Exclusive: Venezuela shifts oil ventures’ accounts to Russian bank – document, sources – Reuters
Exclusive: Venezuela shifts oil ventures’ accounts to Russian bank – document, sources – Reuters

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA is telling customers of its joint ventures to deposit oil sales proceeds in an account recently opened at Russia’s Gazprombank AO, according to sources and an internal document seen by Reuters on Saturday.

PDVSA’s move comes after the United States imposed tough, new financial sanctions on Jan. 28 aimed at blocking Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro’s access to the country’s oil revenue.

Supporters of Venezuelan opposition leader and self-proclaimed interim president Juan Guaido said recently that a fund would be established to accept proceeds from sales of Venezuelan oil.

The United States and dozens of other countries have recognized Guaido as the nation’s legitimate head of state. Maduro has denounced Guaido as a U.S. puppet seeking to foment a coup.

PDVSA also has begun pressing its foreign partners holding stakes in joint ventures in its key Orinoco Belt producing area to formally decide whether they will continue with the projects, according to two sources with knowledge of the talks.

The joint venture partners include Norway’s Equinor ASA, U.S.-based Chevron Corp and France’s Total SA.

“We would like to make formal your knowledge of new banking instructions to make payments in U.S. dollars or euros,” wrote PDVSA’s finance vice president, Fernando De Quintal, in a letter dated Feb. 8 to the PDVSA unit that supervises its joint ventures.

Even after a first round of financial sanctions in 2017, PDVSA’s joint ventures managed to maintain bank accounts in the United States and Europe to receive proceeds from oil sales. They also used correspondent banks in the United States and Europe to shift money to PDVSA’s accounts in China.

State-run PDVSA several weeks ago informed customers of the new banking instructions and has begun moving the accounts of its joint ventures, which can export crude separately. The decision was made amid tension with some of its partners, which have withdrawn staff from Caracas since U.S. sanctions were imposed in January.

The sanctions gave U.S. oil companies working in Venezuela, including Chevron and oil service firms Halliburton Co, General Electric Co’s Baker Hughes and Schlumberger NV, a deadline to halt all operations in the South American country.

The European Union has encouraged member countries to recognize a new temporary government led by Guaido until new elections can be held. Europe also has said it could impose financial sanctions to bar Maduro from having access to oil revenue coming from the region.

Maduro has overseen an economic collapse in the oil-rich OPEC country that has left many Venezuelans malnourished and struggling to find medicine, sparking the exodus of an estimated 3 million Venezuelans.

Sanctions designed to deprive Maduro of oil revenue have left an armada of loaded oil tankers off Venezuela’s coasts that have not been discharged by PDVSA’s customers due to payment issues. The bottleneck has caused problems for PDVSA to continue producing and refining oil without imported diluents and components.

PDVSA also ordered its Petrocedeno joint venture with Equinor and Total to halt extra-heavy oil output and upgrading due to a lack of naphtha needed to make the production exportable, as the sanctions prohibit U.S. suppliers of the fuel from exporting to Venezuela.

Reporting by Marianna Parraga in Mexico City and Corina Pons in Caracas; editing by Jonathan Oatis and G Crosse

Source Article from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-pdvsa-banks-exclus/exclusive-venezuela-shifts-oil-ventures-accounts-to-russian-bank-document-sources-idUSKCN1PY0N3

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Valerie Reyes called her mom in panic. She vanished within days and her body was found in a suitcase. – CNN
Valerie Reyes called her mom in panic. She vanished within days and her body was found in a suitcase. – CNN

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By Nicole Chavez, CNN

Updated 9:55 PM ET, Sat February 9, 2019

Chat with us in Facebook Messenger. Find out what’s happening in the world as it unfolds.

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(CNN)Days before her body was found inside a suitcase near a Connecticut road, Valerie Reyes called her mother terrified someone would kill her.

      CNN’s Evan Simko-Bednarski, Ray Sanchez, Madeline Holcombe and Sarah Jorgensen contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/09/us/valerie-reyes-greenwich-dead/index.html

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    Five minors, ages 12 to 16, charged in fatal shooting of Nashville musician – The Washington Post
    Five minors, ages 12 to 16, charged in fatal shooting of Nashville musician – The Washington Post

    Alex Horton

    February 9 at 6:58 PM

    The group sat inside a stolen Chevrolet pickup when they spotted musician Kyle Yorlets outside his home in Nashville.

    They approached Yorlets, 24, and he gave up his wallet, authorities said. They also wanted his keys. Yorlets refused and was fatally shot, a Nashville Police Department investigation has found.


    Kyle Yorlets, who was shot and killed Feb. 7. (Matt Blum)

    Five minors — two boys and three girls — were charged with criminal homicide Friday in the death of Yorlets, which has shocked the local music community.

    They range in age from 12 to 16. Police released booking photos and the names of three of those charged because they are older than 13. The Washington Post does not name suspects under the age of 18 unless a judge or magistrate has ordered that they be tried as adults.

    Yorlets was the lead singer and songwriter for Carverton, a pop-punk band whose first album is scheduled for release next month.

    “We are in a state of shock and are having to grasp the reality that is now in front of us. We are heartbroken,” the band said in a statement Friday. “Our condolences for his family and loved ones and all the lives that he touched. We will never forget Kyle, and though he is gone too soon his legacy is here to stay.”

    Authorities are seeking to try the group as adults. The attorney for the youngest — a 12-year-old girl — said her client has cooperated and did not belong in an adult court, the Tennessean reported.

    Assistant District Attorney Stacy Miller disagreed in a juvenile court hearing Friday.

    “She didn’t run from there, and she didn’t call the police,” Miller said, according to the Tennessean. “She’s as guilty as they are.”

    Police recovered two stolen, loaded pistols after tracking the juveniles to a Walmart. Their involvement in the case started Thursday, as they searched for the 12-year-old, who had run away from home, police spokesman Don Aaron said.

    Investigators found Snapchat photos of the girl in a car with other young people and guns, Aaron said, according to the Tennessean.

    [Police relaunch search for ‘the Doodler,’ a serial killer who sketched his victims first]

    Yorlets was one of four children raised on a farm in Pennsylvania. His mother, Deb Yorlets, told PennLive that Kyle began singing at a young age.

    “He was extremely passionate about music. Everyone who met him was amazed and loved him,” she said. “It’s just so senseless what has happened.”

    News of Yorlets’s death spread quickly in the tightknit music community in Nashville, said John Ferguson, the father of a bandmate. Many young upstart musicians work in the food industry, and owners there have reached out to provide food for family gatherings. A memorial service is planned for Monday, Ferguson told The Post on Saturday.

    Carverton had released a single and a music video. Their debut album, “Chasing Sounds,” is scheduled for release in late March.

    A single, “Try To,” will be played at the memorial service. It is an autobiographical song by Yorlets, said Ferguson, who started a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for Yorlets’s family.

    The band was growing its local presence and was looking forward to the album’s release, he said.

    “I told the band, ‘The album shows songwriting maturity,’ ” Ferguson said, thanks in large part to Yorlets.

    Read more:

    Signs commemorating death of Bijan Ghaisar stolen from shooting site

    Workers found a suitcase next to a quiet Connecticut road. A woman’s body was inside.

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/crime-law/2019/02/09/five-people-ages-charged-fatal-shooting-nashville-musician/

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    Protesters Rally Against Sackler Family at NYC’s Met Museum – The Daily Beast
    Protesters Rally Against Sackler Family at NYC’s Met Museum – The Daily Beast
    27 views no comments
    Trump needles new presidential candidate Warren on Native American claims – Fox News
    Trump needles new presidential candidate Warren on Native American claims – Fox News
    Video

    Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren announces her 2020 presidential campaign

    President Trump wasted little time Saturday before needling newly declared presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren over her controversial efforts to align herself with Native Americans.

