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The UK was rolling out the red carpet on Tuesday for US President Donald Trump due to arrive on an historic second state visit, with security tight as protestors gear up to make their voices heard.As wars still rage in Ukraine and the Middle East, and major economies grapple with US tariffs, Britain is hoping to woo the mercurial Trump, treating him to a huge show of pomp and pageantry.But controversies over sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and free-speech culture wars could make for some awkward moments when Trump sits down with Britain’s embattled Prime Minister Keir Starmer.Trump was due to arrive Tuesday evening and then head to the historic Windsor Castle on Wednesday, for a full day of lavish events. The 79-year-old Republican has long been fascinated with the royal family and will be honoured with a carriage procession with King Charles III as well as a grand state banquet at Windsor.The setting means he will be far away from crowds and protesters, with his schedule due to avoid London where a large anti-Trump demonstration has been called on Wednesday.Labour leader Starmer is not a natural bedfellow for right-wing firebrand Trump, but has worked to win him over since his return to the White House in January.The visit is “a huge moment for both” men, said Evie Aspinall, director of the British Foreign Policy Group think-tank.”For Trump, the state visit is an opportunity to revel in the pomp and ceremony he loves,” she told AFP.”For Starmer, the visit is a chance to distract from domestic discontent and shift the limelight onto international issues where he has had greater success.”- US investments -Security is being ramped up. Thames Valley Police said it has deployed its marine unit around Windsor as “part of a wide range of security measures in place, many of which will be visible to the public and others which will not”.Downing Street has said Trump’s visit would see the “unbreakable friendship” between the countries “reach new heights”.The two nations are set to sign a raft of agreements worth £10 billion ($13.6 billion), including one to speed up new nuclear projects as well as what British officials called “a world-leading tech partnership”.Ahead of the trip, Google said it would invest £5 billion in the UK in the next two years while US finance firms including PayPal and Citi Group announced they would spend £1.25 billion.Trump, whose mother was Scottish, will become the first US president to get a second state visit, after his previous one in 2019 when he met Queen Elizabeth II.After Windor’s pomp, politics will dominate on Thursday when Starmer hosts Trump at his country retreat Chequers, seeking to capitalise on Britain being one of the first countries to secure a US trade deal.- Epstein scandal -Ukraine will also be a key topic. Starmer is one of a host of European leaders who have pushed Trump to keep backing Kyiv despite signs of him leaning toward Russian President Vladimir Putin.Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday that Trump will likely meet with Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky next week and still hopes to broker a peace deal between Kyiv and Moscow.First Lady Melania Trump, who is making a rare public appearance, has a separate itinerary on Thursday.She is due to take part in an event with Queen Camilla, who is recovering from a bout of acute sinusitis which forced her to pull out attending the Duchess of Kent’s funeral on Tuesday.Despite the pomp, tensions will be lurking in the background.The White House said Trump would discuss “how important it is for the prime minister to protect free speech in the UK” — a topic raised by Trump’s former ally Elon Musk in a speech to a far-right rally in Britain over the weekend.Starmer’s spokesman on Monday called Musk’s language “dangerous and inflammatory”.Starmer desperately needs the visit to go well following a miserable few days in which some of his own Labour party members have openly questioned whether he can remain as leader.He has been dogged by questions over his judgement for appointing the now-sacked Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington despite his known friendship with Epstein.But Rubio, on a visit to Israel, said Mandelson’s sacking “won’t change the nature of the visit”.”It’s a big honour and they’re an important ally and partner,” Rubio said.Trump is facing awkward scrutiny himself over his own links to the convicted sex offender.Activists on Monday unveiled a huge portrait of Trump and Epstein on a large patch of grass outside Windsor Castle.

