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Homan: 166,000 immigrants have been released into the US

Former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan claims that DHS is underreporting border apprehensions

Two federal whistleblowers are alleging that Department of Health and Human Services instructed them to downplay a coronavirus outbreak amongst migrant children being housed at a facility in Fort Bliss, Texas, earlier this year, according to a complaint filed Wednesday.

The complaint, which was sent to four Congressional committees and government watchdogs, was filed by the nonprofit Government Accountability Project on behalf of Arthur Pearlstein and Lauren Reinhold – who they say are “career federal civil servants” and “whistleblowers” who “served as volunteer detailees at the Fort Bliss Emergency Intake Site from April through June 2021.”

“COVID was widespread among children and eventually spread to many employees. Hundreds of children contracted COVID in the overcrowded conditions,” the complaint says. “Adequate masks were not consistently provided to children, nor was their use consistently enforced.”

ABBOTT ORDERS TEXAS NATIONAL GUARD TO ASSIST WITH ARRESTS AT US-MEXICO BORDER

The complaint added that “regularly, when detailees reached the end of their term, a sheet was passed around with detailed instructions from the HHS Public Affairs Office on how, when asked, to make everything sound positive about the Fort Bliss experience and to play down anything negative.”

The complaint also said “every effort was made to downplay the degree of COVID infection at the site, and the size of the outbreak was deliberately kept under wraps.”

“At a ‘town hall’ meeting with detailees, a senior U.S. Public Health Service manager was asked and refused to say how many were infected because “if that graph [of infections] is going to The Washington Post every day, it’s the only thing we’ll be dealing with and politics will take over, perception will take over, and we’re about reality, not perception,’” it claimed.

The manager at the Fort Bliss site reportedly “also dismissed a detailee’s concern that the children in the COVID tents were wearing basic disposable masks instead of N95 masks.

“The manager said N95 masks were unnecessary for the infected – even though uninfected detailees were working with the infected children,” the complaint said.

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The Government Accountability Project says “Pearlstein was primarily assigned to work on two teams while at Fort Bliss: performing clinical assessments on the Clinical Assessment Team; and working with small groups and individual children on the Mental Health/Wellness team,” while Reinhold “worked in the girls’ tent for the first half of her detail; and, during the second half, was on the Call Center Team, and worked in all tents.”

Fox News has reached out to the Department of Health and Human Services for comment.

Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/us/fort-bliss-coronavirus-outbreak-whistleblower-complaint

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Twitter removes tweets by Russian Embassy in United Kingdom for denying ‘violent events’ in Ukraine – CNBC

In this article

TWTR

Twitter took down two tweets by Russia’s embassy in the United Kingdom on Thursday for what the social media giant called “the denial of violent events” during the ongoing Russian attack on Ukraine.

In one of those tweets, Russia’s embassy claimed that a pregnant woman seen in a photo of casualties at a children’s hospital in the besieged port city of Mariupol that was destroyed by a Russian airstrike Wednesday was actually a Ukraine “beauty blogger” and suggested that the photo was staged propaganda.

That tweet contained two separate photos of women the embassy claimed are the same person. Another tweet referencing the claim remained online Thursday after two of the other tweets were taken down by Twitter.

“This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules,” the link to that tweet later read.

At least one child and two adults were killed at the hospital, and another 17 were injured, Ukraine officials have said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in a tweet containing video showing damage at the hospital, wrote, “children are under the wreckage.”

A Twitter spokesperson told CNBC in an email, “We took enforcement action against the Tweets you referenced as they were in violation of the Twitter Rules, specifically our Hateful Conduct and Abusive Behavior policies related to the denial of violent events.”

CNBC has requested comment from the embassy, and from a spokesperson at Russia’s embassy in Washington.

The Russian Embassy in Geneva claimed in a tweet that remains online that the Mariupol hospital was attacked because it was being used as a headquarters by a Ukraine paramilitary group, which was firing on the Russian military while using “#HumanShields.” Russia’s U.K. embassy retweeted that post.

Earlier Thursday, the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said Russia’s invasion has killed at least 549 civilians in Ukraine, of whom 41 were children.

An additional 957 civilians have been injured since the attack began two weeks ago, the office said, while noting that the actual casualty total is believed to be “considerably higher.”

“Most of the civilian casualties recorded were caused by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including shelling from heavy artillery and multilaunch rocket systems, and missile and airstrikes,” that office said.

