John Dean says Mueller report is Donald Trump's 'Watergate road map'
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Donald Trump has tweeted an article about a boom in European tourism as a means of continuing his attack on the US Federal Reserve, arguing domestic interest rates are too high and attacking its policy of “ridiculous quantitative tightening”, declaring: “They don’t have a clue!”
This comes after the House Judiciary Committee announced it had struck a deal with the Justice Department to gain access to redacted interview notes from FBI special counsel Robert Mueller, including “first-hand accounts of misconduct” relating to President Trump, in exchange for not immediately pursing a contempt of Congress action against attorney general William Barr.
A full session of the House of Representatives will still vote as planned on Tuesday on a resolution making it easier to sue the administration and potential witnesses if they refuse to comply with congressional subpoenas, as ex-White House counsel Don McGahn did when asked to give testimony before the Judiciary Committee on whether the president attempted to obstruct justice.
Meanwhile, Mr Trump and Joe Biden assailed each other during overlapping visits to Iowa on Tuesday, previewing what the country might get in next year’s election if Mr Biden becomes his party’s nominee.
Even before he left the White House, the president unleashed a series of schoolyard taunts, declaring that “Joe Biden is a dummy.”
The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020
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Mr Biden quickly retorted that the president is “an existential threat to this country.”
The back-and-forth laid bare the rising political stakes for each, even with Election Day 2020 still about 17 months away. Mr Trump has zeroed in on Mr Biden as a potential threat to his re-election chances and is testing themes to beat him back.
Mr Biden, meanwhile, is campaigning as a front-runner, relishing the one-on-one fight with Mr Trump while making sure he doesn’t ignore the demands of the Democratic primary.
The former vice president hit Mr Trump on the economy — an issue the president often promotes as his chief strength in a time of low unemployment.
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“I hope his presence here will be a clarifying event because Iowa farmers have been crushed by his tariffs toward China,” Mr Biden said. “It’s really easy to be tough when someone else absorbs the pain, farmers and manufacturers.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report. Please allow a moment for our liveblog to load
Democrat 2020 candidate Joe Biden plans to use a visit to Iowa today to criticise Trump's economic policy as hurting those very voters who helped elect him.
In prepared remarks released ahead of his events, Mr Biden says that the president "thinks he's being tough" and "it's easy to be tough when someone else is feeling the pain."
"How many sleepless nights do you think Trump has had over what he's doing to America's farmers? Zero," he is set to say.
Biden plans to speak in blue collar Ottumwa, the seat of Wapello County, where he is expected to bash the president no fewer than 76 times over the course of his addrewss, according to Axios.
Trump was the first Republican to carry the economically struggling county in southeast Iowa since Dwight Eisenhower.
The White House has hit out at other elements of Biden's prepared remarks, in which he calls the president "an existential threat".
Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has dismissed this as laughable.
Later this afternoon Trump will make some remarks on renewable energy in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
He then heads to West Des Moines to give remarks at the Republican Party of Iowa Annual Dinner.
Trump and Biden are not expected to cross paths but no doubt the president will take the opportunity to get in some digs of his own against the former veep.
Sanders also said that, despite their differences, the president called to check on his House foe Jerry Nadler when he was taken ill recently. The pair are both New Yorkers, whose paths have crossed many times over the years.
CNN's chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta reveals in his new book Enemy of the People he received death threats over his criticism of President Trump.
Vice president Mike Pence has defended the Trump administration’s barring of rainbow flags from being flown outside of US embassies during LGBT+ Pride Month, calling it “the right decision”.
"I’m aware that the State Department indicated that on the flagpole of our American embassies that one flag should fly, and that’s the American flag, and I support that,” he told NBC.
That the administration continues to hawk "LGBTQ for Trump" merchandise to boost its re-election war chest while making gestures like this is as nakedly hypocritical as it is entirely unsurprising.
Sorry sports fans, House speaker Nancy Pelosi says the Democrats are still "not even close" to impeachment, saying the opposition are winning victories against the Trump camp in court and would need an "ironclad" case in any event.
Lara Trump, campaign adviser to the president and wife of Eric, insisting on ABC the Trump family paid their own way on their recent trip to London. Just not at the Igoe bar in Doonbeg, it seems.
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