ATLANTA — Former President Biden writes in his White House memoir that Donald Trump, at once his predecessor and successor, has deeply damaged the country and world with an administration determined to “tear down institutions and inflame hatreds.”

And the 83-year-old Democrat said the 80-year-old Trump’s years of lies about his 2020 defeat to Biden and the Jan. 6 attacks on the Capitol should “follow him to his grave.”

Biden’s sweeping indictment comes in the first excerpt of “Promise Me, America,” published Monday by the Atlantic. The 46th president’s full memoir is set for a Nov. 17 release. Biden said that while doctors are encouraged by his response to cancer treatment, his activities promoting the book will be limited because of his health.

“Donald Trump led an insurrection,” Biden wrote of the attack by Trump supporters as Congress met to certify the 2020 election won by the Democrat. “His goal was to remain in power after the American people had voted him out of office.

“The rioters weren’t ‘peaceful protesters,” he wrote. “They came armed to stop the official certification of a legitimate election.” He chided Trump for later issuing more than 1,500 pardons of the offenders.

“To this day, Trump and his supporters continue to preen and posture like they’re supporters of law enforcement,” Biden wrote. “Here’s my view: You don’t get to turn a blind eye to cops being punched, speared, sprayed, and brutalized and call yourself a friend of law enforcement. What Trump did on January 6, 2021, should never be forgotten. It should follow him to his grave.”

Biden also laments Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency and his aggressive reversal of many of his policies, especially those intended to address climate change.

“All presidents must confront a feeling that their legacy is vulnerable to the pendulum of politics and the whims of their successors,” Biden wrote. “In my case, that feeling was magnified by the dismissive and destructive nature of Donald Trump, who seemed unable to tolerate the idea that someone else’s accomplishments might be worth building on rather than tearing down.”

The memoir’s release comes on the heels of Biden’s fellow Democrats trouncing Republicans in the midterm elections, securing stunningly broad House and Senate majorities and flipping control of several statehouses in a comprehensive rebuke of Trump’s second presidency. But Trump’s return to power two years earlier was itself a rejection of Biden’s one White House term, and many voters still harbor skeptical views of his presidency and his party.

In a lengthy social media post on Sunday, Biden pitched his memoir as the best way he can explain his presidency, “the challenges we faced, the decisions I made and why I made them.”

During his four years in office, Biden confronted the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic fallout, and he worked to restore global alliances that Trump frayed. But he faced widespread concerns about his age, and he abandoned his reelection bid after a disastrous June 2024 debate with Trump. Dogged by lingering inflation and other concerns, Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, lost to Trump that November.

Months after leaving office, Biden announced that he’d been diagnosed with prostate cancer. He opened up about his condition in his Sunday social media post, saying he “won’t be able to do as many conversations about my book as I’d hoped” and urging people to let the book speak for him.

Biden said his doctors “continue to be encouraged by how I’ve responded to treatment.” But, he acknowledged, “Some days are better than others. It hasn’t stopped me. But sometimes it slows me down.”

In the excerpt, Biden recounts an unusual Oval Office meeting with Trump days after the 2020 election — well before the Jan. 6 riots.

“‘You know, Joe, if it weren’t for politics, I believe we’d be good friends,’” Trump said, according to Biden.

Trump even commented “that he’d been relieved he didn’t have to run against me,” Biden added.

Public polling at the time Biden dropped his reelection bid showed him trailing Trump, and Democrats pushed for him to yield out of fear that he could not win.

Biden said he used the meeting to give Trump “a tour of the world,” including the Ukraine-Russia war, NATO alliances, Israel and Gaza and China-U.S. relations. Biden said Trump “focused on the personalities” of world leaders rather than the substance of international relations.

He said that two-hour meeting left him worried Trump would indeed dismantle much of his presidency. He wrote that Trump’s opening weeks — his Day One executive orders and everything that followed — confirmed his worries about a “crueler government” that “tried to tear down institutions and inflame hatreds” and a president who “took a wrecking ball to our traditions.”

The memoir’s title echoes an earlier Biden book, “Promise Me, Dad,” that he wrote about his son Beau’s cancer and death — a parallel that implicitly acknowledges the former president’s age, condition and the reality that he may not have a long post-presidency to see the direction of the country and the evolution of his legacy.

In that first book, released between Biden’s vice presidency and his 2020 presidential bid, he explained that the title came directly from a father-son conversation around Thanksgiving in 2014.

“Promise me, Dad. Give me your word that no matter what happens, you’re going to be all right,” Biden recalled Beau saying. Beau Biden died six months later.

In his Sunday post, Biden repeated an argument he made often when campaigning and during his presidency, saying the U.S. is unique because it was “built on an idea” that “all of us are created equal.”

“Promise me, America,” he concluded, that “we’ll never forget it.”

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

The English Football Association, Team GB and England Netball are among major organisations to back the Equal Sport Project – a new initiative aimed at improving equality and making the UK world leaders for women and girls’ sport.

Recent research by Sporting Insights found that fewer than 1% of women working in sport believe gender equality has been achieved across the industry, while more than half believe they are paid less than men for carrying out the same role.

Consequently, the Equal Sport Project has identified five areas where improved leadership, investment and action will have the greatest impact in bringing equality for women and men across sport. These are:

Several organisations have already made pledges based on the above, including Aquatics GB and the FA prioritising female leadership programmes, while Sport England and UK Sport have committed to working with their funding partners to ensure their governance is designed by men and women, for men and women.

