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    'Extremist' Salmond mocked for enlisting Robert the Bruce Sir John Major urges ethics rules overhaul after Cameron Greensill row LibDems accused of breaking mourning pledge day after Prince Philip's death Coronavirus latest news: Follow updates in our live blog Subscribe to The Telegraph for a month-long free trial Rishi Sunak will swerve a series of awkward questions in the Commons today, where he was to be grilled on his involvement in awarding Greensill Capital a Covid loan. The Chancellor, who was sent private text messages by David Cameron last year to ask for help for the finance firm, had been expected to explain how it was accredited for the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Scheme (CLBILS). It would have been the first time he had spoken in the chamber since March 9, more than a month ago. However, small business minister Paul Scully is appearing instead. Labour sources noted that Mr Sunak had only appeared once between the end of November and the Budget, dodging three Treasury questions. They added: "The Chancellor is happy to stand in front of a camera when it suits him, but won't answer questions about his involvement in the biggest lobbying scandal for a generation. What's he got to hide?" But a Treasury source explained “After a year of these schemes being in place and a very detailed letter last week setting out the difference between them, Labour still don’t get that CLBILS is not a Treasury lead.” Follow the latest updates below.

  • Monday Sunrise Briefing: Iran facility sabotaged. Are we safer?

    Good morning! Welcome to your Monday, April 12, 2021, sunrise briefing. Here are three news events - a blackout in Iran, GOP disunity, and British film awards - this past weekend (while you may have been planting arborvitae trees, grilling shrimp, and enjoying an offline life). Also, what to look for in the news this week.

  • A ‘red flag’ gun law would save lives. Will NC do the right thing this time?

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  • There’s Nothing ‘Hypocritical’ About Punishing Georgia for Punishing Voters

    Scott McIntyre/GettyWhen Major League Baseball relocated the All-Star Game from Atlanta to Denver in response to Georgia’s new voting law, Fox News was quick to react. “Is the White House concerned that Major League baseball is moving their All-Star Game to Colorado, where voting regulations are very similar to Georgia?” Fox News reporter Peter Doocy asked White House press secretary Jen Psaki last week.The network also featured Brian Kemp, governor of Georgia and former secretary of state there, claiming that it was “hypocritical” to move the game to Colorado, which, after all, has only half the number of early voting days and more strenuous ID requirements than those the new Georgia law has enacted. In a Republican National Lawyers Association Q&A this week, Kemp said the battle over the law—which pits Georgia-based companies and voting-rights activists against the state’s Republicans—represented the “fight of our lives” against “cancel culture.”All of this misses the point. It is futile to attempt an apples-to-apples comparison of one state’s voting policies to another’s, because there are wide variations in local voting cultures, demographics, geographies, and legal idiosyncrasies. Comparing Georgia’s voting requirements to Colorado’s without this context is like asking why you can play Beethoven on a piano but not a tambourine, as both happen to be instruments.Whoopi Goldberg Cuts Off Meghan McCain’s MLB Georgia Rant: ‘Are You Done?’For example, although it is factually true that Georgia has double the number of early voting days as Colorado, it’s important to acknowledge that most Georgians vote in person while almost no Coloradans do. To say that this is an advantage over Colorado is to fundamentally misunderstand how Coloradans vote. And the proof is in the numbers: Turnout in 2020 was 10 percentage points higher in Colorado than it was in Georgia. It’s unpersuasive to claim that your state is the same as another state when the results are so different, akin to two stores with the exact same security policies but with far different rates of theft because, say, one store is in a mall and the other is in an outdoor market.These misleading comparisons between states show the need for a smarter measuring stick. We should compare states to themselves. Would this bill make voting in this state harder to access than the current rules do? That standard would enable appropriate scrutiny of states that choose to make their own laws worse, negating the need for red-state-blue-state pissing matches, and instead holding the line and demanding states don’t undo their own good work.“If we want to talk about comparing one state to comparing the other, let’s see what trajectory they’re on,” Bob Brandon, president and CEO of the nonpartisan Fair Elections Center, recently told NBC News. Similarly, Justin Levitt, law professor at Loyola Law School at Loyola Marymount University in California, rejected state-by-state comparisons. Having an outdated law on the books is a lot different from “looking back on that law, in the current context, and saying, ‘Yeah, we need one of those,’” he said. “‘Somebody else screwed up’ is not an excuse for screwing up. That’s the inane part about whatabout-ism.”But that whatabout-ism is how politicians and the media have been focusing their attention. They are distracted by essentially meaningless rankings of states’ “ease of access,” pulled from data that is not uniformly collected or may be entirely based on one activism group’s interpretation of the laws as expansive or restrictive—hardly scientific comparisons. Today, conservative media outlets superficially compare the Georgia law to other states with no context. Not a single one has asked, “Does this make it easier for the exact same people in the same state to vote in the way they just did?” The restrictions of the new law may not affect turnout, but they won’t make voting easier or elections better either. It is far simpler, and more logical, to question whether a state is improving or worsening its own standards, and in light of what the standards have been in the immediate past.Take Kentucky. It is the only state with a Republican-controlled legislature that has passed bills so far this session to expand voting access. The state will now have three days of early voting, up from none, and firmer security and ease of access measures around absentee voting. It helps that the state has a governor with a “D” by his name, and also that Kentucky didn’t have to do much to make voting easier. As part of its response to the pandemic, Kentucky offered early and absentee voting for the first time. Once voters realized what a hassle voting had been when they only had a single day to vote in person in the middle of the week, there was no turning back. The voters demanded it become law.Most Republican-controlled state legislatures are poised to do the opposite: Legislation has been introduced that would make laws materially worse for voters, all based on the lie that the election was compromised by fraud. The Georgia law, while it does expand early voting and is a far cry from the horrors of the original legislation, will still produce new barriers for Georgians compared with access in 2020. It gives the state far stricter controls over the counties, essentially makes dropboxes useless, and prevents elections officials from sending absentee-ballot applications out to voters proactively. It also allows partisan groups to challenge the eligibility of an infinite number of voters, with essentially no limitations.Conservatives have also found a carrier for their grievances in the idea that blue states with restrictive voter laws are ignored while red states that introduce the same laws have big baseball games ripped away from them. Connecticut has no early voting at all. Neither does Delaware, the home of President Joe Biden. New Jersey just adopted nine days, the fifth-shortest window in the country, and New York only has 10. Connecticut, Delaware, and New Jersey also have far more restrictive absentee-ballot requirements than almost every state, including those in the Republican South. So why, they ask, do the Republican states end up getting all the criticism?While as a Texan I have long harbored the same frustration—when I lived in New York, for example, I could only vote in in-person at my precinct on Election Day (the 10 early days were introduced last year), and in Texas I can vote for 15 days anywhere in the county—the argument is unproductive. With the latest round of voting legislation, blue states are moving far more rapidly toward modern standards while Republican states are aggressively attempting to roll back what little advantages they had over their bluer counterparts (assuming, of course, they ever really had them). Since I’ve left New York, it has adopted early voting and updated its absentee-ballot requirements. It has implemented ranked-choice voting and synchronized federal and state primary schedules.Meanwhile, my home state has gone rapidly in the other direction. As in Georgia and other Republican-led states, proposals in Texas would restrict access to some of its best voting policies by banning drive-through voting (implemented with great success by Harris County, home of Houston), limiting absentee ballots and reducing early voting. Even the most draconian of these laws will still allow voters more time to vote early than those in Delaware, Connecticut, and New Jersey—but that’s not much comfort to a Texan.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

