As he addressed reporters at the conclusion of the Nato conference on Thursday, Joe Biden sent a defiant message to his critics: I’m not going anywhere. Despite demands from dozens of Democratic lawmakers that he withdraw from the presidential race following his disastrous debate performance, Biden argued he was the best candidate to defeat Donald Trump in November.

“I think I’m the most qualified person to run for president. I beat him once, and I will beat him again,” Biden said. “There’s a long way to go in this campaign, and so I – I’m just going to keep moving.”

That message did not assuage some skeptics in Biden’s party, as three more House Democrats called on the president to drop out in the hours after the press conference. Biden and his team have not yet quieted critics’ concerns, but the president’s detractors have few options beyond their public pressure campaign to get him to step aside.

With just one month left before the Democrats convene in Chicago for their convention, the party has limited time to determine who will be on the top of the ticket in November.

Here’s what you need to know about Biden’s path forward:

Joe Biden was headed for the battleground state of Michigan on Friday, to campaign both for re-election and for his survival as the Democratic presidential nominee.

In Washington, calls for the 81-year-old president to quit continued, while the Democratic leader in the House of Representatives said he had discussed the issue with Biden on Thursday, after Biden’s press conference following the Nato summit.

In a letter to colleagues, Hakeem Jeffries of New York said discussions about Biden’s age and fitness for office had been “candid, clear-eyed and comprehensive”.

“On behalf of the House Democratic caucus,” he said, “I requested and was graciously granted a private meeting with President Joe Biden.

“That meeting occurred yesterday evening … I directly expressed the full breadth of insight, heartfelt perspectives and conclusions about the path forward.”

Biden’s response was not disclosed, nor details of Democratic “conclusions”. But as the letter was released, an 18th congressional Democrat said Biden should let someone else face Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, in November.

The 19th Democrat to say Biden should go, Mike Levin of California, was reported by Politico to have told the president so to his face on Friday, during a virtual meeting with the Congressional Hispanic caucus. Levin then stated his position publicly.

Politico also quoted a “pro-Biden Democrat who attended the meeting” as saying the president “sounded very lucid, sharp, engaged”.

There was further worrying news for Democrats when the New York Times reported that so long as Biden remains the nominee, major donors will put on hold “roughly $90m in pledged donations”.

The Sunrise Movement also called for Biden to quit. Aru Shiney-Ajay, executive director of the youth-led climate-focused activist group, said she was “concerned Joe Biden isn’t in a position to mobilise young voters and win”.

As Biden headed for Detroit, the capital remained abuzz. At the Nato summit on Thursday, Biden spoke assertively and showed his foreign policy experience but also made embarrassing slips, introducing Volodymyr Zelenskiy of Ukraine as “President Putin” and referring to Kamala Harris, his vice-president, as “Vice-President Trump”.

Trump seized on that, posting on social media: “Crooked Joe begins his ‘Big Boy’ press conference with, ‘I wouldn’t have picked Vice-President Trump to be vice-president, though I think she was not qualified to be president.’ Great job, Joe!”

Biden had appeared to say: “Look, I wouldn’t have picked Vice-President Trump to be vice-president [if] I think she’s not qualified to be president.”

Online, Biden fired back, posting: “By the way: Yes, I know the difference. One’s a prosecutor, and the other’s a felon.”

Trump, 78 and facing questions about his own cognitive fitness, was convicted on 34 charges arising from hush-money payments to an adult film star. He faces 54 other criminal charges, concerning election subversion and retention of classified information, and was fined millions of dollars in civil cases over business fraud and defamation arising from a rape allegation a judge called “substantially true”.

Harris came to prominence as a prosecutor in San Francisco before becoming attorney general of California, a US senator and Biden’s running mate.

Michigan is a swing state, choosing Trump in 2016 and Biden in 2020, its Black voters a key part of Biden’s support. The Oscar-winning actor Octavia Spencer was set to appear with Biden in Detroit on Friday.

