President claims Minnesota is a 'laughing stock all over the world' as calls mount for him to respond to crisis
Donald Trump held a fiery teleconference call with state governors, law enforcement, and national security officials on Monday following a weekend of unrest across the nation protesting the death of George Floyd. In the phone call, Mr Trump called the state governors “weak” and said they needed to get “so much tougher” on protesters in the coming days.
Minneapolis was the first site of protests after Mr Floyd was killed during an arrest involving four former police officers. Mr Trump said Minnesota was a “laughing stock” across the world because police stations were set on fire. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz was later commended by the president for taking control over the protests in days following.
Six nights of protests has encouraged the president to put pressure on law and order to control crowds. The president also vowed to designate the militant left-wing demonstrators commonly known as “Antifa” a terrorist organisation. He attacked Democratic mayors and governors for failing to call in the National Guard to deal with “anarchists”.
National security officials such as Defence Secretary Mark Esper and Attorney General Bill Barr also said it was time to get tougher on the protests. Mr Barr encouraged governors to "dominate" the streets to arrest "troublemakers", while Mr Esper officials should "dominate the battlespace".
All of this comes as conversations about police brutality have heightened across America.
The lawyer representing the late Mr Floyd and his family revealed an independent autopsy of his death was ordered. This independent autopsy found Mr Floyd died from asphyxia, which differed from the county's report. It also alleged Mr Floyd probably died at the scene and the three other officers contributed to his ultimate death.
The coronavirus pandemic continues despite attention turned towards the protests going on across the US. Health experts have expressed concerns the large gatherings could cause a second wave. Dr Anthony Fauci, a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, revealed, though, that he and the president have not met or spoken about the issue in more than two weeks.
Top judge faces deadline in Michael Flynn case
The US judge weighing up whether to drop a criminal case against Donal Trump’s former adviser Michael Flynn faces a Monday deadline to respond to the Justice Department’s bombshell request to drop a charge to which Flynn has pleaded guilty.
The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ordered Judge Emmet Sullivan to respond by June 1 after Flynn, who briefly served as Trump’s national security adviser, filed an emergency petition in line with the Justice Department’s request.
Sullivan has tapped attorney Beth Wilkinson, one of the former top prosecutors on the Oklahoma City bombing case, to represent him in the appellate court case.
Sullivan has not yet ruled on the May 7 request by Attorney General William Barr’s Justice Department to drop the false-statement charge against Flynn.
‘The US is not doing good’
Chinese state media is giving extensive coverage to violent protests roiling cities across the US, while the unrest has also featured widely in Chinese social media.
China’s state-run CCTV aired parts of an interview that George Floyd’s brother, Philonise Floyd, gave to US news channel MSNBC, where he said Donald Trump did not give him the opportunity to speak during a phone call and where he cried at the mention of his brother.
On China’s social media platform Weibo, at least five news items on the protests were among the top 20 trending topics by midday, led by reports Trump had been temporarily taken to a bunker as protesters surrounded the White House.
On Twitter, the protests also featured widely among the top 20 trending items, with the hashtag #BunkerBoy at a prominent second place.
For some analysts, the Chinese media coverage of the protests echoed their reporting on the coronavirus situation in the US.
“The number one thing they want to show is that the Communist Party is doing a better job in terms of fighting the coronavirus and managing society,” said Alfred Wu, associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.
“That’s the main message: the US is not doing good.”
Officials warn protesters could spread coronavirus
Minnesota governor Tim Walz said he was worried about a “super-spreader type of incident” from demonstrations in his state. “We’re going to see a spike in Covid-19. It’s inevitable.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said: I would still wish that everyone would realize that when people gather it's inherently dangerous in the context of this pandemic, and I'm going to keep urging people not to use that approach and if they do they focus on social distancing and wearing face coverings.”
Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said: “If you were out protesting … you probably need to go get a Covid test this week.”
Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (AP)
North Korean state media condemns ‘lawless and brutal murder’
North Korea’s official Rodong Sinmun newspaper on Monday reported the demonstrations across the United States in reaction to the death of George Floyd, saying protesters “harshly condemned” a white police officer’s “lawless and brutal murder” of a black citizen.
The article, published with photos, said hundreds of protesters gathered in front of the White House chanting “No justice, no peace.”
It also said there were demonstrations in Minneapolis, New York, Denver, Chicago, Los Angeles and Memphis and that the protests were expected to grow further.
Jake Paul accused of ‘straight lying’ after denying looting
Followers of the YouTuber have criticised the star after he denied looting during a protest – despite being spotted in footage of a shopping mall being vandalised.
Paul said he was documenting the action and engaging in a peaceful protest after videos showed him amid looters in Arizona’s Fashion Square centre, which is based in in Scottsdale.
