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The Trump shooting has made a mockery of the Secret Service

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When trying to put in context how close Donald Trump came to being killed on July 13th, Anthony Cangelosi, a former Secret Service agent, now an academic at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, uses an analogy that the former president could appreciate. “It’s a chip shot,” he says. For the benefit of non-golfers: one that is easy for somebody who practises. “It’s not hard to hit a target from 150 yards with a rifle,” he says. The shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old from a suburb of Pittsburgh (see box on next page), was a member of a rifle club, though he was apparently rejected from his high-school shooting team. Had he been a slightly better shot, America’s election would now look very different.

Economics

The president has deleted a key tenet of American civil-rights law

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IN THE DELUGE of 145 executive orders issued by President Donald Trump (on subjects as disparate as “Restoring American Seafood Competitiveness” and “Maintaining Acceptable Water Pressure in Showerheads”) it can be difficult to discern which are truly consequential. But one of them, signed on April 23rd under the bland headline “Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy”, aims to remake civil-rights law. Those primed to distrust Mr Trump on such matters may be surprised to learn that the president’s target is not just important but also well-chosen.

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Economics

American cities are criminalising homelessness. Will that help?

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DAVINA VALENZUELA watches as sanitation workers heave most of her belongings into a garbage truck. The 33-year-old has been homeless for more than a year, and was sleeping in a dusty alley in central Fresno, the biggest city in California’s Central Valley. The truck devours bags of clothes, a stroller, a pile of hypodermic needles and around $120—much of it in change. Police officers arrest her and a friend and sit them in the back of a truck. They are given tickets for camping in a public place, which became a misdemeanour crime in September in an attempt to shrink the city’s homeless encampments. “That’s all I have right there,” she says, once her handcuffs are taken off. “I don’t know how I ended up here.”

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Economics

Pete Hegseth is purging both weapons and generals

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THE PENTAGON has been mired in chaos in recent months. Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defence, stands accused of mishandling classified information. Many of his aides have been let go over alleged leaks (accusations they deny). Top generals have been fired for no discernible reason beyond their colour or sex. The department is in “a full-blown meltdown”, says John Ullyot, a Hegseth loyalist who served as chief spokesman until April. Yet Mr Hegseth is pressing ahead with sweeping reforms that will change the size, shape and purpose of America’s armed forces.

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