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Police said the vehicle became disabled and took on water, prompting the driver and passengers to abandon it before calling for helpAuthorities in Texas have removed a Tesla Cybertruck from a lake after the driver intentionally drove into in an attempt to try the vehicle’s “wade mode.”On Tuesday, the Grapevine police department announced the vehicle’s recovery from Katie’s Woods Park Boat Ramp, adding that the “driver stated he intentionally drove into the lake to use the Cybertruck’s ‘wade mode’ feature”. Continue reading...

Former health secretary standing down after saying he no longer had confidence in Keir Starmer as PMLabour is in a curious, transitional state at the moment. Officially Keir Starmer is committed to staying as leader and prime minister until the next election. There is no formal leadership contest underway. But, informally, it has already started, with Andy Burnham and Wes Streeting already setting out their offer to the Labour membership. We will hear more from Streeting this afternoon. But much of the parliamentary party is already working on the basis that a Burnham premiership is all-but-inevitable, and so Streeting’s interventions may turn out to be more about shoring up his position in a potential future Burnham administration than a rehearsal for an election that may never happen.Here are some of the stories out today covering Starmer, Burnham and Streeting.Ailbhe Rea in the New Statesman says an insider describes the atmosphere in No 10 now as “very, very odd”. She says:Starmer and his remaining loyal cabinet ministers want to make every day that they are still in office count, and are determined to cut through the noise of the leadership drama. Many cabinet ministers, who may not survive long in their posts if Starmer is replaced as Prime Minister, are desperate to set a legacy and bank achievements in their briefs while they can. “Let’s get out there and make the case for what we’re doing,” has been Starmer’s message to colleagues. There is even a fleeting hope inside Downing Street that the leadership speculation “burns itself out”, that “Wes and Andy tearing chunks out of each other for weeks might just make Keir look better”. But even many loyalists accept that is wishful thinking. “The writing is on the wall, even if we don’t know exactly what form that takes yet,” one concludes.Patrick Maguire, Geraldine Scott and Larisa Brown in the Times say Starmer could stay in Downing Street until early next year. They report:Ministers familiar with Starmer’s thinking say he has no plans to step down before the Labour Party conference in September and is unlikely to relinquish office before Christmas.They told The State of It, the political podcast from The Times and Sunday Times, that there were still significant obstacles ahead for Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, who on Tuesday refused to rule out breaking Labour’s manifesto pledge against tax rises.Caroline Wheeler in the i says cabinet ministers are already angling for jobs in a Burnham administration. She says:Senior ministers are preparing visits to Makerfield amid growing expectations in Westminster that Burnham could ultimately take the Labour leadership – and with it the power to appoint the next Cabinet.“The equation cabinet ministers are making is that if they go and he wins they will get a plum job,” one senior source said. “If they don’t go and he wins, he will remember. And if they don’t go and he loses, he will remember.”Many now believe that Burnham is lining up to make Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary, as his chancellor. It comes as Miliband’s special adviser was seconded to work with Burnham for the by-election campaign …Burnham is also widely expected to make Lucy Powell, the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, his deputy prime minister. Multiple sources said that other women likely to be given top jobs include Angela Rayner, the former deputy prime minister, Lisa Nandy, the Culture Secretary, and Louise Haigh, the former transport secretary, who is also the co-chair of the influential soft-left Tribune group of MPs.Sam Blewett at Politico has taken an in-depth look at the team supporting Burnham. He says the key figure is Kevin Lee, director of the Greater Manchester mayor’s office, who has been advising Burnham with little break since 2010. Continue reading...

Trump plays down need to end war; Meloni among leaders to criticise treatment of flotilla group in video shared onlineThe Jordanian military announced it had shot down a drone of unknown origin in its airspace on Wednesday, AFP reports.No casualties were reported. Continue reading...

Tight primary victory in Philadelphia district bolsters Democrats’ left flank, seen as test of progressive momentumUS politics live – latest updatesChris Rabb, an unflinching progressive state representative, declared his campaign for Pennsylvania’s third congressional district was “indomitable” after winning the Democratic primary in a race that became a proxy battle over the direction of the Democratic party.In a significant victory for the party’s left wing, Rabb took roughly 45% of the vote in Tuesday’s contest, comfortably ahead of early frontrunner state senator, Sharif Street, who fell to under 30%, and surgeon Ala Stanford. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Electoral Commission calls for new controls as Demos finds tools made up fake scandals, invented candidates or gave wrong dateUK politics live – latest updatesThe Electoral Commission has called for new legal controls over misinformation from AI chatbots, after a thinktank found they had made serious mistakes during the recent Scottish election.The thinktank Demos said its investigation had found that AI services gave voters misinformation to 34% of the questions it posed, which it said raised worrying questions about the lack of regulation of AI platforms in the UK. Continue reading...

Internet users often use the "Melodi" hashtag to describe the friendly equation between the two leaders.

Airstrike at the start of the war was aimed at freeing populist ex-president from house arrest, US newspaper claimsMiddle East crisis – live updatesFresh questions have been raised over the US and Israeli effort to depose the Iranian regime after it was claimed that Israel wanted to put the populist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in power.Ahmadinejad’s turbulent presidency, from 2005 to 2013, was marked by incendiary attacks on Israel but he recast himself as a critic of the regime and champion of the poor after falling out with the supreme leader Ali Khamenei. Continue reading...

In state department cable, Jerusalem embassy told to issue protest to Palestinian Authority leaders, warning ‘consequences will follow’ if they failed to complyThe US has ordered its Jerusalem embassy to pressure the Palestinian leadership into dropping a bid for a UN general assembly vice-presidency, anxious that the role could allow Palestinians to chair high-profile debates on the Middle East.A 19 May state department cable seen by the Guardian instructed the US embassy in Jerusalem to issue a démarche (a formal protest) to the leaders of the Palestinian Authority (PA) pressuring them to withdraw the bid by 22 May, warning that “consequences will follow” if they failed to comply. Continue reading...