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A Queensland mother has been committed to stand trial over the deaths of her two young daughters after they were found dead in her sweltering parked car.

Kerri-Ann Conley was charged with two counts of murder under a new definition in Queensland which includes reckless indifference to human life that came into effect in 2019, just weeks before the incident.

It's alleged Ms Conley put her two young daughters, Darcey, two, and Chloe-Ann, one, in her black Mazda sedan after leaving a friend's house before 5am.

When Ms Conley arrived home to her Waterford West address, it is alleged she left the two young girls inside the car before going inside and falling asleep.

Police allege the girls remained in the car for several hours as temperatures rose to over 30C but were not discovered until after 1pm.

The father of Darcey, Peter Jackson, told the Beenleigh Court that he routinely saw his daughter and her sister on Saturdays, but was unable to get in contact with Ms Conley on the morning of the incident.

Mr Jackson said he attempted to contact Ms Conley more than a dozen times but received no response until around the time paramedics were called to the property just before 1.30pm.

Police prosecutor Tim Wise told the court that they had collected more than 140 statements that will be tendered as evidence.

Magistrate Michael O'Driscoll ordered Ms Conley to stand trial, with a date yet to be set.

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Queensland mother committed to stand trial over deaths of daughters in hot car - 9News

Donald Trump returned to the campaign trail with a rally in Ohio on Saturday night, campaigning against a Republican who voted for his impeachment and trailing his own candidacy for president in 2024.

Trump repeated his baseless election 2020 grievances and painted a dystopian picture of the country under Democratic control, while in another echo the past, the crowd chanted Lock her up at the mention of Hillary Clinton, the Democrat he defeated in 2016.

The rally outside Cleveland on Saturday was to support Max Miller, a former White House aide challenging Anthony Gonzalez, a former college football and NFL star censured by his state party for voting for Trumps impeachment.

While he praised Miller as an incredible patriot and a great guy who loves the people of Ohio, Trump spent much of the rally fixating on the 2020 election, which he insists he won. This is despite top state and local election officials, his own attorney general and numerous judges, including some he appointed, saying there is no evidence of the mass voter fraud he alleges took place.

The 2020 presidential election was rigged, he told the crowd, which at one point broke into a Trump won! chant. We won that election in a landslide.

When Marjorie Taylor Greene, a far-right Republican from Georgia known for her incendiary rhetoric, asked the crowd who their president is, they boomed loudly, Trump!

President Trump is my president, too, she said.

The event had many of the trappings of the rallies Trump held as a candidate and as president. There was the eclectic playlist, the same stage design, and many familiar volunteers.

In the lead-up to the event, Trump told the conservative Newsmax channel: Were giving tremendous endorsements.

Fake Republicans, anybody that voted for the impeachment doesnt get it. But there werent too many of them. And I think most of them are being primaried right now, so thats good. Ill be helping their opponent.

Trumps first impeachment, for abusing his power in approaches to Ukraine, attracted one Republican vote, that of the Utah senator Mitt Romney. In his second, for inciting the deadly US Capitol attack, 10 House Republicans and seven in the Senate voted for Trumps guilt.

Trump was acquitted twice but banned from major social media platforms over his role in the Capitol attack. Regardless, he dominates the Republican party.

All bar one of the House Republicans who voted against him have attracted challengers. The 10th, John Katko of New York, co-authored a proposal for an independent, 9/11-style commission to investigate the 6 January attack on Congress, in which a mob roamed the Capitol, looking for lawmakers to capture or kill in an attempt to overturn the election. Senate Republicans blocked it.

By Saturday afternoon, traffic was backed up from the fairgrounds into town, where pro-Trump signs dotted residents lawns. On street corners, vendors sold Trump 2024 flags and other merchandise as supporters arrived.

Marjorie Taylor Greene, a far-right congresswoman from Georgia who was stripped of her committee assignments over a number of extreme comments, mingled with attendees and took pictures.

Trump has said he didnt win the election but has not formally conceded defeat by Joe Biden and continues to voice his lie that the loss was the result of electoral fraud.