The Youth Sport Trust, meanwhile, has committed to support schools in recognising and challenging stereotypes as well as develop male allies to champion gender equality in PE, school sport and physical activity.

The project is also backed by the UK government, with sports minister Stephanie Peacock saying: “We have seen progress in women and girls’ sport, but there is still a long way to go.

“Like the Equal Sport Project, this government is backing women’s sport at every level, from hosting the 2027 Tour de France Femmes Grand Depart and bidding to host the 2035 Fifa Women’s World Cup, to investing £400m in grassroots sport facilities, doubling priority access to football pitches for women and girls and chairing the Women’s Sport Taskforce.

“We will work closely with the Equal Sport Project and encourage all organisations to get involved. Together we can make the UK a world leader in women and girls’ sport.”

A YouGov poll completed on the eve of the 2026 midterm elections has found that Americans were far less likely to back candidates who supported the US-Israel war on Iran.

The poll, released on Monday, found that 44 percent of people said they were less likely to support candidates who backed the war, while just 13 percent said they were more likely.

That means a candidate’s support for the war was more than 3 times as likely to put people off as to win them over.

Another 26 percent, meanwhile, indicated the Iran war would not make much of a difference in their vote.

The economics of the war also factored into people’s choices. Some 56 percent of those surveyed said that the US should prioritise avoiding higher prices domestically over achieving US President Donald Trump’s military goals in Iran.

Meanwhile, 22 percent said the opposite: that the Trump administration should prioritise the war over higher costs.

The poll also asked who should decide when the war ends. A majority, 53 percent, said Congress should have the final say, while 29 percent said that the president should decide.

The US and Israel jointly launched the war against Iran on February 28. But Trump’s decision to bypass congressional authorisation for the war has raised constitutional concerns in the US.

Jonathan Guyer, the programme director at the Institute for Global Affairs at Eurasia Group, a risk consultancy firm, told Al Jazeera that the poll – which was conducted on his organisation’s behalf – indicated Americans were looking to Congress to be more assertive.

“The story of the [economic] tradeoff is really important, and then there’s this other story of where Congress has been: Why haven’t lawmakers, not just over the last year but over the last decade, played a bigger role as a backstop on reckless wars launched by presidents?” said Guyer.

“And I think these numbers show the public really wants Congress to play a bigger role and expects their lawmakers to hold power to account.”

Anti-war lane

The survey is the latest to underscore the unpopularity of the US-Israel war on Iran, which has killed thousands of people in Iran and contributed to surging prices, a top issue in the November 3 midterm elections.

Trump’s Republican Party suffered one of the most significant electoral setbacks in modern US history, with Democrats reclaiming both chambers of Congress with strong majorities.

Democrats also flipped key offices in states like Texas, once seen as a conservative stronghold.

Those results have advanced a debate over the war that is playing out in both parties, often pitting more hawkish establishment figures against newcomers opposed to foreign intervention and support for Israel.

In the wake of the “blue wave”, analysts have argued that Democratic voters may expect the party’s leadership to take firmer steps to rein in the president and bring the fighting with Iran to an end.

On Monday, Trump himself said “Iran militarily is effectively over”, though he declined to rule out any further military action. A US naval and land blockade around Iran also remains in effect.

Guyer said he anticipates that foreign policy and, in particular, US support for Israel is likely to emerge as a key dividing line for candidates in future elections, particularly the upcoming 2028 presidential election.

“I think it does create a lane for people like Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed, for the wing of the [Democratic] party represented by Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who have a very strong position on this war and on the role of the US in the world that traditional Democrats have been largely silent on,” said Guyer.

A similar debate is also taking place on the political right.

Following the midterms, US Vice President JD Vance shared a lengthy social media post blaming his party’s implosion on the war.

Figures such as Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene have also criticised the war as a betrayal of Trump’s promise to end conflicts around the world.

While the YouGov poll found that Republicans were the only group more likely to vote for a candidate if they supported the president’s war, Guyer says that support has been “softening”.

“A third of Republicans say that backing the war made a candidate appealing, so it’s kind of small,” he said. “And 40 percent shrugged and say it made no difference.”

COLDPLAY’S Guy Berryman has returned to his native Scotland to tie the knot at a five-star hotel.

The bass player, 48, married partner Johanna Winona Ekmark at the Fife Arms in Braemar.

The Aberdeenshire venue is a favourite with the rich and famous.

Guy, now living in the Netherlands, was born in Kirkcaldy, Fife, and for-med Coldplay with Chris Martin after meeting at university in London.

His wife, 32, is a Swedish singer who uses the stage name Winona Oak.

A statement issued on his behalf said: “Scotland has always remained a huge part of who he is.

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“For Guy it was about sharing one of the most important moments of his life in the country he loves and beginning their married life somewhere that holds such deep ­personal meaning.”

He has three children with previous partners.

Chris Martin is known for singing about time through his band’s hit 2002 song, Clocks.

But the Coldplay frontman’s family has a long historical connection to timepieces.

The singer is actually the great-great-grandson of William Willett.

Willett was the British builder who first campaigned for changing the clocks, and what would become known as British Summer Time.

Voters have sent a strong election-year message to the new Democratic congressional majority and President Trump: Repair the damage inflation has done to the economy.

