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Britain’s ruling Labour Party is preparing to formally name veteran centre-left politician Andy Burnham as its new leader and the United Kingdom’s next prime minister during a special party conference scheduled for Friday. With Labour holding an overwhelming parliamentary majority, the 56-year-old politician will officially move into 10 Downing Street this coming Monday, marking an extraordinary political comeback just four weeks after he won a parliamentary by-election and returned to the House of Commons following a nine-year absence. Once in office, Burnham will become the UK’s seventh prime minister in just 10 years, a statistic that highlights growing parliamentary volatility in British politics, as sitting MPs increasingly withdraw support from their own party leaders when governments face political turbulence. Widely known by his nickname the “King of the North” for three consecutive victories in the Greater Manchester mayoral election, Burnham faced no opponents in the Labour leadership contest. This marks his third bid for the party’s top job, following failed runs in 2010 and 2015 when he lost to Ed Miliband and Jeremy Corbyn respectively. A former Labour MP between 2001 and 2017 and one-time government minister, Burnham has rebranded his public image over the past years, emerging as a populist, relatable figure who blends an approachable, down-to-earth demeanor with polished, engaging social media content. Labour parliamentarians are pinning their hopes on Burnham to outperform his predecessor Keir Starmer in public communication, and to implement a more ambitious agenda to repair Britain’s struggling public services and reignite sluggish economic growth. “We’ve got to give people a lift, haven’t we? We’ve got to give people a stronger sense of hope and a feeling that the country’s on the way back,” Burnham stated in a recent podcast interview with former professional footballer Gary Lineker on Wednesday. The party is gambling that Burnham is its strongest candidate to counter the rise of Nigel Farage’s anti-immigration Reform UK, which current polling predicts is on track to win the next general election scheduled for 2029. Starmer led Labour out of 14 years of opposition to secure a landslide general election victory over the Conservative Party in July 2024, ending a period of Conservative rule that saw four different prime ministers rotate through office in just five years. However, Starmer’s short premiership was quickly marred by a string of domestic policy missteps and damaging controversies, most notably his decision to appoint Peter Mandelson, a former associate of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, as British ambassador to the United States. Disappointing results for Labour in May’s local and regional elections piled overwhelming pressure on Starmer, which became untenable after Burnham won the June 18 by-election that cleared his path to launch a leadership bid. The vast majority of Labour MPs quickly pulled their support for Starmer, forcing him to announce his resignation on June 22. Later that same day, dozens of Labour lawmakers welcomed Burnham during his parliamentary swearing-in ceremony, a clear public signal that the party elite was ready to anoint him as Starmer’s replacement. A member of the party’s soft left faction, Burnham has secured the public backing of 379 out of Labour’s 403 sitting MPs. No other candidate managed to collect the 81 parliamentary nominations required to launch a leadership challenge. Speaking after securing the leadership, Burnham said he was “deeply grateful” for the cross-factional support and trust extended to him by his parliamentary colleagues. “That is the circuit breaker I am offering: power out of Westminster, an economy rewired for ordinary people, and good growth in every postcode,” he said. Burnham’s signature policy proposal is widespread devolution of government power to regional cities, including the creation of a “No. 10 North” headquarters based in Manchester to address longstanding neglect of regions outside of London. Despite the high hopes within Labour for his premiership, Burnham inherits the same daunting set of challenges that brought down Starmer: a stagnant national economy, elevated government borrowing costs, and ongoing small-boat irregular migration that has boosted support for the right-wing Reform UK. External shocks, including volatile energy prices driven by the ongoing US-Iran conflict and the unpredictable trade and foreign policy approach of US President Donald Trump, also pose major risks to his premiership. Before taking office, Burnham will meet with King Charles III, the UK’s head of state, to formalize his appointment. He has pledged to honor Labour’s 2024 general election manifesto commitment not to raise the country’s core taxes. This pledge leaves him needing to find alternative funding sources to fill a £4.7 billion ($6.3 billion) four-year gap in the national defence investment plan, while also navigating the deeply contentious political issue of welfare reform.

The White House announced Thursday that U.S. President Donald Trump has placed his longtime personal teleprompter operator on unpaid administrative leave following explosive allegations that the staffer used insider access to profit from bets on prediction markets tied to the content of the president’s public speeches.

According to reporting from ABC News, the suspended staffer, Gabriel Perez, who has worked with Trump on managing his speech teleprompters since the former president’s 2016 campaign, allegedly earned more than $100,000 through wagers on the prediction platform Kalshi. The bets centered on guessing which specific words and phrases would be included in major Trump speeches, including February’s State of the Union address, the president’s remarks to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and a primetime national address delivered last December. ABC’s reporting also notes that Perez even adjusted his bets mid-speech when Trump deviated from prepared scripts, backing out of wagers when the president skipped planned lines containing keywords he had bet on.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the suspension to reporters, stating that both the president and her office viewed the alleged misconduct as “deeply unfortunate and frankly a disgrace.” Leavitt added that Perez will no longer serve in any capacity at the White House, noting that the decision to remove him was made directly by President Trump. When asked about Thursday evening’s scheduled national address from the president, which is focused on protecting U.S. election integrity, Leavitt confirmed that a new teleprompter operator would fill the role.

Officials from Kalshi, the prediction market where the wagers were placed, say their internal surveillance team first flagged the suspicious trading activity after unusual patterns jumped out to their analysis team. The platform quickly notified the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the U.S. federal regulator that oversees such trading platforms, and has turned over all collected evidence to regulators as part of the ongoing investigation. Robert DeNault, Kalshi’s head of enforcement, confirmed in a statement to AFP that the platform has fully cooperated with regulators, consistent with its standard protocols for suspicious activity referrals.

Kalshi also confirmed that more than $90,000 in alleged profits from Perez’s bets were frozen in his account before he could withdraw the funds, and that the parties are currently in negotiations over a potential settlement. The revelation comes amid growing national scrutiny of prediction markets over repeated insider trading concerns; such platforms are already outright banned in a number of countries, and this case marks the second high-profile insider trading scandal tied to U.S. insiders using prediction markets in recent months. A U.S. soldier is currently facing federal felony charges for using classified information about the January mission to capture former Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro to place winning bets, reportedly netting more than $400,000 in profits from the trades.

The White House has pushed back against suggestions that its internal ethics rules are lax, with Leavitt noting that the administration enforces “very strict ethical guidelines” that explicitly prohibit the kind of activity Perez is alleged to have engaged in. However, the incident raises new questions for the Trump administration: Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, has served as an advisor to Kalshi since January 2025, and publicly praised the platform after it correctly predicted Trump’s victory in the 2024 presidential election.

Nearly six years after his disputed 2020 presidential election loss, second-term U.S. President Donald Trump is preparing to deliver a primetime national address Thursday focused on what the White House frames as protecting election integrity, a move that has amplified partisan friction and stoked unease within his own Republican Party. The 80-year-old commander-in-chief has spent years amplifying unsubstantiated claims that widespread voter fraud cost him victory in the 2020 race, and this televised speech marks his latest high-profile push to advance that narrative ahead of November’s critical midterm congressional elections.

White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt confirmed the core focus of the 9:00 pm ET (0100 GMT Friday) address in comments to reporters, framing it as a necessary intervention to address widespread voter concerns about electoral processes. “President Trump will deliver a major address to the nation on protecting the integrity of our elections, and we encourage every American to tune in,” Leavitt said, adding that the speech would include what she described as fact-backed claims that would “shock” viewers. She did acknowledge, however, that Trump will likely open his remarks with brief mentions of two top voter priorities: the ongoing Iran war and soaring U.S. cost of living, issues that Republican leaders worry Trump has largely neglected in recent public messaging.

The path to Thursday’s address has been shrouded in incremental reveals. Trump first announced he would deliver a national speech this week on Monday, offering no details on its topic. A day later, he teased “really big news” related to “free and fair elections” but still declined to share substantive specifics about the address’s content.

New reporting from CBS News has shed light on underreported elements of the speech’s planned content: according to the outlet, Trump will lay out previously unrevealed allegations that China interfered in U.S. elections, including claims that Beijing gained unauthorized access to American voter data. He is also expected to accuse U.S. intelligence agencies—including the Central Intelligence Agency—of failing to disclose knowledge of the alleged Chinese interference to him during his first presidential term. CBS added that the heads of the CIA, FBI, Office of the Director of National Intelligence and Department of Homeland Security have all been invited to attend the speech in person.

A core policy priority tied to the speech is Trump’s push for Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, a sweeping piece of legislation that would install new voting restrictions across the U.S. Despite Trump’s aggressive lobbying, the bill has garnered little support even among congressional Republicans, who hold majority control of the chamber ahead of the midterms. Many of the bill’s requirements, such as proof of citizenship to register to vote, are already mandated by federal and state election laws. The proposal also adds new requirements for photo ID at polling places and imposes stricter limits on mail-in voting, a voting method Trump has repeatedly attacked since 2020.