On Friday he told Newsmax he would be making an announcement in the not too distant future about whether he will run again, and said supporters were going to be thrilled by election results in 2024.

We want a little time to go by, maybe watch what happens in [2022], he said.

In those midterm elections, Republicans hope to retake the House and Senate.

Trumps legal problems mounted on Friday, as his own lawyer confirmed that charges are likely in the investigation of the Trump Organization by the Manhattan district attorney. The companys chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, and the company itself are in prosecutors sights.

Many observers point out that Trumps many legal problems did not stop him winning the presidency in 2016 and are unlikely to put off many Republican voters should he run for the White House again.

In his Newsmax interview, the former president referred to his problems and to those affecting Rudy Giuliani, Trumps lawyer and loyal ally. The former New York mayor this week saw his law license suspended, over his advancement of Trumps election fraud lie.

Right now, Trump said, Im helping a lot of people get into office, and were fighting the deep state, and were fighting [the] radical left. Theyre after me, Theyre after Rudy, theyre after you, probably. Theyre after anybody.

The deep state conspiracy theory holds that a permanent government of bureaucrats and operatives exists to thwart Trump. Steve Bannon, Trumps campaign chairman in 2016 then a White House strategist and chief propagator of the theory, has said it is for nut cases.

Theyre vicious, Trump went on, and they dont do a good job and theyre very bad for the country But Ive been fighting them for five and a half years.

Since I came down the escalator [at Trump Tower in New York in June 2015, to announce his run for president], Ive been fighting them. These are vicious people I honestly believe they dont love this country.

Trump has spent much of his post-presidency at his Florida resort and his golf course in New Jersey. He also told Newsmax he was working very hard not only for 2024, but were working very hard to show the corruption of what took place in 2020, and then we see what happens.

Trumps rallies have been an instrumental part of his brand since he launched his 2016 campaign. The former reality star often test-drives new material and talking points to see how they resonate with crowds. His political operation uses the events to collect critical voter contact information and as fundraising tools.

The rallies have spawned hardcore fans who traveled the country, often camping out overnight to snag prime spots. Some such supporters began lining up outside the Ohio venue days early this week.

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Donald Trump returns to campaign trail with rally ...

I just think its been going on for so long that people are kind of tired of it, said Tony Kurtz, a GOP assemblyman from rural Juneau County, which went for Trump last year by nearly 30 percentage points.

For more than seven months since he lost the election, Trump has engaged in a crusade against Republicans who crossed him, an effort he invigorated with a rally in Ohio on Saturday, where he traveled to campaign against Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, who voted to impeach him earlier this year. In most cases, the Republican base has responded zealously. But here, at a convention center attached to a water park, the lack of interest from the rank-and-file suggested some of the first, tentative signs of weariness of Trumps smash-mouth political act.

Even Sen. Ron Johnson, an unfailing Trump ally, broke with the former presidents criticism of Johnsons home-state lawmakers, dismissing Trumps suggestion that they could be primaried.

I dont think that represents much of a threat, quite honestly, Johnson said, describing Vos and his colleagues as doing a pretty good job.

Trump remains wildly popular among Wisconsin Republicans no less than in other states and the belief in his false claim that the election was rigged is widespread, underpinning a raft of elections-related legislation passed by Republican lawmakers in the state this month. At the state convention, activists cheered for Trump when organizers played a recorded message in which Trump repeated his falsehood that he carried the state in November. The convention included a panel on election law changes, the state party homepage prominently features an election integrity dashboard and delegates carried tote bags that read Defend secure elections.

Brian Jennings, chair of the GOP in Florence County, a sparsely populated Trump stronghold in northern Wisconsin, said Trump is the Republican Party right now, and on the sidelines of the convention, several delegates said Trump was right that Vos hadnt done enough to overturn the results of the election.

But unlike in states like Georgia and Arizona, there wasnt widespread interest in purging the states Assembly speaker for it a departure from Trumps dominion over the Republican Partys apparatus in the states.

Thats Wisconsin for you, said Helmut Fritz, a delegate from Milwaukee who sits on the state partys credentials committee. Trump isnt the dictator.