Biden’s campaign said he would target Project 2025, a policy plan led by the Heritage Foundation, a rightwing thinktank. Trump has tried to disavow the project, which Democrats say shows his extremist agenda.

There was good news for Biden on Friday: a poll showing him improving since the disastrous debate against Trump in Atlanta that pitched Democrats into crisis.

“Biden actually gained a point since last month’s survey, which was taken before the debate,” wrote Domenico Montanaro of NPR, which carried out the poll with PBS and Marist. “He leads Trump 50%-48% in a head-to-head matchup. But Biden slips when third-party options are introduced, with Trump [leading] 43%-42%.”

But Politico noted telling dissonance in responses to Biden’s Nato performance. One unnamed Biden aide said the president exceeded expectations and had some great lines. A Democratic aide said Biden had “lowered the bar … until it’s on the floor”.

Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the dean of the Congressional Black caucus, told NBC Biden “sometimes mangles words and phrases but all of that is almost natural for people who grew up stuttering”.

He added: “He has one of the best minds that I have ever been around … and so I would hope that we would focus on the substance of this man … and how he has run this country.

“… The conversation should focus on the record of this administration, on the alternative in this election, and let Joe Biden make his own decisions about his future.

“If he decides to change his mind later on then we will respond to that. We have until 19 August to open our convention” in Chicago.

Asked “Is this the same Joe Biden that we saw four years ago?”, Clyburn said: “No!”

“I’m not the same Jim Clyburn that I was four years ago and in 10 days I’ll be 84. But I’m a bit wiser than I was before … It’s biblical. When I became a man I put away childish things. Joe Biden has put away childish things because he has become a man. His opponent [Trump] is still a child.”

Biden, Clyburn said, “knows what a democracy is all about.”

In the two weeks since that disastrous debate performance, Joe Biden has been busy.

He spent the first few days visiting donors, trying to reassure his financiers that he was up to the job. Then – more than a week later – he kicked off his public reconciliation tour, holding a series of interviews as he seeks to convince Americans that his halting 27 June debate appearance was just a bad night.

So far, the results have been mixed. In a 22-minute interview with ABC on 6 July, Biden attempted to pass off the debate, where he at times struggled to complete his thoughts and stumbled over words, as the result of both a cold and a busy travel schedule.

But while his tone was defiant – Biden said only “the Lord almighty” could persuade him to leave the race – some of his answers were still meandering. A couple of interviews with local radio stations in swing states in the following days largely went unnoticed, until a Philadelphia radio host was fired for asking Biden questions that had been submitted by his campaign team.

All in all, it hasn’t quite been a roaring return to form.

“The real challenge for him will be that it’s awfully hard to prove, as an 81-year-old man, that somehow you’re not an 81-year-old man,” said Marjorie Hershey, professor emeritus of political science at Indiana University Bloomington.

“The slightest deviation from immense competence will be perceived as fatal to him.”

That was evident in a telephone interview with the left-leaning MSNBC news channel on Monday, when Biden fiercely criticized Democrats who wanted him to drop out. The White House was later forced to deny that he was speaking from notes, after people noticed the sound of apparent paper shuffling during the interview.

Undeterred, Biden plans to sit down with NBC on Monday for an in-person prime-time interview, and Hershey said it was difficult to see whether Biden’s strategy should change.

“Voters who have already made up their minds about Biden will likely be convinced that recent events, no matter how dramatic, simply prove what they already thought about the election,” she said.

“And those who were unsure – and who will probably decide the election result – will likely vote on the basis of how they feel about Donald Trump anyway.”

Away from the media arena, Biden had another chance to prove his credentials during an hourlong Nato press conference on Thursday night. But while he demonstrated his grasp of foreign policy during questions about Ukraine, there will have been groans from his campaign team when Biden, just before the press conference, gave a glowing introduction to “President Putin” as he welcomed Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, on to the stage.

Emmitt Riley, a professor of politics and African and African American studies at Sewanee University and the chair of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists, said it was difficult to say how effective Biden’s strategy of being more visible and more open to questions would be.

