I can't believe they're really doing it': Kanye West's presidential bid supported by Republican operatives in five states
Republican activists and operatives in at least five states have supported Kanye West's bid for the November presidential election, according to a report by The Washington Post.
The report is the latest suggesting Republicans are purposely aiding West's bid in swing states in the hope that he will take votes away from Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
West's campaign has filed petitions to appear on the ballot in 10 states, some of which have been found inadequate by state officials.
Louise Hall reports:
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments