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French leftists move to shore up alliance ahead of snap elections

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French leftists move to shore up alliance ahead of snap elections

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Leaders of France’s leftwing New Popular Front moved to shore up their new alliance for forthcoming snap elections after it was rocked by a far-left party purge of moderates.

Far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon enraged colleagues and the leaders of other parties late on Friday when he removed several of his critics and proponents of the alliance from his party’s list of candidates.

He included in the list Adrien Quatennens, a protégé and controversial MP from Mélenchon’s France Insoumise — France Unbowed, or LFI — party, who has a conviction for domestic violence, prompting a furious reaction from other NPF leaders.

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On Saturday, Mélenchon was defiant about his purge, telling news outlet 20minutes.fr that “political coherence and loyalty in the left’s largest parliamentary group are imperative for governing”.

But on Sunday, Quatennens withdrew his candidacy in what appeared to signal a partial retreat by Mélenchon.

Mélenchon, a deeply polarising politician, suggested he would not insist on becoming prime minister if the left emerged from the election with the most seats. A Mélenchon premiership would be a troubling prospect for the other left parties and many voters.

Adrien Quatennens has withdrawn from the election after his inclusion on France Insoumise’s list of candidates prompted a furious reaction © Adrien Quatennens Youtube Channel/AFP via Getty Images

“If you don’t think I should be prime minister, I won’t,” he told France TV, addressing his NPF comrades.

The creation of a united leftwing front is a crucial development in the run-up to the elections on June 30 and July 7. It could seriously harm the prospects of candidates for Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance by making it much harder for them to qualify for the second-round run-off.

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The leftwing parties are deeply divided on the economy, EU policy and Ukraine, but have buried their differences to maximise their chances against Marine Le Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National.

They have united behind a joint programme with a radical tax-and-spend agenda, adding to investors’ jitters ahead of the election. Mélenchon said the left’s programme envisaged tax rises worth €123bn a year.

In a sign of the commitment to the new alliance — which spans Eurosceptic far-left populists and pro-EU social democrats — former socialist president François Hollande said he would run for parliament as an NPF candidate.

However, Mélenchon’s purge of his party just hours after the New Popular Front’s campaign launch created serious strains within the alliance. Olivier Faure, the socialist chief, called it “scandalous”.

“It’s totally petty, small of him, settling scores when the challenge now is to prevent the far right from taking power,” Alexis Corbières, one of the MPs removed as a candidate, told France Info.

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Another, Raquel Garrido, posted on X: “Shame on you, Jean-Luc Mélenchon. This is sabotage. But I can do better. We can do better.”

Political parties are scrambling to assemble their lists of candidates for the election before the deadline of 18.00 on Sunday.

Hollande’s candidacy in his home region of Corrèze took his colleagues by surprise. If elected, Hollande would become only the second former head of state to take a seat in the National Assembly since the start of France’s fifth republic. The other was Valéry Giscard d’Estaing.

Hollande said it was “an exceptional decision for an exceptional situation”, given that the far right is closer to power than at any moment since France’s liberation from Nazi occupation in 1945.

To salvage as many seats as possible, Macron’s centrist alliance is trying to strike reciprocal local deals not to stand against each other with centre-right candidates that refuse to back RN.

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The centre-right Les Républicains party is also in disarray after its leader Éric Ciotti unilaterally agreed an alliance with the far right

Furious colleagues on the party’s executive unanimously voted to expel Ciotti, but the decision was overturned by a Paris court on Friday night, leaving it unclear who was in charge of the list of candidates.

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Want to own a real T. rex? It could cost you $30 million

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Want to own a real T. rex? It could cost you  million

“Gus,” a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton, is pictured during a press preview at Sotheby’s in New York City on July 1.

Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images


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Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images

If you ever wanted to own an actual T. rex and not just a toy, you now have a chance. But it’s going to cost you some bones. Millions of them.

The Tyrannosaurus rex fossil known as “Gus” will go up for auction Tuesday morning at Sotheby’s New York City office. The starting bid for the dinosaur is $19 million and the auction house estimates it could sell for $20 to $30 million.

Gus was found in Harding County, S.D., on private land in 2021, according to Sotheby’s. The T. rex skeleton, which is 38 feet long and 12 and half feet tall, is believed to be from the late Cretaceous period from about 67 million years ago.

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“Judging from the overall size and degree of bone development it can be determined that Gus’ skeleton belonged to a very large, robust, adult individual,” the auction house said in the listing.

Thomas Heitkamp, president of Theropoda Expeditions, the company that excavated the site, said in a Sotheby’s video about the discovery that nearly a thousand pieces were collected.

The creature is named after the owner of the ranch where it was discovered, Gary “Gus” Licking. He died during the excavation process, which ran through 2023, and was not able to see Gus fully assembled, according to Cassandra Hatton of Sotheby’s.

“Gary had for years roamed around his 6,500 acre property and seeing T. rex teeth and little bits of fossils and such, and he realized that there was probably something really important under the ground,” Hatton said in the video.

Gus is one of the largest and most complete T. rex specimens ever found, according to Sotheby’s.

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It’s not the first time dinosaur bones have been for sale to the highest bidder.

The first auction for a dinosaur was held by Sotheby’s in 1997. The creature, a T. rex named Sue, was purchased by a few large companies for the Field Museum in Chicago. It went for $8.4 million.

In 2024, Apex the stegosaurus sold for $44.6 million, the most ever for a dinosaur fossil. It was purchased by billionaire investor Ken Griffin, who loaned it to the American Natural History Museum in New York for four years.

