Both President Donald Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr. praised a CNN report that seemed to put to rest a possible line of inquiry in the ongoing investigations into Russian interfence in the 2016 election. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images
President Donald Trump welcomed a report Thursday that said his son, Donald Trump Jr., did not talk with him on a blocked phone number before and after a meeting at Trump Tower between top campaign officials and Russians linked to the Kremlin.
“Just out: The big deal, very mysterious Don jr telephone calls, after the innocent Trump Tower meeting, that the media & Dems said were made to his father (me), were just conclusively found NOT to be made to me,” the president wrote on Twitter. “They were made to friends & business associates of Don. Really sad!”
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CNN reported Thursday that three sources “with knowledge of the matter” told the network that records provided to the Senate Intelligence Community show the calls were between Trump Jr. and business associates.
Democrats, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who both sit on committees investigating the meeting, have pressed for more information om Trump’s Jr.’s repeated phone exchanges with a blocked number. Others have surmised that the calls could have been with his father, then the Republican frontrunner and future president.
The June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower — between Trump Jr., adviser Jared Kushner, then-campaign manager Paul Manafort and Russians including a lawyer linked to the Kremlin — has long been the source of both speculation and investigation in the various probes into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Trump’s initial insistence that the meeting was to discuss adoptions and not to gather dirt on Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton had fueled claims that the gathering could have been an example of the campaign’s collusion in Russia’s efforts to meddle in the election.
Whether Trump knew of the meeting beforehand, or was informed after the fact, is seen by many commentators as key to the collusion question.
Trump Jr. also touted the report on Twitter and taunted House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who previously said House Republicans, then in the majority, were not doing enough to investigate the phone records.
“Has anyone heard from Adam Schiff?” Trump Jr. said. “I imagine he’s busy leaking other confidential info from the House Intelligence Committee to change the subject?!? #FullOfSchiff”
Trump and his son are frequent critics of CNN reporting, often calling the network’s coverage of the White House and Russia investigation “fake news.”
Source Article from https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/31/trump-donald-trump-jr-trump-tower-calls-1140930
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(CNN)Three people were arrested on charges of running “birth tourism” companies that catered to Chinese clients in Southern California Thursday. It is the first time that criminal charges have been filed in a US federal court over the practice, according to Thom Mrozek, spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office.
Source Article from https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/31/asia/chinese-birth-tourism-arrest/index.html
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has acted wisely in telling FBI Director Christopher Wray that he has some explaining to do, but the chairman should slightly broaden his inquiry.
Graham sent a Jan. 30 letter to Wray demanding a “briefing” to the committee about why the Bureau used such apparently disproportionate force in its pre-dawn raid on longtime political consultant Roger Stone, who stands accused of perjury by special counsel Robert Mueller. Graham’s specific questions of Wray are good, but they seem focused too heavily on the Stone arrest alone. The bigger questions should be about FBI arrest methods more broadly.
Some of us thought the Stone arrest methods were abusive, but they weren’t unique. The FBI used similar tactics on Stone’s former business partner, Paul Manafort, and they and their Drug Enforcement Agency brethren use such raids dozens of times each year not just on people thought to be violent but on low-level offenders and on doctors suspected of overprescribing painkillers.
When such heavily armed force is used, innocents get terrorized and hurt. Wives of suspects, in their nightgowns, awake to find semiautomatic weapons in their faces; an elderly orchard hobbyist watches his furniture smashed while agents look for evidence of flower “smuggling”; doors at wrong addresses get chain-sawed open; children get injured by flash grenades or even killed by clumsy agents.
No matter what some FBI defenders might say, most people suspected of low-level crimes such as perjury are not likely to try to shoot their way out of an arrest. Four or six agents with holstered pistols, not 29 heavily armed agents in full riot gear, should be perfectly able to take Roger Stone into custody.
Graham is surely right to question Wray about the raid on Stone’s house, but question 2 in his letter to the FBI chief is the one that is the most relevant, and that should be expanded: “Was the manner of Stone’s arrest consistent with the arrests of, and procedures for the arrests of, similarly charged individuals?”
The further questions should be: What factors determine how many agents are used? What determines how heavily armed they should be? What criteria govern how much time should be allotted before doors are broken down? Or how rough the agents are to the suspect once inside? Or how careful they are to use the least disruptive means of searching the house for evidence?
What data, if any, supports the use of riot gear for suspects never known to be violent? How many times have suspects or, worse, innocent bystanders or people subject to mistaken identity, been injured or killed in heavily armed raids? And how often, conversely, have FBI agents been injured or killed, and under what circumstances? Have agents been badly injured or killed by white-collar suspects with no record of violence, and did any neutral analysis determine that the agent’s injury or death would have been avoided if the Bureau had made a greater show of force?
In other words, if there is objective justification for heavy use of force — real evidence that it does more good than the downside risks it carries, rather than just a macho sense that efficacy and safety are bolstered by “overwhelming presence” — then let’s see it. Maybe there is. If so, it should not be difficult for Wray to produce.
Despite what some might say, these concerns amount to substantially more than mere “pearl clutching.” We live in a nation founded on the idea of maximum liberty under law, of limited government, and of protections against state overuse of force. We wisely exclude the military from domestic law enforcement, and we at least look with suspicion at turning domestic law enforcement into a quasi-military function.
Yet not only with the Stone arrest, but all too often, we see federal agents who are overarmed and for no good reason, and who act abusively toward citizens they are supposed to protect. The difference this time was that the raid was televised for all the world to see. It led several conservative, pro-law-enforcement people I know — including those who dislike Stone, Manafort, and Trump — to use expressions like “jackboots” and “thugs” in conversations when they offered their impressions of the Stone raid.
One can fully support Mueller’s investigation and think the Trumpist effusions about a “deep state” are overblown nonsense and yet still see that the FBI’s conduct with regard to Trump and Hillary Clinton has been unprofessional and tawdry enough to suggest the bureau needs a thorough housecleaning. The housecleaning should begin with the examination of rules concerning use of force, in the “briefing” Graham is holding with such appropriate dispatch.
Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/lindsey-graham-is-right-to-put-fbi-between-a-stone-and-a-hard-place
President Donald Trump applauded Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris‘ presidential campaign launch, describing it as “the best opening so far” in the 2020 primary race.
Trump made the remarks during an interview with The New York Times published on Thursday night, saying Harris has “a better crowd, better enthusiasm.”
The president, who spent the latter part of his career in show businesses before landing at the White House, homed in particularly on Harris’ ability to draw a crowd, The Times indicated.
The president has frequently pointed to the size of his own campaign rallies as a measure of his likability and success.
Trump claimed that some Democratic candidates had “really drifted far left,” and took another jab at Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who launched an exploratory committee in late December.
“I do think Elizabeth Warren’s been hurt very badly with the Pocahontas trap,” Trump reportedly said, referring to a racist slur he frequently uses to insult her claim of having Native American heritage. “I think she’s been hurt badly. I may be wrong, but I think that was a big part of her credibility and now all of a sudden it’s gone.”
Harris declared her candidacy on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, January 21, and followed it with a campaign rally in her hometown of Oakland, California, where roughly 20,000 people attended.
Harris also appeared at a CNN town hall event this week, where she became “the most-watched cable news single-candidate election town hall” among the age 25-to-54 news demographic, according to CNN’s internal metrics.
Despite an otherwise energetic launch, Harris’ campaign encountered some headwinds over her record as a California prosecutor. She previously served as San Francisco’s district attorney and has faced criticism over her tough stance on crime, including defending the death penalty in California.
Neither White House officials nor Harris’ campaign immediately responded to INSIDER’s request for comment on Thursday night.
Source Article from https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-applauds-kamala-harris-2020-campaign-2019-1
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As the adage goes, there are only two certainties in life: death and taxes. And if Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ new tax plan were to go into effect, death would trigger much higher taxes for the billionaire set.