Trump, who campaigned on the idea that a Democratic victory in the midterms would trigger a 1929-style economic depression, has maintained that the economy is booming. Since his party lost in Tuesday’s voting, he has claimed he is willing to work with Democrats in the House and Senate, though that’s not something he has done much of in the past.

“I’ll get along, probably, with the Democrats, unless they want to be destructive,” Trump told reporters last week.

After Friday’s strong jobs report showed employers adding 165,000 jobs and the unemployment rate dipping to 4.1%, Trump was defiant. “Democrats may control Congress, but I will NEVER stop fighting for you, and I will VETO anything that hurts America,” he said in a text message to his supporters.

Democrats are seeking to check Trump’s power and are preparing for early fights on government spending. Other challenges include chronic budget deficits, tariffs, artificial intelligence and difficult choices about a Social Security system that could run short of money in as little as six years.

But as long as rising prices keep making middle-class lives less affordable, Democrats and Republicans alike face the risk of angering and alienating voters in the next election cycle.

“Until inflation and interest rates are under control, the likelihood of change elections is going to be high on an ongoing basis,” said Marc Goldwein, senior vice president at the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Americans want lower prices

Trump’s tariffs and the war against Iran that he launched in February contributed to the consumer price index climbing to 3.7% annually. The president also tried to bully the Federal Reserve, an independent body tasked with keeping inflation low, to slash its benchmark interest rate in ways that could have worsened inflation.

The gridlock of a Republican White House and Democratic Congress gives the Fed more room to maneuver, possibly smoothing the central bank’s ability to return inflation to the 2% target it has failed to reach for nearly six years.

“I think that one of the surprise winners Tuesday was the Fed,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, an economist and president of the center-right American Action Forum.

The Democratic Senate could block Trump’s ability to fill potentially open spots on the Fed board, Holtz-Eakin said, removing “Trump’s incentives to meddle with the Fed” and clearing a path for Fed Chair Kevin Warsh “to follow his instincts and aggressively reduce inflation.”

Trump has maintained that the costs of oil, gasoline and diesel will all plummet once the Iran war ends. The problem is he refuses to say when or how the war will come to a conclusion.

John Cochrane, an economist at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, stressed that the Fed’s efforts to combat inflation would be helped if the federal government reduced budget deficits.

“It takes monetary and fiscal restraint,” he said.

Federal government keeps borrowing

The U.S. government keeps amassing debt as tax revenues fall short of burgeoning spending on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and other programs. Paying the interest on the national debt now tops $1 trillion annually and exceeds spending on the military. The problem could spiral because investors have pushed up the interest rates charged on government debt over the past year.

Neither the White House nor Democrats ran on spending cuts. The president wants an additional $500 billion a year for the military, while some Democratic candidates have pushed for restoring Affordable Care Act subsidies that lapsed under Trump.

Since August, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has repeatedly said the administration would put forward a plan to trim the roughly $2-trillion annual budget deficit. Bessent is working with White House budget director Russell Vought on cuts they’re branding as a “fiscal consolidation plan,” to be released after the election.

Deficit reduction would likely require some combination of tax increases and spending cuts, Goldwein said. But he said that the lowest hanging fruit would be to trim Medicare expenditures in ways that save money for both the government and patients.

“It’s not rocket science,” he said. “The most important thing you can do is reduce healthcare costs and find policies that lower the costs of Medicare, which will reduce deficits and interest rates.”

AI poses a dilemma for economy

When Harvard University economist Jason Furman thinks about the most important economic issues facing the United States, AI is at the top of his list.

“It’s the most screamingly obvious investment boom this country has ever had, or, possibly, second to railroads” in the late 19th century, Furman said.

Using AI, Furman has built an economic analysis tool called Econvitals that replicates some of the work done when he was chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers in Democratic President Obama’s administration.

Econvitals parsed construction spending data on Tuesday and found an 80.6% increase in data center construction over the past year, while spending on building homes, schools, factories and offices had fallen.

The stock market sold off last week on concerns that Democrats could restrict the construction of data centers and impose guardrails on AI. But the American economy still needs the technology to keep fueling growth now and into the future.

Trump has been vociferous in promoting the sector and has taken a hands-off stance on regulating AI, insisting that existing laws and voluntary agreements signed by tech companies are enough. He has shrugged off public concerns about the risks of job losses and large-scale cyberattacks, but a majority in the AP Voter Poll, a sweeping survey of the American electorate conducted in all 50 states, say AI does more harm than good for the economy.

The dilemma is that AI is helping to propel demand in the economy and sustain the stock market. If those slipped, there could be less consumer spending, lower growth and many in the U.S. feeling even worse off financially.

“Every time you have a single strength in an economy you are also having a big vulnerability,” Furman said.

Social Security needs to be rescued

Senators who won six-year terms last week will face the politically fraught challenge of working with Trump’s successor to find ways to save Social Security, which is projected to be unable to pay full benefits at the end of 2032.

Removing the cap on payroll taxes and increasing the retirement age are among the possible lifelines for sustaining the program that provides income to older Americans and those with disabilities. But any changes would likely need to be bipartisan to get enough votes to clear the Senate because Social Security overhauls cannot be made by party-line votes through the reconciliation process.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said she saw an opening earlier this year to fix Social Security when she overheard Sen. Bernie Moreno, an Ohio Republican, talk about the need to lift the cap on payroll taxes. “I reached out to him in a matter of days,” she said in an interview this summer. The two senators went public with a plan that is still being formulated as legislation.