US President Donald Trump filed a $15 billion defamation lawsuit against the New York Times on Monday, accusing the outlet of a “decades-long pattern” of smears driven by feelings of “actual malice.”Trump, 79, has intensified his long-established hostility toward the media since his return to the White House, repeatedly badmouthing journalists critical of his administration, restricting access and bringing lawsuits.The Times reported last week that Trump had threatened legal action against it in relation to its articles on a lewd birthday note allegedly given to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The Republican president has denied authoring the note.”The New York Times has been allowed to freely lie, smear, and defame me for far too long, and that stops, NOW!” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.The lawsuit also named four New York Times reporters and the publisher Penguin Random House as defendants, according to an 85-page complaint filed in the US District Court for Florida’s Middle District.The document cited three articles that came out between September and October last year, and a book by reporters Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig also published around that time.”The Book and Articles are part of a decades-long pattern by the New York Times of intentional and malicious defamation against President Trump,” read the complaint, which was dated Monday.”The Times has become a leading, and unapologetic, purveyor of falsehoods against President Trump on the legacy media landscape.”The New York Times did not immediately return AFP’s request for comment.Trump’s lawsuit alleged that the Times deviated from its typical journalistic patterns and industry best practices when covering him, such as writing articles “in the most antagonistic and negative way” and not giving him sufficient time to respond before publishing.”Put bluntly, Defendants baselessly hate President Trump in a deranged way,” the complaint read.The court was asked to grant compensatory damages of not less than $15 billion and additional punitive damages “in an amount to be determined upon trial.”In July, Trump sued media magnate Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal for at least $10 billion after it reported on the existence of a book and a letter he allegedly sent to Epstein.Paramount settled Trump’s lawsuit over election coverage on CBS News’ flagship show “60 Minutes” for $16 million the same month. He had alleged that the program deceptively edited an interview with his 2024 election rival, Kamala Harris, in her favor.

FBI Director Kash Patel faces a Senate panel on Tuesday amid criticism of his handling of the investigation into the murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and the case of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee are also expected to grill Patel over an ongoing purge of FBI ranks of agents seen as disloyal to President Donald Trump.Patel has come under fire from both the right and the left since being named by Trump to head the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the nation’s premier law enforcement agency.He angered many Trump supporters with a memo in July that effectively closed the investigation into the activities of Epstein, who died in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking of underage girls.In the memo, the FBI and Justice Department said that the well-connected financier had committed suicide, did not blackmail any prominent figures, and did not keep a “client list.”Trump’s supporters have been obsessed with the Epstein case for years and held as an article of faith that “deep state” elites have been protecting Epstein associates in the Democratic Party and Hollywood.Trump’s one-time close relationship with Epstein has also proved to be potent fodder for his political opponents, with the president and his allies seeking to downplay the whole saga as a Democratic “hoax.”Patel has also been heavily criticized for his actions in the immediate aftermath of last week’s assassination of Kirk during a speaking event at a Utah university.Patel announced the arrest of a suspect a few hours after the shooting, only to turn around two hours later and say that individual had been released and the manhunt was continuing.The actual suspected assailant, Tyler Robinson, was arrested 33 hours after the shooting.Robinson is to be formally charged in Provo, Utah, on Tuesday with the murder of Kirk, the founder of the influential conservative youth political group Turning Point USA.- Right man? -Among those critical of Patel in the wake of the bungled announcement is conservative activist Christopher Rufo, who wrote on X whether “it is time for Republicans to assess whether Kash Patel is the right man to run the FBI.”According to Fox News, Patel’s relationship with Attorney General Pam Bondi is particularly strained, although he continues to enjoy the confidence of the White House for the time being.Since taking office in January, Trump has taken a number of punitive measures against his perceived enemies, purging government officials deemed to be disloyal, targeting FBI agents and law firms involved in past cases against him, and pulling federal funding from universities.Among those summarily dismissed from government service have been scores of FBI agents, including three former senior bureau officials who filed a lawsuit against Patel last week over their firing.The former agents said they were victims of a “campaign of retribution” over a perceived “failure to demonstrate sufficient political loyalty.””Patel not only acted unlawfully but deliberately chose to prioritize politicizing the FBI over protecting the American people,” they said.Following his appearance before the Senate panel on Tuesday, Patel will testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.