Under Sanders’ new tax plan announced Thursday, billionaires would be subject to a 77 percent estate tax, which is the tax levied on the cash, property, real estate and other assets (“everything you own or have certain interests in,” according to the Internal Revenue Service) of a deceased person when it is transferred to another person. In 2018, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act put the estate tax at 40 percent after the first $11.18 million, according to the Internal Revenue Service.
“Our bill only applies to the richest 0.2% of Americans,” Sanders tweeted earlier on Thursday.
According to estimates made by Sanders’ office, here’s what the new bill would establish for the wealthiest five billionaires in the United States:
(For the calculations, Sanders’ office used the net worth list from Forbes, as of Monday, “and then applied our proposed rates” to determine what each billionaire would pay if the new tax plan were implemented, Sanders’ spokesperson Josh Miller-Lewis tells CNBC Make It. To determine a baseline of what each billionaire would have to pay in estate tax under current law, Sanders’ office applied the 40 percent estate tax rate on the Forbes net worth of the given person as of Monday.)
The proposed estate tax rates under Sanders’ new plan are tiered and impact the top 0.2 percent of Americans: from $3.5 million up to $10 million in assets owned upon time of death, the tax rate would be 45 percent; from $10 million to $50 million, the tax rate would be 50 percent; and from greater than $50 million to $1 billion, the tax rate would be 55 percent tax.
Changing the estate tax is not unheard of: Indeed, the estate tax has fluctuated from year to year for most of the last 20 years “creating uncertainty for taxpayers and their advisors,” the Joint Committee on Taxation says in a primer on the U.S. Federal Wealth Transfer Tax System published in 2015.
The Sanders’ tax plan could make $2.2 trillion from 588 billionaires in the United States, according to a written statement from Sanders’ office published Thursday. (The precise date as to when this $2.2 trillion could be reaped is “hard to say,” Miller-Lewis tells CNBC Make It, because it’s impossible to know when an estate tax will be levied since a person’s time of death is unknown.)
The goal, which is a common theme for the progressive Senator from Vermont, is to stem the tide of wealth inequality.
“At a time of massive wealth and income inequality, when the three richest Americans own more wealth than 160 million Americans, it is literally beyond belief that the Republican leadership wants to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the top 0.2 percent,” Sanders says in the written statement. “Our bill does what the American people want by substantially increasing the estate tax on the wealthiest families in this country and dramatically reducing wealth inequality. From a moral, economic, and political perspective our nation will not thrive when so few have so much and so many have so little.”
Indeed, Gates, Bezos and Buffett own more wealth than the bottom half of the American population combined, or 160 million people, according to November 2017 report published by the Institute for Policy Studies, a left-leaning think tank based in Washington, D.C.
Representatives for Buffett, Ellison, Zuckerberg, Gates and Bezos did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
However, Buffett addressed Republicans’ idea to eliminate the estate tax in an interview with Becky Quick on CNBC’s Squawk Box in October 2017.
“I don’t think I need a tax cut,” Buffett said. “[I]f they passed the bill that they’re talking about, I could leave $75 billion to a bunch of children and grandchildren and great grandchildren, and if I left it to 35 of them, they would each have a couple of billion dollars. They could put it out at 5 percent and have $100 million.
“Is that a great way to allocate resources in the United States?” Buffett continued. “That’s what you are doing through the tax code is you are affecting the allocation of resources.”
Still, some are fierce critics of the estate tax, even at current levels. “You work your whole life to build up a nest egg or a family-owned business or family farm. Then you pass away… Uncle Sam can swoop in and take over 40% of everything you’ve earned over a certain amount. It’s just wrong,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady said in August 2017, when the estate tax was being considered then, according to CNN.
See also:
Billionaire Warren Buffett: ‘I don’t need a tax cut’ in a society with so much inequality
Ocasio-Cortez’s 70% tax plan gets fierce response, but even Warren Buffett says rich should pay more
Billionaire Warren Buffett on helping the poor: ‘A rich family does not leave people behind’
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Source Article from https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/31/how-much-bezos-gates-buffet-could-pay-under-bernie-sanders-tax-plan.html
Not long after President Trump said the nation’s intelligence chiefs were “naive” about Iran and perhaps should “go back to school,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer suggested that it was the president who needed tutoring.
Schumer, D-N.Y., called on Dan Coats, director of national intelligence, to stage an intervention with Trump after the president took the unusual move Wednesday of criticizing Coats, CIA Director Gina Haspel and FBI Director Christopher Wray after their Tuesday appearance before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“President Trump’s criticism of the testimony you and other intelligence leaders provided to Congress yesterday was extraordinarily inappropriate,” Schumer wrote to Coats, adding later that “I believe it is incumbent on you, Director Wray and Director Haspel … to impress upon him how critically important it is for him to join you and the leadership of our Intelligence Community in speaking with a unified and accurate voice about national security threats.”
The intelligence chiefs had told the Senate panel that North Korea was unlikely to dismantle its nuclear arsenal and that the Iran nuclear deal was working — assessments that drew responses from the president via Twitter.
Trump insisted that the U.S. relationship with North Korea “is the best it has ever been,” and pointed to a halt in nuclear and missile tests by North Korea, the return of some U.S. service members’ remains and the release of detained Americans as signs of progress. A second Trump-Kim meeting is expected in February.
The U.S. intelligence agencies also said Iran continues to work with other parties to the nuclear deal it reached with the U.S. and other world powers. In doing so, they said, it has at least temporarily lessened the nuclear threat. In May 2018, Trump withdrew the U.S. from that Obama-era accord, which he called a terrible deal that would not stop Iran from going nuclear.
Schumer’s letter to Coats essentially echoed what many Democrats said in the aftermath of Trump’s tweets.
Sen. Mark Warner, the senior Democrat on the Senate’s intelligence panel, said in a tweet that, “The President has a dangerous habit of undermining the intelligence community to fit his alternate reality. People risk their lives for the intelligence he just tosses aside on Twitter.”
Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/schumer-wants-intelligence-community-to-stage-intervention-with-trump
Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse says that if Gov. Ralph Northam can’t say protecting a baby who has survived an abortion is something we all believe in, then he should get the hell out of office.
Nebraska GOP Sen. Ben Sasse, in an interview Thursday with Fox News, ramped up his criticism of Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam over comments on a controversial late-term abortion bill — saying the governor effectively discussed “infanticide” and should resign if he won’t back down.
Sasse, a pro-life Republican, said Northam’s comments were “morally repugnant” and argued the Democratic governor should “get the hell out of office” if he doesn’t support protecting the life of a child who survived an abortion.
“The comments the governor of Virginia made were about fourth-term abortions,” Sasse said on Fox News’ “The Daily Briefing with Dana Perino.” “That’s not abortion, that’s infanticide.”
Northam’s comments were made during an appearance on a local radio station to discuss The Repeal Act, which seeks to repeal restrictions on third-trimester abortions.
Virginia Democratic Del. Kathy Tran, a sponsor, sparked outrage from conservatives when she was asked at a hearing if a woman about to give birth and dilating could still request an abortion. The bill was tabled in committee this week.
“My bill would allow that, yes,” she said. Existing state law does not put an absolute time limit on abortions and Tran’s legislation does not alter that, but it does loosen restrictions on the need to get additional certification from doctors.
NEW YORK ‘CELEBRATES’ LEGALIZING ABORTION UNTIL BIRTH
Northam, a former pediatric neurologist, had been asked about Tran’s comments and said he couldn’t speak for her, but said that third-trimester abortions are done with “the consent of obviously the mother, with consent of the physician, multiple physicians by the way, and it’s done in cases where there may be severe deformities or there may be a fetus that’s not viable.”
“So in this particular example if a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen, the infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.”
Northam’s comments quickly led to an outpouring of criticism from Republicans and pro-life activists. Sasse questioned why pro-life Democrats have not spoken out in opposition to the comments made by Northam and Tran. Neither of the two pro-life Democrats in the Senate – Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Joe Manchin of West Virginia – has made public comments about the controversy.