Warren, who worked with the Republicans on a law this year to encourage the construction of more homes, said other bipartisan efforts had failed because Republican lawmakers had been afraid to cross Trump.

But with Social Security, there is a need to act now. Experts say “the checks that go out to seniors will drop by nearly a quarter” after 2032, Warren said.

“Think what that means, literally, to millions and millions of Americans, who depend on those Social Security checks, or who have parents who depend on them. And Congress is doing nothing,” she said.

Boak writes for the Associated Press.

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

US President Donald Trump has said the FBI is probing Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s relationship with a woman accused of working for Chinese intelligence services.

Speaking at the White House on Monday, Trump said law enforcement had began inquires following Jensen’s admission that he engaged in an extramarital relationship with a Chinese executive named Alice Huang.

“We’ll look into it. I know the FBI is looking into it in terms of something else,” Trump told reporters in a news conference.

“I think he will be in good shape.”

Trump said Huang told him earlier that he had “absolutely no idea” that the woman was an alleged intelligence agent.

“He said I had no idea that she was a spy, and I really believe him,” Trump said.

Asked when he first become aware of concerns about the relationship, Trump said it was “not too long ago.”

“I have been hearing about it and I have been reading a little bit about it over a period of time,” the US president said.

Nvidia, one of the world’s most valuable companies, on Sunday announced that it had opened a probe into its CEO’s relationship with the woman following media reports that US intelligence officials had determined that she was working for China’s Ministry of State Security.

Nvidia’s board of directors said it had no reason to believe that national security or company secrets were compromised, but that an independent inquiry overseen by outside counsel would examine “all available information”

More to follow…

A court in Honduras has delayed a verdict in a sex-trafficking case linked to the 2022 disappearance of Angie Pena, a case that has raised concerns about impunity in transnational crimes.

On Monday, Honduras’s judiciary cited the need to review evidence and wait for the return of a court interpreter, who was out of the country. The decision has been delayed until November 20.

The verdict was expected that same day. Critics framed the unexpected delay as yet another hurdle in a case that has drawn comparisons to the crimes of the late Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender in the US accused of running a sex-trafficking ring.

Four men, including two US citizens, are on trial for crimes related to Pena’s disappearance four years ago.

Harold Green and William James Murdock, both from the US, face human-trafficking charges. Another US citizen, Gary Lee Johnston, and Honduran citizen Gustavo Trejo are accused of criminal association.

Honduran authorities have also sought an Interpol notice for another suspect, US citizen Antony Frank Grayson.

The Honduran public prosecutor’s office said the suspects are part of a network involved in crimes including drug trafficking and sex trafficking involving minors.

It alleges police and at least one judge helped facilitate the criminal network, without naming the officials.

Defence lawyers, however, have denied the men’s involvement and requested an acquittal.

Pena went missing on January 1, 2022, after setting out on a jet ski from West Bay on the Honduran island of Roatan, while vacationing with her family.

Authorities initially focused on a rescue mission at sea, treating her disappearance as a possible accident.

But the case expanded into a trafficking investigation after Pena’s jet ski was found in Belize, some 170km (90 nautical miles) away.

In August 2022, authorities investigating the disappearance found a minor in the Roatan house occupied by Johnston, who was later sentenced to 32 years for commercial sex trafficking and child pornography in a separate case.

An analysis by Honduran media found that the country was mentioned more than 100 times in the Epstein files, including multiple references to Roatan, from where Pena disappeared.

“There are many more women and girls who have been victims of trafficking networks, and those cases are silenced, they go unpunished,” said Kenia Paz, a lawyer for the Legal Team for Human Rights, which represents Pena’s family.

Lawyers representing the family have questioned the lack of transparency in the investigation and in the trial, which was not open to the press or the general public.

Postponing the verdict “fuels the perception of impunity, increases public distrust in state security institutions, and prolongs the suffering and vulnerability of affected families”, said former Honduran Vice Minister of Security Julissa Villanueva in a post on X.

Dereck McNeil, a key protected witness, was killed in August, spurring further concerns about the case.

In videos made public after his death, McNeil alleged corruption within a special unit of the public prosecutor’s office known as the ATIC.

He accused the unit of leaking information about the case and being linked to drug-trafficking networks.

The ATIC director has denied any corruption and said that the unit has not been involved in investigating Pena’s disappearance.

Villanueva, the former vice minister, told The Associated Press that she believes prosecutors mishandled the case from the start, pushing a “tunnel vision” explanation of what happened.

“There are connections with other larger networks, and only by making them public will this family be able to get justice,” said Villanueva.

“It’s not just Angie. It’s all those women around Angie. There are many.”

STAR of Slow Horses Olivia Cooke has revealed how a dibilitating health condition left her unable to work for half of 2026.

The 32-year-old was struck down with the shingles virus at the end of last year, forcing her to take an extended break from her acting jobs.

She contracted the infection while in New York, having to jet back to the UK for treatment.

Olivia subsequently spent weeks holed up in her London home in order to fully recover.

Speaking to GQ Hype, she detailed how much it exhausted her, saying: “I had a two-month period where I couldn’t do small talk.

“Someone was like: ‘How are you?’ And I was like: ‘Yeah, I’ve had shingles’.”

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The House Of The Dragon actress admitted that constantly working contributed considerably to the illness.

“I feel like the past two years, I’ve been, like, jobs, jobs, jobs, and I got really burnt out,” she said. “Your body has a way of flooring you to make sure that you do actually lie down.”

