David Smith in Washington

The Oval Office was crowded, with reporters cautioned not to collide with the Resolute Desk. Standing beside them, dressed in black, was Elon Musk, billionaire ally of Donald Trump and head of his government efficiency drive. “Elon is from South […]

Donald Trump ambushed the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, by playing him a video that he falsely claimed proved genocide was being committed against white people under “the opposite of apartheid”. The hectoring stunt on Wednesday set up the most

It was the night before a US presidential election that Donald Trump had called the most important in history. Who could close the deal at his campaign rally in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania? The answer was Megyn Kelly. Trump “will keep the

George Clooney “felt a knot form in his stomach” as a frail and diminished Joe Biden approached him, apparently failing to recognise one of the most famous actors in the world. “George Clooney,” an aide eventually clarified for the US

Joe Biden “totally fucked us” by leaving it too late to drop out of the 2024 US presidential election, a former top campaign aide to Kamala Harris has told the authors of a new book. David Plouffe, who was manager

There was a disturbance in the Force. Donald Trump celebrated “Star Wars Day” this week with an AI-generated image of himself as a muscle-bound warrior holding a red lightsaber in front of two US flags and eagles. It seemed like

It was an audience more accustomed to stifling a cough or resisting the temptation to unwrap a sweet. But when they spotted vice-president JD Vance taking his seat at the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington

In speech that ran for 100 minutes there was one moment when Donald Trump drew more applause from Democrats than Republicans. As the president told Congress last week how the US had sent billions of dollars in military aid to

The View, one of the US’s most popular daytime television programmes, was a vital campaign stop last year for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. This week, it played host to a cable sports channel personality who might be nurturing political

The stadium announcer called on the crowd to give a warm welcome to “a very special guest”. A cheer went up as basketball fans realised that Barack Obama was in their midst. The former US president rose to his feet,