“I think it’s a little too early to tell. Right now, it appears that the president is trying to do damage control by doing this media tour to convince the American public that he’s still up to the job,” Riley said.

“But when you look at some of the core constituents of the Democratic party, namely Black voters, they’re still in support of Joe Biden. And so time will tell, I think by the end of this week, whether or not Joe Biden has weathered the storm.”

While Biden has undoubtedly been shaky, Riley said there had been a double standard in how the media has covered the president’s weaknesses compared with Donald Trump’s.

“I think that when we contextualize a poor debate performance with the threat that Donald Trump poses to American democracy and the instability of our Nato alliances, of our international coalitions and international institutions, the choice just pales in comparison,” Riley said.

“I think that we would be wise to pivot the conversation back to: if we’re going to ask Joe Biden to leave the race, then we certainly should be asking a person who’s convicted of 34 felonies in a state court to leave the race as well.

“And in addition to that, at a time where convicted felons in the United States are barred from voting in certain states, we now have a convicted felon running for political office and not even being asked to leave the race by mainstream media.”

A two-storey school in north-central Nigeria collapsed during morning classes on Friday, trapping about 120 students and teachers and setting off a frantic search for those in the rubble. A local television station reported 12 deaths.

Authorities are yet to confirm the number of students and teachers killed in Saints Academy college in Plateau state’s Busa Buji community. But Channels Television said 26 people were being treated along with the deaths, citing a witness account at a nearby hospital.

Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency said rescue and health workers as well as security forces have been deployed at the scene. It said that “several students” had been killed.

“Approximately 120 people were trapped, with many evacuated,” Plateau Commissioner for Information Musa Ashoms said in a statement. “To ensure prompt medical attention, the government has instructed hospitals to prioritise treatment without documentation or payment.”

The state government blamed the tragedy on the school’s “weak structure and location near a riverbank.” It urged schools facing similar issues to close down.

Dozens of villagers gathered near the school, some weeping and others offering to help, as excavators combed through the debris. One woman was seen wailing and attempting to go closer to the rubble as others held her back.

Building collapses are becoming common in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country with more than a dozen such incidents recorded in the last two years. Authorities often blame such disasters on failure to enforce building safety regulations and poor maintenance.

The Capri hotel stands a block away from the grandeur of Berlin’s Museum Island, home to the Pergamon Altar and the bust of Nefertiti. Its rooms are grand and this weekend you can expect to pay £400 to stay one night in a deluxe suite with a view of the city. But right now, hanging from the balcony of a penthouse veranda, is an enormous flag of St George with a legend reading: “Sunderland”, “Southside”, “Megawatt” and “Get the rave on”.

The English are coming to Berlin, with as many as 35,000 expected to be in the Olympiastadion when England play Spain in the men’s European Championship final on Sunday night. They are digging deep to get there too. Flights, if you can get them, are starting at €700 (£588) return (some with an overnight stop in Switzerland). Any kind of budget hotel is probably sold out and as for going to the game, well that’s not coming cheap either.

Ash and Curtis are father and son, and follow Nottingham Forest home and away. They paid £1,300 for their tickets to the final. Each. “We paid £700 each to go to the semi-final and we said that was our limit,” says Dad, Ash. “But then we won and we thought: ‘We have to go.’”

The pair describe England’s late dramatic victory over the Netherlands as the best atmosphere they’ve experienced, and they were among the thousands lingering in the stands after the match celebrating. Now the final and “the opportunity of a lifetime”, in Curtis’s words, to watch England win a trophy on foreign soil. Or in Ash’s words: “Curtis said to me: ‘Dad, please don’t die before the final.’”

For Patrick Nolan, also travelling with his son, James, from London, this tournament has created unique memories. “We’ve had a tournament like we’ve never had,” he said. “We’ve had our luck. It wasn’t a penalty on Wednesday night, but we got it. In the past it’s been the other way around, like Gazza’s studs just missing the ball [against Germany] in 96.”

