First Thing: Special counsel challenges Trump classified documents case dismissal

Appeal marks the beginning of a lengthy legal battle that could take years. Plus, Mariah Carey’s shares that her mother and sister died on the same day last weekend

Good morning.

Special counsel prosecutors have asked a federal appeals court to bring back the criminal case against Donald Trump over his retention of classified files, arguing the judge was mistaken in dismissing the charges.

Prosecutors argued that the US district judge Aileen Cannon was wrong to do so in July on the grounds that the special counsel, Jack Smith, was illegally appointed, maintaining that Cannon ignored previous rulings and misread at least four statutes that allowed his appointment.

Cannon’s grounds for dismissing the case rested on the fact that Smith had been brought in externally and was not a Senate-confirmed justice department official when he was named to lead the Trump cases. But prosecutors argued that this was a moot point, as the attorney general has the authority to appoint prosecutors under federal law.

What could this mean? The appeal to reinstate the case marks the beginning of what will likely be a drawn-out legal battle that could reach the US supreme court – expect a timeline of months, if not years.

Ex-Democrat Tulsi Gabbard endorses Donald Trump in 2024 presidential race

The former Democrat Tulsi Gabbard has endorsed Donald Trump for president, saying she is confident that the Republican nominee will “walk us back from the brink of war”.

Gabbard, an Iraq war veteran who represented Hawaii in Congress, ran for president in the Democratic primary in 2020 before quitting the party two years later and pivoting towards rightwing media.

Addressing a National Guard Association conference in Detroit where Trump was speaking, Gabbard said: “This administration has us facing multiple wars on multiple fronts in regions around the world and closer to the brink of nuclear war than we ever have been before.” She said that this was one of the key reasons she was backing Trump, adding: “I am confident that his first task will be to do the work to walk us back from the brink of war.”

How did the Democrats react? Dismissively. Alex Floyd, rapid response director for the Democratic National Committee, said Trump’s brand is “so toxic” that has “resorted to touting support from off-putting extremists like RFK Jr and Tulsi Gabbard”, pointing to Gabbard’s support of Roe’s overturning.

Russia launches fresh wave of deadly strikes on Ukraine

Russian bombers have carried out further deadly strikes on Ukraine, a day after Moscow executed a “massive” assault on the country’s power grid, with President Joe Biden calling the attacks “outrageous”.

Kyiv’s regional air defence systems were deployed several times overnight to shield the capital from attacks, while two people were killed overnight and five wounded in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, emergency services said. Another two were killed and four injured in drone attacks on the city of Zaporizhzhia, east of Kryvyi Rih.

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, called for European air forces to help Ukraine down drones and missiles, saying “we could do much more to protect lives if the aviation of our European neighbours worked together with our F-16s and together with our air defence”.

How long can Moscow continue like this? Analysts at the Washington-based thinktank Institute for the Study of War, said Russia “likely lacks the defence-industrial capacity to sustain such massive strikes at a similar scale” regularly.

In other news …

Mariah Carey’s mother and sister died on the same day this weekend, the singer said, although further details were not immediately available.

A Chinese military aircraft has violated Japanese airspace in an unprecedented step that Japan condemned as “utterly unacceptable” and a security threat.

A 39-year-old woman died on the first day of the Burning Man festival in Nevada, with the cause pending the results of an autopsy and toxicology screening.

Oasis have announced that they will reunite for a 14-date tour of the UK and Ireland in the summer of 2025, 16 years after the band split.

Stat of the day: sea-surface temperatures in the south-west Pacific have risen ‘three times faster than global average’ since 1980

Pacific island states were in “grave danger” from rising sea levels, the UN secretary-general warned during a visit to Tonga, with the region disproportionately affected by the climate crisis. Research compiled by the World Meteorological Organization found that sea-surface temperatures in the south-west of the region had increased three times quicker than the global average since 1980.

Don’t miss this: what can be done with Pablo Escobar’s marauding hippos?

Decades ago, Pablo Escobar assembled a collection of exotic animals: hippos, but also, elephants, giraffes, zebras and many more, at his hacienda near the Magdalena river. After he was shot dead by police in 1993, most of the animals were moved to a zoo: all but a handful of hippos considered too dangerous to move. Fast-forward to 2024, and nobody knows just how many of the beasts live in the Magdalena basin, with an environmental officer calling the situation “completely out of control”.

Climate check: impossible to keep 1.5C alive without phasing out fossil fuels, UN chief warns

The UN secretary general has said all G20 countries must slash their emissions and that fossil fuels must be phased out if global heating is to be contained within 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. “Without a phase-out of fossil fuels in a fair and just way, there is no way we can keep the 1.5 degrees alive,” António Guterres said during the Pacific Islands forum in Tonga.

Last Thing: can Dua Lipa conquer the world of ice-cream as well as pop?

Dua Lipa is branching out to create a range of ice-cream products, which promise to be… interesting. In a radio interview, the pop star said she liked to “get vanilla ice-cream and put olive oil on it and sea salt”. Perhaps an acquired taste?

Sign up

First Thing is delivered to thousands of inboxes every weekday. If you’re not already signed up, subscribe now.

Get in touch

If you have any questions or comments about any of our newsletters please email [email protected]