Trump’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election, in which he lost to Democrat Joe Biden, has had lasting consequences for U.S. politics. In January 2021, months after the election was called, Trump incited a crowd of his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to block the certification of Biden’s victory, an act that led to his second impeachment during his first term. Now, as the country prepares for midterm elections that will determine control of the House and Senate for the final two years of Trump’s second term, the president faces a new threat: if Democrats retake control of the House of Representatives in November, he could be impeached for a third time.

This speech marks Trump’s first major national address since April 1 of this year, when he delivered his first full public justification for the U.S.-Israeli military campaign in Iran, more than a month after the operation launched. For many congressional Republicans, the decision to center a primetime national address on election integrity, rather than top voter priorities like the Iran conflict and cost of living, has sparked deep concern that the party is misaligned with what ordinary voters care about ahead of the high-stakes midterms. For their part, Democrats have pushed back hard against the speech, arguing that Trump is spreading unproven voter fraud claims to tilt public opinion in his party’s favor ahead of the November vote.

Two years after his high-profile bid to challenge Vladimir Putin in Russia’s 2024 presidential election, prominent anti-war Russian politician Boris Nadezhdin finds himself trapped in a escalating standoff with Kremlin authorities, barred from exiting the country and facing criminal charges that could keep him behind bars for months or longer.

Nadezhdin, 61, first rose to public prominence when he launched an independent campaign against Putin, a leader who has systematically eliminated organized political opposition in Russia. His platform centered on ending Russia’s more than four-year-long military campaign in Ukraine, a war that has been accompanied by sweeping domestic censorship and harsh repression of anti-war sentiment. Now, he is set to appear in court Friday on charges of extremism, following his arrest earlier this week.

Weeks before September’s tightly controlled parliamentary elections, Nadezhdin had been preparing to run as an independent anti-war candidate in the race. He told Agence France-Presse in an interview outside his home in Dolgoprudny, a commuter town just outside Moscow, that Putin’s leadership is pushing the nation toward catastrophe. “We must tell people the truth: the course Putin is steering the country on is a path towards chaos — and perhaps, God forbid, even toward disaster,” Nadezhdin said.

The politician, who broke with the Kremlin in 2020 after holding government posts in the 1990s, told AFP he never expected to remain free for this long following his 2024 presidential challenge. Back then, he rallied thousands of Russians to gather signatures to secure a spot on the ballot, a show of grassroots support that caught the attention of authorities. “Honestly, for two years, I was waiting for them to make me a foreign agent or force me to leave, but it never happened,” he said.

That changed earlier this month, when armed police arrested Nadezhdin on Monday. He says he believes he was intended to be imprisoned immediately after the arrest, but a last-minute change of plans at the highest levels of government let him remain at home pending his court date. Already, authorities have labeled him a “foreign agent,” a designation that opens individuals up to continuous legal scrutiny and public marginalization. The new extremism charge stems from a 2023 social media video Nadezhdin shared, which briefly included an image of late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian prison last year. Nadezhdin dismissed the charge as baseless “nonsense,” arguing authorities acted out of fear that his anti-war platform would gain traction in the parliamentary vote.

“Right now, every single deputy is for Putin, for the war and so on. And there was going to be someone different. I think that was the reason,” he explained. The charge carries a maximum 15-day short-term jail sentence, but like many other Kremlin critics, Nadezhdin faces the risk of being caught in the so-called “prison carousel,” a system where authorities repeatedly re-arrest defendants on new short-term charges to keep them in custody indefinitely. A conviction would also bar him permanently from running for public office, eliminating his ability to participate in the September vote.

After his brief initial detention, Nadezhdin’s family, shaken by the arrest, urged him to flee Russia to avoid imprisonment. But Nadezhdin, who has lived in Dolgoprudny his entire life, said that leaving his home at 61 years old is not a simple choice, and he opted to wait for Friday’s court ruling to decide his next steps. His window for exile closed on Thursday, when he received official notification that authorities had banned him from leaving the country, effectively making the choice for him.

In the lead-up to his arrest, Nadezhdin’s campaign had made quiet progress: volunteers distributed thousands of “for peace” election leaflets across his district for weeks, and even managed to open an official campaign headquarters before the crackdown. Nadezhdin has argued that the consequences of the war are now visible to all Russians, pointing to worsening fuel shortages caused by intensifying Ukrainian strikes across Russian territory. Though he has not outlined specific terms for ending the war, nor called for Russia to withdraw from the territories it seized, Nadezhdin has repeatedly called on voters to reject Putin’s ruling United Russia party.