“The Democratic Party has not come out and condemned this, and they really should be,” he said.
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Northam pushed back hard on his critics, tweeting: “I have devoted my life to caring for children and any insinuation otherwise is shameful and disgusting.”
Northam Communications Director Ofirah Yheskel said GOP critics were “trying to play politics with women’s health” — and sought to clarify her boss’ comments:
“No woman seeks a third trimester abortion except in the case of tragic or difficult circumstances, such as a nonviable pregnancy or in the event of severe fetal abnormalities, and the governor’s comments were limited to the actions physicians would take in the event that a woman in those circumstances went into labor. Attempts to extrapolate these comments otherwise is in bad faith and underscores exactly why the governor believes physicians and women, not legislators, should make these difficult and deeply personal medical decisions.”
Tran’s legislation would reduce the number of doctors who would have to certify late-term abortions are needed from three to one. It would also delete the requirement that doctors determine that continuing a pregnancy would “substantially and irremediably” impair a woman’s health. Instead doctors would only have to certify that the woman’s health was impaired.
Supporters said the changes in law would help reduce the bureaucratic burdens women face when dealing with difficult decisions involving late-term abortions, which often involve serious medical complications.
The effort in Virginia follows New York passing a bill last week loosening restrictions on abortion, as New Mexico, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Washington also pass new laws expanding abortion access or move to strip old laws from the books that limit abortions.
Fox News’ Adam Shaw and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/sasse-tells-virginia-gov-northam-to-get-the-hell-of-office-in-wake-of-abortion-comments
ISIS DOWN, NOT OUT: While Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan declared ISIS is just weeks away from losing the last bit of territory it controls in Syria, the nation’s top intelligence official told the Senate, “ISIS is intent on resurging and still commands thousands of fighters in Iraq and Syria.”
Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats testified yesterday at a Select Senate Committee hearing on worldwide threats, “While ISIS is nearing territorial defeat in Iraq and Syria, the group has returned to its guerrilla warfare roots while continuing to plot attacks and direct its supporters worldwide.”
NORTH KOREA NOT DENUCLEARIZING: It wasn’t the only reality check delivered by Coats yesterday. He also cast doubt on whether President Trump will be able to secure a deal to get North Korea’s Kim Jong Un to give up his missiles and nuclear weapons programs.
“We currently assess that North Korea will seek to retain its WMD capabilities. It is unlikely to completely give up its nuclear weapons and production capabilities because its leaders ultimately view nuclear weapons as critical to regime survival,” Coats said in his opening statement. “Our assessment is bolstered by our observations of some activity that is inconsistent with full denuclearization.”
IRAN NOT NUCLEARIZING: “While we do not believe Iran is currently undertaking activities we judge necessary to produce a nuclear device, Iranian officials have publicly threatened to push the boundaries of [the Iran nuclear deal] restrictions if Iran does not gain the tangible financial benefits is expected from the deal,” Coats said in his annual assessment, noting that Iran maintains the largest inventory of ballistic missiles in the Middle East.
“The Iranian regime will continue pursuing regional ambitions and improved military capabilities even while its own economy is weakening by the day,” he said.
HAPPENING THIS MORNING, TRUMP WEIGHS IN: “When I became President, ISIS was out of control in Syria & running rampant. Since then tremendous progress made, especially over last 5 weeks. Caliphate will soon be destroyed, unthinkable two years ago. Negotiating are proceeding well in Afghanistan after 18 years of fighting,” President Trump tweeted at 6:30 a.m. “Fighting continues but the people of Afghanistan want peace in this never ending war. We will soon see if talks will be successful? North Korea relationship is best it has ever been with U.S. No testing, getting remains, hostages returned. Decent chance of Denuclearization.”
COATS ON CHINA: “China’s actions reflect a long-term strategy to achieve global superiority,” Coats said. “In its efforts to diminish U.S. influence and extend its own economic, political and military reach, Beijing will seek to tout a distinctly Chinese fusion of strongman autocracy and a form of Western-style capitalism as a development model; an implicit alternative to democratic values and institutions. These efforts will include the use of its intelligence and influence apparatus to shape international views and gain advantages over its competitors, including especially the United States.”
COATS ON RUSSIA: “Even as Russia faces a weakening economy, the Kremlin is stepping up its campaign to divide Western political and security institutions and undermine the post-World War II international order. We expect Russia will continue to wage its information war against democracies and to use social media to attempt to divide our societies. Russia’s attack against Ukrainian naval vessels in November is just the latest example of the Kremlin’s willingness to violate international norms, to coerce its neighbors and accomplish its goals.”
SLOW MOTION WITHDRAWAL: The Pentagon insists it’s in the process of complying with President Trump’s December order to begin withdrawing all U.S. ground troops from Syria. “We are on a deliberate, coordinated, disciplined withdrawal,” Shanahan said yesterday.
But people in Syria don’t see any sign of it. “There has been no change in the situation on the ground,” Ilham Ahmed told the Washington Post. Ahmed, who heads the executive committee of the Syrian Democratic Council said the situation is “just like before” Trump’s announcement.
Shanahan indicated yesterday that the hold-up may be figuring out who is going to fill the vacuum left by the departure of U.S. troops, so that Russia, Iran or Syria regime forces don’t move in, or worse ISIS reconstitutes.
“The phase that this moves to is how do you sustain local security?” Shanahan said. “You know that’s, that’s where the support of the coalition, that’s where these partnerships are so critical,” he said.
5,000 TROOPS TO COLOMBIA: Shanahan punted when asked about the mysterious notation seen on John Bolton’s legal pad Monday with the words, “5,000 troops to Colombia,” scrawled on it, just as Bolton asserted that “all options are on the table.”
“I didn’t bring a notepad today,” Shanahan joked, but when pressed he repeated refused either confirm or deny whether President Trump is seriously considering dispatching American troops to Colombia to turn up the heat on Nicolas Maduro, the embattled president of neighboring Venezuela.
This morning Trump tweeted, “Maduro willing to negotiate with opposition in Venezuela following U.S. sanctions and the cutting off of oil revenues. [Juan] Guaido is being targeted by Venezuelan Supreme Court. Massive protest expected today. Americans should not travel to Venezuela until further notice.”
MORE TROOPS, OR DIFFERENT TROOPS? Shanahan also revealed yesterday a Department of Homeland Security request for more U.S. military support for southern border security through the rest of the fiscal year.
“DHS has asked us to support them in additional concertina wire, and then expanded surveillance capability,” Shanahan said. “And we’ve responded with, you know, ‘Here’s how many people it would take, and this is the timing we’d be able — timing and mix of the people to support that.’” Asked how many people that would require, Shanahan said “Several thousand. I’ll leave it at that number.”
Currently, there are approximately 2,350 active duty troops and about 2,270 national guard troops on the border. What’s unclear is how many of those troops will be rotated out and replaced with new troops, and what that will do to the total number deployed in 2019.
“The numbers fluctuate,” John Rood, undersecretary of defense for policy, told the House Armed Services Committee, yesterday. “One portion of them has been approved to be deployed through January of 2019. There will be additional deployments of active duty troops that will go through the end of this fiscal year, September 30th, in response to the latest request from the Department of Homeland Security.”
WHY ACTIVE DUTY? Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Smith D-Wash, grilled Rood about why active-duty troops were sent instead of more National Guard units. “It is very, very rare to send troops to the border,” Smith insisted.
Rood said the 5,900 active-duty members of the military were dispatched because they were more readily available since thousands of guardsmen had been deployed in April.
“Active-duty military personnel were selected because the secretary of defense determined them to be the best-suited and most readily available forces from the total force to provide the assistance requested by the DHS,” Rood told the committee.
