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Here are the top stories of the week and a look ahead
1. Donald Trump began his next act Saturday night at the North Carolina Republican Congress.
In a 90-minute speech, Mr Trump went through a litany of conservative culture war issues and ended with a widespread frontal assault on voting and American democracy, advocating a long list of Republican proposals to suppress voters.
The former president is both a pared-down figure and an oversized presence, write our White House correspondents. He closed his blog after hearing from friends that the website had low traffic and made him seem small and irrelevant, according to a person familiar with his way of thinking. But he remains the front runner in every poll for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination and believes he could be “reinstalled” in the White House in August.
“When you’re a president for a term, you usually go quietly into the night,” said a president’s historian. “He sees himself as the leader of the revolution, and he does it from the back of a golf cart.”
Newly exposed emails to Congress show that his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has repeatedly urged the Justice Department over the past few weeks in Trump’s office to investigate unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.
2. The US seems to be trying to close the curtain on the pandemic. On the other side of the ocean, in the UK and the European Union, things are very different. Upstairs, Parisians getting coffee last month after the country’s lockdown measures were eased.
America has essentially overturned all rules for vaccinated people, while parts of Europe maintained assembly restrictions, reintroduced travel restrictions, and weighed local bans even as infection numbers fall. The split is particularly strong in Great Britain, which is facing the spread of Delta, a new variant first discovered in India.
Thailand is one of many Southeast Asian countries suffering from a new wave. Two nightclubs are at the epicenter of the biggest and deadliest surge.
3. Call it a “failed experiment” A federal judge lifted California’s 32-year ban on assault weapons.
Judge Roger T. Benitez wrote in his judgment that the firearms prohibited by state law were “fairly common, popular, modern rifles” and described the AR-15 assault rifle as “a perfect combination of home defense weapon and home defense”. Equipment. “Above, AR-15 style rifles in a gun store in Oceanside, Calif., In April.
The judge granted a 30-day stay to allow the attorney general to appeal the decision, where he is likely to join a number of other closely watched gun rights cases. The clearly formulated statement of the judge, who compared military-style firearms with Swiss army knives, underscored the growing audacity of the advocates of gun law.
4. For the first time in a generation, Workers gain the upper hand.
Our business correspondent writes that companies are always willing to pay a little more for the training of workers, to take advantage of opportunities for people without traditional qualifications and to become more flexible about where and how people work. Above, Adquena Faine, a former ride hailing driver who is now building a career as a cloud storage engineer.
According to one company, the proportion of job postings with the label “no experience required” has risen by two thirds compared to 2019. The shift builds on changes that were underway in the tight labor market before the pandemic, when the unemployment rate was 4 percent or less for two consecutive years.
However, polls suggest that Americans remain divided over whether President Biden’s policies will help or hurt the recovery. Progressive activists claim the improved pandemic unemployment insurance that Republicans and many employers denounce is adding a little more leverage to workers. The White House stresses that the benefit expires in September as planned.
5. A severe drought of historic proportions controls much of the western half of the US.
Almost all of California, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and North Dakota have been affected by drought, and conditions in much of these states are “severe” or “exceptional”. Above, water-intensive almond trees are being removed from an orchard in Snelling, California.
Wildfires of the size typically seen in summer have already occurred in California, Arizona, and New Mexico. Experts fear the forest fires will be severe and widespread this summer. Reservoirs in California hold about half as much water as they normally do at this time of year.
Across the Pacific, the annual summer monsoon in South Asia begins this month. A million years of data suggest that global warming is likely to make the monsoons worse.
6. President Biden will travel to England this week for a Group 7 summit and later meet with European leaders.
In the run-up to the summit, the finance ministers agreed on a new global minimum tax rate of at least 15 percent that companies would have to pay regardless of their location. Officials said the deal could reshape global trade and consolidate public finances after more than a year of fighting the pandemic.
As EU leaders prepare to welcome Biden, the simple fact that he sees Europe as an ally and NATO as vital is almost a revelation. But the Trump administration has left scars that some experts say will not heal anytime soon, and there are serious issues to discuss: withdrawal from Afghanistan, cyber war, trade disputes, vaccines.
Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris is making her first international trip to Guatemala and Mexico to combat migration to the United States and improve conditions in those countries.
7. At the US Women’s Open, a 17-year-old amateur competed.
Megha Ganne, above, a New Jersey high school junior from New Jersey who was nearly eliminated in qualifying, rose to the top of the rankings after two rounds. One of her most famous rivals, Michelle Wie West, 31, wouldn’t be in the tournament if it weren’t for Rudy Giuliani’s gross comments to inspire her comeback.
8.Stonehenge, Angkor Wat in Cambodia, above, and the Taj Mahal: The demand for one-time trips is great.
Last year, travelers had to put aside their dreams of hiking to Mount Everest base camp or visiting the wonders of ancient times. Now that vaccines are available and countries are open to visitors, tour operators are reporting a resurgence in interest in summer and fall travel from those hoping to get to these iconic sites.
If you’re more of a lazy person, these aerial photos of pools around the world are calming, as are these do-it-yourself rain garden ideas.
9. When spring turns into summer, Hope blossoms at prom.
There were made-to-measure masks to match the outfits. There were silent discos to promote social distancing. There was dancing, outside, on the soccer field. And there was joy when the rites of passage in American high school proved durable, flexible, and pandemic-proof. We went to four California high schools to cover Covid-influenced promos.
For more great looks and glamorous dresses, meet Symone – the drag queen personality of Reggie Gavin, the winner of this year’s “Ru Paul’s Drag Race”.
10. And finally, relax and read.
The Secret of the $ 113 Million Deli. The life and death of your jeans. Kate Winslet, above, without a filter. You can find these and more in The Weekender.