“To be absolutely clear, neither I nor anyone in our group was engaged in any looting or vandalism,” Paul wrote on Twitter and posted as an Instagram Story.
Supreme Court decision on ‘Dreamers’ could further complicate Trump re-election campaign
The US Supreme Court is expected to come to a decision in the coming weeks on the fate of young immigrants known as “Dreamers” in a case which could further complicate Donald Trump’s re-election bid.
In 2017, the president sought to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) programme, which was created by his predecessor Barack Obama in 2012, but was blocked by lower courts.
The programme grants deportation relief and work permits to 649,000 immigrants brought to the US illegally as children.
If the Supreme Court sides with Mr Trump and ends the programme, which predominantly affects Hispanic people, he risks further alienating a group of voters which could play a crucial role in election battleground states such as Arizona and Florida.
If the court rules against him, Mr Trump will have failed to live up to his 2016 campaign promise to end DACA.
However, despite the president’s criticism of the programme, DACA is broadly popular among Americans.
Seventy per cent of Americans support the programme, according to a November 2019 survey conducted by the Cooperative Congressional Election Study, with backing among 75 per cent of people who voted for Mr Trump in 2016 but are undecided in 2020.
Russia says it needs more details on Trump’s proposed invite to G7
The Kremlin has said it needs more details before it will respond to Mr Trump’s proposal to invite Russia to attend a Group of Seven (G7) nations summit.
The US president said on Saturday that he would postpone a G7 summit he had hoped to hold next month until September or later and expand the list of invitees to include Australia, Russia, South Korea and India.
“President Putin is a supporter of dialogue in all directions, but in this case, in order to respond to such initiatives, we need to receive more information, which we unfortunately do not have,” Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesperson, said.
“We don't know the details of this proposal yet, we don't know if it is official,” Mr Peskov said, adding that Moscow needed to know what might be on the agenda of the proposed meeting and its format, before responding.
Russia was expelled from what was then the G8 in 2014, after Moscow annexed the Crimea region from Ukraine.
Mr Putin's country still holds the territory and various G7 governments have rebuffed previous calls from Mr Trump to readmit Moscow.
Zuckerberg faces Facebook employee backlash over ruling on Trump comments
Facebook employees who disagreed with Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to not remove an inflammatory comment from Mr Trump have taken their dissent public on Twitter, praising the rival social media firm for taking action against the president.
The criticism is a rare case of high-level employees publicly taking their own CEO to task, with a number of critical posts coming from people who identified themselves as senior managers.
"Mark is wrong, and I will endeavor in the loudest possible way to change his mind,” Ryan Freitas, whose Twitter account identifies him as director of product design for Facebook’s News Feed, said.
He added that he had mobilised “50+ like-minded folks” to lobby for internal change.
Jason Toff, identified as director of product management, wrote: “I work at Facebook and I am not proud of how we’re showing up. The majority of coworkers I’ve spoken to feel the same way. We are making our voice heard.”
Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters on the employee dissent.
The conflict came after Twitter hid a tweet from Mr Trump that included the phrase “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” behind a warning label.
It explained the tweet violated Twitter's rules against “glorifying violence” but was being left up as a “public service exception.”
Facebook declined to take action on the same message, with Mr Zuckerberg saying in a Facebook post on Friday that while he found the remarks “deeply offensive,” the company decided they did not violate its policy against “incitements to violence.”
How the unrest of George Floyd's murder could influence Joe Biden's running mate
Joe Biden's search for a running mate could be reshaped by the police killing of George Floyd and the unrest it has ignited across the US, raising questions about contenders with law and order backgrounds and intensifying pressure on the presumptive Democratic nominee to select a black woman.
Mr Biden, who has already pledged to pick a woman, has cast a wide net in his search.
Some of the women on his list have drawn national praise amid the protests over Mr Floyd's death, including Keisha Lance Bottoms, the mayor of Atlanta, who delivered an impassioned appeal for calm in her city on Friday night.
But the outcry over police brutality against minorities has complicated the prospects of Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar, who had a controversial record addressing police violence as a prosecutor in the city where Mr Floyd died.
Alexandra Jaffe and Bill Barrow report:
Trump doubles down on claims against left-wing group Antifa during George Floyd protests
Donald Trump is tweeting quotes from Fox & Friends as he watches his favourite news programme on Monday morning.
The moments in question from the show discuss militia far left-wing group Anfia and its potential role in the George Floyd protests and riots across the US. The president has claimed that group is involved in the violence, though there is yet to be substantial proof about the ideology of anyone inciting destruction in US cities.
Mr Trump vowed to designate Antifa a terrorist organisation on Sunday in another move that has appeared to inflame protesters across the nation.
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