During her rest period, Olivia passed the time cooking and rearranging her house in East London, which she shares with partner Ralph Davis, describing herself as “a real housewife”.

“I was cooking different meals every day and sorting my cupboards out.

“I was like a real housewife, like, horribly, but I enjoyed it.”

It also gave her the opportunity to take time away from social media, deactivating Instagram.

“I was just like, I’m on this too much – it’s not nourishing,” she explained. “I think the celebri-fied nature of being an actor has now snowballed into this monster.

“And I just think we need to get off this train and realise that we make these TV shows and films, yes, for escapism, but also because it’s artful and it’s creative and it’s not for followers or for a brand deal.”

Despite being back on the social media platform, Olivia’s approach to it has changed.

“Even replying to a DM from someone that is semi-famous or wholly famous, that’s anxiety,” she added. “Why do I then now feel like I have to be smart and charming for this person that I don’t know?”

Olivia is currently filming A Talent For Murder, in which she’ll portray an American heiress on the run.

In Slow Horses, she stars opposite Bond contender Jack Lowden.

SETTING sail on a cruise doesn’t have to mean hitting pause on your hobbies.

Tour operator Cruise Nation has seen interest in themed voyages rocket by up to 50 per cent this year.

Lisa Minot looks at a host of options to please sports fans, green-fingered gardeners, cyclists and even armchair detectives.

BEST FOR CRICKET LOVERS

PAIR your passion for the Gentleman’s Game with a chance to explore some Christmas markets on Ambassador Cruise Line’s Cricket Legends Festive Getaway.

Sailing from London Tilbury, Ambassador Ambience will welcome players and broadcasters including Garry Richardson, Graham Gooch, Henry Blofeld, Jonathan Agnew, David Lloyd and Angus Fraser.

The five-night cruise will include Audience With sessions, with the VIPs sharing stories, insights and behind-the-scenes moments as well as a lively sports quiz.

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There’s also the chance to shop the Christmas Markets with calls at Bremerhaven, Germany; Ijmuiden, the Netherlands, and Zeebrugge, Belgium, as well as lots of entertainment onboard.

Five nights’ full-board is from £789pp, departing London Tilbury on December 13.

See ambassadorcruiseline.com.

BEST FOR TRUE CRIME FANS

THERE are high stakes on the high seas with Virgin Voyages’ True Crime sailing onboard Scarlet Lady.

The adults-only cruise is perfect for armchair detectives and podcast lovers.

The five-night voyage includes meet-and-greets with podcast favourites including Disgraceland, Buried Bones and Wisecrack as well as crime-based trivia and events, themed dining and calls at Virgin Voyages’ private beach club in Bimini, Bahamas, and Grand Turk in Turks and Caicos.

Cruise Nation has combined the trip with a three-night free hotel stay in Miami and return flights from the UK, departing March 17, 2027.

Prices from £1,569pp including full board on the cruise, wifi and up to $150 in free drinks.

See cruisenation.com.

BEST FOR CYCLISTS

COMBINE a love of cycling with the chance to cruise among spectacular Croatian scenery.

Sail Croatia has regular cruises that feature experienced cycling guides to help you explore from mainland national parks and shimmering lakes to smaller islands off the coast.

This is small-ship sailing where you will be joined by a small group of fellow cyclists and can opt to bring your own bike or hire a traditional or electric one.

Unpack once and then cycle at your ports of call with plenty of daily swim stops.

Seven nights’ full-board on a Premier ship, round-trip from Split, is from £949pp, based on April 2027 departures.

Flights extra. For details, see sail-croatia.com.

BEST FOR ASTRONOMY BUFFS

IF the 2026 partial solar eclipse in the UK unlocked your inner astronomer, don’t miss next year’s total solar eclipse passing over Spain in August.

With a cruise offering one of the best opportunities to capture it thanks to unobstructed 360-views, absence of light pollution, and lack of crowds, how about Celebrity Cruises’ 11-night sailing through Italy and Spain.

Celebrity Ascent departs from Rome on July 24, 2027 and calls at Italy’s Livorno and Portofino, plus Spain’s Barcelona, Cartagena and Malaga before a day at sea for the Solar Eclipse itself then stops in Cagliari and Palermo.

The full-board cruise is from £2,779 including a free two-night stay in Rome and return flights from the UK.

See cruisenation.com.

BEST FOR FLOWER FANS

A TRIP to the incredible Keukenhof, the world’s largest flower garden covering nearly 80 acres, is a must-do for all horticultural buffs.

Open for eight weeks between late March and mid-May, the historic Dutch estate erupts into vibrant colour as seven million tulips, hyacinths, daffodils and irises bloom.

Explore the festival and the estate’s pavilions, waterways and windmill on a five-day Riviera Travel excursion.

Boarding the 5H MS Emily Bronte in Zaandam, the round-trip river voyage takes in the picturesque countryside and villages of Zaanse Schans and Huizen.

There’s a full day at the Keukenhof before a relaxing morning sailing into Amsterdam for a guided tour.

The full-board cruise starts from £1,339pp including an all-inclusive drinks package, free wifi, six included excursions and return flights or Eurostar from the UK on April 2 with transfers.

Other dates are also available. See rivieratravel.co.uk.

A bipartisan plan to speed the federal approval process for major energy and infrastructure projects received the endorsement of President Trump on the eve of a key Senate vote on the bill.

