Belgium authorities were awaiting crucial air support Sunday to help battle the largest wildfire in the country’s modern history, which has been ablaze since Friday.

More than 250 firefighters and emergency personnel worked through the night in the High Fens nature reserve near the German border to stop the spread of the wildfire, which has scorched 3,000 hectares.

Firefighters said they are relying heavily on aircraft Sunday to bring the blaze under control, with reinforcements arriving from several European countries.

Belgian federal police helicopters and Dutch aircraft were already operating Sunday morning, repeatedly collecting water from a nearby lake. Additional helicopters from the Czech Republic and Sweden were expected to join later in the day after Belgium activated the EU’s Civil Protection Mechanism. Germany and Norway could also provide aerial support, European Commissioner for preparedness and crisis management, Hadja Lahbib, told AFP.

“Thank you to our European partners for the assistance they are providing,” Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever wrote on X.

Europe has been battling wildfires throughout a summer marked by repeated heatwaves and drought, with blazes forcing thousands to evacuate in Croatia, France, Germany, Greece and Spain. Firefighters in France on Sunday continued battling several wildfires, including one that was nearing the Belgian border.

Belgium’s wildfires are tearing through fragile peatlands and pine forests in the High Fens, which were devastated by wildfires during a similar period of heat and drought in 1911. It is Belgium’s largest wildfire since then. No homes have been damaged so far, but residents of two villages have been evacuated and authorities say the fire remains out of control.

Twelve people were killed and dozens more were injured when a bus transporting Catholic pilgrims back to Poland veered off a Hungarian motorway early Sunday.

Police said the bus overturned after coming off the M3 motorway, which connects Hungary’s capital Budapest with the northeastern city of Nyíregyháza, at around 1:00 a.m. Sunday. Officers have reported that the driver may have fallen asleep at the wheel.

The tour group was returning from Medjugorje in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a popular pilgrimage site for Catholics where multiple visions of the Virgin Mary have been reported.

“I spoke on the phone with the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. I expressed my condolences to the Polish people for the terrible night bus accident,” said Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar on Facebook.

Fifty-seven passengers and two drivers were on the bus, according to Hungarian news agency MTI reports. Emergency services had attempted to lift the rear axle of the 24-ton bus to remove the people trapped underneath before cranes arrived to lift the entire vehicle, the MTI report added.

Hungarian Interior Minister Gábor Pósfai confirmed that the death toll stood at 12, with several of the injured in serious condition, while the driver was taken into custody.

A Spanish F-18 fighter jet on a NATO air-policing mission Sunday shot down a drone that had illegally entered Romanian airspace.

The drone was detected by radar about 24 kilometers north of the eastern city of Galați after entering Romania from Moldova. Having established radar contact, the fighter jet was authorized to shoot it down at 5:01 a.m. Authorities said debris from the destroyed aircraft had fallen in an uninhabited area between two villages.

Martin O’Donnell, spokesperson for NATO operation headquarters, said additional details regarding Sunday’s incident remained under investigation but that the drone “appears to be Russian.”

“The Ministry of National Defence is constantly monitoring the situation and informs in real time the allied structures about such events,” the ministry added in a statement.

It is the fourth drone shot down by NATO over Romania since the beginning of 2026. In July, Romanian F-16s downed three Russian drones that breached the country’s airspace — the first such interceptions after dozens of incursions since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. In May, a Russian drone crashed into an apartment building in Galați, injuring two people.

Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine traded strikes over the weekend. Russian forces launched missile and drone attacks on Kyiv early Sunday, sparking fires in at least two districts and injuring three people, according to the city’s military administration.

Ukrainian drones also struck the Moscow region overnight in what the regional governor Andrei Vorobyov described as one of the largest attacks to target the area, killing an 83-year-old man.

Hungary is sinking two barges to ensure a key nuclear power plant stays online, Prime Minister Péter Magyar said Saturday.

Europe’s summer of extreme heat has caused the Danube’s water level to hit record lows, affecting power production at the Paks nuclear plant. Nuclear power stations are typically built by rivers and along coastlines so they can use water to cool down reactors.

Hungarian authorities are sinking the two barges to raise water levels so Paks, which provides the country with more than a third of its electricity, can continue to operate normally. The sinking began Saturday morning and Hungarian media are quoting the prime minister saying the water level at the plant has risen by 1 centimeter.

Magyar said on X that the current water level near Hungary’s only nuclear energy facility is 122 cm lower than normal and it is projected to drop below 132 cm on Monday, which would force one of the plant’s two turbines to shut down.

On Wednesday, Magyar announced that they would be building a riverbed sill with 150,000 cubic meters of stone and was considering sinking the two 80-meter barges. A sill is an underwater dam meant to slow down the current and raise water levels. Hungary’s Defense Ministry has assigned 100 troops to work around the clock on the project, the prime minister said on X.

Nuclear energy facilities across Europe have been affected by this summer’s droughts and soaring temperatures. Romania shut down a nuclear power plant earlier this week due to the Danube’s water levels.

France — one of Europe’s biggest producers of nuclear power — has seen its fleet of nuclear power plants affected throughout the summer. Le Monde reported authorities had to shut down six of the country’s 57 nuclear reactors as yet another heat wave broiled much of the country. Earlier in the week, a climate change-fueled jellyfish invasion forced workers to bring parts of a different plant offline.

Magyar has also cast doubt on completing an expansion of the Paks plant by a Russian state-owned firm in a deal signed by Magyar’s predecessor, the Kremlin-friendly Viktor Orbàn, citing the water issue.

The European Commission is ready to offer “eyes in the sky” via the Copernicus program to support Indonesian search and rescue operations after the country was hit by a 7.7 magnitude earthquake, President Ursula von der Leyen said Saturday.