    Warren, Democratic Massachusetts senator, officially announced her candidacy on Saturday in Lawrence. Touting a progressive agenda, she didn’t refer to recent controversies over her longstanding claims about having a Native American heritage.

    WARREN OFFICIALLY LAUNCHES 2020 BID FOR WHITE HOUSE

    No matter. Within hours, Trump made it clear he was happy to reference the issue himself, even if she wouldn’t. He did so on Twitter, where he made light of Warren and threw down a campaign gauntlet.

    “Today Elizabeth Warren, sometimes referred to by me as Pocahontas, joined the race for President,” Trump wrote early Saturday evening .”Will she run as our first Native American presidential candidate, or has she decided that after 32 years, this is not playing so well anymore? See you on the campaign TRAIL, Liz!”

    WARREN APOLOGIZES FOR NATIVE AMERICAN CLAIM, SIGNALS THERE MAY BE OTHER DOCS OUT THERE

    Earlier in the day, in announcing her candidacy, Warren didn’t name-check the president, but she did reference him, saying “the man in the White House is not the cause of what’s broken, he’s just the latest and most extreme symptom of what’s gone wrong in America.”

    She also talked of her roots in Oklahoma. saying “when my daddy had a heart attack, my family nearly tumbled over the financial cliff.”

    One thing she didn’t mention, though, was her claims of Native American ancestry, which first came to the fore during her 2012 victory over then-Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts.

    Her October release of a DNA test, meant to bolster her longstanding claims in hopes of settling the controversy before she launched a presidential bid, was widely panned. The move was intended to rebut Trump’s controversial taunts of Warren as “Pocahontas.” Instead, her use of a genetic test to prove ethnicity spurred controversy that seemed to blunt any argument she sought to make.

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP.

    The taking of the DNA test also angered some tribal leaders of the Cherokee Nation, which resulted in an apology by Warren to the tribe. And she apologized again in the last couple of days after the surfacing of a 1986 registration card for the Texas state bar showed that she had written “American Indian” as her race. The inability to put the controversy to rest has proved to be a distraction to Warren, threatening to cast a shadow over her presidential announcement.

    Video

    Minutes before her announcement, Trump’s 202 campaign tagged Warren as a fraud.

    “Elizabeth Warren has already been exposed as a fraud by the Native Americans she impersonated and disrespected to advance her professional career, and the people of Massachusetts she deceived to get elected,” campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement. “The American people will reject her dishonest campaign and socialist ideas like the Green New Deal, that will raise taxes, kill jobs and crush America’s middle-class. Only under President Trump’s leadership will America continue to grow safer, secure and more prosperous.”

    Fox News’ Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-needles-new-presidential-candidate-warren-over-native-american-claims

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    Justin Fairfax Puts Virginia Democrats in Bind on Impeachment – The New York Times
    Justin Fairfax Puts Virginia Democrats in Bind on Impeachment – The New York Times

    “It’s unrealistic to expect politicians to have lived perfect lives — the general public doesn’t expect that, and they are much more forgiving than the Twitter outrage mob,” said Elisabeth Smith, a Democratic strategist, singling out Mr. Herring. “If anything, we’ve learned the importance of taking a step back and taking a deep breath before demanding these guys’ heads on a plate.”

    But there is far less sympathy among black lawmakers in the Capitol for the governor, who has flip-flopped about whether he was in a racist photo that appeared on his medical school yearbook page.

    “Northam called me Friday night and took ownership of that photo and said, ‘I’m sorry, that’s me in the photo,’” recalled Ms. Herring, who is not related to the attorney general. “Then, Saturday, moonwalks it back, and then adds some more pain with the description about how he needs to only put a light coat of shoe polish on because it’s hard to get off. He doesn’t get it.”

    For Ms. Herring and other legislators, the controversies over blackface were painful reminders of the state’s not-so-distant past and its lingering prejudices. Ms. Herring said she had often thought about a particular red glow from her childhood: what she saw when a cross burned outside her Georgia home when she was 9.

    And just a few blocks north of Virginia’s elegant state capitol, several black Richmonders were downright suspicious of Mr. Northam. The Virginia crisis began a week ago Friday when Mr. Northam’s yearbook page surfaced on a conservative website, with one photo featuring a man in blackface and another in Ku Klux Klan robes, and Mr. Northam said he was in the photo and then, a day later, said he was not. Now it is Mr. Fairfax who is under far more pressure to resign or get impeached than Mr. Northam.

    Deon Wright, 42, said he did not know what to think about the various parts of the political crisis. But one thing is certain, Mr. Wright said: “You’re more able to survive as a white man in America who wore blackface than as a black man that’s facing #MeToo accusations.”

    Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/09/us/politics/justin-fairfax-virginia-impeachment.html

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    Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s ‘Green New Deal’ would run up massive debt. That’s how we already pay for perpetual war – Washington Examiner
    Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s ‘Green New Deal’ would run up massive debt. That’s how we already pay for perpetual war – Washington Examiner

    When self-described socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., released her “Green New Deal” Thursday, it was a full-blown leftist buffet.

    “The new Green Deal isn’t a plan. It’s a socialist Christmas list,” explained the Washington Examiner’s Phil Klein. “The Green New Deal, so far as it exists in the form of a nonbinding resolution, isn’t merely confined to addressing climate change; it also calls for tackling jobs, food, healthcare, housing, employment, infrastructure, transportation, education, and a whole host of issues.”

    As conservatives and others rightly mock the “Green New Deal” for its impracticality, Bloomberg’s Noah Smith came up with a rough cost: about $6.6 trillion annually. “That’s more than three times as much as the federal government collects in tax revenue, and equal to about 34 percent of the U.S.’s entire gross domestic product,” Smith notes.

    What’s Ocasio-Cortez’s solution to pay for this? More deficit spending! Print more money!

    Many laughed, but this isn’t much different from how the U.S. already pays for perpetual war.

    In 2016, when Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said Washington politicians “wasted $6 trillion on wars in the Middle East,” he was addressing the exorbitant cost of U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere that just never seem to end.

    Just one week before Ocasio-Cortez revealed her green manifesto, a bipartisan majority in the Senate came together to rebuke President Trump for wanting to bring home American troops from Syria and Afghanistan. With the largest national deficit in years in 2018 and a national debt that just hit $22 trillion (the national debt was less than $7 trillion when the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003), apparently most senators believe we can still afford to stay abroad indefinitely.

    The Pentagon says the U.S. spends about $45 billion a year to keep American soldiers in Afghanistan and $15.3 billion in Syria. This might not be as high as the spending seen at the heights of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, but America’s increasing deficits and debt remind us this is still money we don’t have. These are also wars most Americans no longer want to fight and that the general leading the mission in Afghanistan admits can’t be won militarily.

    It’s amusing how math changes along with politicians’ priorities. Republicans who always demand increased Pentagon spending say they can’t find $70 billion for food stamps. Democrats who agree with Republicans that America’s wars should never end say they can’t even find $5 billion for a border wall.

    But they can always find money for war.

    And virtually every Washington hawk will defend this spending the same way: America’s national security is too important to skimp on.

    This is exactly what Ocasio-Cortez and her progressive friends will say about saving the planet from climate change. Or healthcare. Or housing. Or education. Or any of the many other liberal agenda items Democrats would spend billions if not trillions on if they only could. (Not to mention, it’s not exactly clear how the current U.S. presence in Afghanistan and Syria actually enhances national security).

    It might sound reasonable to many Americans that their government should be spending on healthcare instead of costly wars in places they can’t find on a map. In fact, don’t be surprised if a number of 2020 Democratic presidential contenders who have already backed the “Green New Deal” make that case.

    Ocasio-Cortez already has.

    Fiscal conservatives and libertarians make the case that the U.S. can’t really afford endless war or government healthcare because the money doesn’t exist.