“This Landmark Permitting Reform Legislation will codify our America First Energy Agenda, and ensure that we can build Pipelines, Mines, and Power Plants faster than ever before, lowering Energy Costs for American Families, and creating High Paying American Jobs,” Trump said in a social media post Sunday that urged senators to vote for the bill.

On Monday, the Senate is slated to take a procedural vote on the measure, seen as a once-in-a-generation chance to overhaul the byzantine system for approving projects needed to modernize power grids, build artificial-intelligence data centers and revitalize clean energy development.

The legislation is supported from groups including oil companies and renewable energy developers, but faces hurdles to passage in the two remaining months Congress is in session. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries is opposing the bill in its current form, arguing it hasn’t received enough input from House Democrats. Other progressive Democrats say they should use their newfound control of Congress next year to negotiate a better deal.

Democratic Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, as well as Republican Sens. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Mike Lee of Utah, unveiled a new version of the bill Saturday, but several environmental groups still opposed it.

“After closely evaluating the full bill and the newly released substitute amendment alongside our state and territorial affiliates, Tribal partners, environmental justice partners, hunting, fishing, and outdoor recreation partners, water coalition partners, and other conservation partners, we have concluded we cannot support the legislation in its current form,” Collin O’Mara, president of the National Wildlife Federation, said in a statement Sunday.

Natter writes for Bloomberg.

Judy Collins has been taking photos of Van Nuys football players and other teams free of charge during the past 28 years.

Collins, a grandmother whose two sons graduated from Van Nuys, enjoyed helping capture key moments for families for decades until she was informed Friday she could no longer take photographs despite completing an extension application that complied with Los Angeles Unified School District volunteer policies.

Football coach Ken Osario played with one of Collins’ sons years ago at Van Nuys and tried to figure out what was wrong when he noticed Collins was instructed to leave her usual post earlier this season. Osario and the school’s athletic director Dion Coley invited her to apply to be a voluntary coach to satisfy any concerns about her presence on the football sidelines.

She paid $80 and passed a CPR class and $20 for a TB screening. She got finger printed and went through a background check. She originally was going to pay several hundred dollars for a vendor’s license even though she gives away her photos for free, the group decided becoming a voluntary coach would be the quicker way to satisfy LAUSD requirements.

After completing all the paper work, she was told assistant principal in charge of athletics, Martin Tate, had to meet her. Collins said she attempted multiple times to reach the assistant principal via phone or in person at a game. She could not find him.

Collins said she went to the team’s game on Friday and started taking photos when Tate confronted her and asked her to leave the field. Asked why, Collins said Tate told her, “I’m just following the principal’s order.”

The principal is on administrative leave, a point Collins noted to Tate, but it did not change his instruction to leave.

Collins proceeded to walk to the visitor’s side and sat by a bench taking photos until Tate approached her at halftime and asked her to leave.

Los Angeles Unified School District’s communication office did not respond to a request for comment.

Collins said she had never had issues taking photos since she started until this year.

Osario said she is a “very sweet lady who has been supporting Van Nuys for years.”

The Van Nuys athletic director confirmed Collins completed the volunteer coach application and has begun taking photos for Panorama High while she waits to learn whether she’ll be allowed to resume her work at Van Nuys.

US President made the remarks following a meeting with the Qatari PM in Washington, DC.

A lawsuit had sought to block border wall construction in the Big Bend National Park by targeting the waivers that sidestep environmental protections.

The United States Supreme Court has allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to build a border wall through a remote section of Big Bend National Park in West Texas.

In its decision on Monday, the court granted the government’s emergency request to lift a lower court’s injunction that had paused construction while the matter was litigated.

The injunction, it said, “impedes the Government from advancing its ‘compelling interests’ in border security and integrity”.

The border wall has long been a signature part of Trump’s platform to restrict immigration into the US.

During his first successful bid for the presidency in 2016, for instance, he rallied supporters with chants of “Build the wall!”

But the push to expand the border barrier through the popular national park has met pushback from conservationists, local officials and some members of Trump’s own Republican Party.

Big Bend National Park includes mountain ranges and desert that serve as a home to endangered species like the Mexican long-nosed bat.

Opponents say the plan to build the wall through the park would disrupt the ecologically and culturally significant landscape.

The Trump administration, however, has depicted the project as an urgent priority for national security and immigration control. It has described the Big Bend area as an artery for irregular border crossings and drug trafficking.

US District Judge Kathleen Cardone blocked the construction in October, noting that while the Big Bend sector makes up more than 25 percent of the US-Mexico border, it accounts for only 0.3 to 2.2 percent of migrant apprehensions.

“Therefore, if the Big Bend Sector is an area of high illegal entry, so is every other sector, and the waiver authority would apply to the entire US-Mexico border,” Cardone wrote.

The Supreme Court, however, said the government was “exceedingly likely to prevail” on its argument that Cardone lacked jurisdiction under the 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, which limits the ability of lower courts to rule on border barriers.

Under that law, district courts can only hear claims alleging a violation of the US Constitution. The Supreme Court found that the challengers’ claim did not qualify, writing that “there is no such thing as a ‘constitutional’ major-questions claim”.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the only justice to indicate she would have denied the government’s request. She did not explain her reasoning.

The Center for Biological Diversity was among the plaintiffs who brought the lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security, along with Friends of the Ruidosa Church and a local river guide and landowner.