In part, Voss avoidance of punishment is the result of shrewd politics. Though he has frustrated Republicans who want Wisconsin to pursue an Arizona-style review of the election, Vos is neither a Trump critic nor a defender of the November elections integrity in the mold of Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp or Utah Sen. Mitt Romney. He has infuriated Democrats by hiring three retired police officers to investigate potential irregularities and/or illegalities in the November election. And at the convention, he announced that a conservative former state Supreme Court justice, Michael Gableman, will oversee the effort.

Following that news which an operative familiar with the arrangement said was in the works for weeks Trump said at his rally in Ohio that I hear now that Wisconsin is looking very, very seriously into the election and I respect Wisconsin so much.

But for the purposes of the Wisconsin state convention, he had all but invited attendees to engage in a pile-on. In his statement issued the night before Vos spoke, Trump, seeking to stoke grassroots outrage, accused Vos, LeMahieu and state Sen. Chris Kapenga of working hard to cover up election corruption actively trying to prevent a Forensic Audit.

Dont fall for their lies! Trump wrote. These REPUBLICAN leaders need to step up and support the people who elected them by providing them a full forensic investigation. If they dont, I have little doubt that they will be primaried and quickly run out of office.

On Sunday, a Trump adviser said the former president remains adamant about doing audits and is going to keep up pressure on Republicans to have the courage to do it.

President Donald Trump gestures to the crowd as he arrives to speak at a campaign rally. | Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo

So far this year and in other states, Trumps broadsides against Republicans deemed insufficiently loyal to him have been met with enthusiasm from activists. Utah Republicans heckled Romney, an outspoken Trump critic, at their state convention in May. Republicans in Georgia booed Kemp. The GOP governor of Arizona, Doug Ducey, was censured by his party for his lack of fealty to Trump.

At the convention in Wisconsin, it was a different story. One delegate deleted Trumps statement from his phone, saying he wished Trump would shut up, and Im a big Trump supporter. Another delegate said he hadnt even bothered to read it.

David Blaska, a former Dane County supervisor who worked as a speechwriter for former GOP Gov. Tommy Thompson, said a lot of people still believe the election was stolen. But the fact they werent jeering Vos, he said, was a good sign.

Standing at the back of the convention hall, Blaska said the party is hopefully moving on.

Vos said he wasnt surprised by the reception, citing his relationship with activists dating back to before Act 10, the explosive legislation advanced by then-Gov. Scott Walker in 2011 that limited public employee collective bargaining rights. Trump, he said, was misinformed.

But in a sign that Trumps supremacy isnt absolute, Vos went further than many other Republican have been willing to, aligning himself with former House Speaker Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Republican who in a speech last month clashed with Trump when he said, If the conservative cause depends on the populist appeal of one personality, or of second-rate imitations, then were not going anywhere.

The things that President Trump stands for a strong America, lower taxes, more freedom everybody agrees with that, Vos said in a brief interview off the convention floor. But I will say I agree with Paul Ryan saying that our movement should never be about one person.

Trump, Vos said, did a lot of good things. But so could [Florida Gov.] Ron DeSantis or [Florida Sen.] Marco Rubio or you name the candidate. They all could do good things, too.

One important distinction in Wisconsin is the state partys history it is more firmly rooted than most. Ten years ago, Wisconsin was the Republican Partys leading light. Ryan was ascendant, soon to become the GOPs vice presidential nominee in 2012, then House speaker. Walker was beginning his first term as governor, waging a war on unions that would serve as a model for conservatives across the country. The states former GOP chair, Reince Priebus, ran the national party.

Today, the state party has been set back. After cresting in 2016, with Trumps upset of Hillary Clinton, Republicans here lost the governorship in 2018, then saw the state flip to Joe Biden two years later. Johnson, the states top elected Republican, has not yet said if hell run for reelection (On Saturday, he told reporters he wont announce a decision for quite some time.)

Its still a place [people] look to, Walker said. But its usually for things that have happened in the past.