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Source Article from https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/10/twitter-removes-russian-uk-embassy-tweets-for-ukraine-denials.html

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President Trump expresses regret over trade war with China, then claims he was ‘misinterpreted’ – USA TODAY

President Trump’s ‘America First’ approach has relied on slapping tariffs on countries, such as China and Mexico, which have led to current trade wars. What is a tariff and how do they work? We explain.
Just the FAQs, USA TODAY

BIARRITZ, France — President Donald Trump signaled Sunday that he may be having regrets over his trade war with China, but the White House backtracked a few hours later and said he had been misunderstood.

At a breakfast meeting with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Trump said “yeah” when a reporter asked if he was having second thoughts about how the trade conflict with China has escalated.

“I have second thoughts about everything,” he said.

White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham later issued a statement seeking to clarify Trump’s comments and suggesting the only thing he regrets is not placing higher tariffs on Chinese goods.

“This morning in the (meeting) with the UK, the president was asked if he had ‘any second thought on escalating the trade war with China,'” Grisham said in a statement. “His answer has been greatly misinterpreted. President Trump responded in the affirmative — because he regrets not raising the tariffs higher.”

A transcript of Trump’s exchange with reporters shows that he was asked three times whether he had any regrets on the trade tensions with China. Each time, he indicated that he did.

Trump’s remarks, on the second day of the annual G-7 gathering of leaders of the world’s most industrialized countries, came just days after he ramped up the trade conflict by raising tariffs on $550 billion in Chinese goods.

Trump said Friday he would raise from 25% to 30% U.S. tariffs on $250 billion in Chinese products and would increase from 10% to 15% new tariffs on a remaining $300 billion in goods — some of which are set to take effect next month. The announcement came shortly after China said it would levy its own tariffs on U.S. imports, prompting a market sell-off.

Though Trump’s remarks on Sunday hinted at regrets, he said the escalating trade war with China is necessary because of what he considers Beijing’s unfair trade practices.

“What (China) has done is outrageous,” he said.

Trump said he has “no plans right now” to follow through on his threat to use a national security law to declare an emergency and force U.S. companies to leave China. But he insisted he has the authority to do so.

“If I want, I could declare a national emergency,” he said. But, “actually, we’re getting along very well with China right now. … So we’ll see what happens.”

Mon dieu!: Trump arrives at G7 summit in France amid tensions, threat of tariffs on French wines

French President Emmanuel Macron, right, and Brigitte Macron welcome U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump, left, at the Biarritz lighthouse, southwestern France, ahead of a working dinner Saturday, Aug. 24, 2019. Shadowed by the threat of global recession, a U.S. trade war with China and the possibility of one against Europe, the posturing by leaders of the G-7 rich democracies began well before they stood together for a summit photo. Andrew Harnik, AP

U.S President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron, second right, accompanied by first lady Melania Trump, left, and Brigitte Macron, right, greet each other at the G-7 summit before a dinner at the Lighthouse of Biarritz, France, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2019. Andrew Harnik, AP

A woman sits in the middle of a street in front of a mesh movable barrier installed by French gendarmes in Bayonne, south-west France on Aug. 24, 2019, ahead of expected protests on the sidelines of the annual G7 Summit attended by the leaders of the world’s seven richest democracies, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States. More than 9,000 anti-G7 protesters joined a mass march across the French-Spanish border as world leaders arrived for a summit in Biarritz just hours after activists clashed with police. Authorities remain on high alert, with Biarritz on lockdown and police deployed en masse in the neighboring town of Bayonne as well to keep protesters at bay. Gaizka Iroz, AFP/Getty Images

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife Akie Abe walk after disembarking from an airplane as they arrive at the Biarritz Pays Basque Airport in Biarritz, south-west France on Aug. 24, 2019, on the first day of the annual G7 Summit attended by the leaders of the world’s seven richest democracies, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States. Bertrand Guay, AFP/Getty Images

Last Slide Next Slide

Other G-7 leaders have raised concerns about the trade conflict between China and the U.S.

In what could be read as an effort to put some distance between the U.S. and the U.K. posture on global trade, Johnson told reporters on Saturday that he was concerned about the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China and suggested a “dialing down” of tensions.

“Just to register the faint, sheep-like note of our view on the trade war, we’re in favor of trade peace on the whole, and dialing it down if we can,” Johnson said at Sunday’s breakfast meeting with Trump.

The two leaders then parried gently on trade.

“On the whole, the UK has profited massively in the last 200 years from free trade, and that’s what we want to see,” Johnson said. “And so we’re keen to see —we don’t like tariffs on the whole.”