“Indonesia, we stand with you,” von der Leyen said in a post on X.

Copernicus is an observation system that can provide mapping services useful for search operations and damage assessments.

At least 38 people have died since the powerful quake struck the island of Flores, the BBC reported citing a press conference by Indonesia’s disaster response agency. Rescue operations are ongoing .

The foreign ministries of Italy, Greece and Estonia and officials have posted messages of support on X today.

Earlier this week, the Commission provided €2.1 million for assistance in Colombia as well as use of the Copernicus system after it was hit by a 7.4 magnitude quake.

The Trump administration has granted preliminary approval for a cryptocurrency venture backed by President Donald Trump’s family to operate a federally chartered trust bank, over the protests of Democrats who decried the decision as riddled with conflicts of interest.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the bank regulatory arm of the Treasury Department, said in a letter on Friday that it was conditionally approving World Liberty Trust Co.’s application for a trust bank charter. The company must still meet additional requirements before it receives final approval, the regulator said.

The decision stands to give new powers and federal credibility to a venture in which Trump and his family retain a substantial financial interest. It’s also among the most direct official actions that the administration has taken involving the president’s private finances.

World Liberty Trust Co. President and Chairman Zach Witkoff said the charter will allow the company to manage its USD1 stablecoin, a crypto token whose value is pegged to $1, under the OCC’s watch.

“USD1 grew because institutions trust how it operates, and confidence at enterprise scale deserves the backing of federal supervision,” Witkoff, the son of Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said in a statement. “We welcome continuous scrutiny from Federal regulators for many years to come.”

While Washington has been in knots over the steady drumbeat of news that Trump-linked businesses are expanding during his second term, the World Liberty application stood out to many.

Some Democrats and ethics watchdogs argued that the bid was one of the clearest examples of the conflicts of interest that administration officials face as they weigh the wishes of Trump family-backed companies. And they were quick to bash the OCC’s approval.

“This is the most brazen act of self-dealing our financial system has ever seen — and Congress cannot allow it to stand,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee.

Warren and other Democrats unveiled legislation on Friday that would prohibit regulators from approving banks that are owned or controlled by the president or the president’s family, vice president, members of Congress or other top government officials.

A Democratic Senate aide said the Banking Committee would likely probe the OCC’s approval of the World Liberty bank charter next year if Democrats regain control of Congress.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington CEO Donald Sherman called the OCC’s approval “the most egregious example to date of the President’s businesses profiting from his government job.”

“The President continues to boost the crypto market at the expense of everyday Americans who are wondering what happened to the money in their own bank accounts,” he said.

World Liberty, in advance of the approval, had rejected the conflict allegations — saying Trump is not involved in managing the company and that none of its leaders or employees work for the federal government. The White House has similarly said Trump has no involvement in business deals that would implicate his official responsibilities.

Trump and his family nevertheless retain a substantial financial stake in World Liberty Financial. DT Marks DEFI LLC, an entity affiliated with Trump and members of his family, owns about 38 percent of the holding company that controls World Liberty Financial, according to the company’s website. The entity and Trump family members also hold 22.5 billion of World Liberty’s governance tokens.

Trump disclosed nearly $600 million in income from World Liberty token and equity sales in 2025, a major piece of the $1.4 billion of crypto-related earnings he raked in. He has said he does not manage his financial interests, which are overseen by his children.

The approval doesn’t allow World Liberty to open a traditional bank, but rather a national trust bank — a limited-purpose institution that would not make loans or accept federally insured deposits. It’s the latest in a string of such approvals for crypto firms under Trump’s OCC. Others who have received similar green lights include Circle, Ripple and Coinbase.

The charter still provides significant legal and financial advantages. It’ll allow World Liberty to issue and redeem its USD1 stablecoin directly, manage the reserves backing it and offer digital asset custody services without relying on an intermediary. The company could also operate across state lines more easily without having to answer to individual state regulators.

Federal supervision could also bolster World Liberty’s credibility with customers and investors and help expand the use of USD1.

“This is not World Liberty trying to become Chase or Bank of America. This is World Liberty trying to become like Circle,” the crypto giant, said Austin Campbell, a crypto adviser and professor at New York University. The newly acquired charter, Campbell added, “is a regulatory wrapper to be able to hold these things in the way required under U.S. law to do business with both retail and the big boys.”

The decision to approve World Liberty Trust Co. had put Comptroller Jonathan Gould, a Trump appointee, in the extraordinary position of deciding whether to grant federal banking privileges to a business tied to the president’s family.

Gould had rejected calls to pause the review or recuse himself. And he declined a request by Democrats to share the full, unredacted application submitted by World Liberty. “We process applications in a fair and evenhanded manner,” he told lawmakers in February.

Stephen Lybarger, the top OCC official overseeing bank chartering and a longtime career official of the agency, wrote in the approval letter on Friday that the agency followed “established policies and procedures” in evaluating World Liberty’s application.

“The Comptroller and staff acted consistently with their statutory duties and ethical obligations with respect to the Application,” Lybarger wrote. “Career OCC staff reviewed the application for consistency with the statutory, regulatory, and policy requirements and factors for approval of a de novo application.”

The OCC declined to comment further. The agency consulted with career government ethics officials as it evaluated the World Liberty application, according to a person familiar with the process.

The BBC is seeking to subpoena President Donald Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr., his daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner in connection with a $10 billion defamation lawsuit the president is pressing against the U.K. broadcaster.

Lawyers for the BBC say the Trump family members “without question have personal knowledge” about President Trump’s intentions in delivering the speech at the heart of the case: his Jan. 6, 2021, address to supporters at the Ellipse as the Capitol attack was getting underway.