There is a sense among supporters that momentum is building in a team that struggled at the beginning of the tournament. But there have also been several moments along the way that have made the travel and expense worthwhile. “We were in the upper tier for the Swiss game and we could see [Bukayo] Saka’s smile from there when he scored his penalty,” says Curtis. “And no one will ever forget Jude Bellingham’s goal – it’ll be like the Gazza goal [against Scotland] from 96. We’ve got players who can provide moments of madness.”

One of those players is Ollie Watkins, whose expert finish in the last seconds of the Netherlands game secured the place in the final. Talking about his goal on Friday, Watkins said he had “manifested” the moment in his mind. “Whatever you put into the universe you get back,” he said. “It’s been an unbelievable feeling. I was taken aback by the goal but I wasn’t shocked because I have full belief in myself. I manifested it and I had worked very hard to get to that point.”

Watkins praised the travelling England fans. “Their support is everything. They do have an impact on the players,” he said, his remarks echoing those made by Gareth Southgate, who has endured intense criticism during this tournament but always spoken positively of the support his team have received.

Southgate’s attentions are now on Spain, who he says have been “the best team” in the tournament. “They have won a few trophies,” he said. “They are a bloody good side. Let’s pitch it right. We have got to be perfect to win this game and we will have to find everything that we have got from within us.”

English police have commended the behaviour of England’s fans, with the national lead for football policing, chief constable Mark Roberts, saying there had been 66 arrests. “We estimate there have been about 200,000 visitor trips to Germany so far in the tournament, and the vast majority of the travelling England fans have been extremely well behaved,” he said.

“We are all now very much looking forward to the final and hopefully seeing England lift the trophy on Sunday evening. If you are in Germany have a good time, but please remember to drink responsibly, respect the local culture and don’t put yourself in danger.”

As many as 35,000 England fans are expected at Berlin’s Olympiastadion for Sunday’s Euro 2024 final against Spain, despite an official allocation of 10,000.

Many of the tickets on general sale are expected to be snapped up by England supporters, who will take their place inside the ground alongside the customary extensive retinue of Uefa dignitaries and corporate sponsors.

A spokesperson for the Football Supporters’ Association said the allocation for the 71,000-stadium confirmed “the old story” of tickets being kept from supporters. “It’s tickets going to the wrong people in the first place,” they said. “There will still be 30,000 England fans in the stadium but many will have ended up paying way over the odds on the black market.”

The 10,000 number is roughly a 50% increase on the official allocation to this point and is distributed to members of the England Supporters Travel Club. This is the group found behind the goal at matches and where the most vocal support (and drumming) comes from.

England are expected to be given the bank of seating at the Olympiastadion’s west stand, where the cauldron that once held the Olympic torch during the Nazi games of 1936 still resides. The Olympiastadion is in the far west of the German capital.

The FSA has repeated warnings to supporters looking to buy tickets via unofficial channels that they could leave themselves exposed to scams. “We are reminding supporters of the risks when purchasing tickets via unofficial third party websites or social media accounts,” it said. “There is every chance you could lose your money and end up with no ticket – it happens to many fans at every tournament.”

A New York judge dismissed Rudy Giuliani’s bankruptcy case on Friday, clearing the way for two Georgia election workers to try and recover nearly $150m Giuliani was ordered to pay them for defaming them after the 2020 election.

The ruling by US bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane comes after lawyers for the two women, Ruby Freeman and her daughter Shaye Moss, as well as other creditors accused Giuliani of concealing information about his finances. The judge also prevented Giuliani from refiling for bankruptcy within one year.

“Since day one, Giuliani has regarded this case and the bankruptcy process as a joke, hiding behind the façade of an elderly, doddering man who cannot even remember the address for his second multimillion-dollar home and claims impending homelessness if he must sell that second multimillion-dollar home,” lawyers for creditors wrote in a filing earlier this month.

Giuliani had initially asked a judge to convert the case from chapter 11 bankruptcy – a type of bankruptcy that allows a debtor to reorganize their assets – to a chapter 7, which would allow him to liquidate his assets. He abruptly reversed course and requested that Lane dismiss the bankruptcy altogether.

