First Thing: Trump’s impeachment charge goes to the Senate

Good morning.

The House formally delivered its article of impeachment against Donald Trump to the Senate on Monday evening, marking the beginning of the Senate’s first ever trial of a former president. Nine impeachment managers took part in a ceremonial procession across the Capitol to deliver the article, walking the same halls that came under siege from a violent mob this month. The charges were formally read to the Senate, before arguments beginning on the week of 8 February.

Joe Biden told CNN yesterday that the trial “has to happen”, despite the impact it may have on his presidency, threatening to delay his efforts to pass policy. Biden insisted it would have “a worse effect if it did not happen”.

• Dominion Voting Systems is suing Rudy Giuliani for $1.3bn over his baseless claims that the company’s voting machines were involved in fraud during the presidential election. The firm said Trump’s personal lawyer had “manufactured and disseminated” a conspiracy theory related to the machines that had led to its staff getting deaths threats and its firm’s reputation being harmed.

• Oregan’s Republican party suggested the Capitol attack was “a ‘false flag’ operation”, falsely stating in a resolution that there was “growing evidence” to indicate this. The resolution, which had been endorsed by the executive committee of the state Republican party, said the siege was a conspiracy designed to discredit Trump and Republicans. There is no evidence for this.

The US is getting its first female treasury secretary

Janet Yellen has been confirmed as the first woman to lead the US Treasury, after she was approved by the Senate on an 84-15 vote. She had already been approved by the Senate finance committee and supported by all living former treasury secretaries.

Yellen is the former chair of the Federal Reserve and celebrated economist, experience that will set her in good stead as she faces the most significant economic crisis in the US for decades. Last week, another 900,000 people filed for unemployment benefits – more than the population of San Francisco and four times as high as the number of weekly claims made before the coronavirus pandemic.

• The Treasury is picking up plans to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill, a plan under the Obama administration that was blocked by Trump. Tubman was a 19th-century abolitionist, who escaped from slavery and helped to rescue hundreds of enslaved people using a network called the Underground Railroad.

Transgender people will again be able to serve in the military

Biden has overturned Trump’s ban on transgender members of the military, a move the American Civil Liberties Union said was “an incredible victory” for transgender rights. There are already thousands of transgender staff in the US military, making the Pentagon the biggest employer of transgender people in America. A thinktank report last year, co-authored by former military surgeons general, found the ban had damaged military readiness.

• A hate crime charge has been added to the attempted murder of Holden White, a gay teenager from Louisiana. White was violently attacked by another teen he met on the dating app Grindr last year, which White has continually alleged was because he was gay.

Biden appears to have increased his vaccinated targets

Biden appeared to raise his goal for the number of coronavirus vaccinations in his first 100 days in office, suggesting that an average 1.5 million Americans could be getting the inoculation each day. Over the last week, the US has exceeded 1m doses a day, and Biden assured the public that the country was on its way to herd immunity by summer. The new president also signed an executive order boosting government purchases from US manufacturers, in an attempt to support the economy as it copes with the impact of the pandemic.

But despite the positive signs, Biden warned there could be more than 600,000 deaths in the US “before we begin to turn the corner in a major way”. Meanwhile, talks with Congress over a $1.9tn stimulus package stalled, as Biden called for urgent relief but Congress appeared to want the bill reduced.

California has lifted its statewide stay-at-home order after projections showed that intensive care capacity was higher than 15% in the worst-hit regions for the first time in weeks. The move takes the state back to a tiered system of reopening among counties, with most regions expected to enter the toughest tier of restrictions. The state has also extended its eviction moratorium until the end of June, preventing landlords from evicting tenants who could not pay their rent between March and August due to the pandemic, and those who have been able to pay at least 25% of their rent.

• US scientists are attempting to upgrade Covid-19 vaccines to tackle new variants of the virus that are now spreading in the UK and South Africa, according to Dr Anthony Fauci. Moderna said its vaccines worked against the variants, but that it was developing a new version as a booster shot.

In other news…

• Billions of cicadas are set to descend on the eastern US after 17 years underground, the first such event since 2004. Residents can expect swarming numbers and loud mating calls to towns and cities.

• Facial recognition tech will exacerbate racist policing and threaten the right to protest, Amnesty International has said, as it called for New York City police to ban its use. Facial recognition risks being weaponised by law enforcement against marginalised communities around the world, human rights researcher at Amnesty said.

• The New York Times has reportedly sacked an editor over a tweet which said she had “chills” after seeing Biden’s plane land at Joint Base Andrews. Lauren Wolfe’s tweet was attacked by rightwing social media users and news outlets, who said it demonstrated media bias.

Stat of the day: the wealth amassed by the richest 10 people during the pandemic could vaccinate every adult

The wealth of the world’s richest 10 individuals has risen by more than $500bn, enough to pay for the vaccinations of every adult on earth, and to restore the money lost by the poorest people during 2020. Financial inequality is destabilising and damages democracy, Simon Jenkins writes, arguing that tax must be reformed to tackle economic crises.

Don’t miss this: how the pandemic threatens family planning

Sixty million more women and girls are using contraception in the world’s poorest countries, following an eight-year campaign to expand family planning worldwide. But a global partnership on family planning has warned that the coronavirus pandemic and the economic fallout threatens to undermine progress. In April, two-thirds of the 103 countries surveyed by the World Health Organization reported disruptions to family planning services.

Last thing: Josh Hawley’s yearbook hints at early presidential ambitions

Josh Hawley, Missouri’s Republican senator who is seen as a potential political heir to Trump, signed his friend’s eight-grade yearbook “Josh Hawley, president 2024”. Hawley has faced calls for expulsion from the Senate over his support for Trump’s baseless claims over voter fraud during the presidential election, and is widely expected to run for Republican nomination for the next presidency. The yearbook also named him among “future presidents”.

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