The president’s lawsuit alleges that a BBC documentary aired in the U.K. in 2024 defamed him by splicing together distant parts of the speech to make it sound like he was endorsing violence. The BBC has apologized for the editing but denies that it is valid grounds for a suit.

Drawing largely on testimony gathered by the House Jan. 6 Committee, the BBC’s attorneys say Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump were present as the president revised his speech and were on hand at the Ellipse as he spoke. The network’s lawyers also say Kushner drafted a proposed statement for the president condemning the violence.

The subpoenas seek both deposition testimony and relevant documents from the Trump family members.

Court filings indicate that the BBC tried to serve the subpoenas to Kushner and Ivanka Trump’s home in Miami in May, but police blocked the attempt. A lawyer for the Secret Service, Troy Epstein, informed the BBC’s lawyers by email that the agency could not accept the subpoenas.

“The United States Secret Service, as an agency of the United States Government, is not authorized to accept service of these subpoenas for these individuals, nor can we opine on how you all may best facilitate or effectuate service of these subpoenas,” Epstein wrote.

A similar attempt to serve Donald Trump Jr. at the Trump Organization’s Trump Tower offices in New York was also unsuccessful.

In a motion filed Friday in federal court in Miami, the BBC’s attorneys said the president’s lawyers also refused to accept the subpoenas. The network is asking the court to authorize service by mail or to order that service through President Trump’s attorneys is adequate.

Spokespeople for the Trump family members and for President Trump’s legal team did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

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The U.S. on Friday threatened action against the EU unless Brussels reins in its environmental and human rights rules, which Washington says unfairly burden American companies.

Acknowledging Brussels had made “some positive reforms,” Washington said the EU had “failed to fully address U.S. concerns,” and that it “will take any actions necessary to address unreasonable burdens on U.S. commerce.”

U.S. Ambassador to the EU Andrew Puzder piled on the pressure Friday, writing on X that “now it’s time for the EU to deliver.” He pointed to commitments made under last year’s Turnberry trade deal to ensure U.S. businesses do not face “undue restrictions” on transatlantic trade due to Brussels’ green regulations.

The dispute centers on two pillars of the EU’s corporate sustainability rulebook: the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, which requires large companies to address human rights and environmental harms linked to their operations and supply chains, and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, which requires companies to disclose sustainability-related information.

Brussels has scaled back both laws in its drive to cut red tape, but has stopped short of Washington’s demand to shield U.S. companies from their reach.

Last week, Puzder similarly attacked the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism as a tariff on U.S. exporters. On Thursday, the White House also accused the EU and more than 40 countries of enabling Chinese goods to skirt U.S. tariffs by rerouting them through their markets.

A European Commission spokesperson told POLITICO that Brussels had made “considerable efforts” to explain its rules and highlight “its willingness to cooperate with the US to increase trade where possible,” but drew a line at changing its regulatory regime in response to U.S. pressure.

“We have been very clear and consistent on the fact that neither our rules framework nor our regulatory autonomy are up for negotiation,” said the spokesperson.

This story has been updated.

Koen Verhelst contributed reporting.

PARIS — Le Conseil constitutionnel a rendu ce vendredi sa décision sur la loi interdisant les réseaux sociaux aux mineurs et a annoncé censurer son article 1er, qui acte ladite interdiction pour les moins de 15 ans.

De fait, la décision rend caduque le principal objet de cette loi portée depuis plusieurs années par le président de la République.

Dans sa décision, les Sages estiment en effet que cet article, en instituant une interdiction “de portée générale” des réseaux sociaux aux moins de 15 ans, porte “une atteinte disproportionnée à la liberté d’expression et de communication” qui n’est pas “adaptée, nécessaire et proportionnée à l’objectif poursuivi” : celui de protéger les mineurs en ligne.

“L’interdiction instituée par la loi est susceptible de s’appliquer à des services de communication en ligne dont les risques pour la santé et la sécurité des mineurs ne sont pas établis”, estime encore le Conseil constitutionnel, insistant sur l’imprécision autour du champ d’application de l’article.

Le risque avait été soulevé au moment de l’examen du texte au Sénat, certains élus de la Chambre haute ayant tenté d’imposer l’établissement d’une “liste noire” qui définirait plus précisément les plateformes concernées par cette limitation d’accès aux mois de 15 ans – et éviterait ainsi le risque de censure par le Conseil constitutionnel.

Un élément du texte retiré au moment de son examen en Commission mixte paritaire pour assurer sa conformité avec le droit européen.

Le Conseil constitutionnel estime par ailleurs que le texte ne définit pas les garanties légales propres à assurer le droit au respect de la vie privée des utilisateurs qui seront contraints de faire vérifier leur âge par les plateformes pour prouver leur majorité.

“Le gouvernement n’a pas assez écouté le Sénat et le risque d’inconstitutionnalité que nous pointions depuis des mois. Désormais, le risque, c’est que le texte soit vidé de sa substance”, a réagi, sur ce point, la rapporteure du texte au Sénat, Catherine Morin-Desailly, auprès de POLITICO.

Un constat partagé par le député socialiste Arthur Delaporte, à l’origine de l’une des saisines du Conseil constitutionnel. L’autre émanait du groupe de la France Insoumise (LFI).

“Dans notre recours, nous dénoncions un dispositif disproportionné passant à côté de son objectif”, a-t-il commenté sur X. “L’obstination présidentielle a été mauvaise conseillère”.

Le président du groupe EPR, Gabriel Attal, a déclaré sur X prendre acte de la décision de la juridiction concernant ce texte porté par son groupe : “Avec Laure Miller et les députés Ensemble nous poursuivons le travail pour atteindre notre seul objectif : protéger nos enfants et notre jeunesse”, a-t-il promis.

