U.S. forces to ‘withdraw from Iraq by end of 2026’

By Geoff Earle, Deputy U.S. Political Editor for DailyMail.com

After tearing into ‘hostile’ New York judges and blasting female accusers, Trump fired off a few negative comments about his stable of lawyers.

‘I’m disappointed at my legal talent, to be honest with you,’ Trump said, before complaining about a fight over evidence in the E. Jean Carroll case.

He also complained about a lawyer who ‘is not with us any longer’ who advised him not to show up for the first E. Jean Carroll case.

‘And so I didn’t show up, and I was found guilty,’ he said. Trump also complained that ‘I don’t get fair panels.’ Trump had three lawyers in D.C. Thursday who have successfully delayed his January 6 case past the election.

But he had nice things to say about Judge Aileen Cannon, who ruled in his favor by dismissing the classified documents case. ‘I think she’s a brilliant woman,’ Trump said.

The United States and Iraq have reached an understanding on plans for the withdrawal of U.S.-led coalition forces from Iraq, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

The plan, which has been broadly agreed but requires a final go-ahead from both capitals and an announcement date, would see hundreds of troops leave by September 2025, with the remainder departing by the end of 2026, the sources told Reuters.

‘We have an agreement, its now just a question of when to announce it,’ a senior U.S. official said.

The U.S. and Iraq are also seeking to establish a new advisory relationship that could see some U.S. troops remain in Iraq after the drawdown.

An official announcement was initially scheduled for weeks ago but was postponed due to regional escalation related to Israel’s war in Gaza and to iron out some remaining details, the sources said.

Former President Donald Trump is tearing into a series of female accusers at his Trump Tower press conference.

He ripped E. Jean Carroll on a day his lawyers and hers faced off in an appeals court in New York.

Then he tears into Jessica Leeds, the woman who testified that he attacked her aboard an airplane in the late 1970s. ‘You have an armrest in planes back in those days.

‘It couldn’t have happened. It didn’t happen. And she would not have been the chosen one,’ Trump said.

Then he went after Natasha Stoynoff, who alleges Trump assaulted her at Mar-a-Lago when she was doing an interview with him and Melania at Mar-a-Lago. ‘Whatever her name was, I don’t know the lady,’ Trump said.

By Geoff Earle, Deputy U.S. Political Editor for DailyMail.com

Former President Donald Trump was back in court Friday, this time to sit in on a U.S. Appeals Court while his lawyers contest a jury’s $5 million award in the E. Jean Carroll case.

He was there attend oral arguments before a three judge panel of the 2nd Circuit Court of appeals. The arguments lasted just 22 minutes.

It comes a day after he opted to skip a court appearance in Washington, D.C., where he faces a new superseding indictment in the January 6th case. In that venue, Trump opted to let his lawyer issue a new ‘not guilty’ plea on his behalf.

Trump’s presidential campaign has made hay out of his various court sagas, including his New York fraud case, where Judge Juan Merchan is set to decide today whether to keep a schedules September 18th sentencing deadline, which could give Trump a jail sentence two months before he faces the voters. A Manhattan jury last May issued the verdict in Carroll’s defamation case. She said Trump assaulted her inside a Manhattan department store dressing room in the 1990s. Trump called her claims a hoax.

The jury awarded her a combined $5 million after finding he committed sexual abuse and defamation.

In 2019, Kamala Harris voiced her support for a plastic straw ban when she was running for the Democratic presidential nomination.

But the plastic straw ban is one more issue where the campaign is quietly walking back the vice president’s position, ahead of the 2024 general election.

Trump supporters have used the straw ban as one of the most egregious examples of the left’s tyrannical nanny state tendencies.

New York Judge Juan Merchan will decide Friday whether to put off scheduled sentencing for Donald Trump in the Stormy Daniels hush money case.

Sentencing is scheduled for September 18th, just two months before election day. Trump’s lawyers want him to postpone it.

The judge, who Trump repeatedly attacked during his trial, has told the parties he will make his decision on timing Friday. Trump faces up to four years in prison, although experts predict the first-time offender might not get any jail time.

Trump, who scheduled a press conference for Friday, is also due in court in a separate case where his las lawyers are appealing a $5 million judgement against him in E. Jean Carroll’s defamation case.

Sarah Ewall-Wice, Senior U.S. Political Reporter:

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign announced it raised $361 million last month, the largst cash haul of the 2024 election so far.

The Democratic presidential nominee has now raised more than $615 million since taking over the top of the ticket with President Biden’s departure from the race in late July, the campaign said.

Harris and running mate Tim Walz have $404 million in cash on hand with sixty days to go before Election Day.

The August cash haul came from nearly three million contributors including 1.3 million 1.3 million donors who made their first donation of the 2024 cycle last month. According tot he campaign, of those new donors, three out of four did not contribute in the 2020 presidential election.

Ninty-five percent of all August donations were under $200. Among the top occupations for contributors were teachers and nurses.

More than 60 percent of donors last month were women and nearly one in five were registered Republicans or Indepedents.

‘In just a short time, Vice President Harris’ candidacy has galvanized a history-making, broad, and diverse coalition – with the type of enthusiasm, energy, and grit that wins close elections,’ said campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriquez in a statement.

The massive cash haul came in the same month Harris accepted the Democratic presidential nomination at the convention in Chicago.

Five of the top ten grassroots fundriasing days were last month, and the third best day of the campaign to date was August 6 when Harris announced Walz as her running mate.

By comparison, the Trump campaign announced it raised $130 million in August and ended the month with $295 million cash on hand. Ninty-eight percent of his campaign donations last month were under $200.

Former President Donald Trump is set to face the media again with a Friday afternoon press conference at Trump Tower.

It comes a day after he outlined some of his economic proposals at the Economic Club of New York, including a long answer where he said he would provide child care, then explaining that it ‘relatively speaking not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in’ through tariffs.

Trump and running JD Vance have been hammering Vice President Kamala Harris for not doing more unscripted press conference. She is in Pittsburgh holding meetings and doing prep in advance of Tuesday’s high stakes ABC News debate in Philadelphia.

Some U.S. voters will get to cast their ballots in the 2024 election any day now as the very first ballots of the cycle are set to start going out on Friday.

The crucial battleground state of North Carolina begins to mail its first ballots on September 6 with sixty days to go before Election Day.

It is the first state in the country to start sending out ballots as the campaign season kicks in to high gear for the final stretch. More than 132,000 ballots are prepped to go out in the first round.

It comes as Robert Kennedy Jr. has been attempting to get his name removed from the state ballots, but a North Carolina judge rejected the effort Thursday. However, she did order election officials not to send out ballots before noon.

Both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are looking to secure the key swing state and its sixteen electoral votes while the Tar Heel State also has one of the most contentious governor races of 2024.

The race between Trump and Harris could be closest election since Kennedy and Nixon in 1960, forecaster says

The latest prediction model from Decision Desk HQ and The Hill showed it ‘as close as’ it has been this century, and perhaps since Kennedy narrowly beat Nixon 64 years ago.

It means the presidential debate on Tuesday is criticial and has the potential to have a huge impact on the result.

The new forecast comes a day after historian Allan Lichtman, known as the ‘Nostradamus’ of election predictions, finally revealed his forecast.

He determined that Kamala Harris has met the critical objectives for victory in his model.