“How about the last three years?” Trump interjected, suggesting the approach the west has taken on trade has not been as prosperous recently.

“Don’t talk about the last three,” Trump joked. “Two-hundred, I agree with you.”

U.S.-China trade war: New, higher tariffs could raise the prices of these Chinese-made products

Source Article from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/08/25/president-donald-trump-trade-war-china-regrets-g-7-summit/2107246001/

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Humans Are Speeding Extinction and Altering the Natural World at an ‘Unprecedented’ Pace – The New York Times

“Human actions threaten more species with global extinction now than ever before,” the report concludes, estimating that “around 1 million species already face extinction, many within decades, unless action is taken.”

Unless nations step up their efforts to protect what natural habitats are left, they could witness the disappearance of 40 percent of amphibian species, one-third of marine mammals and one-third of reef-forming corals. More than 500,000 land species, the report said, do not have enough natural habitat left to ensure their long-term survival.

Over the past 50 years, global biodiversity loss has primarily been driven by activities like the clearing of forests for farmland, the expansion of roads and cities, logging, hunting, overfishing, water pollution and the transport of invasive species around the globe.

In Indonesia, the replacement of rain forest with palm oil plantations has ravaged the habitat of critically endangered orangutans and Sumatran tigers. In Mozambique, ivory poachers helped kill off nearly 7,000 elephants between 2009 and 2011 alone. In Argentina and Chile, the introduction of the North American beaver in the 1940s has devastated native trees (though it has also helped other species thrive, including the Magellanic woodpecker).

All told, three-quarters of the world’s land area has been significantly altered by people, the report found, and 85 percent of the world’s wetlands have vanished since the 18th century.

And with humans continuing to burn fossil fuels for energy, global warming is expected to compound the damage. Roughly 5 percent of species worldwide are threatened with climate-related extinction if global average temperatures rise 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, the report concluded. (The world has already warmed 1 degree.)

“If climate change were the only problem we were facing, a lot of species could probably move and adapt,” Richard Pearson, an ecologist at the University College of London, said. “But when populations are already small and losing genetic diversity, when natural landscapes are already fragmented, when plants and animals can’t move to find newly suitable habitats, then we have a real threat on our hands.”

Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/06/climate/biodiversity-extinction-united-nations.html

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‘Freedom Convoy’ protesters at Canada’s Ambassador Bridge to be arrested, police say – The Washington Post

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Surrey, British Columbia, southeast of Vancouver, said Saturday night that there was still “significant traffic congestion” on the main road leading to the Pacific Highway Border Crossing into Blaine, Wash. The crowd was “beginning to dissipate” but there were “still a number of individuals on foot,” the police said. An incident involving “a few vehicles” crossing police barricades and driving the wrong way down a street was under investigation, the police said, noting there were no injuries.

Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/13/canada-freedom-convoy-border-blockades-truckers/

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Dems, GOP lash out as stimulus package talks turn sour, $600 unemployment boost ends – USA TODAY

WASHINGTON – The discussions over another stimulus package turned testy Friday as Democrats and Republicans each blamed the other for their inability to come to an agreement just hours before a $600 weekly unemployment benefit for Americans officially ends.

In dueling press conferences, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows laid into Democrats for rejecting a short-term deal to continue the bolstered unemployment benefit for one week, while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi railed against Republicans and the Trump administration for attempting to take a piecemeal approach to helping Americans as COVID-19 cases continue to surge nationally.

“What we’re seeing is politics as usual from Democrats up on Capitol Hill,” Meadows said from the White House podium. “The Democrats believe that they have all the cards on their side, and they’re willing to play those cards at the expense of those that are hurting.”

Pelosi, D-Calif., criticized Republicans for waiting months before attempting to take up another emergency package, noting the surge of coronavirus cases and high unemployment rate.

“They do not understand the gravity of the situation,” she said of Republicans. “We don’t have shared values. That’s just the way it is.”

$1,200 checks? Money for schools?:Breaking down what Republicans and Democrats want in the coronavirus stimulus plan

She argued a deal to extend the unemployment benefit by one week would only be meaningful if a larger bill was nearly worked out, noting the time it would take for the measure to pass and for money to reach families. Pelosi also said the Senate, which has remained divided on unemployment, likely would not have the votes to approve a continuation of the $600 weekly benefit, which bolsters state benefits that average nationally about $370 a week.

Though the back-and-forth attacks signal a deal is still far off, both Meadows and Pelosi said they plan to meet again to continue talks.