“Le Président de la République a chargé le Premier ministre de travailler, dans les meilleurs délais, à une rédaction juridiquement robuste tenant compte de la décision du Conseil constitutionnel ainsi que du cadre européen”, a assuré de son côté l’Elysée dans un communiqué publié peu après. Et de poursuivre : “la détermination du Président de la République à faire aboutir cette réforme d’ici au printemps 2027 demeure totale”.

Cet article a été mis à jour pour ajouter les réactions à la décision du Conseil constitutionnel.

A court in France on Friday shot down a bill seeking to ban access to social media for under-15s from September — a major blow to President Emmanuel Macron that raises fundamental questions about efforts to protect kids on the internet.

The Constitutional Council, which reviews the constitutionality of French legislation, said the restrictions in the bill disproportionately infringe on minors’ right to freedom of expression and communication.

Europe’s would-be first social media ban, which sought to prohibit access to anyone in France under the age of 15 from next month, had been a flagship policy of Macron’s second and final term.

The French president has also pushed restrictions to the top of the EU agenda, with an expected announcement of bloc-wide measures by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in September.

In a statement late Friday, the French presidential office said the government would not be giving up on the bill. It has set a new target date for spring 2027, which coincides with when Macron will leave office.

The statement said Macron “has instructed the Prime Minister to work, as quickly as possible, on a legally sound draft that takes into account” the court’s decision. The ruling hinted at what would make the age restriction align with fundamental rights: giving parents more flexibility.

Peter Craddock, a senior Brussels-based attorney advising social media firms, said the French court decision could have far-reaching implications.

“What they’re basically saying here is: ‘Listen, government, if you want to get this to succeed, you can’t just work on the basis of a general ban. There have to be limitations,” said Craddock, a partner at Keller & Heckman. “There have to be ways for people to say, ‘well, actually, in my case, my son, my daughter is of a certain degree of maturity and is able to use this properly.'”

The government bill had passed through the French legislative procedure after a lengthy back-and-forth earlier this summer. It was set to bring forward Europe’s first social media age restrictions, with Greece and Denmark planning to follow suit.

But Article 1 of the French bill essentially rendered it a blanket ban, without sufficiently distinguishing between the risks of each social media platform or the varying levels of vulnerability among minors themselves, said the court. The ban would also apply to online platforms that have not been proven to have risks to the health and safety of minors.

Craddock warned the court’s judgment may not bode well for other national bans or restrictions coming from the European Commission, since the decision is framed around fundamental rights, which are harmonized across the bloc.

“The reasoning is actually equally relevant internationally,  throughout the EU, because this fundamental freedom is not specific to France,” he said.

This article has been updated.

Jets from NATO’s Baltic Air Policing mission shot down a drone that entered Latvian airspace overnight, the country’s armed forces reported on X.

The drone was downed near the village of Rugāji in northeastern Latvia, close to the Russian border, after Italian Eurofighters based in Lithuania and Turkish F-16s based in Estonia were scrambled.

The uncrewed aerial vehicle appeared in Latvian airspace “as a result of Russian electromagnetic warfare,” said the Latvian National Armed Forces in a press release. Earlier Friday, more than 50 Ukrainian drones attacked targets in Russia’s western regions, including Leningrad and Tver, where they struck Ust-Luga — the second-largest port in Russia — and a warehouse belonging to e-commerce giant Wildberries.

Latvia’s military warned that similar incidents may happen again in the future. “While the Russian aggression in Ukraine is ongoing, the recurrence of such cases when a foreign unmanned aircraft enters or approaches Latvian airspace is possible,” it said.

An air raid alert was declared in four eastern Latvian municipalities at around 4 a.m. local time. The military urged people to stay indoors and away from exterior walls.

After the drone was downed, Sandra Kapteine, head of the Rugāji village administration, told the Latvian Information Agency that the incident “caused no casualties,” as the drone wreckage fell in a “wooded area.”

There has been an uptick in similar incidents over recent months in countries close to the war-zone. A week ago, Bulgarian Defense Minister Dimitar Stoyanov said a Ukrainian-made drone crossed Bulgarian airspace from Romania and exploded near the village of Kardam.

Thousands of Spanish and Moroccan security officers reinforced Ceuta’s borders on Friday as online messages spread calling for a new mass incursion into the exclave in North Africa.

Following last month’s unprecedented arrival of 72,000 migrants into the Spanish city, viral social media posts proposed a similar surge be staged on Saturday, Aug. 15 — a national holiday in Spain. Authorities in Madrid and Rabat have been tracking the online chatter and coordinating a common response.

Moroccan Interior Ministry Spokesperson Rachid El Khalfi on Wednesday confirmed the country was “taking all necessary measures to counter any attempt at illegal crossing,” and local journalists reported a significant buildup of troops around the border town of Fnideq on Friday.

Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska traveled to Ceuta on Thursday to inspect border infrastructure and a new sea barrier designed to keep people from swimming into the city. The exclave’s security personnel has also been reinforced with an additional 300 police officers and 2,000 soldiers.

“We do this to dissuade anyone who aspires to enter Ceuta and Melilla irregularly,” said Grande-Marlaska. “None of them will remain in Ceuta, none of them will make it to the Iberian Peninsula, none of them will be given legal status.”

The rumored mass crossing has been cited by critics of Spain’s migration policies.

Austria’s conservative Europe, Integration and Family Minister Claudia Bauer, last week mentioned the rumored Aug. 15 surge in a written statement, demanding Madrid “immediately and significantly reinforce border protection in its African enclaves and ensure that this time it will hold.”