The United States said Monday it has decertified Colombia as an ally in the fight against drugs, a decision that could cost Bogota hundreds of millions of dollars in US military support.After decades of close alliance in the so-called war on drugs, US President Donald Trump denounced his Colombian counterpart Gustavo Petro for not only failing to curb cocaine production, but overseeing its surge to “all-time records”, according to a signed determination the White House sent to Congress on Monday.”Under President Petro’s leadership, coca cultivation and cocaine production have reached record highs while Colombia’s government failed to meet even its own vastly reduced coca eradication goals, undermining years of mutually beneficial cooperation between our two countries against narco-terrorists,” Trump wrote.The Trump administration has repeatedly pressured Petro, the first leftist elected to lead Colombia, and voiced hope for a shift after elections next year.”Colombia has been a great partner historically. Unfortunately, they have a president now that, in addition to being erratic, has not been a very good partner when it comes to taking on the drug cartels,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a sworn enemy of leftist leaders in Latin America, said on a visit to Israel.”I think we have willing partners, if it was up to the military, the police. We’ve been working with them for decades,” Rubio told reporters, voicing hope that Colombia could be recertified in the future. Washington has conducted assessments annually since 1986 on the anti-narcotics efforts of some 20 drug-producing and distributing countries. In the case of Colombia, the world’s largest cocaine producer, US assistance for anti-narcotics efforts reached some $380 million a year, a figure which is now in jeopardy.In a meeting with his cabinet, Petro confirmed the change, saying “the United States is decertifying us after dozens of deaths of police officers and soldiers” in the fight against drug cartels and leftist guerrillas funded by drug trafficking.Since coming to power in 2022, Petro has championed a paradigm shift in the US-led war on drugs, which he considers a failure, to focus on the social problems that fuel drug trafficking.Since 2022, cultivation of coca, the main ingredient in cocaine, has increased by about 70 percent, according to Colombian government and United Nations estimates.To regain the designation, Trump called on Colombia’s government to take “more aggressive action to eradicate coca and reduce cocaine production and trafficking”.He also urged it to “hold those producing, trafficking and benefiting from the production of cocaine responsible, including through improved cooperation with the United States to bring the leaders of Colombian criminal organizations to justice”.- ‘Failure’ by leadership -The decertification comes amid a major drive by Trump against drug cartels, in which US forces have blown up two alleged Venezuelan drug boats, killing 14 people.Trump’s statement praised Colombian authorities, laying blame squarely with Petro.”The failure of Colombia to meet its drug control obligations over the past year rests solely with its political leadership,” Trump wrote, also touching on Venezuela and Bolivia’s efforts to curb cocaine trafficking.The downgrade is a major blow for Colombia, coming as the military and police reel from a string of deadly attacks by the guerrillas.Washington’s disavowal of Petro had been expected since January, when he became embroiled in a blazing row with Trump over migrant deportations.In Colombia, the military and police are reeling from a string of deadly attacks by guerrilla groups. On August 21, 12 police officers were killed when breakaway members of the defunct FARC rebel group shot down a police helicopter during a coca eradication operation in the country’s northwest.On the same day, a truck bomb was detonated on a busy street near a military aviation school in the city of Cali, killing six people.

US President Donald Trump said Monday that he is bringing a $15 billion “defamation and libel lawsuit” against the New York Times.”The New York Times has been allowed to freely lie, smear, and defame me for far too long, and that stops, NOW!” he wrote on his Truth Social platform, adding the lawsuit was being brought in Florida.AFP has contacted the New York Times for comment.Trump decried the newspaper as a “virtual ‘mouthpiece’ for the Radical Left Democrat Party” and accused it of lying about his “family, business, the America First Movement, MAGA, and our Nation as a whole.”He provided no evidence for his claims.The news outlet reported last week that Trump had threatened legal action against it in relation to articles on a lewd birthday note given to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.The Republican president has denied authoring the note.Trump has intensified his attacks on traditional media since his return to the White House, repeatedly badmouthing journalists critical of his administration, restricting access and bringing lawsuits.He sued media magnate Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal for at least $10 billion in July after it published an article about his friendship with Epstein.Paramount settled Trump’s lawsuit over election coverage on CBS News’ flagship show “60 Minutes” for $16 million the same month. He had alleged that the program deceptively edited an interview with his 2024 election rival, Kamala Harris, in her favor.