LOCKHEED MARTIN IN THE BLACK: Lockheed Martin Corporation reports $1.5 billion in profits on fourth quarter 2018 net sales of $14.4 billion. The company expects sales to climb more than 6 percent this year amid a swelling order backlog for the F-35 fighter jet, the most expensive weapons program in U.S. history
The Bethesda, Md.-based defense contractor said Tuesday its targeting $57 billion in revenue this year after sales growth in 2018 fueled by increased U.S. military spending. An F-35 order late in the year added 250 planes to the fighter’s outstanding orders, pushing the total to 400, CEO Marillyn Hewson told investors on an earnings call. That “exceeds the total F-35 deliveries made to date,” she said, “a clear sign of the program’s momentum.”
MORE 4Q RESULTS DUE: Both Boeing and General Dynamics are set to release their fourth quarter results this morning, with Northrop and Raytheon reporting tomorrow.
BOEING: At yesterday’s off-camera press briefing at the Pentagon, Shanahan was asked about reports he was perceived as ‘the man from Boeing,” given his past position with the company, and reports that in private meetings that he trashed Lockheed Martin and boasted that Boing would have done a better job meeting production goals for the F-35.
“I am biased towards performance,” Shanahan said. “I am biased towards giving the taxpayer their money’s worth. And the F-35 unequivocally I can say has a lot of opportunity for more performance.”
He said the Pentagon’s strong ethics rules prevent him from intervening on behalf of Boeing and dismissed the grumbling about pro-Boeing bias as “just noise.”
THE RUNDOWN
Washington Post: Russia secretly offered North Korea a nuclear power plant, officials say
Bloomberg: Launch-and-Landing Failures Add to $13 Billion Ship’s Troubles
Voice of America: Afghans Worry as US Makes Progress in Taliban Talks
Navy Times: Senator: Chinese Buildup In South China Sea Like ‘Preparing For World War III’
Foreign Policy: U.S. Developing Supply Route Along Dangerous Stretch From Djibouti to Somalia
Breaking Defense: More Missile Defense Ships, New Ground Deployments
Voice of America: Iran’s Cyber Spies Looking to Get Personal
Stars and Stripes: China tests ‘Guam killer’ missile, claims weapon could strike moving aircraft carrier
Air Force Magazine: Air Force Academy to Hire Enlisted NCOs for Accredited Faculty Position
Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/afghanistans-government-losing-its-grip-on-the-country-as-the-taliban-gain-upper-hand-in-peace-talks
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(CNN)Three very important things happened on Thursday in Washington.
Source Article from https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/31/politics/donald-trump-nancy-pelosi-government-shutdown/index.html
Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse says that if Gov. Ralph Northam can’t say protecting a baby who has survived an abortion is something we all believe in, then he should get the hell out of office.
Nebraska GOP Sen. Ben Sasse, in an interview Thursday with Fox News, ramped up his criticism of Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam over comments on a controversial late-term abortion bill — saying the governor effectively discussed “infanticide” and should resign if he won’t back down.
Sasse, a pro-life Republican, said Northam’s comments were “morally repugnant” and argued the Democratic governor should “get the hell out of office” if he doesn’t support protecting the life of a child who survived an abortion.
“The comments the governor of Virginia made were about fourth-term abortions,” Sasse said on Fox News’ “The Daily Briefing with Dana Perino.” “That’s not abortion, that’s infanticide.”
Northam’s comments were made during an appearance on a local radio station to discuss The Repeal Act, which seeks to repeal restrictions on third-trimester abortions.
Virginia Democratic Del. Kathy Tran, a sponsor, sparked outrage from conservatives when she was asked at a hearing if a woman about to give birth and dilating could still request an abortion. The bill was tabled in committee this week.
“My bill would allow that, yes,” she said. Existing state law does not put an absolute time limit on abortions and Tran’s legislation does not alter that, but it does loosen restrictions on the need to get additional certification from doctors.
NEW YORK ‘CELEBRATES’ LEGALIZING ABORTION UNTIL BIRTH
Northam, a former pediatric neurologist, had been asked about Tran’s comments and said he couldn’t speak for her, but said that third-trimester abortions are done with “the consent of obviously the mother, with consent of the physician, multiple physicians by the way, and it’s done in cases where there may be severe deformities or there may be a fetus that’s not viable.”
“So in this particular example if a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen, the infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.”
Northam’s comments quickly led to an outpouring of criticism from Republicans and pro-life activists. Sasse questioned why pro-life Democrats have not spoken out in opposition to the comments made by Northam and Tran. Neither of the two pro-life Democrats in the Senate – Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Joe Manchin of West Virginia – has made public comments about the controversy.
“The Democratic Party has not come out and condemned this, and they really should be,” he said.
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Northam pushed back hard on his critics, tweeting: “I have devoted my life to caring for children and any insinuation otherwise is shameful and disgusting.”
Northam Communications Director Ofirah Yheskel said GOP critics were “trying to play politics with women’s health” — and sought to clarify her boss’ comments:
“No woman seeks a third trimester abortion except in the case of tragic or difficult circumstances, such as a nonviable pregnancy or in the event of severe fetal abnormalities, and the governor’s comments were limited to the actions physicians would take in the event that a woman in those circumstances went into labor. Attempts to extrapolate these comments otherwise is in bad faith and underscores exactly why the governor believes physicians and women, not legislators, should make these difficult and deeply personal medical decisions.”
Tran’s legislation would reduce the number of doctors who would have to certify late-term abortions are needed from three to one. It would also delete the requirement that doctors determine that continuing a pregnancy would “substantially and irremediably” impair a woman’s health. Instead doctors would only have to certify that the woman’s health was impaired.
Supporters said the changes in law would help reduce the bureaucratic burdens women face when dealing with difficult decisions involving late-term abortions, which often involve serious medical complications.
The effort in Virginia follows New York passing a bill last week loosening restrictions on abortion, as New Mexico, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Washington also pass new laws expanding abortion access or move to strip old laws from the books that limit abortions.
Fox News’ Adam Shaw and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/sasse-tells-virginia-gov-northam-to-get-the-hell-of-office-in-wake-of-abortion-comments
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(CNN)After a day of attacks from commentators on the right, the White House announced Wednesday night that it planned to nominate three judges for the California seats on the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals.
Source Article from https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/30/politics/9th-circuit-court-appeals-nominees-white-house-judges/index.html
A top spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., summed up the legislative achievements of the Republican-controlled 115th Congress as such: “The most accomplished Congress in decades.” McConnell declared that it was “the best … in my time in the Senate.”
The public, however, disagreed. According to a Gallup survey conducted immediately after the 2018 midterm elections, only 21 percent approved of Congress and 74 percent disapproved. The number of Americans who liked what “the most accomplished Congress in decades” was accomplishing hovered around 18 percent throughout 2017 and 2018. While Congress’s approval is usually low (31 percent of Americans have approved of the institution, on average, since Gallup first began tracking such sentiment in 1974), 18 percent is a lot lower than 31 percent.
This raises two questions. Was the 115th Congress really “the most accomplished” in decades given that so few people approved of its accomplishments? Was the Senate’s legislative record really the best it has been in more than 30 years, as McConnell claimed? A closer inspection of what senators did over the last two years suggests that the answer to both questions is “no.”
The Senate’s overall legislative productivity appears, at first, to affirm McConnell’s favorable assessment. The institution has actually been on a lawmaking streak, passing more bills in every two years since 2013. After approving only 364 bills in the 112th Congress (2011-2012), the Senate passed 378 in the 113th (2013-2014), 427 in the 114th (2015-2016), and 585 in the 115th. The Senate appears to have been especially productive in the 115th Congress. It passed more bills in 2017 and 2018 than it has in any two years going back to 2005-2006, when the 109th Congress passed 684 bills.
Yet, appearances can be deceiving. On closer inspection, the Senate’s recent record appears productive only when juxtaposed with the nadir hit by the institution in the 112th Congress. The total number of bills passed by the Senate in the 115th Congress is nevertheless quite low, remaining well below the 1,043 bills that it has passed, on average, going back to the 83rd Congress (1953-1954).
