Joe Biden vows ‘there will be no default’ after latest round of debt ceiling talks with Republicans – as it happened

After weeks of uncertainty and tension, reports indicate that Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy is nearing a deal with Joe Biden to raise the debt ceiling in exchange for cutting some government spending. But both the GOP-controlled House and Democratic-led Senate have to approve whatever compromise emerges in order to prevent a US government default that could happen as soon 1 June. At the Treasury, they’re not taking any chances – the Wall Street Journal reports that officials have dusted off a plan in case the limit is not lifted in time.

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Here’s what else happened today:

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• Ron DeSantis is trying to make the most of yesterday’s campaign announcement on Twitter, which was marred by the site’s prevalent technical glitches.

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• The supreme court’s conservatives weakened environmental protections concerning waterways in a case brought over a couple’s attempt to build a lakeside house in Idaho.

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• Donald Trump had classified materials lying around at Mar-a-Lago and sometimes showed them to people, the Washington Post reported.

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• Centrist Democrats are annoyed that McCarthy has allowed House lawmakers to head home for the Memorial Day weekend without resolving the debt standoff first.

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• Kamala Harris paid tribute to rock’n’roll star Tina Turner, who died yesterday, aged 83.

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The Washington Post reports new details of how Donald Trump handled classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort in South Florida, including that they were visibly displayed and shown off by the former president to visitors, and that staff moved boxes of papers the day before federal agents searched the property last year.

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Trump’s possession of government secrets from his time as president that he was not authorized to keep is one of three major issues being investigated by Jack Smith, the justice department’s special counsel. The Post reports that grand jury activity slowed down this month, and Trump’s attorneys have taken steps that indicate a decision over whether to bring charges against the former president could happen soon.

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Here’s more from the Post’s report:

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Two of Donald Trump’s employees moved boxes of papers the day before FBI agents and a prosecutor visited the former president’s Florida home to retrieve classified documents in response to a subpoena — timing that investigators have come to view as suspicious and an indication of possible obstruction, according to people familiar with the matter.

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Trump and his aides also allegedly carried out a “dress rehearsal” for moving sensitive papers even before his office received the May 2022 subpoena, according to the people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a sensitive ongoing investigation.

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Prosecutors in addition have gathered evidence indicating that Trump at times kept classified documents in his office in a place where they were visible and sometimes showed them to others, these people said.

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Taken together, the new details of the classified-documents investigation suggest a greater breadth and specificity to the instances of possible obstruction found by the FBI and Justice Department than has been previously reported. It also broadens the timeline of possible obstruction episodes that investigators are examining — a period stretching from events at Mar-a-Lago before the subpoena to the period after the FBI raid there on Aug. 8.

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That timeline may prove crucial as prosecutors seek to determine Trump’s intent in keeping hundreds of classified documents after he left the White House, a key factor in deciding whether to file charges of obstruction of justice or of mishandling national security secrets. The Washington Post has previously reported that the boxes were moved out of the storage area after Trump’s office received a subpoena. But the precise timing of that activity is a significant element in the investigation, the people familiar with the matter said.

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Grand jury activity in the case has slowed in recent weeks, and Trump’s attorneys have taken steps — including outlining his potential defense to members of Congress and seeking a meeting with the attorney general — that suggest they believe a charging decision is getting closer. The grand jury working on the investigation apparently has not met since May 5, after months of frenetic activity at the federal courthouse in Washington. That is the panel’s longest hiatus since December, shortly after Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Jack Smith as special counsel to lead the probe and coinciding with the year-end holidays.

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Joe Biden said he has had “several productive conversations” with Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy, and despite outstanding differences over raising the debt ceiling, “there will be no default”.

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“The only way to move forward is with a bipartisan agreement, and I believe we’ll come to an agreement that allows us to move forward and that protects the hardworking Americans in this country,” the president said at the White House during an event to introduce Charles Q Brown Jr, his nominee for chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

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He spoke positively of his negotiations with McCarthy, and said, “our staffs continue to meet, as we speak as a matter of fact, and they’re making progress. I made clear, time and again, that defaulting on our national debt is not an option … congressional leaders understand that and they’ve all agreed there will be no default.”

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He then went on to criticize the GOP’s negotiating platform, saying “speaker McCarthy and I have a very different view of who should bear the burden of additional efforts to get our fiscal house in order. I don’t believe the whole burden should fall on the backs of the middle-class and working-class Americans, my House Republican friends disagree.”

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Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right Oath Keepers group, has been sentenced to 18 years in prison after being convicted of seditious conspiracy over his role in the January 6 attack on Congress.

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