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government also cited the possibility of a mid-August mass arrival last week while justifying its decision to maintain border checks on travelers from Spain.

LONDON — Nigel Farage’s victory in the Clacton by-election is emphatic — but it won’t let him off the hook.

Winning back his seaside House of Commons seat by an increased margin allows the Reform UK leader to claim victory in the “people vs the establishment” contest he triggered in response to intense scrutiny of his finances.

Farage won the backing of 22,239 constituents, or 63 percent of the vote. That’s 1,014 more votes in this by-election than at the U.K. general election two years ago, and a 17-point swing in his favor.

But second-placed this time was Count Binface, a comedian with a trash can on his head who secured — by many thousands — his highest ever vote count in a palpable protest against Farage. None of Britain’s mainstream parties took part in the contest, branding it a circus.

The Reform UK leader’s refusal to turn up at the count to hear the result Friday — a move that would have seen him pictured alongside a cast of comedy characters — underlined the struggle for him to get back on the front foot he is used to contesting politics from. 

More significantly, Farage’s triumph means that parliamentary investigations into his financial affairs will now resume. That could lead to another by-election — one in which serious rivals are far less likely to stand aside to allow Farage to face-off against a long list of no-hopers.

Labour MPs switched out their own leader in part because of Farage’s storming success at local elections in May, but the focus on this contest has also made it harder for Farage to land blows on Britain’s new Prime Minister Andy Burnham.

This week, Labour overtook Reform in POLITICO’s Poll of Polls after months on the back-foot for the governing party.

Snubbing the count

Clacton is Farage’s fiefdom. It was one of the most Brexit-voting constituencies in the country and was the place that first sent him to the Commons on his eighth time of trying.

But Binface, a proud proponent of the British tradition of satirical candidates contesting elections, had never won more than 308 votes in a parliamentary election before. Against Farage, he secured 9,455 votes. That means 28 percent plumped for the comedy candidate with a bin on his head.

Farage on Friday snubbed the leisure center count and the mild embarrassment of accepting victory alongside Binface that three prime ministers — Boris Johnson, Rishi Sunak and Andy Burnham — have endured before him. 

He told his own “Farage Fest” jamboree organized in secret away from the results venue that he’d been advised by Essex Police of an “organized campaign to disrupt and degrade the result.”

“I’m not scared of these people, far from it,” he told fans. “But I’m damned if I’m going to stand on a stage, having won a resounding victory, a ringing endorsement of all that I’ve tried to fight for, and you’ve tried to fight for, and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies, and I will not sadly be attending the count.”

That meant, according to reports, Farage became the first winning candidate not to turn up for a result since jailed Irish Republican Army hunger striker Bobby Sands won Fermanagh and South Tyrone in 1981.

Instead, Farage railed against the media and the “establishment” in his own event fit with branded pint cups, a ferris wheel and yurts for overnight stays. It was yet another demonstration of his attempt to bend the norms that accompany mainstream politics to his will.

Essex Police assured a “proportionate and robust policing operation” was in place at the count — while it was made clear that Farage was not advised to avoid the event. He cancelled a scheduled speech in Clacton, too.

Farage had gambled that a strong victory would inhibit the chances of parliamentary watchdogs imposing a severe enough sentence to set up a recall, should he be found to have breached the rules. “The bigger the vote, the bigger the message. Let’s tell the establishment where to go,” Farage said as polls opened on Thursday.

In the event, the turnout — at 44 percent — was not astonishing. That it’s less than the general election may not be surprising, but it was lower than another high-profile by-election held in this seat a decade earlier.

In 2014 Douglas Carswell resigned as the Conservative MP for the area to run for Ukip, Farage’s Eurosceptic party that helped drive Brexit. 

Clacton returned Carswell in his new guise, making him the first MP elected under the Ukip banner. He won 60 percent of the vote, on a 51 percent turnout.

That day was described as a “mini-earthquake in British politics” — but Friday’s result is producing less stable ground for Reform. “Farage’s distraction by-election doesn’t clear his name – it just shows he likely has so much more to hide,” argued Labour Party Chair Bridget Phillipson Friday morning.

Probes continue

So now the uphill battle. The parliamentary standards commissioner will resume two investigations into Farage — one centering on a £5 million donation from a crypto-entrepreneur, the other into support provided by a convicted fraudster.

The MP denies wrongdoing in both instances, arguing he didn’t need to declare the donations because they were given in a personal capacity before he was elected. 

But if there’s a finding of a serious rule breach then the Commons could vote to suspend Farage and trigger a recall petition.

The signatures of just 10 percent of registered voters in Clacton would then be needed to expel Farage from parliament — and trigger another by-election in which he could stand. Farage has expressed hopes that there isn’t such an appetite in his constituency — but the support for Binface throws that into doubt.

Clacton’s electorate is 79,785 — the 9,455 votes that Binface secured represents around 12 percent of those eligible voters, a comfortable margin for recall to be successful. 

Tactical errors?

That is all potential peril for the future. Right now, the August by-election has even some supporters questioning whether this was a rare miscalculation from a veteran campaigner.

Farage has in recent years dominated the summer break when many MPs vacate the political playing field.

But broadcasting rules on election periods stymied this year’s effort. Media invites to the press conferences Farage did throw had to assure broadcasters he would not be mentioning Clacton. And every mention of Clacton meant presenters were obliged to read the full 34-candidate list — namedropping Nick the Incredible Flying Brick and Baron Von Thunderclap in the process. 

Reform has also been struggling to grapple with a squeeze on its right from Rupert Lowe’s Restore Britain splinter party. Farage’s one-time Reform comrade touted the possibility of a pact to unite the right — but deeply held grievances on both sides mean the distraction has dragged on.