Yet a comeback for the GOP in Wisconsin could be just a year away. Trump lost the state by fewer than 21,000 votes in 2020. Republicans still control the state legislature, and the party has a credible chance of unseating Tony Evers, the Democratic governor, next year.

I think Wisconsin will be back in terms of being a focal point nationally, because you'll have one of the most competitive gubernatorial elections, and probably at least nationally more importantly, you're going to have a Senate race that could very well determine who holds the Senate for the next several years, Walker said.

He said the party has a tremendous opportunity not to be wed to any one individual, and I say that fully acknowledging that on policy what President Trump did was phenomenal.

On politics, however, his record was mixed. In November, Wisconsin served as a blaring example of Trumps difficulties in the suburbs, with the former president juicing turnout in rural areas but underperforming in metro areas. Convention-goers repeatedly mentioned how Republicans running in the states five Republican-held House seats outperformed Trump in their districts.

In a swing state with a recent history of highly competitive elections, convention delegates and strategists repeatedly cited an imperative to rally together, and also to avoid needlessly alienating large swathes of otherwise attainable voters. Other states, said a Republican strategist at the Wisconsin convention, arent used to a decade of battles where every yard matters and where f---ing with each other internally can cost the party an election.

The stuff thats going on nationally, weve experienced it longer, said Jennie Frederick, president of the Wisconsin Federation of Republican Women. I feel like we know who the enemy is, and its not us.

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Trump isnt the dictator: Wisconsin GOP inches away from Trump - POLITICO

Working on the second floor of the West Wing allowed aides to avoid dealing with President Donald Trump because he never walked up the stairs to get to the upper floor, a forthcoming book by author Michael Wolff said.

Wolff wrote that working out of the second-floor office, as Trump advisors Kellyanne Conway and Stephen Miller opted to do, "meant a degree of exclusion but also protection" because "Trump would never climb the stairs (and, by the end of his term, he never had)."

An excerpt of Wolff's book "Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency" published in New York Magazine on Monday shed more light on the confusion among Trump and his hollowed-out circle of aides as the January 6 insurrection unfolded.

Read more: How Trump could use his relationship with Putin and Russia to skirt prosecution back in the USA

The unlikelihood of Trump climbing those stairs was first reported by The Washington Post in January 2017, during the early days of the Trump administration.

"Though Conway took over the workspace previously occupied by Valerie Jarrett, who had been Obama's closest adviser, the confidant dismissively predicted that Trump would rarely climb a flight of stairs," The Post said at the time.

In April, Trump lodged a rare defense of President Joe Biden after he took a tumble on the stairs of Air Force One while leaving Joint Base Andrews in March. Trump defended Biden against criticisms that he is too old, and compared Biden's plane stumble to when he struggled to walk down a ramp at West Point in June 2020.

"I know that if it were me, they would be up and down, going crazy," Trump told Fox News' Sean Hannity. "I had an instance where on a slippery, slippery ramp, a piece of steel, very steep and very long railings ... and it was pouring at West Point." He added, "The last thing I want to do is go down because when Gerald Ford went down and it was not good."

"Landslide" is scheduled to be published by Henry Holt & Co. on July 27.

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Trump never climbed the stairs to the 2nd floor of the White House's office, new book says - Business Insider

It makes it difficult to openly start campaigning as [Trump] at least contemplates running again, said Saul Anuzis, former chair of the Republican Party of Michigan, cautioning its still early in the election cycle. It keeps activists on the sidelines.

DeSantis, who has the benefit of claiming hes just running for reelection, continues to gain accolades for opening up Florida during the coronavirus pandemic sooner than most large states. His frequent appearances on Fox News put him in the national spotlight almost nightly. Last weekend, DeSantis beat Trump 74-71 in the annual Western Conservative Summits straw poll in Denver results that surprised even organizers of the summit. Last year, Trump won the same straw poll with nearly 95 percent support.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis arrives to speak at a press conference. | Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The governors backers say he is aware of the dangers of appearing to rise too quickly. One Republican consultant close to the governor, who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely about DeSantis and Trump, said the governor is very wary of eliciting the former presidents rage.