As the September election approaches, coming more than four and a half years after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Putin’s domestic approval ratings have softened, and the Kremlin has tightened its grip on the electoral process to prevent any unexpected opposition gains. Even amid sweeping restrictions on political activity, Nadezhdin says he remains committed to pushing for change through legal, electoral means. He argues that efforts to elect anti-war candidates are the first step toward his ultimate goal: a peaceful transfer of power in Russia. “I always act strictly within the law — until the end,” he said. “These efforts must be aimed at bringing about a peaceful change of power in Russia.”

Four years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a sudden political shakeup by President Volodymyr Zelensky has sparked rare public unrest across the war-torn nation, as thousands took to the streets this Thursday to denounce the ousting of popular reformist Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.

Fedorov, who was appointed to the defence portfolio just six months prior, had quickly built a reputation as an agent of change for Ukraine’s beleaguered military. Tasked with rooting out long-standing graft and modernizing armed forces strained by years of combat, crippling manpower shortages, and widespread fatigue, he led sweeping overhauls of military digitization, implemented open, transparent procurement processes, and accelerated the development and deployment of long-range drone capabilities that have recently become one of Ukraine’s most effective asymmetric tools against Russian forces. Under his leadership, the Ukrainian government also raised frontline soldiers’ salaries and introduced landmark plans for phased demobilization, a long-sought reform for troops who have been deployed for years.

But his aggressive push to upend entrenched systems put him on a collision course with top military leadership, culminating in his removal as part of a broader cabinet reshuffle announced by Zelensky this week. In a fiery post-ouster press conference in Kyiv, Fedorov delivered a blistering public rebuke to Ukraine’s newly appointed Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky, accusing the top general of sowing national division and issuing a formal ultimatum to Zelensky demanding his firing.

“Instead of focusing on how to defeat Russia through asymmetric tactics — that is the commander-in-chief’s core job — he has focused on splitting this country,” Fedorov told reporters, standing in front of a display of images of military drones. “In this configuration, I personally don’t know how to win the war.”

By late Thursday, thousands of Fedorov’s supporters had gathered in public spaces across major Ukrainian cities to protest the decision. In central Kyiv, AFP correspondents counted more than 1,000 demonstrators, who sang the Ukrainian national anthem, waved national and European Union flags, and chanted calls for Fedorov’s reinstatement and slogans decrying the decision as shameful.

“I believe that his dismissal is a slap in the face of the Ukrainian people,” 30-year-old Kyiv business owner Vlada Roman told AFP at the rally. “Zelensky is afraid of effective people. I hope after today’s rally, he will change his mind.”

Unrest was also reported in other major population centers including Lviv, Odesa, and Dnipro, a rare development in wartime Ukraine, where broad national unity in the face of invasion has mostly quelled public dissent against Zelensky’s leadership. In recent months, however, growing public frustration over high-profile corruption scandals, mismanagement of military mobilization and conscription, and the prolonged stalemate of the war has sparked intermittent waves of public outcry.

The political aftershocks of Fedorov’s ouster quickly spread, with Ukraine’s deputy air force commander Pavlo Yelizarov announcing his resignation in protest of the decision. Political analysts have framed the reshuffle as a clear win for Syrsky and entrenched military interests, noting that Zelensky opted to side with the uniformed leadership over an outsider minister pushing for systemic change.

“He fell out with various generals and with different established drone suppliers. In other words, he really did start implementing many useful reforms that threatened certain vested interests,” said political analyst Anatoliy Oktysiuk. He added that Zelensky’s decision to remove Fedorov has “undermined himself politically” at a critical moment in the conflict.

Supporters of Fedorov have described his removal as political retribution for his anti-corruption and modernization efforts. The shakeup also comes at a particularly sensitive moment for Ukraine’s war effort: after months of Russian territorial advances, Kyiv’s forces have recently managed to halt Russia’s momentum, and have launched consistent long-range drone strikes targeting Russian energy infrastructure and military positions, putting Ukraine in one of its strongest operational positions in months. Fedorov’s removal has cast uncertainty over the future of the military reforms that have supported these recent gains.

International observers and Ukrainian stakeholders have also raised questions about how the change will be received by Ukraine’s key Western backers, who have long pushed for greater anti-corruption and military modernization reforms in Kyiv. On Thursday, the European Union Ambassador to Ukraine publicly praised Fedorov, crediting him with securing a “victory in cognitive warfare” for Ukraine.

Current Interior Minister Igor Klymenko is widely regarded as the most likely candidate to replace Fedorov, though it remains unclear whether he will secure enough votes in Ukraine’s parliament to confirm the appointment. In a separate move Thursday, Ukraine’s parliament also confirmed Sergiy Koretsky, the former head of state energy firm Naftogaz, as the country’s new prime minister as part of the broader cabinet reshuffle.