A row over one of Reform’s most senior officials, Zia Yusuf, calling a Conservative former defense secretary a “traitor to Britain” has also been generating unwanted headlines and exposing rifts inside Reform.

If that second by-election does emerge in the coming months then the Conservatives have already vowed to fight it. Farage, should he choose to stand again, would face a far tougher contest against the backdrop of parliament having ruled against him, and many voters in Clacton had been unimpressed by the “laughing stock” caused by the first election.

The Reform hardcore may be buoyed by Farage’s railing against the “establishment” — but what this saga does to his reputation with the wider electorate he needs to propel him into Downing Street remains the biggest unanswered question.

LONDON — Nigel Farage was declared the winner of the Clacton by-election Friday morning — and immediately stepped into a resumed parliamentary investigation into his finances.

The Reform UK leader won the special contest with 22,239 votes, returning him as the member of parliament for the seaside constituency. His nearest rival, a comedian styling himself as Count Binface, came second with 9,455 votes.

Farage got 1,014 more votes this time around than in 2024 — a 17-point swing in his favor — albeit against no real competition after all the main political parties boycotted the contest. Turnout was 44.37 percent.

The by-election was called by Farage himself amid mounting scrutiny of his finances.

The right-wing populist has faced repeated questions over a £5 million donation from crypto-entrepreneur Christopher Harborne, received before he became Clacton’s member of parliament in 2024, as well as support from convicted fraudster George Cottrell.

Farage has given varying explanations for the support, and billed this election — called at a dramatic press conference railing against the mainstream parties — as a “people versus the establishment” chance for Clacton’s voters to be his judge.

On Friday, the website of Parliament’s standards commissioner was updated to make clear that a paused probe into the Harborne donation has now been resumed.

That tees up the prospect of a further electoral test for Farage in Clacton if he is found to have broken the rules. The Conservatives, likely to be the most competitive challengers, have made clear that they would stand in such a contest.

Farage on Friday broke with tradition by declining to attend the result declaration at Clacton Leisure Centre.

He told supporters in an earlier speech in the town he would not be attending due to what he called an “organized campaign to disrupt and degrade” the result, claiming police had warned Reform UK of such a threat. A later Clacton victory rally has also been cancelled.

An Essex Police spokesperson said only that: “The decision of candidates to attend or not attend the election count is a decision for individuals and their security teams, our role is to make sure our policing operation is sufficiently robust to ensure the safety of all and we are grateful to all of our officers, staff and the staff at Tendring District Council who worked through the night to ensure the safety of all.”

Farage told his supporters: “I’m damned if I’m going to stand on a stage having won a resounding victory, a ringing endorsement of all that I’ve tried to fight for and you’ve tried to fight for and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies.”

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This week and next, the Brussels Playbook Week Ender podcast is away for the summer holiday. 

So, we thought we’d re-up this popular installment on Europe’s quest to become independent from U.S. tech. 

In this episode first released in June, Sarah Wheaton is joined by “The Tech Coup” author and former Member of the European Parliament Marietje Schaake and POLITICO’s Laurens Cerulus, as they look at what happens when the systems running Europe’s schools, ministries, banks, businesses and security are controlled elsewhere. They also discuss whether Brussels can build real alternatives or simply learn to manage its dependence better. 

The Brussels Playbook Podcast will be back to its regular schedule on Aug. 24. 

Questions? Comments? Send us a message to our WhatsApp here or at +32 491 05 06 29. 

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has a problem: Nobody wants the hardest job in Washington.

The Ukrainian president is struggling to find someone of sufficient influence to represent Kyiv to the Trump administration, with prospective candidates proving reluctant to take on the grueling assignment at a critical moment in the war, according to two former senior Ukrainian officials and four lawmakers.

The need to replace the previous envoy, Olga Stefanishyna, helped trigger Zelenskyy’s still-incomplete government reshuffle. Stefanishyna was formally dismissed on Aug. 3 over impending embezzlement charges. 

Zelenskyy moved his reshuffle plans forward so he could offer the ambassadorship to Yulia Svyrydenko, the outgoing prime minister, according to a former senior Ukrainian official and a Republican foreign expert familiar with the background to the shake-up. But she declined, disrupting his plans. 

“It is no secret that I counted on and offered Yulia Svyrydenko the post of ambassador to the United States,” Zelenskyy said at a press conference in late July. He added that he was looking for a candidate with the highest possible qualifications: “a person at the level of a deputy prime minister, minister, or prime minister.”

Since then, however, other prospective candidates have proved equally reluctant, spurning what would in any case be the difficult job of handling Donald Trump’s unpredictable White House.

Ukrainians with sufficient heft and skill for the ambassadorship are looking at it askance, “worrying that they would not enjoy the conditions they would need to do the job properly,” said Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, a prominent Ukrainian opposition lawmaker and former deputy prime minister who is a regular critic of Zelenskyy.

“Certainly that would be the case without having the ear of the president or his trust,” she added. That narrows Zelenskyy’s options sharply. The person would likely have to come from his tight inner circle of trusted aides, Klympush-Tsintsadze said, but there is no one there who seriously fits the bill. 

“Framing it as if nobody wants the job would be a kind of oversimplification,” said a former Ukrainian diplomat who was granted anonymity in order to speak freely. “Of course, there are people who want the job, but there’s no one who really measures up to it. Zelenskyy is having a hard time filling the position.”

Wrong direction

The trouble filling the Washington post is part of a broader problem for Zelenskyy, whose office did not respond to a request for comment. The president’s approval ratings have deteriorated since he embarked a month ago on a government shake-up that remains incomplete and has proved turbulent. According to a Socis Center for Social Research survey, more than 55 percent of Ukrainians believe their nation is moving in the wrong direction.

