Republican strategists believe rise of Mamdani could present opportunity to tag Democrats with most extreme views of the left – key US politics stories from Friday 26 June
Donald Trump has previewed a Republican strategy for the midterm elections, seizing on a progressive sweep in New York to portray Democrats as “godless communists” who pose an existential threat to the nation.
The US president, who was a child during the “red scare”, seized on wins by democratic socialists backed by the mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani, to stoke fears that the Democratic party has embraced extremism that could lead to the violent persecution of Christians.
On Friday, Trump was addressing religious conservatives at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s annual Road to Majority conference at the Washington Hilton hotel. He described the election winners in New York as “very troubling people” and claimed without evidence that they “want to destroy our country, and they hate our country and our people”.
Republicans have spent months trailing in the polls as voters accuse Trump of breaking his campaign promises to lower prices and keep the US out of foreign wars. But party strategists believe they have spotted an opening in the rise of Mamdani, giving them an opportunity to tag the entire Democratic party with the most extreme views of the left.
“The Democratic party is in big trouble,” Trump said. “This is not stopping with New York.”
Preaching to a religious right audience on Friday, Trump emphasised: “All communists are godless. They do not believe in God … These ruthless communists attack all religions, but in particular Christianity. They always do. They’re after Christianity more than any other religion.” Trump noted the US military had intervened in Nigeria to save Christian populations who had been persecuted. Nigeria is not a communist country.
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The US has struck Iran in a tit-for-tat response to a drone strike on a cargo ship, as the ceasefire between the US and Iran that reopened the strait of Hormuz undergoes its greatest test yet.
The US strikes targeted multiple missile and drone facilities in Iran near the strait of Hormuz and on Qeshm Island on Friday in what appeared to be a limited strike meant to respond to Iran’s attack on a Singapore-flagged cargo ship without escalating the conflict.
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John Bolton, the former US national security adviser who became an arch-enemy of Donald Trump after serving under him and then being fired, pleaded guilty on Friday to a charge of mishandling classified information that could result in him going to prison.
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While they welcome the recent closure of the controversial Alligator Alcatraz migrant detention center, leading environmental groups and their allies say they want an independent investigation into the environmental damage the facility inflicted on the surrounding wilderness during its 12 months of operations.
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Advisers to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will soon hold a meeting about whether to ease restrictions on access to some research peptides, a group of drugs with a zealous following and thin evidence to support them.
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The United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, on Friday raised the alarm internationally about deaths in US government immigration custody and called for “prompt, independent, impartial and effective investigations”.
Türk’s call came as the Trump administration faced investigations by watchdogs at its own Department of Homeland Security (DHS) into deaths and use of force against people detained in its expanding immigration detention system across the country.
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The Texas education board has approved a broad new statewide reading list that, for the first time, will make passages from the Bible required reading for more than 5 million public school students.
A federal judge declared a mistrial in the arson case against the 29-year-old man accused of sparking the deadly 2025 Palisades fire in Los Angeles, after the jury said it could not agree on a verdict.
Billionaire financier Leon Black’s testimony before a House committee investigating Jeffrey Epstein ended abruptly on Friday morning after members from both parties said Black refused to answer questions about non-disclosure agreements.
Pete Buttigieg, the former US transportation secretary, said on Friday an anonymous and – police say – meritless accusation led Child Protective Services to investigate his family.
A Utah judge held a prosecutor in contempt on Friday for speaking to the media about the murder case against the man accused of killing Charlie Kirk, but did not grant the defense attorney’s request to bar the death penalty as punishment in the case.
Catching up? Here’s what happened on Thursday 25 June.
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