Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.

Britain’s King Charles will use a trip to New York today to showcase cultural and economic ties between the UK and the US at a time when the so-called “special relationship” is under strain.

It is the third day of a four-day state visit, clouded by tensions over the Iran war, that began in Washington with president Donald Trump greeting the monarch and his wife, Queen Camilla, AFP reported.

The New York leg will first see the royals take part in a wreath-laying ceremony at the 9/11 memorial to mark 25 years since the terror attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people. The city’s mayor Zohran Mamdani is not expected to meet Charles privately but will join him for the ceremony.

“This atrocity was a defining moment for America and your pain and shock were felt around the whole world,” Charles told the US Congress on Tuesday.

“We stood with you then. And we stand with you now in solemn remembrance of a day that shall never be forgotten,” he added in a speech that called for unity among western powers.

It comes as Trump said Charles agrees with him that Iran should never be allowed nuclear weapons. The president’s comments are likely to cause some embarrassment to royal aides that his views have been made public.

Trump said in his speech at the white-tie event on Tuesday evening:

We’re doing a little Middle East work right now … and we’re doing very well. We have militarily defeated that particular opponent, and we’re never going to let that opponent ever, Charles agrees with me even more than I do, we’re never going to let that opponent have a nuclear weapon.

They know that, and they’ve known it right now, very powerfully.

A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said:

The king is naturally mindful of his government’s longstanding and well-known position on the prevention of nuclear proliferation.

In other developments:

• Todd Blanche, the former defense lawyer for Donald Trump now serving as acting US attorney general, announced two charges against James Comey, the former FBI director and deputy attorney general for allegedly “knowing and willfully making a threat to kill” the president of the United States in a social media post.

• Patrick Fitzgerald, a former US attorney for the northern district of Illinois who now represents James Comey, said that his client, “vigorously denies the charges” filed against him.

• US defense secretary Pete Hegseth will face tough questions from lawmakers about the Iran war on Wednesday during his first testimony to Congress since the start of the conflict.

• President Trump will welcomes the Artemis II astronauts to the White House later today. The capsule returned to Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on Tuesday, almost a month after blasting off on humanity’s first lunar trip in more than a half century.

• The supreme court will hear arguments Wednesday over the Trump administration’s push to end legal protections for migrants fleeing war and natural disaster, one in a series of immigration cases the high court is considering against the backdrop of the president’s far-reaching immigration crackdown.

• The US Federal Reserve is widely expected to hold interest rates steady on Wednesday after a key policy meeting, likely the last chaired by central bank chief Jerome Powell. Policymakers will weigh the risks of surging energy prices and snarled supply chains due to the US-Israel war on Iran, with analysts widely expecting a third pause in a row.