More details soon…

Volodymyr Zelenskiy is expected to travel to the UK next week to address European leaders at Blenheim Palace who are meeting to discuss Ukraine, European security and democracy.

The Ukrainian president met Keir Starmer last week at the Nato summit in Washington, but this would be his first opportunity to meet a wider delegation of the Labour government, who will be eager to reiterate the UK’s continued support.

His travel arrangements are rarely confirmed but a source said it is “90% certain” Zelenskiy will be there.

The conference is the fourth meeting of the European Political Community, a collective launched after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 that was the brainchild of the French president, Emmanuel Macron.

It is being seen as a “very significant” opportunity for Starmer to not just host up to 50 European leaders but to restore confidence in the UK and show the world the country is back on the international stage after years of reputational damage caused by Brexit.

The EPC is designed to facilitate the strengthening of ties between EU and non-EU leaders in an informal setting, with previous conferences held in Spain, Moldova and the Czech Republic.

Apart from the UK, non-EU countries including Norway, Iceland, Georgia, Kosovo, Serbia, Albania and Turkey are invited, though it is understood that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president who did not attend previous summits, has not confirmed participation.

As host Starmer will address the opening plenary session, which will be held in one of the halls in Blenheim Palace, the birthplace of Winston Churchill. He is expected to underline the UK’s commitment to Ukraine and Zelenskiy, and to resetting the country’s post-Brexit relationship with the EU.

The prime minister has already pledged to establish closer ties with the EU, and the new minister for European relations, Nick Thomas-Symonds, travelled to Brussels for an introductory meeting with the former Brexit negotiator Maroš Šefčovič on Monday.

Simon Harris, the Irish taoiseach, has pledged to support the UK at a European level and has instructed his ministers to increase contact with London counterparts.

Starmer will have a number of bilateral talks – he is meeting Harris the night before at Chequers and is expected to have a separate meeting with Macron on Thursday in addition to taking soundings from EU leaders on what a new security and defence pact with the UK could look like post-Brexit.

Ukraine will dominate the plenary discussion with leaders, who will then be invited to join three break-out working groups centring on defence and democracy, which will include sessions on the disinformation crisis, energy and migration.

Macron is also determined to use the occasion to send a strong message of support to Ukraine from the EU in face of renewed threats from Vladimir Putin and more ominous comments this week by the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, who denounced Nato’s summit promise to eventually support Ukraine’s membership of the defence bloc.

Security around the summit is tight with airspace restrictions in place over the Oxfordshire palace between 14 and 18 July. Police drones and the police air service will enforce the restricted airspace, according to Thames Valley police.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy is expected to travel to the UK next week to address European leaders at Blenheim Palace who are meeting to discuss Ukraine, European security and democracy.

The Ukrainian president met Keir Starmer last week at the Nato summit in Washington, but this would be his first opportunity to meet a wider delegation of the Labour government, who will be eager to reiterate the UK’s continued support.

His travel arrangements are rarely confirmed but a source said it is “90% certain” Zelenskiy will be there.

The conference is the fourth meeting of the European Political Community, a collective launched after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 that was the brainchild of the French president, Emmanuel Macron.

It is being seen as a “very significant” opportunity for Starmer to not just host up to 50 European leaders but to restore confidence in the UK and show the world the country is back on the international stage after years of reputational damage caused by Brexit.

The EPC is designed to facilitate the strengthening of ties between EU and non-EU leaders in an informal setting, with previous conferences held in Spain, Moldova and the Czech Republic.

Apart from the UK, non-EU countries including Norway, Iceland, Georgia, Kosovo, Serbia, Albania and Turkey are invited, though it is understood that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president who did not attend previous summits, has not confirmed participation.

As host Starmer will address the opening plenary session, which will be held in one of the halls in Blenheim Palace, the birthplace of Winston Churchill. He is expected to underline the UK’s commitment to Ukraine and Zelenskiy, and to resetting the country’s post-Brexit relationship with the EU.

