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Following the Vice President's widely criticized pre-taped interview with CNN, reports circulated that the Democrats were considering replacing Kamala Harris with the more coherent Joe Biden. Harris's joint interview with running mate Tim Walz was met with poor reviews, with top Democratic officials citing Harris' inability to provide cogent answers or communicate like a person as reasons why the party should turn to the clarity and coherence of Joe Biden. "It may be time to consider a more mentally fit candidate," said one high-ranking Democrat who asked to remain anonymous. "We gave Kamala the good ol' college try, but she...

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were not invited to Arlington National Cemetery by Gold Star families last week to commemorate the third anniversary of the attack at Abbey Gate, a White House official and a Harris aide told NBC News, refuting separate claims made Sunday by GOP Sen. Tom Cotton and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. The two were speaking about former President Donald Trump's visit to Arlington National Cemetery last week, where he has drawn criticism for posing for photos with Gold Star families in a section of the cemetery where photos are traditionally prohibited. Last week,...

There is growing evidence that fake judge @Alexandre engaged in serious, repeated & deliberate election interference in Brazil’s last presidential election. Under Brazilian law, that would mean up to 20 years in prison. And, I’m sorry to say that it appears that some former Twitter employees were complicit in helping him do so. Anyone with examples or evidence to this effect, please reply to this post. 11:54 PM · Aug 31, 2024

Russian forces are just a few kilometres from the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, a crucial logistics hub used by the Ukrainian military. Home to a key railway station and major roads, Pokrovsk is an essential supply and reinforcement point for Ukraine’s troops on the eastern front line. Critics in Kyiv fear that the country's military has made a serious miscalculation. By sending troops into Kursk instead of reinforcing the eastern frontline, the military has left Pokrovsk and other important Ukrainian towns exposed, these critics say.

Vice President Kamala Harris excoriated former President Donald J. Trump on Saturday for his visit on Monday to Arlington National Cemetery, where his campaign’s filming of him in a heavily restricted area caused a confrontation between one of his political aides and a cemetery official. In her first public comments on the situation, Ms. Harris said that Mr. Trump had desecrated a solemn place that should be free of politics when he appeared there for a wreath-laying ceremony for 13 service members who were killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan during the withdrawal of U.S. troops three years ago....

Kosovo authorities on Friday closed five parallel institutions working with the ethnic Serb minority, a move that was immediately criticized by the United States and could further raise tensions with neighboring Serbia. Elbert Krasniqi, Kosovo's minister of local administration, confirmed the closure of five so-called parallel institutions in the north — where most of the ethnic Serb minority lives — writing in a Facebook message that they "violate the Republic of Kosovo’s constitution and laws.” The U.S. embassy in Kosovo reiterated Friday in a statement Washington’s “concern and disappointment with continuing uncoordinated actions” taken by Pristina “that continue to have...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy fired the commander of the country's air force Friday, four days after an F-16 warplane that Ukraine received from its Western partners crashed during a Russian bombardment. The order to dismiss Lt. Gen. Mykola Oleshchuk was published on the presidential website. "We need to protect people. Protect personnel. Take care of all our soldiers," Zelenskyy said in an address minutes after the order was published. He said Ukraine needs to strengthen its army on the command level. The dismissal came on the same day that Oleshchuk directed scathing criticism at a lawmaker who is deputy head...

Vice President Kamala Harris insisted that she did not support a fracking ban, even though in 2019 she strongly backed a nationwide ban on it. “I made it clear on the debate stage in 2020 that I would not ban fracking. As vice president, I did not ban fracking. As president, I would not ban fracking,” she told CNN in an interview Thursday night. But before she dropped her bid for president in 2019 and joined President Biden’s ticket, Ms. Harris said in a CNN town hall, “there’s no question I’m in favor of banning fracking.” When asked whether her...

Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday offered her most expansive explanation to date on why she’s changed some of her positions on fracking and immigration, telling CNN’s Dana Bash her values haven’t shifted but that her time as vice president provided new perspective on some of the country’s most pressing issues. ... Pressed by Bash on her reversals on fracking and decriminalizing illegal border crossings, Harris sought to explain why her positions had changed. ... “How should voters look at some of the changes that you’ve made?” Bash asked Harris. “Is it because you have more experience now and you’ve...

A top Ukrainian pilot was killed when a US-made F-16 fighter jet crashed on Monday, a Ukrainian Defence Forces source told CNN. The Ukrainian Defence Forces do not believe pilot error was behind the incident, the source added. The pilot, Oleksiy Mes known as “Moonfish,” was killed in the crash while “repelling the biggest ever aerial attack” by Russia against Ukraine, said the source, adding that the pilot was buried on Thursday.