Donald Trump lands in Britain on Tuesday for an historic second state visit that will see the UK government spare no effort in trying to flatter the mercurial American president.As wars still rage in Ukraine and the Middle East, and major economies grapple with US tariffs, Britain hopes the pageantry of its monarchy can help keep Trump on side.But controversies over sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and free-speech culture wars could make for some awkward moments when Trump sits down with Britain’s embattled Prime Minister Keir Starmer.Trump has long been fascinated with the royal family and will be treated to a carriage procession with King Charles III and a grand state banquet at Windsor Castle.He will also be kept far away from crowds and protesters, keeping outside London, where a large demonstration has been called against the 79-year-old Republican.Labour leader Starmer is not a natural bedfellow for right-wing firebrand Trump, but has worked to win him over since his return to the White House in January.”This is really special, this has never happened before, this is unprecedented,” Starmer said as he hand-delivered a letter from the king to Trump in the Oval Office in February inviting him for the state visit.Accepting the invitation, Trump told Starmer that Charles — who is currently undergoing treatment for cancer — was a “great, great gentleman”.Downing Street has said Trump’s visit, with engagements taking place throughout Wednesday and Thursday, would see the “unbreakable friendship” between the countries “reach new heights”.- US investments -The two are set to sign agreements worth £10 billion ($13.6 billion), including one to speed up new nuclear projects as well as what British officials called “a world-leading tech partnership”.Ahead of the trip, Google said it would invest £5 billion in the UK in the next two years while US finance firms including PayPal and Citi Group announced they would spend £1.25 billion.Trump, whose mother was Scottish, will become the first US president to get a second state visit, after his previous one in 2019 when he met Queen Elizabeth II.The US leader will once again mix with royalty on Wednesday in a series of events capped by a state banquet in the evening.Politics takes over on Thursday when Starmer hosts Trump at his country retreat Chequers, seeking to capitalise on Britain being one of the first countries to secure a US trade deal and avoid the worst of Trump’s tariffs.- Epstein scandal -Ukraine will also be a key topic. Starmer is one of a host of European leaders who have pushed Trump to keep backing Kyiv despite signs of him leaning toward Russian President Vladimir Putin.First Lady Melania Trump, who is making a rare public appearance, has a separate itinerary on Thursday when she will take part in an event Queen Camilla.Despite the pomp, tensions will be lurking in the background.The White House said Trump would raise “how important it is for the prime minister to protect free speech in the UK” — a topic raised by Trump’s former ally Elon Musk in a speech to a far-right rally in Britain over the weekend.Starmer’s spokesman on Monday called Musk’s language “dangerous and inflammatory”.Starmer desperately needs the visit to pass successfully following a miserable few days that have featured murmurings about his future.He has been dogged by questions over his judgement for appointing the now-sacked Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington despite his known friendship with Epstein.Trump is facing awkward scrutiny himself over his own links to the convicted sex offender, whose friendship with Charles’s younger brother Andrew also embarrassed the royal family.

Lower US tariffs on Japanese autos kicked in on Tuesday, as a relieved Tokyo welcomed the implementation of a trade pact negotiated with Washington. As of 1.01 pm (0401 GMT), Japanese cars entering the United States face a 15 percent tariff instead of 27.5 percent, providing manufacturers some reprieve from the hefty duties imposed by President Donald Trump earlier this year.”The government welcomes US efforts this time towards the steady implementation of the July 22 Japan-US deal,” chief government spokesman Yoshimasa Hayashi told reporters.While the outcome marked a win for Japan, the levies will still cause huge pain for the nation’s industries, with car titan Toyota telling AFP in a statement that it hoped they could be lowered further.”We hope that the environment surrounding the automotive industries of both Japan and the United States will continue to improve going forward, based on open and free trade, including further tariff reductions,” the firm said.Japanese business lobbies also said they wanted Tokyo to push on with tariff negotiations. Since returning to the presidency in January, Trump has targeted specific sectors with stiff tolls, with imported automobiles and parts hit with a 25 percent duty.This dealt a blow to Japanese automakers, who already faced a 2.5 percent tariff.For goods falling outside specifically targeted sectors, Trump has also imposed a separate 10 percent tax on imports from nearly all trading partners.That rate was hiked again in August to various higher levels for goods from dozens of economies, including the European Union and Japan.The move left Japanese products facing a 15 percent tariff that was tacked onto existing duties for many goods.While the two countries initially unveiled a trade pact in July, they appeared to diverge in their understanding of its details, such as whether the duties would generally stack on existing tariffs for certain products.Japan’s tariffs envoy Ryosei Akazawa previously told reporters that Washington was expected to revise the rule.The new US order that took effect Tuesday sees a 15 percent tariff cap instead for many products, applying retroactively to August 7.Under the terms of the US-Japan deal, Tokyo is also expected to make investments worth $550 billion in the United States, according to the White House.Top Japanese power generation company JERA said last week it had signed an initial agreement aimed at buying liquified natural gas from a huge pipeline project in Alaska.

