US to co-host second global Covid summit on 12 May – live

An influential conservative group that includes two Donald Trump allies who helped push lies about voter fraud in 2020 is spearheading “election integrity” summits in battleground states, advocating for expanded poll watching, “clean” voter rolls and other measures watchdogs say could curb voting rights to help Republican candidates.

The Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI) “election integrity network” is run by the veteran GOP lawyer Cleta Mitchell, who helped to spread misinformation about supposed election fraud in 2020.

Mark Meadows, Donald Trump’s last White House chief of staff, is a senior partner of the CPI and reportedly had a lead role in at least one of its summits.

Mitchell, CPI’s senior legal fellow, has hosted multi-day summits, seeking to mobilize hundreds of conservative activists for elections this year in Georgia, Arizona and Pennsylvania, all states that Trump lost to Joe Biden, and Florida, which he won.

CPI is slated to hold summits this spring in Virginia, Michigan and Wisconsin, as it seeks to build “election integrity” infrastructure in swing states.

Powerful groups on the right such as Heritage Action and Tea Party Patriots Action have participated in previous summits.

Ties between CPI and Trump were underscored last July, when the former president’s Save America leadership Pac donated $1m to the group weeks after the House voted to create a committee to investigate the attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 by Trump loyalists seeking to disrupt certification of Biden’s election victory.

Read more here:

A second global Covid-19 summit will take place virtually on 12 May, the White House has announced, seeking to increase the take-up rate of vaccinations internationally.

The news comes as the BA.2 subvariant begins to take hold in several areas of the US. The White House statement said the US would co-host the summit with Belize, chair of the Caribbean Community (Caricom); Germany, which holds the G7 presidency; Indonesia and Senegal:

The emergence and spread of new variants, like Omicron, have reinforced the need for a strategy aimed at controlling Covid-19 worldwide. Together, we can mitigate the impact of Covid-19 and protect those at the highest risk with vaccinations, testing, and treatments.

We know we must prepare now to build, sustain, and finance the global capacity we need, not only for emerging Covid-19 variants, but also future health crises.

Joe Biden convened the first global Covid-19 summit last September, calling for international cooperation in finding strategies to end the pandemic. But the Delta and Omicron variants sent infection rates soaring, while less than 60% of the world’s population is fully vaccinated.

There are renewed concerns over a resurgence of the pandemic, with Omicron forcing new lockdowns and deaths in China, and the spread of BA.2 worrying world leaders, including in the US, where an indoor mask mandate took effect Monday in Philadelphia, the first major American city to do so.

The 12 May summit, the White House says, will focus on several areas and “place an emphasis on supporting locally-led solutions to both immediate and long-term challenges.”

They include “getting shots into arms; deploying tests and treatments, especially for the highest-risk populations; expanding and protecting the health workforce and minimizing disruptions to routine and essential health services; and generating sustainable financing for pandemic preparedness, health security, and health systems.”

Read the White House statement here.

Good morning, welcome to the US politics blog, and a new week in Washington DC (although lawmakers are mostly elsewhere, with Congress on Easter recess for another week).

Joe Biden begins his week with the coronavirus pandemic on his mind. The White House has announced the US will co-host the second global Covid-19 summit on 12 May, the virtual event seeking primarily to increase the take-up rate of vaccinations internationally.

Russia appears to be making territorial gains and expanding its missile attacks in Ukraine. You can follow developments in the conflict on our 24-hour live blog here.

Here’s what else we’re following today:

• Joe Biden will host the annual Easter Egg roll at the White House later this morning, joined by the first lady Jill Biden and the vice-president Kamala Harris. The year’s event, the first for two years, is billed as an EGGucation egg roll.
• It’s Tax Day in the US, and soaring inflation remains a concern for American families and Democratic politicians, who fear it could cost them dearly in November’s midterm elections.
• If Republicans do win back control of Congress, they have a plan to term-limit ranking Democrats on House committees.