The lawsuit challenged waivers used by the agency to fast-track border construction and sidestep environmental and conservation laws.

Without those waivers, plaintiffs said that construction would have to comply with laws such as the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act to alter the landscape in “one of the most remote and ecologically and culturally significant landscapes in the United States”.

Model Leomie Anderson has become the fourth star to land in Australia ahead of I’m A Celebrity after Wayne Rooney, Ade Adepitan and Sharky were all seen landing Down Under

Model Leomie Anderson has become the fourth star to land in Australia for I’m A Celebrity.

Over her career, Leomie has modelled for Victoria’s Secret multiple times and became one of their Angels in 2019.Speaking as she arrived, Leomie told The Mirror: “I came here to see the sights baby, the Gold Coast it’s beautiful.”

The ITV jungle show is back in just a few days’ time and the stars have started to arrive Down Under. Wayne Rooney was one of the first to arrive, with the former footballer being one of the show’s most expensive signings ever.

Elsewhere, social media star Sharky, whose real name is Sharmarke Mohamud, also arrived in Brisbane, with bosses said to be hoping he will emulate the success of last year’s winner AngryGinge.

Ade Adepitan was the third to arrive Down Under. Pretending, as all arriving stars do, that he isn’t really in town to appear on I’m A Celeb, the former wheelchair basketball player said: “I am here to advise on the 2027 Australian tap-dancing festival. I am here to dance.” Asked what he would miss most about being away, he said: “Time with my family.”

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Meanwhile, Sam Thompson, 34, is returning to the Jungle this year, fronting the spin-off show, Unpacked, alongside former Mirror journalist turned Capital FM presenter, Kemi Rodgers.

Sam says he was stunned to be asked to present the programme. Of the show’s main hosts Ant and Dec, he said: “They’re so lovely. I’ve seen them more than they probably ever want to see me in their lives. I’m like that boy who used to sit on the living room floor with his parents and watch the jungle.

“They are literally the reason I wanted to do the jungle in the first place. To be able to work right next to them, it’s just one of the coolest things in the world. “They are so gracious. They are so genuine. They just want you to do well..”

Meanwhile, Wayne’s wife Coleen has said she has vowed to get “revenge” on her husband. Insiders say Coleen intended to “blow the voting app up” as she votes for her husband to do a succession of Bushtucker trials.

Friends say we can expect Coleen to take to the task with “utmost determination.” They said: “They are all rooting for Wayne to do as many as possible – its only right after they all voted for her. She is laughing how she wants her revenge.

“Wayne has a lot to live up to Coleen’s amazing performance in the jungle two years ago but he is determined to give it a good go. She was a huge influence in him deciding to sign on the dotted line. He has no shortage of advice from Coleen who became a firm favourite with viewers during her own stint in camp.”

The former England captain is understood to be particularly keen to impress his four sons – Kai, 16, Klay, 13, Kit, ten, and Cass, eight – by taking on the trials.

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A pre-feasibility study for Barrick Mining’s (B) Fourmile gold deposit in Nevada, one of the world’s richest gold discoveries, is at risk of taking longer than previously expected as the company re-evaluates engineering and project access plans, Bloomberg reported Monday.

Barrick (

After initially congratulating Democrats on their midterm wins, which he said he was “absolutely willing to accept,” President Trump posted a baseless missive to social media about not trusting early ballot totals or voting machines.

“Does anybody really believe that this ‘Election’ was honest. How could the Polls be so wrong???” he wrote.

The post was a return to the unsubstantiated election denial that has animated his political career since its inception. It was also the latest swing in public messaging from the president and his administration since Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress and key governorships across the country last week.

Trump — notoriously hard to pin down and prone to meandering tangents — has waffled for nearly a week now on several key policy positions. Other leaders in his administration have split on the same issues, further confusing the public.

On Friday, Trump named Stephen Miller — chief architect of his administration’s sweeping immigration crackdown — as his new chief of staff, which many took as an unambiguous sign that Trump intends to double down on those policies through the second half of his term.

In a “60 Minutes” interview taped the same day and aired Sunday, Trump said that some of those same policies were “too tough,” and that he was open to working with Democrats to find a pathway for undocumented but law-abiding immigrants to remain in the country legally.

On Monday, Trump said he hadn’t told Miller to change his approach, that his administration has a “very strong deportation policy” and that there would be “no amnesty, no anything” for undocumented immigrants, though the administration will be focusing on “the worst of the worst.”

“My policy hasn’t changed,” he said. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement posted, “If you are here illegally, we will find you, arrest you, and DEPORT you.”

After Vice President JD Vance last week blamed the party’s stunning losses squarely on the Iran war, Trump acknowledged that the war — and the spiking gas prices it caused — probably hurt his party at the polls.

But he has since dismissed growing calls from both sides of the aisle for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to be fired, claimed the war has already been “won,” and suggested Americans’ displeasure with the economy was based on little more than bad messaging on the nation’s economic “numbers,” which he claimed are strong.

Hegseth said he wasn’t going to get into a “finger pointing exercise” over Vance’s remarks, but that the war “doesn’t have to be necessarily popular” to be necessary.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Trump’s shifting postelection messaging.

Leading Democrats, smelling political blood and preparing to take control in Washington, have seized on Trump’s vacillations and doubling down on unpopular positions to paint him as badly out of touch and stubbornly resistant to the will of the American people.