Zelenskyy’s dismissal in July of popular defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov sparked street protests and a political backlash, while several key posts remain unresolved. The reshuffle has also raised questions about how Zelenskyy chooses his senior team — and how far beyond his tight circle of trusted aides he is prepared to look. 

“No one has explained to Ukrainians why exactly the government had to be changed,” Mykola Knyazhitskiy, an opposition lawmaker from Lviv and founder of Ukraine’s Espreso TV channel, said.

“There had been no clearly articulated public complaints about Svyrydenko. In her farewell address to parliament, Svyrydenko received applause. MPs gave her a standing ovation. So why was she dismissed if her performance was considered so successful and was so highly regarded?” 

Difficult timing

The ambassadorial vacancy comes at an especially fraught moment for Kyiv. Washington remains central to Ukraine’s ability to sustain the war, and whoever takes the job will have to navigate a Trump administration that has repeatedly shifted course on military support and on how — and when — the war should end.

In an interview with POLITICO’s Dasha Burns earlier this year, Stefanishyna acknowledged she had experienced “diplomatic whiplash” in the role. 

Kyiv is trying to persuade Trump to give Ukraine a license to manufacture Patriot air defense systems, something he promised in June, only to reverse himself in July. The issue is becoming more urgent as Ukraine heads toward another winter of Russian attacks on its energy and civilian infrastructure and is already struggling to intercept intensified ballistic missile strikes. Zelenskyy has said this year’s deliveries of air defense missiles from Ukraine’s allies have fallen by two-thirds compared with 2025.

At the same time, there are signs the White House may soon seek to revive stalled peace negotiations. That would put a premium on having an ambassador in Washington with the political weight to get through the door, the authority to speak for Zelenskyy and the skill to navigate an administration where policy can change quickly. And also to lobby Congress. 

Leaving the post vacant, therefore, carries risks well beyond diplomatic protocol. Ukraine could find itself without a heavyweight operator in Washington just as decisions are being made over weapons, air defense, logistics and intelligence sharing, as well as the terms of any renewed peace push.

“It is quite likely that Zelenskyy won’t appoint anyone this side of the midterm elections in the United States,” said Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, an opposition lawmaker. “It will be hard to judge who would fit the political landscape best until those elections have been held.”

BRUSSELS — Geopolitical crises and natural disasters have an annoying habit of rocking Europe in the middle of summer, when the bloc’s political leaders are off soaking up the sun or unplugging in some bucolic retreat.

While the continent’s governments have proved remarkably adept at functioning with their leaders on holiday, in a crisis, being seen to be present can matter almost as much as actually being there. 

“Emotions play an important role in crisis communication,” said Olga Eisele, a crisis-communications researcher at the University of Amsterdam. “People are likely insecure, anxious, maybe furious or depressed about having lost things or even people, and want these emotions to be heard by those in charge.”

“Physical presence can signal much more effectively that these emotions are taken seriously and are heard,” she added.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez was just hours away from kicking off his weeks-long summer break when 72,000 migrants surged into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta on July 30. The Socialist leader duly postponed his plans and traveled to the North African coastal city, where he delivered a televised address pushing back against criticism from other EU leaders. 

But as soon as the emergency was deemed to be under control, Sánchez resumed his scheduled vacation at a state-owned villa on the island of Lanzarote.

His decision to take time off, even as the political aftershocks continued to roil the bloc, drew criticism from opposition politicians like Elías Bendodo, deputy secretary of the center-right People’s Party, who this week accused the prime minister of “unprecedented selfishness” for taking time off while the situation in Ceuta is “far from normal.”

“Sánchez insults the Spanish people by remaining on his beach vacation,” he added.

The Spanish government rejected the criticism, noting the prime minister is not only reachable but actively participating in remote meetings, and insisted the state remains fully operational even when its top leaders are away.

The perils of taking time off

Sánchez isn’t the only EU leader reluctant to let the Ceuta crisis spoil their August break.

At a moment when passport-free travel has been suspended between Spain and Italy, and its prime ministers are openly criticizing each others’ policies, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen appears to have embraced the quieter side of summer in an undisclosed rural location.

With the migration row still ongoing this week, von der Leyen posted a video on Instagram — soliciting names for two chicks hatched by her hen, Chickeletta.

Despite the light-hearted post, a Commission spokesperson told POLITICO that von der Leyen continues to track developments across the bloc and “remains in constant contact with her team in Brussels and her College.”

“While family time is important, she always follows all critical matters closely, remains fully engaged, and intervenes directly whenever needed,” the spokesperson added, insisting the Commission president had closely followed the developments in Ceuta and was in “daily contact” with the three commissioners involved in directly addressing the crisis.

The spokesperson also stressed that the Commission remains “fully operational” throughout the summer, with “duty commissioners” appointed to ensure a member of the College is available during the periods when Brussels becomes a ghost town.

Similarly, some national governments like Finland’s publicly announce when ministers are on summer holidays and which of their deputies are handling their portfolios.

“What matters from a crisis-management perspective is that the responsible authorities can take decisions quickly, mobilise the necessary resources and coordinate the response,” said a separate Commission spokesperson.

But even when mechanisms are in place to ensure governments have the ability to manage dramatic situations, officials on holiday risk looking callous or indifferent if they continue to holiday during a crisis.

In 2022, North Rhine-Westphalia Environment Minister Ursula Heinen-Esser was forced to step down after it was revealed that she had resumed a holiday break to Mallorca days after devastating floods killed over 180 people in western Germany the year before. Germany’s federal Family Minister Anne Spiegel also resigned in the face of backlash for similarly taking a four-week holiday in France in the aftermath of the catastrophe.