  • Panthers are giving Sam Darnold a chance to succeed, fair or not

    Matt Rhule did not name Sam Darnold the team’s starting quarterback during Monday’s virtual press conference.

  • Police officer who pepper-sprayed US Army soldier fired

    The black army lieutenant filed a lawsuit against two policemen in Virginia after a traffic stop turned violent.

  • NAACP calls to end qualified immunity in Virginia after police officer pepper-sprayed Black and Latino Army officer

    A Virginia police officer accused of pepper-spraying a Black and Latino military officer during a traffic stop in December has been fired.

  • OnPolitics: The battle for the GOP's soul

    The GOP continues to struggle to maintain party unity after former President Donald Trump's election loss.

  • Hornets get some rare good injury news with P.J. Washington’s status

    The Hornets are already down two starters due to injury, but it looks like that number won’t increase to three for Tuesday’s game vs. the LA Lakers.

  • Biden meets with bipartisan group on $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan, saying he's open to negotiate

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  • William, Harry remember Prince Philip's wit, service to UK

    Princes William and Harry paid tribute Monday to their grandfather, Prince Philip, remembering his wit, sense of duty and barbecue skills. The brothers, who are at the center of a royal family rift, issued separate statements about Philip, who died last week at 99. Prince Harry, who stepped away from royal duties last year and now lives in California, has arrived in the U.K. to attend Philip's funeral service Saturday at Windsor Castle.

  • One person dead and a police officer shot and injured at a high school in Knoxville, Tennessee

    Knoxville Police Department said there were no other known gunshot victims and that the high school had been secured.

  • The exchange project uniting young Americans during the pandemic

    Teenagers from across the US are coming together to discuss their vastly differing backgrounds.

  • Attack on Iran's Natanz plant muddies US, Iran nuke talks

    The attack on Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility is casting a major shadow over the resumption of indirect talks between the U.S. and Iran over resurrection of the international accord limiting Iran's nuclear program. Neither Iran nor the U.S. say the incident will crater the negotiations.