The US Senate on Monday narrowly cleared President Donald Trump’s choice for a key role at the Federal Reserve, as the clock ticks down to the central bank’s next policy meeting.The decision came just as a US federal appeals court also ruled Monday night that Fed Governor Lisa Cook can remain in her position while challenging her ouster from the bank — after Trump sought to fire her.Both developments set the stage for the two-day gathering of the bank’s rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), due to begin early Tuesday.All eyes will be on the outcomes of this gathering amid concern over political pressure faced by the independent central bank.Late Monday, the Republican-majority Senate voted 48-47 to confirm Stephen Miran, who chairs the White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), allowing him to join the Fed’s board of governors and the FOMC, which sets interest rates steering the world’s biggest economy.The FOMC’s 12 voting members include the seven members of the Fed’s board of governors.With the latest ruling from the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Cook also is due to participate in the gathering.Although the Trump administration could turn to the Supreme Court for further intervention, time is running low before the Fed meeting opens.Miran’s swift confirmation and Cook’s lawsuit come as Trump intensified pressure on the central bank to slash interest rates this year, often citing benign inflation figures in doing so.But critics worry that the president’s moves threaten the Fed’s separation from politics.- Rate cut pressure -Miran fills a vacancy on the Fed’s board after another governor, Adriana Kugler, resigned before her term expired. He is expected to serve out the remainder of her term, lasting just over four months.But Democratic lawmakers have raised strong concerns over his White House ties.Their main worries include Miran’s plan to take a leave of absence from the CEA rather than resign — a decision he attributed to his short tenure.Miran has, however, indicated willingness to step down if confirmed for a longer stint at the Fed.He holds a PhD in economics from Harvard University and served as a senior advisor in the Treasury Department during Trump’s first presidency.He later joined the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, where he wrote commentaries on issues including calls for Fed reform.Separately, Cook has been in a legal fight to stop her removal from the central bank after Trump sought to oust her over allegations of mortgage fraud.Trump had tried to appeal a federal judge’s decision to block her removal temporarily as her legal case played out, but this too was rejected Monday.In the appellate court’s 2-1 decision, judges Bradley Garcia and J. Michelle Childs noted Cook’s “strong likelihood of success” on at least her argument that she was not given proper notice or chances to respond before Trump moved to fire her.Judge Gregory Katsas, who dissented, said the importance of the Fed’s board “only heightens the government’s interest in ensuring that its Governors are competent and capable of projecting confidence into markets.”The eventual outcome of Cook’s legal case could have broader implications for the Fed.For now, the central bank is widely expected to lower its benchmark lending rate by 25 basis points on Wednesday, to a range between 4.0 percent and 4.25 percent — as policymakers try to shore up the economy amid a weakening labor market.Trump on Monday reiterated his call for a rate cut, writing on his Truth Social platform that Fed Chair Jerome Powell “must cut interest rates, now, and bigger than he had in mind.”Investors will also closely monitor Powell’s remarks after the rate decision is unveiled Wednesday, for hints on the pace and size of further reductions to come.

Life, liberty and the right to a stable climate? A group of young Americans say President Donald Trump is trampling their inalienable rights through an aggressive push for fossil fuels and a crusade against federal climate science — and on Tuesday, a rural courtroom in Missoula, Montana will be their stage in a closely watched showdown.Lighthiser v. Trump is emblematic of a growing global trend of legal action as a tool to push action on planetary warming amid political inertia — or outright hostility.”It’s very intimidating to think about my future,” lead plaintiff Eva Lighthiser recently told AFP in Washington, where she and other plaintiffs represented by the nonprofit Our Children’s Trust recently traveled to lobby lawmakers.The 19-year-old from Livingston, Montana, described smoke-choked skies, relentless floods, and her family’s climate-driven relocation as “a lot to reconcile with, as somebody who’s just entering adulthood.”Over two days of hearings, she and 21 co-plaintiffs — all young adults or minors — will testify about their health and other harms they have endured from the Trump administration’s actions. At issue are three executive orders that “unleash” fossil fuel development and curb the electric vehicle market; invoke emergency powers to accelerate drilling; and designate coal a “mineral,” granting it priority status for extraction. The plaintiffs also allege that scrubbing climate science from federal research has obscured the risks from global warming.Their lawyers have called on several expert witnesses, including climate scientists, a pediatrician and even former senior White House official John Podesta, to weigh in on the legality of the directives at issue.”This is really the first time plaintiffs have been able to put on live, cross-examined testimony against the federal government about how it is causing the climate crisis and injuring young people,” Andrea Rogers, a lawyer with Our Children’s Trust, told AFP.- A long road -The plaintiffs are seeking a preliminary injunction that could open the door to a full trial. The federal government, joined by 19 conservative-leaning states and the territory of Guam, wants the case thrown out.Most observers give the youths long odds. Judge Dana Christensen, an Obama appointee with a record of pro-environment rulings, is presiding. But even if the plaintiffs notch a win, the case would then almost certainly land before the conservative-dominated Supreme Court.”We don’t have strong judicial precedent for there being a constitutional right to a clean environment at the federal level,” Michael Gerrard, a professor of environmental law at Columbia University told AFP.”They’re trying to frame it as a matter of substance or due process, but that would require novel rulings from the courts to apply that to climate change,” he continued, adding: “This Supreme Court is more about taking away rights than granting them, unless you’re a gun owner.”Still, the legal team hopes momentum is building in the wake of recent state-level victories. In 2023, a Montana judge sided with young plaintiffs who argued ignoring climate impacts when issuing oil and gas permits violated their constitutional right to a clean environment. A year later, youth activists in Hawaii reached a settlement requiring the state to accelerate decarbonization of its transport sector.But the record has proven bleak at the federal level.The most prominent case was filed in 2015, Juliana v. United States, and eventually got dismissed after the Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal earlier this year.The new suit argues that the government is violating due process by stripping citizens of fundamental rights, overstepping executive authority under laws like the Clean Air Act, and breaching its duty under the Fourteenth Amendment by knowingly worsening climate risks.Gerrard said it would be intriguing to see whether the government will try to contest the factual claims brought by the plaintiffs, or focus instead on legal arguments. The government is expected to argue these are policy questions for elected officials, not by courts.But Rogers argued it was the government straying from its lane. “Whether the executive branch is violating the constitutional rights of young people — that’s precisely the kind of question courts have resolved for decades.”