    Obviously, what Ocasio-Cortez would like to spend on her progressive agenda would significantly dwarf what the Iraq and Afghanistan wars cost. Her annual budget, according to Bloomberg, has roughly the same price tag as 17 years of fighting in the Middle East.

    But saying her big government is laughable compared to our current big government is not a good argument for those who imagine themselves to be fiscally responsible.

    By all means, continue mocking the “Green New Deal” for all the policy and fiscal lunacy that it is. But don’t pretend that Ocasio-Cortez’s ideas to fund it are that different from how Washington operates every day.

    Jack Hunter (@jackhunter74) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’ s Beltway Confidential blog. He is the former political editor of Rare.us and co-authored the 2011 book The Tea Party Goes to Washington with Sen. Rand Paul.

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/the-green-new-deal-would-run-up-massive-debt-thats-already-how-we-pay-for-perpetual-war

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    Average tax refunds down 8.4 percent as angry taxpayers vent on social media – AOL
    Average tax refunds down 8.4 percent as angry taxpayers vent on social media – AOL

    Average tax refunds were down last week 8.4 percent for the first week of the tax season over the same time last year, according to the Internal Revenue Service. Dipping refunds are inflaming a growing army of taxpayers stunned by the consequences of the Trump administration’s tax law — and the effects of the partial government shutdown.

    The average refund check paid out so far has been $1,865, down from $2,035 at the same point in 2018, according to IRS data. Low-income taxpayers often file early to pocket the money as soon as possible. Many taxpayers count on the refunds to make important payments, or spend the money on things like home repairs, a vacation or a car.

    The IRS had estimated it would issue about 2.3 percent fewer refunds this year as a result of the changes in the federal tax law, according to Bloomberg. MSNBC reports that 30 million Americans will owe the IRS money this year — 3 million more than before Trump’s tax law.

    “There are going to be a lot of unhappy people over the next month,” Edward Karl of the American Institute of CPAs told Politico. “Taxpayers want a large refund.” Some 71 percent of taxpayers received refunds last year worth about $3,000 on average, according to Karl.

    Scads of taxpayers are complaining on Twitter that they have always received a refund — but now owe the IRS instead.

    The number of refunds sent out by the IRS was also down — about 24 percent — as the agency struggled to get up to speed after the government shutdown. The agency sent out about 4.67 million tax refunds in the week ending Feb. 1, compared with about 6.17 million in the same period in 2018, according to IRS data.

    This year’s filing season, which began two days after the shutdown ended on Jan. 25, is complicated because it’s the first after the 2017 tax law was enacted. Though President Donald Trump boasted that the new code would be so simplified that people could file their taxes on a postcard, that’s not the case. 

    In addition, the changes complicated payroll withholding, so that not enough money was withheld by employers in many cases, meaning that people now owe more taxes. The new law also capped IRS deductions for paid state and local taxes, including real estate taxes, resulting in a nasty surprise for many filers. Several other deductions are no longer allowed.

    The frustrations will likely continue to fuel support for plans to boost taxes on the ultra-wealthy. A poll last month found that nearly 60 percent of registered voters support a plan by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to impose a 70 percent marginal tax rate on the portion of annual income that exceeds $10 million a year.

    Twitter is filling up with complaints from people whose situation has changed radically.

    California

    State income tax: 1% to 13.3% 

    Maine

    State income tax: 5.8% to 10.15%

    Oregon

    State income tax: 5% to 9.9%

    Minnesota

    State income tax: 5.35% to 9.85%

    Iowa

    State income tax: 0.36% to 8.98%

    New Jersey

    State income tax: 1.4% to 8.97%

    Vermont

    State income tax: 3.55% to 8.95%

    Washington, DC

    State income tax: 4% to 8.95%

    New York

    State income tax: 4% to 8.82%

    Hawaii

    State income tax: 1.4% to 8.25%

    Wisconsin

    State income tax: 4% to 7.65%

    Idaho

    State income tax: 1.6% to 7.4%

    South Carolina

    State income tax: 0% to 7%

    Connecticut

    State income tax: 3% to 6.99%

    Arkansas

    State income tax: 0.9% to 6.9%

    Montana

    State income tax: 1% to 6.9%

    Nebraska

    State income tax: 2.46% to 6.84%

    Delaware

    State income tax: 2.2% to 6.6%

    West Virginia

    State income tax: 3% to 6.5%

    Georgia

    State income tax: 1% to 6%

    Kentucky

    State income tax: 2% to 6%

    Louisiana

    State income tax: 2% to 6%

    Missouri

    State income tax: 1.5% to 6%

    Rhode Island

    State income tax: 3.75% to 5.99%

    Maryland

    State income tax: 2% to 5.75%

    North Carolina

    State income tax: 5.75%

    Virginia

    State income tax: 2% to 5.75%

    Oklahoma

    State income tax: 0.5% to 5.25%

    Massachusetts

    State income tax: 5.1%

    Alabama

    State income tax: 2% to 5%

    Mississippi

    State income tax: 3% to 5%

    Utah

    State income tax: 5%

    Ohio

    State income tax: 0.495% to 4.997%

    New Mexico

    State income tax: 1.7% to 4.9%

    Colorado

    State income tax: 4.63%

    Kansas

    State income tax: 2.7% to 4.6%

    Arizona

    State income tax: 2.59% to 4.54%

    Michigan

    State income tax: 4.25%

    Illinois

    State income tax: 3.75%

    Indiana

    State income tax: 3.3%

    Pennsylvania

    State income tax: 3.07%

    North Dakota

    State income tax: 1.1% to 2.9%




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    Typically, children are placed in a lower tax bracket than their parents and the reason for this is quite simple: most children don’t have that much income, and those that do, rarely earn more than their parents. Some parents have attempted to take advantage of this by putting investments in their children’s names, hoping that any investment profits would be taxed at the child’s lower rate. In response, the federal government changed the tax treatment of children’s unearned income by taxing it at the parent’s tax rate. Form 8615 is used to make the child’s tax calculations for this income.

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    Source Article from https://www.aol.com/article/finance/2019/02/09/average-tax-refunds-down-84-percent-as-angry-taxpayers-vent-on-twitter/23665728/

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    Exclusive: Venezuela shifts oil ventures’ accounts to Russian bank – document, sources – Reuters
    Exclusive: Venezuela shifts oil ventures’ accounts to Russian bank – document, sources – Reuters

    CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA is telling customers of its joint ventures to deposit oil sales proceeds in an account recently opened at Russia’s Gazprombank AO, according to sources and an internal document seen by Reuters on Saturday.

    PDVSA’s move comes after the United States imposed tough, new financial sanctions on Jan. 28 aimed at blocking Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro’s access to the country’s oil revenue.

    Supporters of Venezuelan opposition leader and self-proclaimed interim president Juan Guaido said recently that a fund would be established to accept proceeds from sales of Venezuelan oil.

    The United States and dozens of other countries have recognized Guaido as the nation’s legitimate head of state. Maduro has denounced Guaido as a U.S. puppet seeking to foment a coup.

    PDVSA also has begun pressing its foreign partners holding stakes in joint ventures in its key Orinoco Belt producing area to formally decide whether they will continue with the projects, according to two sources with knowledge of the talks.

    The joint venture partners include Norway’s Equinor ASA, U.S.-based Chevron Corp and France’s Total SA.

    “We would like to make formal your knowledge of new banking instructions to make payments in U.S. dollars or euros,” wrote PDVSA’s finance vice president, Fernando De Quintal, in a letter dated Feb. 8 to the PDVSA unit that supervises its joint ventures.

    Even after a first round of financial sanctions in 2017, PDVSA’s joint ventures managed to maintain bank accounts in the United States and Europe to receive proceeds from oil sales. They also used correspondent banks in the United States and Europe to shift money to PDVSA’s accounts in China.

    State-run PDVSA several weeks ago informed customers of the new banking instructions and has begun moving the accounts of its joint ventures, which can export crude separately. The decision was made amid tension with some of its partners, which have withdrawn staff from Caracas since U.S. sanctions were imposed in January.