Russian troops advanced into the village of Novohrodivka in eastern Ukraine on Wednesday. That puts them within five miles of Pokrovsk, a main objective of Russia’s nearly yearlong eastern offensive. The Ukrainian military doesn’t have many extra troops to deploy to the Pokrovsk front. Many of the spare brigades it had a month ago are now participating in Ukraine’s surprise invasion of Russia’s Kursk Oblast. Ukrainian leaders are finally beginning to grasp the urgency of the balance of forces on the Pokrovsk axis. “The situation is extremely difficult,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky conceded on Wednesday.

A strong, capable, independent, girlboss of a woman that "don't need no man" has reportedly asked a man to accompany her on a job interview in case there are any hard questions. Tim Walz, running mate for Kamala Harris on her 2024 presidential campaign, didn't need any further explanation. "Yeah, okay," he sighed. "I knew what I was signing up for." According to sources, the pair prepped for the softball interview long into the night. Walz had hoped to prepare her enough that he wouldn't have to go, but reluctantly, he called it a night after she failed to answer...

French prosecutors on Wednesday freed Telegram CEO Pavel Durov from police custody after four days of questioning over allegations that the messaging app is being used for illegal activities. Durov was detained on Saturday at Le Bourget airport outside Paris as part of a judicial inquiry opened last month involving 12 alleged criminal violations. “An investigating judge has ended Pavel Durov’s police custody and will have him brought to court for a first appearance and a possible indictment,” a statement from the Paris prosecutor’s office said.

Ukraine’s daring ground offensive has taken the fight to Russia, but not nearly as much as its leaders would like because, they say, the United States won’t let them. The U.S. restricts the use of long-range ballistic missiles it provides to Ukraine, which wants to aim them at military targets inside Russia. Ukraine’s offensive, along with a barrage of drones and missiles that Moscow launched this week, has intensified pressure on the Biden administration to ease its cautious approach to the use of Western weapons in escalating Ukrainian attacks. The Biden administration says its careful deliberations, including which advanced weapons...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the incursion into Russia’s Kursk region was the first part of Kyiv’s victory plan, which he intends to present to US President Joe Biden in September. While light on details, Zelensky said the four-stage plan began with the cross-border incursion into Kursk, which he said “is already done.” “Second direction is Ukraine’s strategic place in the security infrastructure of the world,” Zelensky continued. “Third direction is the powerful package of forcing Russia to end the war in a diplomatic way, and the fourth direction is economical.” It also raised questions on how it would end...

Russia has targeted Ukraine with another wave of strikes, a day after one of its biggest air attacks of the war. US President Joe Biden called the attacks "outrageous", saying Washington would continue to support Ukraine's energy grid. Local official Yevhen Sytnychenko reported the deaths, saying houses, shops and vehicles had been damaged in the incident. Kryvyi Rih is the home city of Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky. The latest attacks are being seen as an attempt by Moscow to reassert its control over the conflict after Ukraine's recent gains of territory in Russia's Kursk region.

The detention of Pavel Durov, the founder of the Telegram messaging app, in Paris on Saturday has raised questions about the future of a platform that has come to define the public perception of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Russia’s invasion in 2022 helped transform Telegram from a niche communication tool for Russia’s educated classes into a global phenomenon. The app has allowed millions of people to follow battlefield developments in near real time, turned soldiers into the narrators of the conflict unfolding around them and gave both propagandists and dissidents a pulpit in the struggle for the hearts and minds...

French President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged Monday that authorities had arrested the founder and CEO of the widely used messaging app Telegram, saying it was "not a political decision at all" and that Pavel Durov's fate was in the hands of France's independent judicial authorities. French media said Durov was detained Saturday over Telegram's alleged failure to moderate criminal activity on the platform, which has also been used by pro-democracy activists worldwide. Macron said France remained committed to the tenets of "freedom of expression and communication, to innovation and entrepreneurship," but added that "freedoms are exercised within a framework established by...

Sen. Lindsey Graham on Sunday pitched a fiery strategy for securing the release of Israeli hostages: threaten to bomb Iran. Well known for his hawkish foreign policy, Graham (R-SC) implied during an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Tehran has the influence needed to entice Hamas into releasing the hostages. “If I were the state of Israel, I would tell the ayatollah if these people do not come home alive — the ones that are left alive — and if we don’t get the bodies of the fallen, we’re going to blow up your oil refineries,” he said....

Russia and Ukraine exchanged 230 prisoners of war on Saturday, weeks after Ukraine launched a cross-border attack into the Kursk region of Russia. Kyiv has said one of the goals of the Kursk offensive is to capture Russian soldiers to trade for Ukrainian prisoners of war. Ukraine claims to control over 1,000 sqkm of the Kursk region. Mr Zelensky said that in addition to capturing Russian soldiers, the Kursk operation had other goals he could not disclose. The Ukrainian president said the operation was a preventative strike to deter Russian attacks towards Sumy, a city in Ukraine.