Thursday’s top story: Key witness claims Trump cared more about investigating Biden than the fate of Ukraine. Plus, why the super-rich love South Dakota

This article is more than 10 months old

This article is more than 10 months old

Good morning, I’m Tim Walker with today’s essential stories.

Dems try to capture America’s attention as hearings go public

The Democrats see the impeachment process as their best chance to break through the partisan echo chambers and put the case against Donald Trump to the American public. And the first day of televised testimony certainly proved damning for the president, with the acting US ambassador to Ukraine, Bill Taylor, telling the House intelligence committee he understood Trump “cared more” about forcing a damaging, unfounded investigation of his political rival, Joe Biden, than about the future of Ukraine.

Democrats handled the hearings like pros, writes Moira Donegan, as Republicans flailed in search of a convincing defence of the president. But while the Guardian’s panel of experts believe Adam Schiff and co are building a compelling case, they are far less certain it will lead to Trump’s ouster. At a bar in Kansas City, Chris McGreal found the public mood much the same.

Fox News. The president’s most fervent media defender covered the hearings with discrediting commentary and audience gaslighting in its efforts to exonerate the president, writes Adam Gabbatt.

Drag Queen. Also covering the hearings: drag queen Pissi Myles, who turned heads by turning up on Capitol Hill in a scarlet dress and stilettos to report for Happs, a live news startup.

Trump says troops in Syria ‘only for the oil’, contradicting aides

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Trump and Erdoğan hold a joint press conference at the White House on Wednesday. Photograph: China News Service/VCG via Getty Images

The president insisted on Wednesday that the US military remains in Syria “only for the oil”, a direct contradiction of his own officials, who say US troops have stayed in the region to continue the fight against Isis. Trump made the remarks while sitting alongside the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who was visiting DC just over a month since Turkey launched its controversial offensive in northern Syria, to the dismay of US lawmakers and Trump’s own state department.

Guantá namo Bay. Trump proposed designating undocumented immigrants as “enemy combatants” and shipping them to Guantánamo Bay, according to a forthcoming book by an anonymous author purporting to be a “senior official” in the administration.

Stephen Miller. Newly revealed emails between a Breitbart writer and the senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller show Miller promoted racist conspiracy theories and implied a bipartisan organisation backed by Mark Zuckerberg was promoting illegal voting.

Majority of Facebook anti-vaxx ads funded by two groups

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Robert F Kennedy Jr, chairman of the World Mercury Project, at Trump Tower in New York in 2017. Photograph: Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

A new study published by the journal Vaccine has found that more than half of the ads on Facebook spreading misinformation about vaccines are backed by just two groups. Between them, Robert F Kennedy Jr’s World Mercury Project and Stop Mandatory Vaccinations, a project led by campaigner Larry Cook, bought 54% of the anti-vaxx ads shown on the social media platform during the period of the study. Pro-vaccination messages, meanwhile, emanated from 83 different healthcare organisations.

‘Dangerous misinformation’. Kennedy is the son of the former US attorney general Bobby Kennedy. His own family members have decried his campaign against vaccines as “tragically wrong”.

Cheat sheet

Aung San Suu Kyi , the Myanmar leader and Nobel Laureate, is for the first time facing legal action over the persecution of Rohingya Muslims, after she was named in a case filed in Argentina, accusing several top Myanmar officials of complicity in genocide.

Israel and the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad have agreed to an Egyptian-mediated ceasefire in the Gaza Strip after 48 hours of fighting in which 34 Palestinians have been killed, the region’s worst surge in violence for months.

Dozens of foreign students have been urged to flee Hong Kong as violent clashes between pro-democracy protesters and police continue to worsen, with the island’s university campuses becoming battlegrounds amid the rising unrest.

French researchers believe that human hair may be to blame for urban pigeons’ widespread toe loss, after a study found that pigeon toe mutilation “tended to increase with the density of hairdressers”.

Must-reads

Facebook Twitter Pinterest South Dakota is home to Mount Rushmore - and billions of protected dollars belonging to the ultra-wealthy. Illustration: Guardian Design

South Dakota: the great American tax haven

Sparsely-populated South Dakota is known to most people as the home of Mount Rushmore, and not much else. But to the world’s super-rich, the deeply deregulated state holds a stronger allure: as the ideal home for their billions. Oliver Bullough reports.

The rise of the anti-natalists

Earlier this year, an Indian man sued his parents for conceiving and giving birth to him, claiming he had been born against his will, and that “human existence is totally pointless”. Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow tries to wrap her mind around a rise in anti-natalism: the idea that life itself is not a gift, but an imposition.

The sordid inner workings of the National Enquirer

America’s most notorious print publication began by covering murders and car crashes, swerved into prurient celebrity coverage, and eventually became a tool of the Trump campaign. Adrian Horton watches a new documentary tracing the scandalous history of the National Enquirer.

Do men and women sext differently?

The common conception of sexting is men sending unsolicited dick pics to women who don’t want them – and women sending nudes to men, who do. But as Elle Hunt discovers, the motivations behind men and women’s sexting habits may not be all that dissimilar.

Opinion

Under Evo Morales and his Movement for Socialism party, much of Bolivia’s indigenous-majority population has lived above poverty for the first time ever, writes Nick Estes. Which means a coup against Evo is a coup against indigenous people.

The indigenous-socialist project accomplished what neoliberalism has repeatedly failed to do: redistribute wealth to society’s poorest sectors and uplift those most marginalized.

Sport

Zlatan Ibrahimovic has thanked LA Galaxy for making him “feel alive again” as his two-year spell at the MLS club comes to an end, and instructed Galaxy fans to “go back to watch baseball” now that he is leaving. Graham Ruthven examines the Swede’s uncertain American legacy.

Astros pitcher Justin Verlander has won his second AL Cy Young Award, beating out his teammate Gerrit Cole in balloting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. The NL prize also went to a previous winner, after Mets ace Jacob deGrom claimed the award for a second straight year.

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