    The sanctions gave U.S. oil companies working in Venezuela, including Chevron and oil service firms Halliburton Co, General Electric Co’s Baker Hughes and Schlumberger NV, a deadline to halt all operations in the South American country.

    The European Union has encouraged member countries to recognize a new temporary government led by Guaido until new elections can be held. Europe also has said it could impose financial sanctions to bar Maduro from having access to oil revenue coming from the region.

    Maduro has overseen an economic collapse in the oil-rich OPEC country that has left many Venezuelans malnourished and struggling to find medicine, sparking the exodus of an estimated 3 million Venezuelans.

    Sanctions designed to deprive Maduro of oil revenue have left an armada of loaded oil tankers off Venezuela’s coasts that have not been discharged by PDVSA’s customers due to payment issues. The bottleneck has caused problems for PDVSA to continue producing and refining oil without imported diluents and components.

    PDVSA also ordered its Petrocedeno joint venture with Equinor and Total to halt extra-heavy oil output and upgrading due to a lack of naphtha needed to make the production exportable, as the sanctions prohibit U.S. suppliers of the fuel from exporting to Venezuela.

    Reporting by Marianna Parraga in Mexico City and Corina Pons in Caracas; editing by Jonathan Oatis and G Crosse

    Source Article from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-pdvsa-banks-exclus/exclusive-venezuela-shifts-oil-ventures-accounts-to-russian-bank-document-sources-idUSKCN1PY0N3

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    Larry Kudlow: Trump’s Policies Ended Obama’s "War On Business" – RealClearPolitics
    Larry Kudlow: Trump’s Policies Ended Obama’s "War On Business" – RealClearPolitics

    National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow on President Trump’s comments on socialism during his State of the Union address and the Trump administration’s economic policies.

    LARRY KUDLOW, DIRECTOR OF THE U.S. NATIONAL ECONOMIC COUNCIL:

    I just think it was great that he dealt with that issue head-on. Many of us had suggested to him that we should say something about all these crazy anti-growth, anti-incentive, anti-business, anti-reward policies coming out of the opposition party. And we should have a generic statement at a minimum and so there you have it regarding socialism. And I want to carry that forward, you know you and I’ve talked about this a while back and I want to raise this issue. One of the great things that President Trump has done in a relatively short period of time but he started right off the bat. His policies basically ended the war on business and the prior administration was conducting a war on business. Not only in terms of over regulation and taxing, which is bad enough, but in terms of attitudes, you know, what you say about businesses and I don’t want to go deep into the partisanship here, that’s not my intent, but what I’m saying is I believe President Trump really changed the whole psychology of large and small business men and women and that that’s one of the reasons his plan has paid off and that we’re growing about three percent which is you know, virtually nobody thought would be possible.


    I think the psychology here is so important and hence the statement he makes on socialism is another reassurance that we will not go down that path and that we America has always been, we have always been a nation of entrepreneurs who thrive for freedom and the incentive model of growth.

    Source Article from https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/07/larry_kudlow_trumps_policies_ended_the_war_on_business.html

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    Bond denied for 3 accused of first-degree murder of Naperville man – WLS-TV
    Bond denied for 3 accused of first-degree murder of Naperville man – WLS-TV
    Bond was denied for three people accused of the first-degree murder of a Naperville man who went missing a year ago.

    Ernest Collins, 22, and his girlfriend, Cassandra Green, 21, both of Rockford, and his mother, Candice Jones, 38, of Chicago – appeared in bond court Saturday morning for the murder of Michael Armendariz, according to the DuPage County state’s attorney’s office.

    On Jan. 18, 2018, Naperville police responded to a call about a missing person, Armendariz, 21, who prosecutors said was last seen the night of Jan. 14, 2018.

    Armendariz reportedly received an electronic communication from Green at 9:11 p.m. that night. Authorities believe upon receiving the communication, Armendariz left his apartment in the 100 block of South Whispering Hills Drive and got into an SUV driven by Green in the parking lot of the apartment complex before Green drove off.

    Collins allegedly emerged from the back several minutes later and shot Armendariz twice in the back of the head before the duo drove to Jones’ house in the 6800 block of South Artesian Avenue in the Marquette Park neighborhood on the Southwest Side. She helped place the man’s body in a garbage can that was in her garage.

    The garbage can was later moved to the garage of the vacant house next door, prosecutors said. It is also alleged that Collins and Green took Armendariz’s apartment keys and burglarized his apartment the next day.

    Armendariz’s body was discovered May 31, and an investigation was started by Chicago police, prosecutors said. The investigation led to Collins and Green being taken into custody Monday in Rockford, while Jones was taken into custody Wednesday in Chicago.

    The trio was charged with one count each of first-degree murder, aggravated kidnapping and armed robbery, and concealment of a homicidal death, prosecutors said. Collins and Green were also charged with one count of residential burglary.

    “The investigation into the execution of an unsuspecting man is an outstanding example of law enforcement agencies working together,” DuPage County State’s Attorney Robert Berlin said. “Thanks to the truly outstanding work and cooperation of several law enforcement agencies, these three defendants, Mr. Collins, Ms. Green and Ms. Jones, find themselves before a judge this morning with first-degree murder for the pre-meditated murder of Michael Armendariz.”

    “This investigation required intense resilience and diligence on the part of our detectives and law enforcement partners,” Naperville Police Chief Robert Marshall said.

    The next court appearance for the trio of defendants is scheduled for March 4 for arraignment.

    (Source: Sun-Times Media Wire – Copyright Chicago Sun-Times 2017.)

    Source Article from https://abc7chicago.com/bond-denied-for-3-accused-of-first-degree-murder-of-naperville-man/5129448/

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    Elizabeth Warren has officially announced that she’s running for president, urged supporters to join ‘the fight of our lives’ – Business Insider
    Elizabeth Warren has officially announced that she’s running for president, urged supporters to join ‘the fight of our lives’ – Business Insider

    Sen. Elizabeth Warren officially announced she is running for president in the 2020 Election.

    Speaking to a lively crowd in Lawrence, Massachusetts Saturday afternoon, Warren called supporters to back the “fight of our lives” against corruption and slanted regulations in Washington.

    “It won’t be enough to just undo the terrible acts of this administration,” Warren said. “We can’t afford to just tinker around the edges — a tax credit here, a regulation there. Our fight is for big, structural change.”

    Decrying the broken system in Washington, Warren echoed her past comments when she vowed to fight for middle-class Americans.

    “This is the fight of our lives.,” Warren said. “The fight to build an America where dreams are possible, an America that works for everyone. I am in that fight all the way. And that is why I stand here today: to declare that I am a candidate for President of the United States of America.”

    Laying out the primary concerns of her campaign, Warren said she was focused on changing regulations that would “clean up Washington, change rules in our economy, [and] change rules to strengthen our democracy.”

    Warren repeated her promise that she would not accept any money from PACs or federal lobbying, and would not allow super PACs to be formed on her behalf.

    Pointing to her background in law and academia, which contributed to her spearheading the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and calling banking executives before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, of which she’s a member, Warren said she would focus on eradicating corruption in Washington.

    “Corruption is a cancer on our society and we will get rid of it with strong medicine, with real structural reform,” Warren said.

    Warren took aim at President Donald Trump’s administration, which she called “the most corrupt in living memory,” but held up as an example of necessary reform.

    “The man in the White House is not the cause of what is broken, he is just the latest and most extreme symptom of what’s gone wrong in America,” Warren said. “A product of a rigged system that props up the rich and powerful and kicks dirt on everyone else. So once he’s gone, we can’t pretend that none of this ever happened.”

    Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy III introduced Warren, touting his former professor’s ability to formulate comprehensive and holistically beneficial policy.