Friday’s news conferences cap off a week filled with negotiations over another stimulus bill, talks that have all but stalled as Republicans are divided over what should be included in the measure and Democrats remain against a smaller bill to keep unemployment flowing for a short period.

On Thursday, Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin met with Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., for a lengthy meeting where both sides attempted once more to come to a deal before millions saw their unemployment benefits rolled back significantly.

Hong Kong election delay:White House ‘condemns’ election delay in Hong Kong after Trump raised idea of postponing US vote

Meadows said Democrats were given four separate offers throughout the day but rejected all of them.

“We’re going in the wrong direction. They’re going in the wrong direction because of partisan politics. It is very disappointing,” Meadows said. “It surprises me that when we talk about compassion and caring about those that truly are in need, that a temporary solution to make sure that unemployment, enhanced unemployment continues has been rejected not once but multiple times.”

House Democrats passed their version of the next stimulus package in May, a $3 trillion measure that would have extended the $600 boost in weekly unemployment compensation until at least January. The proposal has not been taken up by the Republican-held Senate.

Democrats, including Pelosi, have balked at taking up unemployment assistance as a separate measure, arguing Republicans should come to the table for a larger deal on a host of pressing policy items, including more funds for local and state governments. House Democrats’ bill included not only an extension of unemployment but also another round of $1,200 stimulus checks and increased funds for state and local governments.

Senate Republicans, meanwhile, have had trouble negotiating their demands as the conference remains divided on what the next stimulus package should include. Some even expressed doubt that another bill is needed. The divisions remained even after Republicans unveiled their own proposal this week that included $1,200 stimulus checks, funds for schools and small businesses, and a scaled-back unemployment benefits of $200 per week.

Many Republicans have spent weeks railing against the $600 unemployment benefit, which is paid to Americans in addition to state claims. They argue it should be changed or replaced with a back-to-work incentive in hopes of jump-starting the economy and getting shuttered businesses to rehire laid-off workers.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell started the process on Thursday for the Senate to take up a measure that could tackle unemployment, meaning boosted unemployment could be approved by the chamber early next week, though currently the House is not expected to approve such a proposal.

While unemployment benefits have remained a point of contention, both sides have butted heads over a number of proposals, including Republican demands that companies be shielded from coronavirus-related lawsuits and Democratic requirements that state and local governments be given more funds to offset their budgets after the pandemic.

Source Article from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/07/31/coronavirus-stimulus-trump-pelosi-cast-blame-unemployment-ends/5554365002/

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Wu and Essaibi George will advance as top candidates in historic race for Boston mayor – The Boston Globe

After puzzling delays by the city in posting the outcome, results showed Wu decisively in first place with 33.3 percent of the vote followed by Essaibi George at 22.4 percent. Massachusetts Secretary of State William F. Galvin said Wednesday the slow count was evidence of his determination — and that of Boston election officials — to ensure the integrity of Tuesday’s election.

Wu and Essaibi George hit the stump early Wednesday morning to underscore the differences in their visions for the city, even as results were still being tallied. Wu greeted commuters at the Forest Hills T stop in Jamaica Plain, while Essaibi George chose Mike’s City Diner, a South End eatery.

The candidates represent the two poles of the ideological spectrum in this year’s field. Either would be the first woman of color Boston has ever elected mayor, a historic shift. But the contest between them will nonetheless test the city’s appetite for change.

Essaibi George, 47, has inhabited the most moderate stance. She has courted the supporters of former Mayor Martin J. Walsh, who vacated his post to take a job in the Biden administration, setting up Tuesday night’s preliminary election. Walsh himself did not endorse in the preliminary but Essaibi George escorted his mother to the polls.

By contrast, Wu, 36, is a favorite among the city’s young progressives, and a protege of Senator Elizabeth Warren. She has called for free public transportation and a Green New Deal for Boston, sometimes facing criticism that her pitches are unrealistic. Consistently the leader of public polling in the weeks ahead of the election, Wu emerged as the top vote-getter Tuesday night.

“This election is about the future of our city,” Wu told reporters outside the T stop Wednesday. “And we need to tackle the big, bold challenges to move forward and ensure that we are transforming our systems, and not sit back and wait and just nibble around the edges of the status quo.”

She greeted commuters at the station too, wishing them a good day and thanking them for their votes.

”How did you do yesterday?” one passing transit employee joked.

”We did OK,” Wu said.

”Good, good, good! I’m glad for you!” He replied.