Evangelina Petridou, a crisis management expert and political science professor at Mid Sweden University, said a number of factors shape the intensity of backlash to a leader’s absence during a crisis. “Whether the opposition weaponizes the event, whether it is a majority or minority government and whether there is an institution in place to handle the crisis that can take the heat away from the individual minister or public official,” can all have an effect.

Another factor is the time of year, said Eisele, the crisis-communications researcher at the University of Amsterdam.

“If leaders are on holiday, then it is usually also a time when not much else is happening — in Germany we call that the Sommerloch,” Eisele said, explaining that the absence of hard news can turn an otherwise routine absence into a political drama. 

She added that while a public official’s physical presence is preferable, “reassurance can also come remotely” if the public is ultimately convinced the situation is being handled competently.

Should I stay or should I go?

Senior British military officials accused then-U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson of “dereliction of duty” for his decision to head off on a holiday in Somerset as Taliban forces moved to take Kabul in August 2021. His foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, faced even greater criticism for remaining on vacation in Crete until after the Afghan capital fell, at a moment when British forces were frantically trying to evacuate civilians.

Although he was also on holiday when the Taliban took Kabul, French President Emmanuel Macron did not face similar censure. From the Fort de Brégançon, the coastal retreat traditionally used by France’s head of state, he delivered a televised address to the nation that reinforced the perception that his government was taking care of the situation and doing everything it could to bring citizens home.

Fear of backlash leads many leaders to cancel holidays amid crisis situations. Keir Starmer called off a family vacation in August 2024 as far-right riots spread across England, and Portugal’s Prime Minister Luís Montenegro similarly declined to take time off as wildfires tore across the country last year.

But data suggests Europeans don’t necessarily expect their leaders to sacrifice their time off at the first sign of trouble.

A July 2025 Ipsos poll found that 46 percent of Britons thought it was important that the prime minister take a holiday, while 44 percent believed the head of government should take about as much time off as the average worker. More than three-quarters — 78 percent — said it was important that the prime minister be easily contactable while away.

Politicians on the continent may also face less pressure to sacrifice their holidays, given a working culture in which time off is widely regarded as a right. International Labor Organization data shows Europeans are entitled to more paid annual leave than workers in any other part of the world, and polling like Eurofound’s annual European Working Conditions Survey shows the bloc’s citizens strongly value work-life balance.

For that reason, the University of Amsterdam’s Eisele said backlash over holiday absences is usually related to larger image issues.

“If the leader has strong support, then not showing up immediately might be forgiven,” she said. But if the official in question is already having popularity problems, “crises are usually a prime situation to question the competence of a political leader.”

A bipartisan House delegation met with top Vatican officials on Wednesday to discuss artificial intelligence during a visit that briefly included Pope Leo XIV, according to two people with knowledge of the trip granted anonymity to disclose details of the private meetings.

The delegation’s visit, which has not been previously reported, included nine lawmakers and was coordinated by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, the person said. Committee member Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) and California Rep. Ro Khanna, the panel’s top Democrat, led the trip.

A spokesperson for the committee declined to comment.

In an interview confirming the visit, Khanna said the topics of discussion included religious freedom, AI’s economic and geopolitical risks, as well as broader ethical and existential implications. It centered on two key principles: human dignity and equality.

“Human dignity means that human beings need to be responsible for any key decisions involving health, involving finances, involving individual freedom, involving public services,” he said.

The Silicon Valley Democrat said that in this context, equality means preventing automation from causing mass unemployment, and ensuring AI cannot be used to exclude people from social services. Khanna said it also means guarding against a concentration of power in which “a few billionaires can make decisions about data and algorithms.”

The Vatican did not respond to a request for comment about the meeting. But Pope Leo has taken a special interest in the technology and used a May encyclical to call on countries to “safeguard humanity” as AI develops, warning that the technology could deepen inequality, fray the social fabric and erode moral responsibility if it doesn’t have ethical guardrails. Congress, meanwhile, has introduced dozens of AI bills and held several hearings, but has failed to agree on a comprehensive federal framework for governing the technology.

The pope previously cast the global race to develop cutting-edge AI technology in stark terms. As the U.S., China and other powers compete for an edge, he warned against a “dehumanizing ambition to develop ever more powerful technologies or to secure control over them,” describing a contest between “opposing imperialisms” seeking either to preserve or seize technological supremacy.

Khanna told POLITICO he plans to introduce legislation that would tax the use of autonomous AI agents to incentivize companies to hire human workers.

The group also discussed AI’s implications for human mortality and the limits of human knowledge — boundaries some developers have long imagined technology might overcome by uploading human consciousness and accumulated wisdom to the cloud.

Following the meetings, Khanna sent letters to top executives at OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Microsoft, Apple, Nvidia, and Amazon, asking how they intend to align their technology with the tenets of human dignity and equality.

An OpenAI spokesperson pointed POLITICO to prior policy documents outlining the AI company’s commitment to safety and to ensuring benefits from the technology are distributed equitably. The other companies did not respond to requests for comment.

The lawmakers traveled to Berlin to discuss China’s rising global influence, before picking up on the topic during their Vatican visit and in meetings with Italian government officials a few days later.

Alongside Khanna and Newhouse, Reps. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), Buddy Carter (R-Ga.), John Rutherford (R-Fla.), Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa), Shontel Brown (D-Ohio), Jill Tokuda (D-Hawaii) and Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) took part in the discussions, according to one of the people familiar with the trip.

Spokespeople for the members did not respond to requests for comment.