    “Before there was an editorial every day lamenting economic inequity, Elizabeth Warren knew that stock prices don’t tell a full account of our country’s economic story,” Kennedy said. “Medical bankruptcies and foreclosures and paychecks are part of that story, too.”

    The event came days after refreshed controversy over Warren’s claim of Native American heritage, which has plagued her image since a 2012 Senate race, sparked by a report by The Washington Post that said Warren wrote that her race was “American Indian” on a 1986 Texas state bar registration card.

    Read more: Elizabeth Warren’s Native American heritage has become a major source of contention for the 2020 presidential candidate. Here’s everything you need to know.

    Warren was at the event in below-freezing temperatures alongside her family, including her husband, Bruce, and her two children.

    In an email to supporters last week, Warren’s campaign said the location for the announcement was chosen because of the 1912 strike by textile workers in Lawrence, many of whom were women, because they were “underpaid, overworked, and flat-out exploited workers from more than 50 countries gave Lawrence the nickname ‘Immigrant City.'”

    Read more:Here’s everyone who has officially announced they are running for president in 2020

    The Massachusetts senator is the latest congressional heavyweight to join the race, joining Democratic senators Kamala Harris and Cory Booker. Top senators Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar are also widely reported to be joining the race soon.

    Warren first announced that she was launching an exploratory committee for a presidential run in 2020 in a video posted to her website on December 31, 2018. In the video, Warren — who has long been expected to run — described her vision of defending the middle class, which she said was “under attack.”

    After the announcement, Warren quickly began recruiting top staff in key primary states including New Hampshire and Iowa, and has campaigned in those states, South Carolina, and Puerto Rico.

    Source Article from https://www.businessinsider.com/elizabeth-warren-president-announcement-2020-election-shes-officially-running-for-2019-2

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    Warren formally launches 2020 campaign, makes no mention of Native American controversy – Fox News
    Warren formally launches 2020 campaign, makes no mention of Native American controversy – Fox News
    Video

    Elizabeth Warren: We need to take power away in Washington f

    LAWRENCE, Massachusetts – Vowing to “fight my heart out,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Saturday formally declared her candidacy for president.

    The populist Democratic senator, who was re-elected in November to a second term representing Massachusetts, pushed her progressive platform as she told her life story of growing up “on the ragged edge of the middle class” and spotlighted her efforts on behalf of working class Americans.

    BACKDROP FOR WARREN CAMPAIGN IS SANCTUARY CITY, SITE OF MASSIVE FENTANYL BUSY

    But Warren made no mention of the swirling controversy over her longstanding claims of Native American heritage, which resurfaced over the last week and served as a major distraction as the senator geared up for her much anticipated official campaign launch.

    “This is the fight our lives. The fight to build an America were dreams are possible, an America that works for everyone. I am in that fight all the way. And that is why I stand here today to declare that I am a candidate for president of the United States,” Warren said in this working class city that sits along the Merrimack River in northern Massachusetts.

    Warren promised to fight so “that every kid in America can have the same opportunity I had – a fighting chance to build something real.”

    Warren spotlighted her upbringing in Oklahoma, saying “when my daddy had a heart attack, my family nearly tumbled over the financial cliff.”

    But as expected, she didn’t say a word about her claims of Native American ancestry, which first surfaced during her 2012 victory over then-Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts.

    Her October release of a DNA test, meant to bolster her longstanding claims in hopes of settling the controversy before she launched a presidential bid, was widely panned. The move was intended to rebut Trump’s controversial taunts of Warren as “Pocahontas.” Instead, her use of a genetic test to prove ethnicity spurred controversy that seemed to blunt any argument she sought to make.

    WHO’S RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT IN 2020? GROWING FIELD OF CANDIDATES JOIN RACE FOR DEMOCRATIC NOD

    The taking of the DNA test also angered some tribal leaders of the Cherokee Nation, which resulted in an apology by Warren to the tribe last week. And she apologized again in the last couple of days after the surfacing of a 1986 registration card for the Texas state bar showed that she had written “American Indian” as her race. The inability to put the controversy to rest has proved to be a distraction to Warren, taking her off message in the days leading up to her presidential announcement.

    Warren supporter Joy Wieder of Acton, who traveled 30 miles to see the senator announce her candidacy, said the Native American controversy “bothers me but I think there have been worse sins by politicians and I think that her strengths outweigh what her questionable actions in the past have been.”

    Another Warren supporter, Alissa Onigman of Reading, said she doesn’t care about the stories. But she added that “I think it’s a distraction technique” used by the senator’s opponents.

    The historic Everett Mills, where Warren declared her candidacy, was the site of the two-month long Bread and Roses strike in 1912, when textile workers protested a cut in pay implemented after a shortening of the workweek for women.

    Speaking in front of the massive textile mill buildings on a windy and chilly winter day, Warren told the crowd –estimated at 3,500 by the campaign – that “the textile workers here in Lawrence more than 100 years ago won their fight because they refused to be divided. Today, we gather on those same streets, ready to stand united again.”

    Touting that she’s “been in this fight for a long time,” Warren argued that “the rules in our country have been rigged” against women, African Americans and Latinos, Native Americans, immigrants, people with disabilities black Americans

    And she highlighted that “the rules of our economy have gotten rigged so far in favor of the rich and powerful that everyone else is at risk of being left behind.”

    “Rich guys have been waging class warfare against hard working people for decades. I say it’s time to fight back,” she emphasized.

    Warren spotlighted her push for government investments in child care, college, infrastructure, clean energy and the Green New Deal. She advocated for the proposed big government Medicare for All program, and for criminal justice reform.  The senator also vowed to fight for voting rights and repeated her pledge to refuse to accept contributions from federal lobbyists and political action committees (PACs).

    She didn’t mention by name Republican President Donald Trump. But she criticized the president, saying “the man in the White House is not the cause of what’s broken, he’s just the latest and most extreme symptom of what’s gone wrong in America.”

    President Trump’s 2020 campaign called her a “fraud” minutes before she made her announcement.

    “Elizabeth Warren has already been exposed as a fraud by the Native Americans she impersonated and disrespected to advance her professional career, and the people of Massachusetts she deceived to get elected,” campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement. “The American people will reject her dishonest campaign and socialist ideas like the Green New Deal, that will raise taxes, kill jobs and crush America’s middle-class. Only under President Trump’s leadership will America continue to grow safer, secure and more prosperous.”

    The senator was introduced and endorsed by Rep. Joe Kennedy of Massachusetts, a rising star in the Democratic Party. And she was also backed by the Bay State’s other senator, veteran Democrat Ed Markey, who also spoke at the rally.

    Warren formally enters a Democratic field that’s shaping up as the most crowded in decades, a field that includes some of her Senate colleagues. Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey have already declared their candidacies, and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York launched an exploratory committee. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota’s expected to jump into the race on Sunday.

    Another Senate colleague and fellow populist – independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont – appears to be moving towards making a second straight run for the Democratic nomination.

    Also in the race are former San Antonio, Texas mayor and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, former Rep. John Delaney of Maryland, and South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

    Video

    Former Vice President Joe Biden and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke of Texas are seriously mulling White House runs, as are Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Jeff Merkley of Oregon, Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington and former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, billionaire media mogul and former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, and Rep. Eric Swalwell of California.

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

    After her announcement in Lawrence, Warren beelined for neighboring New Hampshire, where she’ll hold an organizing event in Dover, a working class city and Democratic stronghold located along the border with Maine. The first in the nation primary-state is considered a ‘must win’ for the senator. Warren campaigns Sunday in Iowa – which votes first in the White House race – holding events in Cedar Rapids, Iowa City and Davenport.

    Warren’s kick-off tour also takes her to South Carolina, which holds the first southern primary, and Nevada, which holds the first western contest, as well as Georgia and California.

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/elizabeth-warren-formally-launches-2020-presidential-bid

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    Fairfax is starting to look more guilty – Washington Examiner
    Fairfax is starting to look more guilty – Washington Examiner

    A day ago, Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax looked like he might survive politically. Now, his odds look much weaker.