After his Friday appointment of Miller, for example, California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote, “The American people just delivered Donald Trump a historic rejection. So naturally, he hands keys to the architect of his most cruel and inhumane policies. Absolutely disgraceful.”

After Trump’s post Monday about voting machines, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote, “Donald Trump’s pathetic return to election denialism was inevitable. He can whine all he wants, but nothing will stop this inescapable truth: For the last two years of his presidency, Trump will face the largest Democratic congressional majorities in decades, all because he has been an unprecedented failure.”

Experts who have long studied the president’s rhetoric said it should come as no surprise, as it is perfectly in line with his mantra of never admitting defeat, never accepting blame and never showing weakness — even in the face of an overwhelming defeat.

“He is caught between a rock and a hard place,” said Robert C. Rowland, a professor of rhetoric at the University of Kansas and author of “The Rhetoric of Donald Trump: Nationalist Populism and American Democracy.” “He’s seen the anger of the country, but he’s trying desperately to blame someone else — when all of the data says that this was mostly about him and the results or failures of his policies.”

After Republicans suffered substantial midterm losses in 2006, President George W. Bush acknowledged his party got a “thumping” and immediately fired Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who was closely tied to the unpopular Iraq war. After Democrats suffered losses in 2010, President Obama acknowledged what he called a “shellacking” and also recalibrated, becoming less “post-partisan” in his messaging and more pragmatic, Rowland said.

Trump’s message about working with Democrats on certain issues could be seen as his own attempt to pivot, if only slightly, Rowland said, but it has been completely undermined by his moves to elevate Miller and reject accountability from Hegseth and others tied to the Iran war.

More than anything, Rowland said Trump’s baseline instinct is to project masculine power and deny culpability for any political failings, in part to hold on to his MAGA base, which is “pretty much all he has left,” and in part to resist any move by Republican moderates to reclaim power in the party.

“He doesn’t want to send any messages of weakness that would allow the remaining Reagan Republicans to kind of stick their heads back up and try to become involved again in conservative politics,” and is loath to “fire any of the men who screw up for him” lest he undercut his message of masculine power, Rowland said.

Trump is ultimately desperate to leave a mark — as evidenced by his ballroom and other vanity projects in Washington — and cares less about substantial policy accomplishments than “his name being in lights in historical terms,” Rowland said.

In his “60 Minutes” interview Sunday, Trump repeatedly avoided accepting blame. Instead, he suggested those who disagreed with him were wrong or misunderstand the reality before them.

He said the American people’s displeasure with the economy, for instance, was due to “bad messaging,” which he blamed in part on the press not covering “positive news for Republicans.”

Others in his administration have also dug in on pre-midterm messaging about the Trump administration being on the side of the American people, ignoring the fact that the electorate clearly and resoundingly rejected its policies last week.

Miller took an immediately combative tone after his promotion to chief of staff was announced, writing on X that Trump has saved the nation “from those who would destroy it,” and that the “mission now is more clear than ever: Fight with all of our soul to support our President and defend this magnificent Republic.”

On Monday, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin wrote on X, “While Americans enjoyed their weekend, the patriots of [ICE] worked around the clock to arrest and remove dangerous criminals from our communities, including murderers, pedophiles, and sexual predators.”

Over the weekend, Hegseth posted a video to U.S. military troops, telling them, “Don’t blink. Ignore the noise. Never hesitate.”

“You see, all this is politics. You do real things. 
You stay the course. And as always, President Trump leads the way. And I’ll assure you, we have only just begun to fight,” Hegseth said.

Whether such bravado will hold is unclear.

On Monday, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) filed articles of impeachment against Hegseth, calling for his ouster on eight charges, including for “waging the Iran war despite no declaration of war, statutory authorization, attack on the United States, or imminent threat”; for launching “extrajudicial killings” against alleged drug smugglers in offshore boats; and for the “kidnapping of a sovereign foreign leader,” a reference to the U.S. capture of now-former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

About the same time, Trump posted an AI-generated video of Ultimate Fighting Championship Chief Executive Dana White serving as White House press secretary, telling reporters to “sit down and shut up.”

Hours later, he and White were actually in the White House briefing room — where Trump defended the Iran war as “won” by the U.S., called Massie a “loser” and said he will “stand by” Hegseth even if he’s impeached.

“He won two wars,” Trump said.

Manchester United look increasingly likely to sack head coach Michael Carrick.

The club opted to stick with Carrick after the side’s 3-0 home defeat by Bournemouth on 25 October, with the intention of reassessing the situation during this month’s international break.

Multiple sources have told BBC Sport that the board remain committed to that process, and that no final decision on Carrick’s future has been made.

However, there is a growing expectation that chief executive Omar Berrada and director of football Jason Wilcox will recommend to minority owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the Glazer family for Carrick to be sacked.

The 4-4 draw with Aston Villa on Sunday means United, who are 18th in the table, have made their worst start to a domestic campaign in 40 years.

BBC Sport reported in October that the club had sounded out former Newcastle boss Eddie Howe and ex-Germany coach Julian Nagelsmann over replacing Carrick.

Former Chelsea coach Antonio Conte is known to be keen on the role, while multiple sources have told BBC Sport that former Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino is open to a move to Old Trafford.

Pochettino signed an extension to his contract as USA coach in August.

However, the deal is thought to contain clauses that would allow him to leave for specific high-profile jobs. The US have a two-legged Concacaf Nations League play-off with Haiti on 14 and 18 November.