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Map: 4.1-Magnitude Earthquake Shakes Southern California

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Map: 4.1-Magnitude Earthquake Shakes Southern California

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Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 3 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “weak,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown.  All times on the map are Pacific time. The New York Times

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A light, 4.1-magnitude earthquake struck in Southern California on Sunday, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The temblor happened at 3:38 a.m. Pacific time about 1 mile southeast of Frazier Park, Calif., data from the agency shows.

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U.S.G.S. data earlier reported that the magnitude was 4.4.

As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.

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Aftershocks detected

Subsequent quakes have been reported in the same area. Such temblors are typically aftershocks caused by minor adjustments along the portion of a fault that slipped at the time of the initial earthquake.

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Quakes and aftershocks within 100 miles

Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.

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When quakes and aftershocks occurred

 All times are Pacific time. The New York Times

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Sources: United States Geological Survey (epicenter, aftershocks, shake intensity); LandScan via Oak Ridge National Laboratory (population density) | Notes: Shaking categories are based on the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale. When aftershock data is available, the corresponding maps and charts include earthquakes within 100 miles and seven days of the initial quake. All times above are Pacific time. Shake data is as of Sunday, July 12 at 11:54 a.m. Eastern. Aftershocks data is as of Sunday, July 12 at 2:24 p.m. Eastern.

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Mexico-US relations are already strained, but experts say they’re about to get worse | CNN

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Mexico-US relations are already strained, but experts say they’re about to get worse | CNN

The death of a Mexican man in Houston at the hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement is threatening to upend already-strained relations between Mexico and the United States.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum took the unusual step of announcing at a press conference on Thursday that Mexico is seeking civil and criminal investigations in the US related to the deaths of 17 Mexican nationals during immigration enforcement operations or at detention centers.

These investigations aim to “protect the human rights of Mexicans in the United States,” the Mexican government said.

The impetus for the announcement was the ICE shooting death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas last week. ICE officials said agents shot Salgado Araujo, whom they said was in the US illegally, after he rammed a law enforcement vehicle and refused to follow verbal commands during a traffic stop.

His family has disputed ICE’s account, telling CNN that the 52-year-old father of three would have stopped if he had known the car that followed him belonged to law enforcement.

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At her press conference announcing the request for criminal investigations, Sheinbaum also called for petitions to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Asked about Sheinbaum’s comments, the US Department of Homeland Security defended ICE’s actions.

“ICE agents are trained to use the minimum necessary force to resolve dangerous situations to prioritize the safety of the public and our officers,” the agency said.

The agency also said that detainees in ICE custody “receive full due process, are provided with adequate food, water, and medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their families and attorneys.”

Analysts who spoke with CNN said that Salgado’s death and Mexico’s response may signal a major rift between Mexican and US authorities.

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“This is no minor incident,” said José Luis Valdés Ugalde, academic at the Center for Research on North America at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). “It affects the bilateral relationship and the pending issues that Mexico and the United States have before them,” including “security, migration, and trade.”

International affairs expert and newspaper columnist Fausto Pretelin said the relationship between Mexico and the United States was at “its worst moment” in the aftermath of the killing of Salgado Araujo. But he thinks Sheinbaum’s actions will damage relations further, for little more than political points gained within Mexico.

“It’s a performance,” Pretelin said of Sheinbaum’s announcement. “The opportunity to take these issues seriously is lost. And when I say seriously, I mean that diplomatic channels should be used.”

Yet some might argue that diplomatic channels have seen plenty of traffic, especially on this issue. Mexico’s government has already issued 11 diplomatic notes of protest to the US over the deaths of its citizens, Foreign Minister Roberto Velasco told reporters.

Now, his country had to go “beyond the diplomatic realm.”

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While Pretelin and Valdés Ugalde have warned that Sheinbaum’s announcement spells trouble for US-Mexico relations, some experts believe that the Mexican president hasn’t gone nearly far enough.

Academic and columnist Tomás Milton Muñoz Bravo, professor of international relations at UNAM, says that this type of response should have come much earlier.

“It’s incredible that 17 deaths had to occur for Mexican authorities to finally announce a strategy that goes beyond the merely diplomatic to the judicial,” said Muñoz Bravo. “Of course, the announcement has been made, but I still want to see the actions that have been stated actually develop.”

Yet Valdés Ugalde points out that the US shows no signs of caring about Mexican criticisms of its immigration policy. Likewise, Valdés Ugalde said, Mexico has not known how to defend the migrant community and has made what he describes as “mistakes” in its foreign policy.

One of these, according to Valdés Ugalde, has been rejecting extradition requests for politicians allegedly linked to drug trafficking on the grounds of national sovereignty. This has given the Trump administration an opening to retaliate in other areas, such as the renegotiation of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which protects many Mexican exports from American tariffs.

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“There are no signs of rebuilding the relationship; the relationship is very damaged by the attitudes of both governments and by Mexico’s defensive stance,” Valdés Ugalde said.

Muñoz Bravo said that the November midterm elections in the US could open an opportunity for Mexico if Republicans lose their control of Congress.

“What we’re going to see in November is extremely important,” he said. If Trump “does not have a majority in the chambers, there will be checks and balances that will even allow for room to negotiate with other actors in the United States.”

Until then, tensions between the neighbors remain high, with any further deaths of Mexican migrants threatening to deepen the rift.

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