A review of the substantive content of the bills passed by the Senate during the “most accomplished Congress in decades” suggests that its limited productivity gains are based mostly on minor legislation.
For example, of the 585 bills that the Senate passed over the last two years, 106 renamed post offices or other federal buildings. One bill renamed a piece of legislation that was enacted into law in 2012 in honor of the late Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y. Twenty-five bills temporarily extended existing programs or delayed pending deadlines. On six occasions, senators made routine technical corrections to legislation that they previously had passed. The Senate also approved 33 bills that were commemorative in nature. Among these were such “historic” bills as the Smithsonian National Zoological Park Central Parking Facility Authorization Act (HR 4009; Public Law 115-178) and a bill to designate the Nordic Museum in Seattle, Wash., as the National Nordic Museum (S. 2857).
Looking at how the Senate passed legislation over the last two years is also helpful. It is a useful way to determine if a bill is significant, or otherwise considered controversial by senators, given that senators typically approve minor bills by voice vote and unanimous consent whereas they usually require a recorded vote to pass major bills. In the 115th Congress, a recorded vote was needed to pass legislation on only 52 occasions. On the 533 other times when the Senate passed legislation, a voice vote or unanimous consent was sufficient.
To be fair, today’s Senate may be more productive. However, its members have struggled to debate, much less pass, major legislation on a regular basis. Unlike the period before 2013, today’s senators neither deliberate nor legislate when it comes to significant issues of concern to the public like border security, immigration, and healthcare. This was on display throughout the government shutdown, when senators worked hard to avoid taking action in it. It was also on display during the early days of the 115th Congress when President Trump and Republican majorities in the House and Senate should have been especially productive. Instead, Republicans struggled to approve their agenda, mostly because of the Senate’s inability to function. Unlike their House colleagues, Republicans in the Senate failed to pass a single major bill during the first eleven months of the 115th Congress.
Far from being “the best,” today’s Senate looks more dysfunctional than ever.
James Wallner (@jiwallner) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a senior fellow at the R Street Institute. Previously, he was a Senate aide and a former group vice president for research at the Heritage Foundation.
Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/mitch-mcconnell-said-the-115th-congress-was-the-best-but-its-more-dysfunctional-than-ever
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As the adage goes, there are only two certainties in life: death and taxes. And if Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ new tax plan were to go into effect, death would trigger much higher taxes for the billionaire set.
Under Sanders’ new tax plan announced Thursday, billionaires would be subject to a 77 percent estate tax, which is the tax levied on the cash, property, real estate and other assets (“everything you own or have certain interests in,” according to the Internal Revenue Service) of a deceased person when it is transferred to another person. In 2018, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act put the estate tax at 40 percent after the first $11.18 million, according to the Internal Revenue Service.
“Our bill only applies to the richest 0.2% of Americans,” Sanders tweeted earlier on Thursday.
According to estimates made by Sanders’ office, here’s what the new bill would establish for the wealthiest five billionaires in the United States:
(For the calculations, Sanders’ office used the net worth list from Forbes, as of Monday, “and then applied our proposed rates” to determine what each billionaire would pay if the new tax plan were implemented, Sanders’ spokesperson Josh Miller-Lewis tells CNBC Make It. To determine a baseline of what each billionaire would have to pay in estate tax under current law, Sanders’ office applied the 40 percent estate tax rate on the Forbes net worth of the given person as of Monday.)
The proposed estate tax rates under Sanders’ new plan are tiered and impact the top 0.2 percent of Americans: from $3.5 million up to $10 million in assets owned upon time of death, the tax rate would be 45 percent; from $10 million to $50 million, the tax rate would be 50 percent; and from greater than $50 million to $1 billion, the tax rate would be 55 percent tax.
Changing the estate tax is not unheard of: Indeed, the estate tax has fluctuated from year to year for most of the last 20 years “creating uncertainty for taxpayers and their advisors,” the Joint Committee on Taxation says in a primer on the U.S. Federal Wealth Transfer Tax System published in 2015.
The Sanders’ tax plan could make $2.2 trillion from 588 billionaires in the United States, according to a written statement from Sanders’ office published Thursday. (The precise date as to when this $2.2 trillion could be reaped is “hard to say,” Miller-Lewis tells CNBC Make It, because it’s impossible to know when an estate tax will be levied since a person’s time of death is unknown.)
The goal, which is a common theme for the progressive Senator from Vermont, is to stem the tide of wealth inequality.
“At a time of massive wealth and income inequality, when the three richest Americans own more wealth than 160 million Americans, it is literally beyond belief that the Republican leadership wants to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the top 0.2 percent,” Sanders says in the written statement. “Our bill does what the American people want by substantially increasing the estate tax on the wealthiest families in this country and dramatically reducing wealth inequality. From a moral, economic, and political perspective our nation will not thrive when so few have so much and so many have so little.”
Indeed, Gates, Bezos and Buffett own more wealth than the bottom half of the American population combined, or 160 million people, according to November 2017 report published by the Institute for Policy Studies, a left-leaning think tank based in Washington, D.C.
Representatives for Buffett, Ellison, Zuckerberg, Gates and Bezos did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
However, Buffett addressed Republicans’ idea to eliminate the estate tax in an interview with Becky Quick on CNBC’s Squawk Box in October 2017.
“I don’t think I need a tax cut,” Buffett said. “[I]f they passed the bill that they’re talking about, I could leave $75 billion to a bunch of children and grandchildren and great grandchildren, and if I left it to 35 of them, they would each have a couple of billion dollars. They could put it out at 5 percent and have $100 million.
“Is that a great way to allocate resources in the United States?” Buffett continued. “That’s what you are doing through the tax code is you are affecting the allocation of resources.”
Still, some are fierce critics of the estate tax, even at current levels. “You work your whole life to build up a nest egg or a family-owned business or family farm. Then you pass away… Uncle Sam can swoop in and take over 40% of everything you’ve earned over a certain amount. It’s just wrong,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady said in August 2017, when the estate tax was being considered then, according to CNN.
See also:
Billionaire Warren Buffett: ‘I don’t need a tax cut’ in a society with so much inequality
Ocasio-Cortez’s 70% tax plan gets fierce response, but even Warren Buffett says rich should pay more
Billionaire Warren Buffett on helping the poor: ‘A rich family does not leave people behind’
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Source Article from https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/31/how-much-bezos-gates-buffet-could-pay-under-bernie-sanders-tax-plan.html
Frustrated Republicans say it’s time for the Senate to reclaim more power over foreign policy and are planning to move a measure Thursday that would be a stunning rebuke to a president of their own party.
GOP lawmakers are deeply concerned over President TrumpDonald John TrumpSchumer: Past time for Intel leaders to ‘stage an intervention’ with Trump Venezuelan opposition leader pens op-ed in NY Times urging unity Trump says he has not spoken to Whitaker about end of Mueller probe MORE’s reluctance to listen to his senior military and intelligence advisers, fearing it could erode national security. They say the Senate has lost too much of its constitutional power over shaping the nation’s foreign policy and argue that it’s time to begin clawing some of it back.
“Power over foreign policy has shifted to the executive branch over the last 30 years. Many of us in the Senate want to start taking it back,” said a Republican senator closely allied with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnellAddison (Mitch) Mitchell McConnellMcConnell blasts House bill that makes Election Day a federal holiday To end Washington corruption, officeholders and candidates must have a new way to finance their campaigns Mike Pompeo to speak at Missouri-Kansas Forum amid Senate bid speculation MORE (R-Ky.).
They plan to send Trump a stern admonishment by voting Thursday afternoon on an amendment sponsored by McConnell warning “the precipitous withdrawal” of U.S. forces from Syria and Afghanistan “could put at risk hard-won gains and United States national security.”
The resolution also expresses a sense of the Senate that the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and al Qaeda pose a “continuing threat to the homeland and our allies” and maintain an “ability to operate in Syria and Afghanistan.”