He will take measures so that Trump wont get mad at him, but believe me, the more successful you are, with Trump, sometimes makes it worse, the consultant said. Its a weird spot to be in for sure.

Trump is scheduled to hold a campaign-style rally on July 3 in Sarasota, Fla., one of a series of public events aimed at boosting the former presidents standing ahead of a possible 2024 presidential run. A Trump official planning the Florida rally told POLITICO that DeSantis team was contacted about the rally, but the governors office did not return a request seeking comment about whether or not he will be attending.

Trump remains the leader of the Republican Party, commanding loyalty from members and remaining active in congressional and statewide races as he weighs a 2024 comeback. But at 42, DeSantis represents a young, fresh face who presses similar conservative policies but with arguably more discipline than the former president. DeSantis has even started getting help from well-known Trumpworld figures, including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who joined the governor on a west coast fundraising swing that included stops in Las Vegas and Southern California.

But the biggest question remains whether DeSantis will outshine the former president, and if that will in turn provoke Trump. The former president in April both took credit for DeSantis political ascension and seemed to tamp down the governors 2024 dreams when he told Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo that hes considering DeSantis as his 2024 running mate.

Hes a friend of mine. I endorsed Ron, and after I endorsed him, he took off like a rocket ship, Trump said. A lot of people like that you know, Im just saying what I read and what you read they love that ticket certainly, Ron would be considered. Hes a great guy.

Meadows told the Washington Examiner in an interview published earlier this week that he doesnt expect DeSantis to challenge Trump if the former president officially entered the race.

That being said, Gov. DeSantis wont even hes asked over and over and over again every time Im in his presence hes been asked, Are you running in 2024? said Meadows, who now works for the Washington-based Conservative Partnership Institute, a group DeSantis met with on Wednesday afternoon, according to a schedule released by his office.

Others within Trumps orbit also downplay DeSantis national ambitions, saying that he is focused on his 2022 reelection as governor.

Ron DeSantis is not focusing on the ups and downs of 2024, he is focused on making the state of Florida successful, said David Bossie, head of Citizens United and a former Trump deputy campaign manager. That means solely focusing on his re-election in 2022. He is not getting sidetracked by the chattering class.

Florida state Rep. Anthony Sabatini, one of the GOP-led Legislature's biggest Trump backers, said the former presidents influence over the early 2024 jockeying has set up a clandestine presidential campaign process.

The reality is, right now, everyone has to run these kinds of secret, or indirect, presidential campaigns, Sabatini said. Of those trying it, I do think DeSantis has done the best job.

Photo by Pool/Getty Images

Many in Florida politics point to the irony of the situation. Trump is largely responsible for lifting DeSantis profile and helping him secure the governorship three years ago. Trumps 2018 primary endorsement helped DeSantis beat former Florida Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, himself a former congressman who was supported by Floridas entire Republican political establishment and a heavy favorite at the outset of the race. As governor, DeSantis has consistently pushed legislation that appeals to the conservative base and Trump, including a measure aimed at reigning in Big Tech and a bill that restricts some voting access in the state.

The two men, however, couldnt be more different. Trump, a billionaire, has been a staple of reality television and tabloids for years and promotes himself has one of the worlds most successful businessmen while DeSantis is a civil servant whose only source of income is his $134,000 annual taxpayer funded salary.

Others, however, see Trumps position possibly weakening as much of the nation moves beyond his presidency.

Donald Trump was not as strong in his position as he was last year, which is getting a lot of attention and a lot of news organizations covering us, said Jeff Hunt, vice president of Public Policy at Colorado Christian University who also helped organize last weeks Western Conservative Summit in Denver which featured the straw poll DeSantis won. Its very clear Trump has strong control among grassroots conservatives, but what people are looking for is Trump presidency policies but with a fresh face, and Ron has done a good job doing things like going toe-to-toe with the media, and grassroots conservative appreciate that.

I think they are looking for that next step and that next generation, he added.

Meridith McGraw contributed to this story.

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DeSantis very wary of upsetting Trump - POLITICO