    Until today, Fairfax faced one compelling, but not contemporaneously corroborated, allegation of sexual assault from Vanessa Tyson, a liberal feminist professor whom he met at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

    Given that he was sandwiched in the gubernatorial succession between two separate Democrats accused of wearing blackface, he might have survived. For the better part of a week, it’s been a three-way stalemate among a governor publicly lambasted by the entire Democratic party, his almost equally aggrieved third-in-line state attorney general, and Fairfax, on whom Democrats have largely maintained radio silence. After all, thought many Democrats, why stand up for the black feminist professor levying a serious assault allegation against the black lieutenant governor when they could stick it to the boring old white men instead?

    Well, silence won’t suffice much longer. A second woman, Meredith Watson, has come forward with an allegation that Fairfax raped her in a “premeditated and aggressive assault” when they were both classmates at Duke University. The possible death knell for Fairfax’s political (and maybe legal) fate? Watson told people of the incident at the time, and they have now gone on the record to confirm that not only did she allege rape back then, but that she specifically named Fairfax.

    Earlier this week, I deemed Tyson’s allegation credible — due to the undisputed fact that she and Fairfax did have an encounter of some sort at the time and place she alleges — but not yet reaching the preponderance of the evidence. After all, she didn’t tell anyone about her assault until 2017, and the press hadn’t interviewed any of them to determine whether her story was consistent.

    Watson’s allegation, on the contrary, is about as watertight as two-decade-old account can be without an actual rape kit or video evidence. Barring the emergence of any extraordinary exculpatory information, Watson’s allegation, especially combined with Tyson’s, probably fulfills the standard of “preponderance of the evidence.”

    To the untrained eye, Fairfax now looks more likely to have raped at least one woman, and maybe two. He’s not qualified for the governor’s mansion, let alone civil society. It’s time for him to resign, and far past time for Democrats to start standing up for women, not just when it’s politically expedient for them to do so.

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/fairfax-is-starting-to-look-more-guilty

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    Between Acting AG Whitaker and House Dems, Trump-Mueller hearing turns testy – Fox News
    Between Acting AG Whitaker and House Dems, Trump-Mueller hearing turns testy – Fox News
    Video

    Highlights from Acting Attorney General Whitaker’s testimony to the House Judiciary Committee

    What was pitched as an oversight hearing with Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker on Friday quickly morphed into recriminations and barbed exchanges as Democrats pressed him for hours on his dealings with FBI Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation — and Whitaker, in turn, angered committee lawmakers with his equally fiery comebacks.

    The grilling amounted to a confirmation-style hearing for an acting official who may only have a few more days left on the job  — President Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of Justice, William Barr, is poised for Senate confirmation in the near future.

    HEARING ERUPTS AS ACTING AG WHITAKER CALLS TIME ON DEM CHAIRMAN: ‘YOUR 5 MINUTES IS UP’

    The questions from Democrats were aggressive, particularly on the question of Whitaker’s oversight of the Mueller probe. But the acting AG repeatedly punched back.

    “Can you say right now, ‘Mr. President, Bob Mueller is honest and not conflicted’?” asked Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif.

    “Congressman, I’m not a puppet to repeat what you’re saying,” Whitaker shot back.

    Democrats became increasingly agitated at what they saw as Whitaker’s efforts to run out the clock and control the hearing process. Whitaker stunned onlookers when he told House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., that his time slot had expired as Nadler asked Whitaker if he’d been “asked to approve any requests or action” for the special counsel.

    “Mr. Chairman, I see that your five minutes is up, so…” Whitaker replied as gasps ricocheted around the hearing room. “I am here voluntarily. We have agreed to five-minute rounds.”

    WHITAKER: MUELLER PROBE IS ‘CLOSE TO BEING COMPLETED’

    At one point, he tussled with Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, when she pressed on whether he’s appeared before for an oversight hearing. While the answer, eventually, was that he had not, the congresswoman objected when Whitaker would not answer with a requested “yes or no.” When she asked the chairman if her time had been restored, Whitaker replied with a degree of snark, “I don’t know whether your time’s been restored or not.”

    Video

    “Mr. Attorney General, we’re not joking here, and your humor is not acceptable,” the congresswoman responded.

    “I control this time, Mr. Whitaker,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., when Whitaker accused him of challenging his character.

    “This is my time. Mr. Whitaker, you don’t run this committee. You don’t run the Congress of the United States, and you don’t run the Judiciary Committee.”

    Republicans on Friday backed Whitaker, with ranking member Doug Collins, R-Ga., calling on the committee to adjourn — although a vote to do so did not pass.

    For his part, Collins called the daylong hearing a “dog and pony show.”

    WHITAKER WILL TESTIFY BEFORE HOUSE PANEL AFTER TENSE BACK-AND-FORTH: NADLER AND DOJ

    The hearing had been teased a day earlier when Nadler threatened to subpoena Whitaker, while the DOJ threatened to boycott the hearing.

    Nadler made clear early Thursday that he did not want to have to subpoena Whitaker, but said a “series of troubling events” suggested it would be better for him to be prepared with that authority, just in case he decided not to show up for the hearing.

    But Whitaker then warned he would not show up unless lawmakers dropped the threat.

    “Consistent with longstanding practice, I remain willing to appear to testify tomorrow, provided that the Chairman assures me that the Committee will not issue a subpoena today or tomorrow and that the Committee will engage in good faith negotiations before taking such a step down the road,” Whitaker wrote to Nadler.

    Hours later, Nadler responded that if Whitaker appeared before the panel “prepared to respond to questions from our members, then I assure you there will be no need for the committee to issue a subpoena on or before February 8.”

    Whitaker accepted the assurances, as evidenced by his Friday appearance. But Nadler told reporters after the hearing that he was not happy with Whitaker’s answers and said he intends to bring him back for an additional deposition..

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

    “He will come back, because we will use a subpoena if we have to,” he said.

    The hearing Friday comes as the Senate is close to confirming Trump’s nominee for attorney general. The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday voted, along party lines, to advance Barr’s nomination to the full Senate for confirmation.

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/between-acting-ag-whitaker-and-house-dems-trump-mueller-hearing-turns-testy

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    Virginia governor to learn black sensitivity by going back to somebody else’s Roots – Washington Examiner
    Virginia governor to learn black sensitivity by going back to somebody else’s Roots – Washington Examiner

    Virginia Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam’s aides want him to read his way out of trouble.

    If you can believe it, the aides’ strategy for helping him survive his “blackface scandal” involves assigned reading, including Alex Haley’s book Roots and an essay written by the Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates, according to BuzzFeed News.

    It’s the whitest solution to a blackface problem that only the whitest of whites could have devised.

    Northam stands credibly accused of having once attended a party in the mid-1980s dressed either in blackface or Ku Klux Klan regalia, according to an old yearbook uncovered first by the right-wing news site Big League Politics.

    At first the governor apologized for the yearbook photo. Then he backtracked, after his apology failed to kill the controversy, by denying any involvement in the photo. Northam then held a press conference wherein he maintained he couldn’t possibly be the man in blackface because he “vividly” remembers looking different the one time he dressed in blackface to impersonate Michael Jackson for a dance competition.

    So his defense for wearing blackface was that it was a different sort of blackface.

    This all really happened, even the part where Northam nearly “moonwalked” for reporters.

    Suffice it to say, the governor has had a rough go of it, looking like both a supremely incompetent fool and a baby boomer racist. He has refused his own party’s many calls for his resignation, and he has even floated the idea of becoming an independent just so he can stay in office. But if you thought this couldn’t get any more ridiculous, the governor’s staff is here to disabuse you of that notion. Via BuzzFeed News:

    His office has begun to explore how it might recalibrate Northam’s legislative agenda to focus closely on race and equity … The move would mark a brazen attempt to hang onto his office by shifting the conversation away from Northam’s admission of having once worn blackface and his denials that he is featured in the racist yearbook photo, either as the person in blackface or the person in a Klan outfit. Northam’s policy team is looking at crafting a set of proposals based on the premise that the governor’s mistakes have rendered him keenly aware of inequity and the lack of justice faced by black Virginians 400 years after the first African people arrived in the Commonwealth, at Point Comfort, in 1619.