It’s a pointed rebuttal to the claim Trump made on Twitter in December that “we have defeated ISIS in Syria.”
Speaking on the Senate floor, McConnell said his amendment “simply re-emphasizes the expertise and counsel offered by experts who have served presidents of both parties,” a subtle rebuff of Trump’s tweets from earlier in the day mocking his intelligence advisers as “naive.”
Trump stunned Republican senators Wednesday by lashing out at Director of National Intelligence Dan CoatsDaniel (Dan) Ray CoatsSchumer: Past time for Intel leaders to ‘stage an intervention’ with Trump Hillicon Valley: Mueller alleges Russians used case files to discredit his probe | Trump blasts intel leaders | Facebook ends 2018 with record profits | Judge refuses request to unseal possible Assange charges Overnight Defense — Presented by Raytheon — Trump blasts intel officials as ‘passive and naive’ | Lawmakers reintroduce Yemen war powers resolution | Dems push Pentagon to redo climate report | VA proposes new rules for private health care MORE and CIA Director Gina Haspel after they contradicted some of his optimistic claims about the threats posed by North Korea and ISIS. The senior intelligence officials also angered Trump by testifying that Iran is in compliance with the nuclear treaty it signed with Western powers under the Obama administration.
Trump tweeted “the Intelligence people seem to be extremely passive and naive when it comes to the dangers of Iran. They are wrong!” The president added in a follow-up tweet about Iran: “Perhaps Intelligence should go back to school!” Trump appeared to be responding to television news coverage that focused on how the testimony contradicted his views on global threats.
Exasperated Republican lawmakers quickly pushed back against the criticism, urging the president to show more restraint.
“I don’t know how many times you can say this, but I would prefer that the president stay off Twitter, particularly with regard to these important national security issues where you’ve got people who are experts and have the background and are professionals,” said Senate Republican Whip John ThuneJohn Randolph ThuneSchumer: Past time for Intel leaders to ‘stage an intervention’ with Trump No GOP appetite for a second shutdown Senate Republicans reintroduce bill to repeal the estate tax MORE (S.D.). “In most cases I think he ought to, when it comes to their judgment, take it into consideration.”
Thune praised Coats, a former senator, as “an incredibly capable, principled guy” who “is very committed to doing the right thing for the country.” Thune predicted that most Republican senators will vote for the resolution urging Trump to exercise caution in assessing troop forces in Syria and Afghanistan.
“It reflects the widely held view in our conference — again — you want to trust our military leaders when it comes to some of these decisions,” he said.
He added that “a number of our members” talk to the president on a regular basis “and have articulated to him that they think that the policies that currently he wants to employ with regard to Syria, for example, are not the right ones.”
Sen. Mitt RomneyWillard (Mitt) Mitt RomneyHey team, loyalty means we don’t whine ‘Trump is a wimp’ Poll: Utah voters split down middle on Trump’s job performance Likely 2020 Dem contenders to face scrutiny over Wall Street ties MORE (R-Utah), who has emerged as a high-profile counterweight to the president on foreign policy issues, said, “I have full confidence in our intelligence community and its leadership. They are highly sophisticated and capable, and I take them at their word.”
“Precipitous withdrawal from Syria would put our allies at risk and be detrimental to our allies in the region,” he added.
Sen. Roy BluntRoy Dean BluntNo GOP appetite for a second shutdown The Memo: Divisions linger in Trump World over ‘emergency’ gambit Senate GOP plots to advance rule change for Trump picks by March MORE (R-Mo.), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said “this is an intel community that the president has largely put in place.”
“I have confidence in them, and I think he should, too,” he said.
Coats told the Intelligence Committee on Tuesday that U.S. analysts believe “North Korea will seek to retain” its ability to deploy weapons of mass destruction and “is unlikely to completely give up its nuclear weapons and productions capabilities because its leaders ultimately view nuclear weapons as critical to regime survival.”
The statement undercut Trump’s praise of a declaration made with North Korea last year pledging to normalize relations in exchange for the “denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
Coats also testified that U.S. intelligence does not believe that Iran is undertaking any “key activities” to produce a nuclear device. On the subject of ISIS, Coats warned that the group is planning a comeback and numbers thousands of fighters in Syria and Iraq.
Haspel warned that North Korea is committed to developing a long-range missile that could strike the United States and corroborated Coats’s testimony that Iran is still in compliance with the nuclear deal.
Trump and some of his supporters have long accused a so-called deep state of national security and intelligence officials of attempting to subvert his presidency. But one former White House official who worked on national security issues chalked up Trump’s reaction on Wednesday to his penchant to hit back at critics, no matter who they are.
“Trump is always going to respond to somebody who is going against him or who he thinks is trying to make him look bad,” the official said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re the intelligence community. It doesn’t matter if you’re the Agriculture secretary.”
Sen. John CornynJohn CornynOvernight Health Care — Presented by Kidney Care Partners — VA unveils proposal to expand private health care for veterans | House Dems launch probe of ‘skyrocketing’ insulin prices | Fight erupts over late-term abortion bill in Virginia Overnight Health Care — Presented by Kidney Care Partners — Grassley insists drug companies will testify on prices | Dems use hearing to hit GOP on pre-existing conditions | Bloomberg says ‘Medicare for all’ could bankrupt country GOP chairman: I’ll be ‘insistent’ on drug companies testifying on their prices MORE (R-Texas), another member of the Intelligence panel, praised Coats and Haspel as “great patriots” who “tell it like it is.”
“Sometimes facts are inconvenient,” Cornyn said.
“But they work for him,” he added, referring to Trump. “He ought to call them on the phone.”
Asked about Trump’s tweeted criticism, Cornyn said: “Just say no. No more Twitter.”
Trump has long disagreed with the intelligence community and the national security establishment on a long list of issues, especially engagement with Russia. That dynamic has caused resentments to fester.
“Whether there is merit to it or not, Trump views the Russia conversation as a direct threat to his legitimacy and he is very sensitive about it,” the former official said. “He’s not willing to give an inch on that.”
The hearings also struck a nerve among some of the president’s supporters, which amplified the issue on cable television.
Fred Fleitz, former chief of staff to national security adviser John Bolton, said Coats should be fired over his comments to Congress.
“I gotta tell you, I would let him go because of this and I’ve thought this for some time,” Fleitz said Tuesday in an interview with Fox Business Network’s Lou Dobbs, a Trump favorite. “I think Mr. Coats is a great guy, but intelligence is to inform presidential policy. It’s not supposed to undermine it. It’s not supposed to second-guess presidential policy.”
Fleitz also said the intelligence community should stop issuing an unclassified, public assessment of threats to the U.S. because it “undermines” Trump’s policies.
“This is crazy. This has to stop,” he said.
A turning point for many Republicans was Trump’s unexpected announcement on Dec. 19 that “we have won against ISIS” and he would order the withdrawal of 2,000 American troops from Syria. The next day, Secretary of Defense James MattisJames Norman MattisBudowsky: Dems can win a 2020 landslide Bipartisan House group introduces bills to stall Syria, South Korea troop withdrawals Trump pushes back on intel chiefs: ISIS ‘will soon be destroyed’ MORE announced his resignation, citing policy differences and his concern over the future of U.S. alliances.
Even before that, there was growing sentiment within the Senate GOP conference to constrain Trump’s power as commander in chief. Seven Republicans voted with Democrats on Dec. 13 for a resolution directing the president to withdraw U.S. forces from participating in the civil war in Yemen. It marked the first time the Senate successfully passed a resolution under the 1973 War Powers Act, which was enacted to constrain executive power at the end of the Vietnam War.
McConnell has tried to shift focus away from the differences between Trump and Republican senators on national security by highlighting divisions among Democrats over the resolution on Syria and Afghanistan.
“Democrats objected to a vote on this amendment, apparently because it would expose a rift among their membership. A division between those Senate Democrats who still subscribe to this vision for American leadership and their colleagues who have abandoned those principles at the urging of the far left — or are too afraid to take either position,” McConnell said on the Senate floor.
