Day: August 17, 2022

Voters in the US state of Wyoming have cast their ballots in a primary election that pits moderate Republican views against Donald Trump's unfounded claims of election fraud. Liz Cheney - the sitting state congresswoman and one of the few Republicans to have been fiercely critical of the former president - faces a major challenge from a relative political newcomer and Trump-backed candidate, Harriet Hageman. As one of only two members of her party to have joined the committee investigating Mr Trump's attempts to cling to power, Ms Cheney has placed her three-term tenure on the line. All 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Mr Trump after his supporters attacked the US Capitol building in January last year have been targeted in a scorched-earth campaign o...

A week after an apparent Ukrainian attack on a Russian military base in occupied Crimea, an arms store at another military facility has been hit by a series of explosions. Blaming "sabotage", Russian officials said a fire triggered the blasts in the Dzhankoi area, another fire hit a power station and a railway was damaged. A string of blasts last week destroyed Russian warplanes at a Black Sea base on the Crimean coast. Ukraine has not admitted that attack. However, presidential office adviser Mykhailo Podolyak has described the latest incident as "demilitarisation in action", indicating that the explosions were not accidental. Crimea was seized from Ukraine and then annexed by Russia in early 2014. Russia gave no indication...

US President Joe Biden has signed a $700bn (£579bn) bill that aims to fight healthcare costs and climate change while raising taxes mainly on the rich. The act includes measures to make good on decades of congressional promises to curb the price of prescription drugs. The final version is more modest in scope than the $3.5tn package first envisaged by Democrats. A flagship of Mr Biden's agenda, the bill could provide a boost ahead of the mid-term elections. Voters casting their ballots in November will decide whether Mr Biden's Democrats retain control of Congress for two more years. The president hailed the bill as he signed it on Tuesday as the "final piece" of his domestic agenda. The package invests $375bn to fight...

COPENHAGEN, Denmark -- Estonia's government started removing a Soviet World War II monument Tuesday from near a city on the Russian border as part of a wider effort, prompted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, to dismantle remaining Soviet-era symbols. Crews removed a replica of a T-34 tank that sat atop the monument outside the city of Narva in Estonia's Russian-speaking east and placed it on a truck that took it to the Estonian War Museum in Viimsi, a town north of the capital, Tallinn. The monument commemorates the Soviet soldiers who died fighting Nazi Germany during World War II. Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said a neutral Oboz Hiking Shoes grave marker would replace the tank replica and the memorial outside Narva would “remain a dignified site for commemorating the dead.” Est...

Former White House counsel Pat Cipollone and former deputy White House counsel Pat Philbin have been interviewed by the FBI regarding documents that were stored at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News. Cipollone and Philbin are the most senior former administration officials known to have spoken with the FBI about Trump's handling of documents to date. ABC News has reported that the FBI has already interviewed multiple former White House officials and members of Trump's current staff. A spokesperson for Cipollone and Philbin declined to comment. Sources tell ABC News that Philbin sat for an interview with the FBI in the spring. It's not clear when Cipollone's interview occurred. The New York Times was first to report that Ph...

On Monday, the U.K. became the first country to approve a bivalent vaccine booster shot for adults, which would target both the original COVID virus and the Omicron variant. This vaccine, which is likely going to be available in the U.S. starting in the fall, is expected to provide increased and longer-lasting protection against COVID and the new variants. Sony Salzman, coordinating producer for ABC News’ Medical Unit, sat down with ABC News' podcast “Start Here” to discuss what people can expect from the new bivalent vaccine, and the way forward in the country’s vaccination strategy. START HERE: Yesterday the U.K. became the first country on Earth to approve a new type of vaccine, a vaccine that was engineered with a more recent variant of COVID in mind. Let's check in with ABC's Sony ...