Robert Mueller found no evidence that Donald Trump’s campaign ‘conspired or co-ordinated’ with Russia but the stage is set for a new set of political and legal battles, says Andy Sullivan.

Republicans aren’t preparing for another shutdown because they don’t want to believe that one is possible — but that’s what they thought last time too, says Ramesh Ponnuru.

Around 700 jobs at Aughinish Alumina in Limerick are safe for now after the US senate voted to support the White House in ending sanctions against the plant’s Russian owner.

Implicated by his own justice department in a felony, Donald Trump has seen the stock market plunge as the tide begins to turn against him, writes Elizabeth Drew

America’s friends and allies couldn’t do it. Nor could America’s potential enemies. Neither could his wife, children or White House staff. It took the American people to reign in Donald Trump.

A win for Irish Texan Beto O’Rourke in the US midterm elections could reorder politics in America and precipitate Trump’s downfall.

Here's your lunchtime bulletin.

Here's your morning bulletin.

SPORT is political, sometimes deeply so. It is a conduit to our higher ambitions. It gives voice to our better angels and, unless corrupted, can distil principle more powerfully than any policy document drowning in caveats or derogations.

They comprise 22% of the US electorate and are decisive, but they do not vote uniformly and while they want a president of belief, he or she does not have to be of their faith, says Jonathan Alter

A handful of vacation homes. A car elevator for his four-car garage. A wife whose hobbies included show horses.

Growing number of politicians from both parties believe action needed to prevent more massacres.

Democrats may win seats with their hardline stance on gun control, but compromise is vital or things are destined to remain deadlocked in this polarised politics, writes Adam Skaggs

US president Barack Obama formally endorsed fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton for president yesterday, describing himself as eager to get out and campaign for her, days after she gained the delegates needed to secure the party’s White House nomination.

Donald Trump has made certain this election is no longer going to exclusively be about ‘the economy, stupid’, writes Bette Browne.

The US Senate looks set to pass a $1.1tn (€883bn) spending bill in time for a Saturday night deadline, following a narrow House of Representatives vote that averted a government shutdown.

Tens of thousands of protesters are marching through central Bangkok, paralysing traffic and facing off with police outside the prime minister’s residence in their latest mass rally against Thailand’s government.

The focus of efforts to end the government shutdown and prevent a US default has shifted to the Senate, where leaders were in talks aimed at resolving the twin stalemates.

The political stalemate that partially shut down the US government has worsened with Democrats rejecting the latest Republican effort to negotiate over efforts to derail the health care overhaul.

Republicans and Democrats are trading blame for the impasse on a temporary bill to keep agencies open as the US government teeters on the brink of a partial shutdown.

President Barack Obama has asked congressional leaders to convene today at the White House for last-minute talks on a “fiscal cliff” deal that avoids automatic tax increases and broad spending cuts that threaten the economy’s nascent recovery.

Newly re-elected President Barack Obama will once again deal with a divided Congress as Democrats retained control of the US Senate, while Republicans kept their solid majority in the House of Representatives.

Republicans have lost two seats in the Senate, boosting Democratic prospects for keeping control of the upper chamber.

President Barack Obama and Republican rival Mitt Romney attacked one another yesterday in frenzied campaigning as the presidential election enters the closing stages.

A fired-up President Barack Obama persistently attacked Republican challenger Mitt Romney in a critical debate, offering a striking contrast from his listless performance two weeks ago that appeared to damage his re-election prospects.

In a spirited debate that laid out stark choices, Joe Biden and Paul Ryan teed up pointed arguments on the economy, social policy, and America’s place in the world that US president Barack Obama and rival Mitt Romney now will drive forward into the campaign’s final stretch.

Republicans lashed out at President Barack Obama and his administration chiefs over their evolving description of the deadly September 11 attack on the US consulate in Libya.

Bill Clinton took centre stage at the Democratic National Convention as President Barack Obama’s nomination is placed before a party hoping that the last president to preside over sustained growth can help propel him to re-election in a sputtering economy.

Paul Ryan, a hero to conservatives and lightning rod for Democrats, accepted the Republican nomination as Mitt Romney’s vice-presidential running mate, saying the moment for President Barack Obama’s Democrats “came and went”.

Controversial US conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh has apologised to a law student he branded a “slut” and “prostitute” amid a storm of criticism from Republican and Democrat politicians and advertisers who severed ties with his radio programme.

The US “super-committee” that was supposed to solve the country’s massive deficit problem was being wound up today, having failed to bridge bitter differences between Republicans and Democrats.

A group of married Japanese has lodged a legal challenge to a civil law that effectively stops women from keeping their surnames when they wed.

The US Senate gave its blessing to an arms control treaty with Russia that reins in nuclear weapons, giving President Barack Obama a major foreign policy win in the closing hours of the post-election congress.

The US Senate today ratified an arms control treaty with Russia that reins in nuclear weapons, giving President Barack Obama a major foreign policy win in the closing hours of the post-election Congress.

President Barack Obama has signed into law a massive tax package that frayed his relations with liberals, caused him to abandon a pledge not to extend tax cuts to the rich and heralded a new balance of power in Washington.

Thailand’s ruling Democrat Party staved off possible dissolution today when a court refused to accept a case accusing it of illegal financing.