The prime minister has already pledged to establish closer ties with the EU, and the new minister for European relations, Nick Thomas-Symonds, travelled to Brussels for an introductory meeting with the former Brexit negotiator Maroš Šefčovič on Monday.

Simon Harris, the Irish taoiseach, has pledged to support the UK at a European level and has instructed his ministers to increase contact with London counterparts.

Starmer will have a number of bilateral talks – he is meeting Harris the night before at Chequers and is expected to have a separate meeting with Macron on Thursday in addition to taking soundings from EU leaders on what a new security and defence pact with the UK could look like post-Brexit.

Ukraine will dominate the plenary discussion with leaders, who will then be invited to join three break-out working groups centring on defence and democracy, which will include sessions on the disinformation crisis, energy and migration.

Macron is also determined to use the occasion to send a strong message of support to Ukraine from the EU in face of renewed threats from Vladimir Putin and more ominous comments this week by the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, who denounced Nato’s summit promise to eventually support Ukraine’s membership of the defence bloc.

Security around the summit is tight with airspace restrictions in place over the Oxfordshire palace between 14 and 18 July. Police drones and the police air service will enforce the restricted airspace, according to Thames Valley police.

Emergency workers claim to have recovered the bodies of approximately 60 Palestinians from two districts of Gaza City after Israeli forces pulled back from days of battles with Hamas militants in the territory’s biggest urban area.

The civil defence agency in Hamas-run Gaza on Friday said the bodies were found in the Tal al-Hawa and Al-Sinaa districts after the week-long offensive.

“There are still missing people under the rubble of destroyed homes, which is difficult for our crews to reach,” the agency’s spokesperson Mahmud Bassal said. “There are reports that many people are missing since the first day of the incursion.”

“There are many calls for help but we just cannot reach them. We just do not have enough crews,” Bassal added. He said the Sabha medical centre, near the Gaza City district of Shujaiya, which provides care for 60,000 residents, had been destroyed in the new fighting. This was not immediately confirmed by Israel.

The Israeli military and Shin Bet intelligence agency announced on Friday that they killed Ayman Shweidah, the deputy commander of Hamas’s Shujaiya battalion. The joint statement said he was involved in planning the 7 October attacks and took part in the fighting that followed.

On Wednesday the Israeli army had dropped leaflets warning “everyone in Gaza City” – the focus of a heavy Israeli assault this week – that it would “remain a dangerous combat zone”. The leaflets urged residents to flee and set out designated escape routes from the area where the UN humanitarian office said up to 350,000 people had been sheltering.

Many civilians told the Guardian they had concluded there was no refuge in war-stricken Gaza and said they lacked confidence in the safe corridors set by Israel. Residents said they also feared that if they left they would not be able to take belongings or return.

The offensive came as Arab mediators, backed by the US, are trying to reach a ceasefire deal that would free Israelis held hostage by Hamas in return for many Palestinians jailed by Israel.

Hamas said the heavy Israeli assault on Gaza City this week could wreck efforts to finally end the war just as negotiations have entered the home stretch. In a statement, the Palestinian Islamist militant group said mediators had yet to provide it with updates on the state of the talks since it made concessions last week in response to a US-backed Israeli peace offer.

“The occupation continues its policy of stalling to buy time to foil this round of negotiations, as it has done in previous rounds,” the statement said.

The White House national security spokesperson, John Kirby, said the US was “cautiously optimistic” about talks taking place in Egypt and Qatar.

“There are still gaps remaining between the two sides,” Kirby told CNN. “We believe those gaps can be narrowed, and that’s what US Middle East envoy Brett McGurk and CIA director Bill Burns are trying to do right now.’’

Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, who faces opposition from within his coalition government to any deal that would halt the war without Hamas being vanquished, has said a deal must allow Israel to resume fighting until it meets all its objectives.

Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report

The judge in Alec Baldwin’s involuntary manslaughter trial is considering a motion from the defense to dismiss the case after the actor’s lawyers argued that the state improperly withheld evidence.

Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the Rust armorer who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter earlier this year, was initially expected take the stand at Baldwin’s trial on Friday. But the proceedings took a dramatic turn as Baldwin’s defense team accused the state of concealing evidence that would have been favorable to the actor and asked Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer to throw out the case.

The evidence consists of live rounds of ammunition turned over to New Mexico police in March that the defense argues call into question the source of the bullet that fatally struck cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. Baldwin is charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of Hutchins, who was shot during rehearsals for the western when a gun the actor was holding fired.

Gutierrez-Reed oversaw all weapons on set and was responsible for ensuring their safety.

Prosecutors have long said evidence shows that Gutierrez-Reed was the source of the live round, but the defense said the state received evidence that suggested otherwise. A “good samaritan” came forward to police this year with a box of munitions that he claimed came from the prop supplier, Seth Kenney, and matched the ammunition that killed Hutchins, said Alex Spiro, Baldwin’s defense attorney, on Thursday.

A report of the interview was not included with the other Rust evidence nor shared with the lawyer of Gutierrez-Reed and was instead filed under a number unrelated to the case, the defense said.

Troy Teske, the man who came forward with the ammunition, is a friend of Gutierrez-Reed’s father, special prosecutor Kari Morrissey said. She denied the defense’s accusations, and said Baldwin’s team was aware of the evidence brought forward.

Luke Nikas, one of Baldwin’s attorneys, said the report was relevant to the entire case and to the credibility of witnesses who testified in the trial.

“If this evidence wasn’t as important as we say it is, they would have turned it over,” Nikas said.

Morrissey, the special prosecutor, had said the state did not its obligations.

“This is a wild goose chase,” she said. “This has no evidentiary value whatsoever.”

The arguments on Friday morning appeared to stun the courtroom. Sommer asked that the prosecution bring forward the bullets turned over to police and to call the crime scene technician Marissa Poppell, who spoke to Teske and logged the evidence, and bring her back to the stand.

Sommer briefly left the bench and put on gloves to examine the bullets alongside a crowd of lawyers for the prosecution and defense. Shortly after, she dismissed the jury for the day to allow the court to hear from witnesses regarding the motion.

The development seemed to please Hilaria Baldwin, the actor’s wife, who could be seen smiling as she exited the courtroom.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is requiring an investigation into the in-flight failure of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket as it was launching a batch of Starlink internet satellites.

The second-stage engine failure occurred on Thursday evening during a routine launch of the satellites from Vandenberg space force base in Santa Barbara county, California.

Approximately an hour after the rocket took off, the rocket’s second stage, which was carrying 20 Starlink internet satellites, failed to reignite and instead deployed the satellites in a dangerously low orbit where they run the risk of burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere, Reuters reported.

In a statement on X, SpaceX posted: “During tonight’s Falcon 9 launch of Starlink, the second stage engine did not complete its second burn. As a result, the Starlink satellites were deployed into a lower than intended orbit.

“SpaceX has made contact with 5 of the satellites so far and is attempting to have them raise orbit using their ion thrusters,” the company added. The SpaceX founder, Elon Musk, who also owns X, formerly Twitter, followed up with a highly technical explanation about ion thrusters, a form of electric propulsion used in spacecraft.

“We’re updating satellite software to run the ion thrusters at their equivalent of warp 9. Unlike a Star Trek episode, this will probably not work, but it’s worth a shot,” he said.

In a separate post on X, Musk said: “Upper stage restart to raise perigee resulted in an engine RUD for reasons currently unknown,” referring to a rapid unscheduled disassembly – a euphemistic industry acronym for explosion, adding: “Team is reviewing data tonight to understand root cause.”

Thursday’s failure occurred on the rocket’s 354th mission and marks the first Falcon 9 failure since 2015, when the rocket exploded on a launch site in Florida.

