Trump's children listed by investigators as probe into White House intensifies

Fans of irony, be advised.

As Democrats launch yet another investigation into "abuses of power, into corruption and into obstruction of justice" with the explanation, "It's our job to protect the rule of law", the president's schedule has thrown up a beauty.

He's addressing the National Association of Attorneys General this afternoon.

  ↵ The president has been condemned by a former director of the US Office of Government Ethics for this tweet from Saturday, promoting his golf course in Aberdeen, Scotland:

“This is Trump’s most explicit commingling of personal interests and public office to date,” said Walter Shaub.

“This is the tone from the top that leads his appointees to violate ethics rules.

“This is shameless, corrupt and repugnant presidential profiteering. This is an invitation to graft.”

Here's our report.

Here's Clark Mindock on the Texans fighting Donald Trump's land seizures to build his US-Mexico border wall.

For the likes of Yvette Gaytan, born and raised along the Rio Grande, Mr Trump's illegal immigration crisis simply does not exist: it's the federal government that really poses a threat to their prosperity.

"A wall is just literally an illusion of safety. It’s like my fence. Yes, I have a fence around my house. It’s for the illusion of privacy, not security, because that is not going to stop anybody from coming in," she says. 

"This is a complete b******t state of emergency," adds conservationist Marianna Trevino-Wright of the National Butterfly Centre in Mission. 

A group of children - including 11-year-old Levi Draheim - are suing the US government for failing to protect them against climate change in a case that could force the authorities to rapidly decarbonise the American economy.

Here's Tim Wyatt on further push-back against the Trump administration's regressive policies.

A new article from Jane Mayer of The New Yorker alleges that Fox News had the story of the Stormy Daniels "hush money" payment before the election but suppressed it, telling reporter Diana Falzone: "Good reporting, kiddo. But Rupert [Murdoch] wants Donald Trump to win. So just let it go." Wow.

It also suggests President Trump ordered his economic adviser Gary Cohn to pressure the Justice Department into blocking the ATT-Time Warner merger as revenge on CNN.

And, less surprisingly, that he ranks his favourite reporters on a scale of one to 10: Bret Baier, Fox's chief political anchor, is a six, Sean Hannity a 10 and Steve Doocy of Fox and Friends a 12 (!)

Here's House Judiciary Committee chairman Jerrold Nadler's appearance on ABC's This Week, announcing the new abuse of power investigation.

The president's praise of his own Scottish golf resort on Twitter (see below) was a probable attempt to pressure the UK and explicitly tied "his personal business interests to American diplomacy", according to legal experts.

The tweet came just two days after judges ruled Mr Trump’s club must pay the Scottish government's legal costs following a two-year court battle over a major North Sea wind power development, which the claimant argued would spoil the view from the green if its wind turbines were built. Eleven duly went up last summer after the Supreme Court ruled against the billionaire.

Here's Tom Embury-Dennis.

Former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper has said on Monday he's running for president to challenge Donald Trump, casting himself as a can-do uniter who's used to overcoming adversity and accomplishing liberal goals in a politically divided state. 

"I'm running for president because we need dreamers in Washington, but we also need to get things done," Mr Hickenlooper, 67, said in a video announcing his campaign . "I've proven again and again I can bring people together to produce the progressive change Washington has failed to deliver." 

He becomes the second governor to enter the sprawling field, after Washington's Jay Inslee announced last week, and is trying to cast himself as a pragmatist who can also take on President Trump.

Though as governor Mr Hickenlooper prided himself for staying above partisan fights, he has argued his record as a former governor and big-city mayor distinguishes him from a broad field of Democratic presidential aspirants who are backing ambitious liberal plans on healthcare, taxes and the climate. 

Mr Hickenlooper has held back on supporting Democratic rallying cries like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal to combat climate change. He once worked as a geologist for a petroleum company and was roundly criticised for telling a congressional panel he drank fracking fluid while arguing for the safety of the energy extraction technique. 

It was after Mr Hickenlooper was laid off from his geologist position during the energy bust of the 1980s that he inadvertently started on his road to politics. He opened a brewpub in a then-desolate stretch of downtown Denver that unexpectedly took off. That enabled him to become wealthy by building a mini-empire of restaurants and bars. It also led to him making a quixotic run for Denver mayor in 1993.

Campaign ads featured Mr Hickenlooper feeding quarters into parking meters to protest the city's charging for Sunday parking downtown. He won handily. 

As mayor, John Hickenlooper helped persuade dozens of suburban cities, sometimes led by Republicans, to back a tax hike to fund a light-rail network. He was filmed diving out of an aeroplane to advocate for a statewide ballot measure to suspend an anti-tax measure passed in the 1990s and allow the state budget to grow. When he ran for governor in 2010, he featured an ad of himself fully dressed, walking into a shower to scrub off negative attacks. 

It's all part of his quirky political image - he vows not to run attack ads and has frequently made fun of his tendency to misspeak and wander off political message. 

"As a skinny kid with Coke bottle glasses and a funny last name, I've stood up to my fair share of bullies," he says of Donald Trump. 

The Trump administration is threatening to place additional financial restrictions on Cuba's military and intelligence services over the political turmoil still unfolding in Venezuela.

"Cuba's role in usurping democracy and fomenting repression in Venezuela is clear. That's why the US will continue to tighten financial restrictions on Cuba's military and intel services. The region's democracies should condemn the Cuba regime," White House national security adviser John Bolton said in a Twitter post. 

The US has backed self-declared president Juan Guaido in Venezuela over elected incumbent Nicolas Maduro, who has presided over a corrupt and repressive administration and seen the country slide into hyperinflation-inspired economic chaos.

Maduro and his allies in Havana have accused the White House of reviving Cold War anti-Communist tactics to install a puppet president in South America in the shape of the youthful National Assembly president.

Donald Trump’s alleged affair with porn star Stormy Daniels may have first been reported by Fox News during the 2016 election — possibly derailing his shot at the presidency — had the network’s leadership not wanted him to win the White House. 

The report, titled “The Making of the Fox News White House” and published by journalist Jane Meyer in The New Yorker on Monday morning, looks at the relationship between the president and his favourite news outlet from the beginning of his campaign onward. 

Ms Meyer added new revelations to previous claims made by FoxNews.com reporter Diana Falzone, who previously sued the outlet for gender discrimination. Ms Falzone has claimed a story she reported in 2016 about Mr Trump’s alleged affair with the porn star and resulting illegal hush money payments made thereafter was never published by Fox News.