Senior White House official Stephen Miller vowed Monday that the Trump administration would dismantle an alleged “vast domestic terror movement” that he linked to the killing of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, made the comments on Kirk’s podcast, which Vice President JD Vance hosted on Monday.”We are going to channel all of the anger that we have over the organized campaign that led to this assassination, to uproot and dismantle these terrorist networks,” said Miller.Miller and Vance both alleged the existence of a rising left-wing extremist movement, which they said the administration would now target.”We are going to use every resource we have at the Department of Justice, Homeland Security and throughout this government to identify, disrupt, dismantle and destroy these networks and make America safe again for the American people,” said Miller.The remarks, which come before all details of Kirk’s killing are fully known, have sparked alarm among some Trump critics that such a campaign could be used to quash dissent.While Kirk was a vocal conservative, the United States has seen violence targeting members of both political parties in recent years, amid a sharp rise in polarization and easy access to firearms.US President Donald Trump escaped two assassination attempts on the campaign trail last year, while a Minnesota Democratic lawmaker and her husband were shot dead by a masked gunman in June.Two months earlier, a man attacked the home of Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, a prominent Democrat.Kirk, a close ally of Trump, was shot Wednesday during a speaking event on a Utah university campus. He was the founder of the influential conservative youth political group Turning Point USA.On the podcast Monday, Vance was full of praise for a man he called “the smartest political operative I ever met.””He was a critical part of getting Donald Trump elected as president, getting me elected as vice president,” he said.Trump will attend a memorial service for Kirk on Sunday at a stadium in Arizona.On Monday, the president said he was considering designating “Antifa” a domestic terrorist organization and bringing organized crime charges against those raising funds for alleged “agitation.”Antifa — short for “anti-fascist” — is an umbrella term for diffuse far-left groups, and is often mentioned in right-wing talking points around violence at protests.Trump has previously threatened to name Antifa a “domestic terrorist organization” in his first term, but never followed through.While federal law enforcement includes combating domestic terrorism under its purview, the United States does not have a list of designated “domestic terrorist organizations.”- DNA evidence -Earlier Monday, FBI Director Kash Patel said that DNA found at the scene of the murder had been matched to suspect Tyler Robinson, who was arrested Thursday after a 33-hour manhunt.The 22-year-old is expected to be formally charged in the murder on Tuesday.Authorities said the suspect used a rifle to shoot Kirk with a single bullet to the neck from a rooftop.Patel also discussed a note that Robinson is believed to have written before the crime and later destroyed.The note is “basically saying… ‘I have the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I’m going to take it,'” Patel said on Fox News.Kirk, a father of two, used his audiences on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube to build support for conservative talking points, including strong criticism of the transgender rights movement.A polarizing figure, he often posted carefully edited clips of his interactions during debates at his many college events.Utah Governor Spencer Cox on Sunday said Robinson was romantically involved with a transgender roommate and had “leftist ideology.”Patel has been heavily criticized for his actions in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, including having quickly announced the arrest of a suspect, only to confirm they had been released two hours later.On Monday, Patel defended his actions.”Could I have worded it a little better in the heat of the moment? Sure. But do I regret putting it out? Absolutely not,” he said.Patel is expected at Congress on Tuesday to answer questions from lawmakers.