  • John Boehner on His New Book, the Rise of Donald Trump and the Future of the GOP

    Former House Speaker John Boehner speaks at a ceremony to unveil a portrait in his honor at the U.S. Capitol on November 19, 2019 in Washington, DC. John Boehner left office months before the biggest political story of the decade played out: Donald Trump won the Republican presidential nomination, became President, and redefined the Republican Party. Boehner, who announced his resignation in 2015 with such relief that he sang zip-a-dee-doo-dah, watched Trump’s rise from afar, apparently glad to be out of the political fray.

  • Prince William paid tribute to his 'extraordinary' grandfather Prince Philip, saying his life was 'defined by service'

    Prince William's statement on Prince Philip's death was published on the Royal Family's website on Monday.

  • The Minnesota Twins and Timberwolves have postponed their games after Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, was fatally shot by police

    Daunte Wright, 20, was killed by a police officer in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, a northern suburb of Minneapolis, on Sunday.

  • Missouri lawmakers send tax benefits for foster, adoptive parents to Parson’s desk

    The legislation was a top priority for Republican leaders in the Missouri House.

  • Top Treasury official to be grilled over David Cameron Greensill lobbying saga

    A top mandarin is to be grilled over text messages sent by David Cameron as committee chairs are in talks about launching an inquiry into Greensill. Sir Tom Scholar, Permanent Secretary at The Treasury, will appear before the Public Accounts Committee on April 22, where he will be asked questions about Greensill, a finance firm advised by the former prime minister which sought access to government coronavirus support funding. The Telegraph understands that discussions are underway along Parliament’s select committee corridor about a bigger inquiry, with two senior members of committees currently working closely together so as not to “overlap” witnesses. One senior Tory MP said the Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case, is due to come before the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee "in the next couple of weeks". He said while it would be a "routine appearance" he was "sure Greensill will be a feature of it". It comes after further revelations regarding the lobbying row over the collapsed lender found the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, met Mr Cameron and Lex Greensill for a "private drink" to discuss a new payment scheme for the NHS in 2019, according to The Sunday Times. Mr Greensill's firm at the time wanted to introduce a flexible scheme to pay doctors and nurses either daily or weekly. NHS SBS, a joint venture between the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and a French IT firm, went on to announce in October last year that Earnd, a mobile app that was then a division of Greensill, would be available free-of-charge to NHS employees to access their pay. Mr Hancock referred Mr Greensill to work directly with the NHS rather than his department, according to an ally of his, who insisted the final decision to use the scheme was for local NHS employers. "Matt acted in entirely the correct way - he updated officials on the business that was discussed, as is appropriate," the friend said. Mr Hancock is the fourth minister to have been lobbied by Mr Cameron on behalf of the company, with Rishi Sunak and Treasury ministers Jesse Norman and John Glen also having been contacted by him. It was also revealed that the Treasury reconsidered Mr Greensill's application for an emergency coronavirus loan after Mr Cameron messaged a senior adviser to Boris Johnson. Mr Cameron was said to have described the decision to exclude his employer's firm, Greensill Capital, from the multibillion-pound scheme as "nuts" and pressed for the Chancellor to reconsider. On April 3 last year Mr Cameron emailed: "What we need is for Rishi (Sunak) to have a good look at this and ask officials to find a way of making it work.” Sir Alistair Graham, a former chairman of the committee on standards in public life, told Sky News the lobbying raised “big questions” about "ministers who leave office who get very well paid jobs in the private sector that could almost be seen an extension to their pension arrangements." He added: “I think there are important lessons to learn and new rules may be required". While Mr Cameron has not commented publicly on the allegations, a source close to him said: "David Cameron was an enthusiastic champion of Greensill's pay product, Earnd, and met with various people to discuss its rollout across the NHS." Meg Hillier, chairwoman of the Public Accounts Committee, told The Telegraph that there are “many questions about Greensill's access to Government”. She said: “The Government had to act fast at the beginning of the pandemic but it had no licence to act fast and loose. "Too often, as the PAC and NAO have highlighted, basic checks were not carried out. And transparency over decisions made- particularly in awarding contracts has been poor. We need to know why and how Greensill secured what seems to be preferential access to cabinet ministers, officials and schemes. “The fact that information is only dripping out shows a woeful attitude to transparency about how Greensill got this access.” A DHSC spokesman said: "Our approach was and is that local NHS employers are best placed to decide how different pay flexibilities fit with their overall pay and reward offer for their staff." A No 10 spokesman: "Throughout the pandemic, an immense number of businesses contacted Downing Street with representations; these were passed on to relevant departments." James Kirkup: David Cameron's anti-cronyism rings hollow now

  • 10 Things in Politics: GOP's new power base is in South Florida

    And who's behind efforts to recall California Gov. Gavin Newsom.