    The centerpiece proposal is not complete in its scope or in terms of what it will seek to accomplish. But there are many possibilities being considered for a broad platform: increasing resources for affordable housing; setting new, more equitable standards in small business procurement; implementing programs that expand economic opportunity for entrepreneurs; pumping money into public services like education and transportation.

    Then comes the really embarrassing detail [emphasis added]:

    This is like something lifted directly from a “South Park” episode. Northam should just pay an indulgence to Jesse Jackson and get it over with already. This also seems like the lazy man’s way of familiarizing oneself with the black community. (“Isn’t there a book I can just read?”)

    The amazing thing is: There’s no way that we’ve hit rock bottom with what’s happening now in Virginia. It surely will get worse or weirder from here.

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/virginia-governor-to-learn-black-sensitivity-by-going-back-to-somebody-elses-roots

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    Verdict of Trump’s ‘second periodic physical exam’: president in ‘very good health’ – Fox News
    Verdict of Trump’s ‘second periodic physical exam’: president in ‘very good health’ – Fox News

    President Trump is in “very good health” according to his doctor.
    (Reuters)

    President Trump underwent his “second periodic physical exam” on Friday and was judged to be “in very good health” by his physician.

    “This afternoon at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, the president participated in a second periodic physical examination,” Sean P. Conley, DO, the physician to the president, said in a statement.

    “Over the course of approximately four hours, I performed and supervised the evaluation with a panel of 11 different board-certified specialists. He did not undergo any procedures requiring sedation or anesthesia,” Conley said.

    “While the reports and recommendations are being finalized, I am happy to announce the president of the United States is in very good health and I anticipate he will remain so for the duration of his presidency, and beyond,” Conley said.

    It wasn’t immediately clear when a full report on Trump’s exam would be released.

    Trump’s 2018 examination occurred with much greater fanfare and public attention. His physician at the time, Dr. Ronny Jackson, was peppered with multiple questions by media members about the president’s physical and mental well-being.

    “All clinical data indicates the president is healthy and that he will remain so for the duration of his presidency,” Jackson, a rear admiral in the Navy, said at the time.

    Jackson recommended that Trump do more dieting and exercise. He said Trump’s blood pressure was 122 over 74, and his total cholesterol was 223, which was higher than recommended.

    Jackson was later nominated by the president to run the VA but he was forced to withdraw his nomination following multiple allegations of drinking while on duty.

    The president recently re-nominated Jackson for a second star despite an ongoing Pentagon investigation against him.

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

    During his campaign for president in December 2015, Trump released a letter from his longtime personal physician, Dr. Harold Bornstein, predicting he would be “the healthiest individual ever elected to presidency.”

    Bornstein later told NBC News that the president’s longtime bodyguard and an attorney, along with another man, raided his office last year to take the president’s medical records. But press secretary Sarah Sanders said the White House simply “took possession” of Trump’s past medical records from Bornstein, denying a “raid” ever took place, calling what happened “standard operating procedure.”

    Fox News’ Jennifer Earl and Alex Pappas contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/verdict-of-trumps-second-periodic-physical-exam-president-in-very-good-health

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    Harry Reid Rebuked Amy Klobuchar For Mistreatment Of Staff – HuffPost
    Harry Reid Rebuked Amy Klobuchar For Mistreatment Of Staff – HuffPost

    In response, Ben Goldfarb, who managed her 2006 campaign, said, “Running for political office is incredibly hard for the candidate, their family and staff, and our team was proud to help elect her.“

    Source Article from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/amy-klobuchar-mistreat-staff-harry-reid_us_5c5db1ece4b03afe8d674530

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    As border wall funding divides Washington, new $600M barrier will soon break ground in Texas – Fox News
    As border wall funding divides Washington, new $600M barrier will soon break ground in Texas – Fox News
    Video

    New border wall about to be built in south Texas

    Two border wall projects totaling 14 miles will start this month

    MISSION, Texas — Heavy machinery has started to roll in near the National Butterfly Center, which straddles the Mexican border. Customs and Border Protection has positioned vehicles here. And construction workers and architects have started plotting out their work for the next few months, and possibly years.

    As the nation’s capital grapples over how to fund the controversial border wall, construction of a new one in the Rio Grande Valley is set to begin in the next few days.

    Bentsen, a top national destination for bird watching, is located down the road from the bird center and will see one of two Rio Grande Valley border wall projects run through its property. Both plans were funded by last year’s congressional appropriations. Congress green-lighted more than $600 million for 33 miles of wall in the area.

    Environmentalists are not happy.

    “The construction would tear all the natural wildlife and the trees and all that’s been here forever,” said Lisa Doubet, a St. Louis native visiting Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park.

    Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park will see a portion of a new six-mile border wall run along a levee road in the property. 
    (Fox News)

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

    The project that will cut through Bentsen and the butterfly center was the first contract to be awarded by CBP at the end of October. It calls for six miles of new border wall and will run on the south side of the U.S. International Boundary Water Commission levee, featuring concrete slabs with 18-foot tall bollards. About two weeks after making that first announcement, CBP awarded a second contract for another eight miles.

    AS BORDER WALL GOES UP IN TEXAS, SOME LANDOWNERS PUT UP A FIGHT

    The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the butterfly center have criticized the potential damages that construction would have on wildlife and vegetation. Last year, the Trump administration waived 28 environmental and public-health laws to make way for the construction of the wall.

    Last year, Customs and Border Protection awarded contracts for two border wall projects in the Rio Grande Valley, totaling 14 miles. 
    (Fox News )

    Newly selected Rio Grande Valley Sector Chief Patrol Agent Rodolfo Karisch did not provide many details regarding the projects during his “State of the Border” address in Mission on Friday. However, he did bring up the high number of illegal border crossers.

    “Every 14 days, we have as many people that show up in San Diego as far as a caravan. There’s so much work we have to do, but this is also not the answer, having men and women make this trek coming across the border there” said Karisch.

    President Trump has ramped up calls for more money for additional border fencing. His push for $5.7 billion for a border wall triggered a standoff last month that led to the country’s longest government shutdown. Now, as lawmakers discuss border security funding ahead of a budget deadline next week, Trump is showing no signs of softening his stance, preparing instead for a MAGA rally in El Paso, where he’s expected to highlight the issue.

    TRUMP ANNOUNCES CAMPAIGN RALLY IN EL PASO AS BORDER WALL DEBATE RAGES

    “Now is the time for Congress to show the world that America is committed to ending illegal immigration and putting ruthless coyotes, drug dealers, and human traffickers out of business,” Trump said during his State of the Union address on Tuesday.

    But, Mayor Jim Darling from the neighboring city of McAllen said it’s untrue that border towns are dangerous and lawless.

    “We’re still fighting the image of being a lawless area of the border, the area’s unsafe and all those, so we’re still fighting that,” said Darling.

    President Donald Trump continues to push for tighter border security, preparing for a MAGA rally in El Paso next week, where he’s expected to raise the issue. 
    (AP)

    Darling, who doesn’t identify as a Democrat or a Republican, said he believes in border security but doesn’t think a wall will solve what he says is the real issue: the number of asylum seekers.

    “A wall doesn’t stop that. So, we’ve been seeing numbers at the respite center that are caravan-type numbers. But, the people haven’t been crossing in the caravans. They’ve been individual families or individuals themselves,” said Darling.

    Meanwhile, as contractors move closer to construction, officials from Bentsen State Park worry about the area’s future.

    “It’s a little scary for me,” Doubet said. “I just don’t think I’d want to be close to a border wall in a park.”