The FAA released a statement, saying: “The FAA is aware an anomaly occurred during the SpaceX Starlink Group 9-3 mission that launched from Vandenberg space force base in California on July 11 … The incident involved the failure of the upper stage rocket while it was in space. No public injuries or public property damage have been reported. The FAA is requiring an investigation.

“The FAA will be involved in every step of the investigation process and must approve SpaceX’s final report, including any corrective actions.”

Prosecutors in Argentina have charged two French rugby players with aggravated rape, in the grisly case of a woman who said she was repeatedly assaulted by the athletes after they took her back to their hotel room and prevented her from leaving.

The prosecutor’s office in the western city of Mendoza – where the alleged assault took place last Sunday following the French team’s test match against the Argentinian Pumas – ordered the two players, Oscar Jegou and Hugo Auradou, to remain in detention until trial.

After being arrested in Buenos Aires, Jegou, 21, and Auradou, 20, were transferred 1,000km (620 miles) to Mendoza on Thursday for their first court appearance. They chose not to testify in Friday’s hearing.

The French Rugby Federation had previously said that the players admitted to having consensual sex with the alleged victim and denied any acts of violence.

The prosecutors said the court would soon decide whether to grant the defendants’ request for house arrest.

The account of the assault – provided by Natacha Romano, the lawyer of the victim – has drawn outrage in France and caused a stir in Argentina, where recent scandals involving professional athletes have prompted questions within the greater sports community about misogyny and sexual violence.

The woman says that after meeting the players at a nightclub, she was taken to their hotel room and subjected to violent, non-consensual sexual acts and prevented from leaving. After escaping the hotel room, Romano said the victim filed a police complaint and underwent physical examinations.

The charges of aggravated sexual assault in Argentina carry the maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. The mandatory minimum is eight years.

Authorities said that they would move the defendants to another jail later on Friday.

• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html

Robert F Kennedy Jr, the independent presidential candidate, sent a text apologizing to a woman who had accused him of sexual assault in a Vanity Fair article, it was reported on Friday, just days after the increasingly isolated member of the famous political dynasty tried to brush off the scandal.

Kennedy said in the text that he had “no memory” of the incident but nevertheless apologized in a message his accuser called “arrogant” and an attempt at “damage control”, according to the Washington Post.

Eliza Cooney, who was once a nanny and legal intern and lived in the Kennedy family home, said Kennedy made inappropriate advances and sexually assaulted her in a pantry there in the late 1990s. She was 23 at the time. Kennedy was then 45 and married with children.

In response to the public allegations, Kennedy apparently called Cooney twice, and then sent a text just after midnight on the Fourth of July, the newspaper reported. Reuters also reported the news, independently verifying the texts.

“I read your description of an episode in which I touched you in an unwanted manner,” Kennedy said in a text message to Cooney, according to the news agency.

“I have no memory of this incident but I apologize sincerely for anything I ever did that made you feel uncomfortable or anything I did or said that offended you or hurt your feelings,” Kennedy wrote, according to the reported texts. “I never intended you any harm. If I hurt you, it was inadvertent. I feel badly for doing so.”

Cooney, who said the assault damaged her confidence and her concentration on her law career, told the Post that the texts were “disingenuous and arrogant”.

“I’m not sure how somebody has a true apology for something that they don’t admit to recalling. I did not get a sense of remorse,” the Post reported her as saying.

Previously, he told a podcast host that he was “not a church boy”, but that he would not respond directly to the allegations.

Kennedy is best known for peddling anti-vaccine conspiracy theories and his work as an environmental attorney. He is the son of the late US senator and former attorney general Robert F Kennedy. He has also made a habit of making wild claims.

For instance, in a recently obtained divorce deposition, Kennedy claimed his health problems were caused by a brain worm.

His increasingly extreme and bizarre stance has split his family, with prominent members endorsing Joe Biden.

Polls show Kennedy pulling about 9% of voters, a wildcard in what is otherwise a tight race between Biden, the US president and presumptive Democratic nominee for re-election, and Donald Trump, the former US president and presumptive Republican nominee.