Democrats, however, were quick to pounce on Trump’s comments and draw a comparison to the president’s controversial joint press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin last year when he appeared to give equal weight to U.S. intelligence findings that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election and Putin’s categorical denial.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam SchiffAdam Bennett SchiffGOP announces members who will serve on House intel panel Schiff: Intel chiefs testimony may ‘undermine’ Trump’s ability to declare emergency for wall On The Money: Lawmakers look to end shutdowns for good | Dems press Mnuchin on Russia sanctions, debt limit | Trump budget delayed by shutdown MORE (D-Calif.) accused Trump of undercutting U.S. intelligence officials. “It gives a great opening to our adversaries who can discredit our intelligence agencies, who can say: ‘Well look, even the president of the United States doesn’t believe his intelligence agencies so why should we believe what the intelligence community says about Russia’s intervention in our election? Why should we believe what the intelligence community has to say about Iran’s compliance with the nuclear deal?’ ” he said Wednesday.
Source Article from https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/427773-gop-poised-to-rebuke-trump
CHICAGO — A bitter, biting cold landed on the Midwest, and then it stayed.
As the middle of the nation awoke on Thursday, the deep freeze seemed to have settled in for a long, unwanted visit, disrupting life across an entire region for much of a week, contributing to deaths and injuries, and leaving residents impatient to emerge from their homes and get back to normal.
The grim temperatures and gusty winds lingered in the Midwest, and had spread to the Northeast.
Here are the latest developments:
• Temperatures broke records in some places, and remained low, near record levels, in much of the Midwest on Thursday morning. Minneapolis was minus 23, with a wind chill of minus 38, the National Weather Service said. Chicago was at minus 21, with a wind chill of minus 41. And Milwaukee hit minus 21, with a wind chill of minus 40.
• At least eight deaths have been connected to the Midwest’s dangerously cold weather system, according to The Associated Press, including that of a University of Iowa student who was found behind an academic hall several hours before dawn on Wednesday.
• The sustained cold taxed energy systems across the Midwest, leading to some outages and urgent calls to customers to reduce the heat in their homes.
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/us/weather-polar-vortex.html
The University of Iowa student who died after being found outside on campus in subzero temperatures was “a momma’s boy with a tough exterior,” his dad said.
Gerald Belz, 18, was discovered unconscious Wednesday around 3 a.m. behind an academic hall — when the wind chill was about minus 51 degrees. The first-year pre-med student was rushed to a hospital, where he died.
“I want people to remember him as a compassionate person,” his dad, Michael Belz, told KCRG. “He had many more friends than I was aware of.”
Officials believe the teen died because of arctic temperatures that have been linked to at least nine other deaths as a polar vortex grips the Midwest. Doctors didn’t find any alcohol in his system, his family said, but the precise cause of death is not yet known.
The teen had been Snapchatting with his girlfriend late Tuesday and told her he was going to bed, his dad said, according to the Daily Iowan.
He’d graduated in May from Kennedy High School, where he played football.
The university canceled classes until Thursday amid the frigid weather.
With Post wires
Source Article from https://nypost.com/2019/01/31/student-who-died-in-polar-vortex-recalled-as-a-mommas-boy-with-a-tough-exterior/
Democrats offered to boost spending and flashed signs of flexibility as congressional talks began Wednesday aimed at resolving the standoff with President Donald Trump over border security. (Jan. 30)
AP
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump expressed skepticism Thursday that a congressional committee will agree to his demands for a border wall, raising the specters of another government shutdown or an “emergency declaration” sure to be challenged in court.
Tweeting that “Republicans on the Homeland Security Committee are wasting their time,” Trump said that “Democrats, despite all of the evidence, proof and Caravans coming, are not going to give money to build the DESPERATELY needed WALL.”
Trump did not specifically cite the prospects of another shutdown or an emergency declaration, but told Republicans “I’ve got you covered” because the “wall is already being built, I don’t expect much help!”
He did not elaborate.
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The tweet came shortly after Trump changed his terms of debate, now insisting he wants a “wall” on the border, not a “barrier” or “fence.”
“Lets just call them WALLS from now on and stop playing political games!,” he posted on Twitter. “A WALL is a WALL!”
After weeks of downplaying the stark image of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border – and saying it could be a less obtrusive “barrier” like a “steel slat fence” – Trump said Thursday he is returning to his original formulation.
The new approach popped up a day after the first meeting of a bipartisan committee of 17 lawmakers on a new border security plan, the key feature of last week’s agreement to reopen the government until Feb. 15 following a record-setting shutdown that lasted 35 days.
If the committee’s plan does not include wall funding to Trump’s liking, he can refuse to sign a new spending plan to keep the government open beyond Feb. 15. That would trigger another partial government shutdown.
Trump has also talked about declaring some sort of national emergency at the border, theoretically allowing him to use military funds for a wall. Democrats, however, have vowed to sue over such a declaration, saying Trump lacks the legal authority to take such a step.
Such a move would tie up the wall debate in court for months or years.
Trump and aides are also trying to develop a public relations plan to influence those congressional negotiations, including next week’s State of the Union, a Super Bowl Sunday television interview and possibly another trip to the U.S.-Mexico border.
But Trump’s message and terminology has been inconsistent throughout much of the debate. During the 2016 campaign, he reliably used the word “wall” to describe the barrier he wants on the Southwest border. More recently, he has taken to words like “barrier” or “steel slats.”
When Congress approved border security money that only allowed the administration to erect previously approved barrier designs, the White House embraced the term “bollard wall,” which is a reference to a structure that some have compared to a large, steel fence.
The president relied on a less specific terminology just last week when he announced the short term funding agreement to reopen the government. He said he had heard from members of Congress willing to make a deal on border security.
“They have said they are for complete border security, and they have finally and fully acknowledged that having barriers, fencing, or walls – or whatever you want to call it – will be an important part of the solution,” Trump said in the Rose Garden.
“We do not need 2,000 miles of concrete wall from sea to shining sea – we never did; we never proposed that; we never wanted that – because we have barriers at the border where natural structures are as good as anything that we can build,” Trump said. “They’re already there. They’ve been there for millions of years.”
Contributing: John Fritze
Source Article from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/01/31/donald-trump-border-wall-talks-congress/2729908002/
WASHINGTON — A White House security specialist has been suspended without pay for defying her supervisor Carl Kline, less than a week after NBC News reported Kline approved Jared Kushner for top secret clearance over the objections of career staff.
The specialist, Tricia Newbold, had filed a discrimination complaint against Kline three months ago.
Newbold’s two-week suspension from the White House security office was for failure to supervise, failure to follow instructions and defiance of authority, according to the suspension decision notice obtained by NBC News. Security office chief Crede Bailey first proposed the suspension on Dec. 3, 2018.
Wednesday’s notice is signed by Bailey and mentions that in Newbold’s 18-year career she has not faced any “prior formal disciplinary action.” The document also harshly criticizes Newbold for her “defiance” and notes that Newbold said she would “continue to do what is best for the Executive Office of the President.”
In the notice, the chief security officer denies that the suspension has anything to do with Newbold’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint.
Newbold’s lawyer, Ed Passman, considers her a whistleblower and said he believes the administrative charges were brought as payback for her decision to file the complaint against Kline.
“It’s clearly reprisal for her whistleblowing,” Passman said. “[It] has no basis in merit whatsoever.”
Newbold told NBC News, “I confidently feel that this is completely unwarranted and I am also confident that I have done nothing wrong, every decision I and my team have made have always been in the best interest of the United States,” she said. “There is no compromise of personal identifiable information or sensitive information.”
Asked about Newbold’s suspension, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said, “We don’t comment on personnel issues.”
Kline was the subject of an NBC News article last week that revealed he had approved Kushner’s top-secret clearance after it was rejected by two career White House security specialists. The pair had made the decision to deny Kushner the clearance after an FBI background check raised concerns about potential foreign influence on him, two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News.