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/us/construction-for-new-border-wall-to-begin-in-rio-grande-valley-in-a-few-days-as-lawmakers-grapple-with-border-funding

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    Humanitarian Aid Is Blocked Amid Venezuelan Political Crisis – NPR
    Humanitarian Aid Is Blocked Amid Venezuelan Political Crisis – NPR

    The Tienditas bridge connecting Colombia and Venezuela has been blocked by Venezuelan military forces, as seen here on Wednesday. Opposition leader Juan Guaidó and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are demanding that humanitarian aid be allowed to enter.

    Edinson Estupinan/AFP/Getty Images


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    Edinson Estupinan/AFP/Getty Images

    The Tienditas bridge connecting Colombia and Venezuela has been blocked by Venezuelan military forces, as seen here on Wednesday. Opposition leader Juan Guaidó and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are demanding that humanitarian aid be allowed to enter.

    Edinson Estupinan/AFP/Getty Images

    Trucks full of food and medicine have arrived at the Venezuelan border, setting up a showdown between President Nicolás Maduro and U.S.-backed opposition leader Juan Guaidó.

    The aid convoy arrived at the Colombian border city of Cúcuta, The Associated Press reports, but Maduro and the military have blocked the Tienditas bridge so that the trucks cannot enter Venezuela.

    “The United States is prepositioning relief items — including food, nutritional supplements, hygiene kits and medical supplies — in Colombia so they are available to reach those most in need in Venezuela as soon as possible,” a U.S. official told The AP.

    Maduro has rejected aid offers and says his country has “never been, nor are we, a country of beggars,” the BBC reports.

    Venezuela has been in a political crisis since Guaidó, the president of the National Assembly, declared himself interim president last month. Maduro has refused to step aside and accuses the U.S. and others of attempting to overthrow him. Venezuela’s economy and medical system have collapsed in recent years, sending millions fleeing from the once-rich country, home to the world’s largest oil reserves.

    Meanwhile, Colombia’s migration office has canceled more than 300 daily entrance passes used by Venezuelan politicians and the families of Maduro supporters.

    “It doesn’t make sense that while [the Venezuelan people] migrate for hunger and need, supporters of the dictatorship enjoy these benefits and enter our country, using this card, to shop, among other things,” Christian Krüger Sarmiento, the director general of the migration agency, said in a statement.

    U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted a photo of the barricaded bridge. “The Venezuelan people desperately need humanitarian aid. The U.S. & other countries are trying to help, but Venezuela’s military under Maduro’s orders is blocking aid with trucks and shipping tankers. The Maduro regime must LET THE AID REACH THE STARVING PEOPLE.”

    Guaidó has been talking about the aid convoys. “While we work every day to successfully achieve the delivery of the humanitarian aid; they insist on taking away the medicines and foods of those who need them urgently,” he tweeted.

    “The first phase continues with collection centers in three allied countries,” he wrote, posting photos of the trucks.

    Maduro has called the convoys “a political show,” according to Reuters.

    Source Article from https://www.npr.org/2019/02/08/692698637/humanitarian-aid-arrives-for-venezuela-but-maduro-blocks-it

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    Second woman accuses Va. Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax of sexual assault – The Washington Post
    Second woman accuses Va. Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax of sexual assault – The Washington Post

    Jenna Portnoy

    Gregory S. Schneider

    February 8 at 5:14 PM

    A Maryland woman said Friday she was raped by Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax (D) in a “premeditated and aggressive” assault in 2000, while they both were undergraduate students at Duke University. She is the second woman this week to make an accusation of sexual assault.

    The woman, Meredith Watson, said Friday in a written statement through her attorney that she shared her account immediately after it happened with several classmates and friends. Watson did not speak publicly Friday and her lawyer did not make her available for an interview.

    Fairfax denied the allegations forcefully.

    “I deny this latest unsubstantiated allegation,” Fairfax said in a statement. “It is demonstrably false. I have never forced myself on anyone ever.”

    Watson was friends with Fairfax at Duke but they never dated or had any romantic relationship, Watson’s lawyer, Nancy Erika Smith, said.

    “At this time, Ms. Watson is reluctantly coming forward out of a strong sense of civic duty and her belief that those seeking or serving in public office should be of the highest character,” Smith said in the statement . “She has no interest in becoming a media personality or reliving the trauma that has greatly affected her life. Similarly, she is not seeking any financial damages.”

    Watson wants Fairfax to resign from office, Smith said.

    Fairfax’s statement said he would not resign. “I demand a full investigation into these unsubstantiated and false allegations” the statement said. “I will clear my good name and I have nothing to hide. I have passed two full field background checks by the FBI and run for office in two highly contested elections with nothing like this being raised before. “

    Watson’s claim comes at the end of a turbulent week that began when a different woman, Vanessa Tyson, accused Fairfax of sexually assaulting her in 2004 when both were in Boston attending the Democratic National Convention.

    [Tyson has spoken for years about the sexual assault issue]

    Fairfax denied that he assaulted Tyson, said he was the victim of a “smear” and has said repeatedly that they had a consensual encounter.

    Smith said the details of Watson’s alleged attack are similar to those described by Tyson.

    Kaneedreck Adams, 40, who attended Duke with Watson, said that in the spring of 2000, when they lived across from each other in on-campus apartments, Watson came to her crying.

    “She was upset,” Adams, an attorney, said. “She told me she had been raped and she named Justin.”

    “She said she couldn’t speak, but she was trying to get up and he kept pushing her down,” Adams. “She said he knew that she didn’t like what was happening, but he kept pushing her down.”

    The alleged attack happened at fraternity house, Adams said.

    She said both the women were friends with Fairfax, who was one year ahead of them in school. “We all knew he wanted to be in politics,” Adams said. “He had a reputation for being very friendly. Some of my friends, we called him sunshine. He was a nice sweet charming guy.”

    Watson’s attorney provided an email exchange from 2016 between Watson and Milagros Joye Brown, a friend from Duke. Brown was inviting a group of Duke friends to a fundraiser for Fairfax, as he launched his campaign for lieutenant governor.

    “Molly, Justin raped me in college and I don’t want to hear anything about him. Please, please, please remove me form any future emails about him please,” Watson wrote on Oct. 26, 2016.

    [An isolated governor; all three officeholders under fire]

    All week, Democrats and Republicans have been treading carefully regarding Tyson’s allegation, unsure what to believe because Tyson offered no corroborating evidence. Several have called for an investigation.

    Watson’s claim is likely to further stoke chaos in Richmond, where one week ago, a racist photo on the 1984 medical school yearbook page of Gov. Ralph Northam (D) was unearthed, setting off calls for his resignation. On Wednesday, Attorney General Mark R. Herring disclosed that he wore blackface as part of a costume during college in 1980.

    After Watson’s allegations became public Friday. former Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe called for Fairfax to resign.

    “The allegations against Justin Fairfax are serious and credible,” McAuliffe said in a statement. “It is clear to me that he can no longer effectively serve the people of Virginia as Lieutenant Governor. I call for his immediate resignation.” McAuliffe has similarly called for Northam’s resignation.

    If Northam were to step down, Fairfax would be next in line. And he was preparing to do just that, after scandal enveloped Northam and before Tyson accused Fairfax of sexual assault.

    Fairfax, a 39-year-old former federal prosecutor, has been a rising star in Democratic politics. The great-great-great-grandson of a slave, he is the second African American to hold statewide office in Virginia.

    Until this week, Fairfax was best known for silently protesting the state Senate’s annual tribute to Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

    Aaron C. Davis, Neena Satija, Rachel Chason, Fenit Nirappil and Samantha Schmidt contributed to this report.

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    Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/second-woman-accuses-va-lt-gov-justin-fairfax-of-sexual-assault/2019/02/08/19e6bb6c-2bdf-11e9-b011-d8500644dc98_story.html

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