In her EEOC complaint, Newbold, who has a rare form of dwarfism, accused Kline of discriminating against her because of her height.
Her complaint states that, in December 2017, Kline moved security files to a new location that were too high and out of her reach. “You have people, have them get you the files you need; or you can ask me,” he told Newbold, according to her complaint.
Two sources who did not want to be identified confirmed that Kline had moved files out of Newbold’s reach.
Source Article from https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/whistleblower-white-house-security-clearance-office-gets-suspended-n964826
Sen. Elizabeth Warren wasn’t the first major American politician to put the idea of a tax on large fortunes on the political agenda.
Indeed, it’s been kicking around in one form or another since the late 1990s, when an influential then-independent rolled out a proposal that he framed as a way to reduce the national debt while preserving the interests of the 99 percent.
Here’s how the plan’s architect described it: “By my calculations, 1 percent of Americans, who control 90 percent of the wealth in this country, would be affected by my plan. The other 99 percent of the people would get deep reductions in their federal income taxes.”
His name? Donald Trump.
Trump’s plan, as articulated during a 1999 flirtation with a Reform Party presidential bid, differed from Warren’s in three important respects.
One, he wanted the tax to be a one-time levy that would reduce the national debt and therefore reduce interest service payments. That reduction in payments would be the enduring win for the middle class, while rich people would just pay the tax once and then forget it. Warren’s plan would simply levy a smaller tax each year.
Two, he wanted a fairly hefty rate — 14.5 percent — that would have required a lot of rapid-fire liquidation of business assets. Warren’s rate structure is much lower than that.
Three, he set the threshold for his tax lower. While Warren wants to tax fortunes worth more than $50 million, Trump proposed taxing wealth starting at $10 million. This was in 1999, and there’s been some inflation since then, but even in inflation-adjusted dollars, the Trump tax cutoff is a bit below $15 million.
What’s more, Warren has a progressive rate structure: Assets worth between $50 million and $1 billion would be taxed at 2 percent, and assets above $1 billion taxed at 3 percent tax. Trump’s tax is flat but starts lower, so he soaks the kinda-sorta rich more relative to the super-duper rich. The plan didn’t really make a ton of sense, but it does underscore one reason that very wealthy people express a lot of anxiety about the national debt.
One major issue with wealth taxes historically has been that actually collecting the funds is relatively difficult — financial assets are highly portable, and the rich people who own them have a strong incentive to find ways to avoid paying.
Warren’s proposal contains a few ideas to try to curb avoidance — including the simple but important step of increasing IRS funding — though, of course, there are no guarantees.
Trump’s one-time wealth tax would suffer from all the same challenges as Warren’s, except that by setting the rate much higher while also making it a one-time tax, he created enormous avoidance incentives and never came up with a plan to deal with them.
Perhaps more importantly, the whole concept of dedicating a massive effort to reducing the federal debt overhang is somewhat dubious. Trump’s idea was that paying off the national debt would reduce federal interest rate costs, allowing for a middle-class tax cut. Instead, the debt volume has increased dramatically since 1999, but federal debt service payments as a share of GDP are actually lower than they were back then, since interest rates have fallen dramatically.
Relatively little of that debt accrual took the form of middle-class tax cuts — Bush’s regressive tax cuts, a couple of wars, a major recession, and a new round of regressive Trump tax cuts were the bigger player — but if we’d wanted to enact a big middle-class tax cut in 1999, we could have just done that, rather than fussing around with exotic taxes.
However, Trump’s thinking here does raise an important point. If the country continues to be nonchalant about the deficit, there is at least some chance that at some future point, debt service costs will spike unexpectedly. And if that does happen, some kind of quick soak-the-rich tax scheme would be an attractive means of reducing those costs. So if you happen to be a very wealthy person, it makes a lot of sense to worry about long-term debt accumulation (because if it goes badly, you are likely to be stuck with the bill) and to prefer instead that we slowly but surely reduce the deficit by cutting retirement programs.
The issue is rarely debated squarely in those terms, but Trump floated essentially what would be a reasonable approach to dealing with a debt crisis. And very rich people tend to want to avoid that outcome.
Source Article from https://www.vox.com/2019/1/31/18203999/donald-trump-wealth-tax-14-5-percent
The European Union has announced the setting up of a payment mechanism to secure trade with Iran and skirt US sanctions after Washington pulled out of the landmark nuclear deal last May.
The proposal of a financial instrument has been a key element in the EU’s strategy to keep Iran from quitting the 2015 nuclear agreement, which was signed to prevent Tehran from building nuclear weapons in exchange for sanctions relief.
The new institution, named INSTEX – Instrument In Support Of Trade Exchanges – will allow trade between the EU and Iran without relying on direct financial transactions. It is a project of the governments of France, Germany and Britain and will receive the formal endorsement of all 28 EU members.
The administration of US President Donald Trump has been closely eyeing European efforts to establish the financial mechanism and warned any attempt to evade its “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran would be subject to stiff penalties.
The mechanism is the first concrete step by the EU to counter Trump’s unilateral decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal.
Iran and EU announced the plan to set up a legal entity in September last year to circumvent US sanctions, which has largely succeeded in preventing European firms from investing in the country.
On Thursday, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs said the Special Purpose Vehicle will serve as the first step in the collection of commitments of Europeans towards Tehran.
“We hope they will be fully implemented and will not be incomplete,” Abbas Araqchi told the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Broadcasting (IRIB) Channel One on Thursday.
INSTEX will initially be used for non-sanctionable trade, including humanitarian goods such as medicine, food and medical devices. Some have questioned whether it will prove effective.
“If [the mechanism] will permanently be restricted to solely humanitarian trade, it will be apparent that Europe will have failed to live up to its end of the bargain for Iran,” political analyst Mohammad Ali Shabani told Al Jazeera.
Foad Izadi, a professor at the University of Tehran, offered a similar analysis.
“I don’t think the EU is either willing or able to stand up to Trump’s threat,“ he said. “The EU is not taking the nuclear deal seriously and it’s not taking any action to prove to Iran otherwise… People are running out of patience.”
Esfandyar Batmanghelidj, founder of a Europe-Iran business forum, however, said the role of new payment channel should not be undermined given the pivotal role that medicines play as a trade category between Europe and Iran.
In 2017, the export of drugs from Europe to Iran totalled $884m compared with $194m from China and $52m from India, according to UN data.
As Batmanghelidj pointed out, even if limited, the mechanism could eventually pave the way for further advancement.
“The value of it is to give the EU an opportunity to learn how to operate properly, and then create [a mechanism] for more strategic sectors. It could turn into a pilot that the US would find difficult to target with political legitimacy given its humanitarian focus,” said Batmanghelidj.
“What seems a limitation, could turn into a strength.”
Opportunity for EU
The launching of INSTEX is not only a matter of Iran-EU relations but also embodies a new approach by the bloc towards US policies, according to Batmanghelidj.
INSTEX “becomes an opportunity when it’s understood as an experiment and as part of a bigger project to strengthen EU economic power”, he said.
“What is relevant in this case is to see that the EU is doing something despite the position of the US, and in opposition to the US. This is something new.”
Witnessing the effect of US secondary sanctions on non-US firms, EU leaders are becoming more aware of the necessity to strengthen the eurozone, as German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated in her speech in Davos at the recent World Economic Forum.
“This [mechanism] is at most going to be a baby step towards international financial structures that would give the EU more independence,” said Henry Farrell, a professor of political science at George Washington University, in a social media post.
In the meantime, Iranians are waiting for their European partners to salvage the nuclear deal. But as Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, recently warned, the EU needs to step up “before it is too late”.
“We [Iran] will be losing trust and once the trust is lost, everybody will be a loser in the game,” Salehi said.
Source Article from https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/eu-launches-mechanism-bypass-sanctions-iran-190128084529234.html