Some morning commuters applauded and congratulated Wu as they headed for their buses and trains. A mother with her preschooler in a stroller said, “We’re fans,” and Wu posed for a selfie with Cheronna Monroe, a transit customer service agent.

Wu continued to push her campaign message later Wednesday during a briefing outside City Hall, flanked by supporters.

Outside Mike’s City Diner, a cheerful Essaibi George expressed confidence Wednesday about her chances in November, despite returns showing that Wu won significantly more votes in the first round.

To many, the race is shaping up to be a test of how progressive the city has become. But Essaibi George dismissed as “lazy” the “labels” painting her as the moderate candidate and Wu as the progressive. She did, however, pitch herself as “a little more pragmatic than others.”

“We can say whatever we want about the challenges we face as a city, but unless it’s followed up with an action plan, with the work, and with the rolling up of the sleeves and doing it, it’s really not that bold,” she told reporters. “I think many of [Wu’s] plans unfortunately are very unrealistic. We have to make sure every day we are working towards the solutions to the challenges we face as a city. And that comes with not just bold ideas, but the action behind them.”

Gene Gorman, 50, a supporter from Dorchester said he has been friends with Essaibi George for decades, including when her husband coached his son in little league.

Essaibi George has the “boots on the ground mentality” necessary for leadership at the municipal level, while Wu’s ideas are broader and perhaps too lofty, he said. And the distinctions didn’t end there.

“She didn’t go to Harvard Law,” he said of Essaibi George, an apparent dig at Wu, who did. Essaibi George, he said, “came up in the school of hard knocks.”

Essaibi George also made stops Wednesday morning at a raising of the Honduran flag on City Hall plaza and at the epicenter of the city’s opioid crisis at the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard. Deteriorating conditions for residents there struggling with housing and addiction have become a campaign issue.

She said it was critical “to be here, to make sure this is a part of not just the conversation, but part of what we’re talking about solutions for.”

One bizarre wrinkle to the election night drama was that declarations of victory by Wu and Essaibi George, and defeat by their rivals, were made by the candidates themselves, rather than city officials, as part of a chaotic night in which election officials delayed posting any results hours after the polls closed.

Galvin said Wednesday that officials had expected to collect 3,000 mail-in and drop box ballots Tuesday, but ended up receiving 7,000 in total by 8 p.m.

Since then, Galvin said, city and state election officials have been cross referencing voting lists from polls with the mail-in and drop box ballots to make sure no one voted twice.

”I wanted to make sure the integrity of the election process was beyond reproach. Orderly can sometimes be slow, and it was, but that doesn’t mean it’s incorrect,’’ Galvin said. “I think what we are talking about here is accuracy — it’s important. There is no mystery here. I want every voter satisfied that if they cast their ballot yesterday it was counted. I want every candidate satisfied.”

At Mike’s Wednesday morning, Essaibi George acknowledged “it was a long night” waiting for Boston’s election results to roll in. But she praised city workers for continuing to tally every ballot and said it’s a crucial effort.

Tuesday saw disappointing turnout levels, with only about 100,000 voters, or roughly 25 percent of the electorate casting a ballot. The low level of interest in the race likely helped Essaibi George, who had built a solid base among voters who are most likely to cast a ballot in a preliminary election, according to a recent poll conducted by research group MassInc. Preliminary municipal election turnouts are typically lower than other races and attract only the most consistent voters.

Those conditions did little to help candidates Kim Janey and Andrea Campbell, who had been in a fierce competition for second place with Essaibi George leading to Tuesday, and were dependent on a high voter turnout, according to the recent poll. Wu had commanded the lead in that poll and other recent surveys. When the votes were tallied, Campbell ended up in third place, while Janey, the acting mayor, took fourth.

Janey’s loss comes after she made history in March as the first woman and person of color to occupy the mayor’s office, when she was appointed to the role in an acting capacity after Walsh decamped for Washington.

“Kim Janey over performed in communities of color, but Campbell’s attacks, the Globe endorsement, and a more traditional turnout hurt and gave [Essaibi George] an opening,” tweeted Doug Rubin, a veteran political consultant who worked on Janey’s campaign. “We were not able to counter effectively enough – for that I take responsibility.”

What comes now is an ultimate, historic showdown between Wu, a flag bearer of the politically progressive movement that has taken hold in Boston and reshaped its ideological identity, and Essaibi George, who has taken a more conservative lane to focus on quality of life issues, such as public safety and improving schools.

An aide for Essaibi George told the Globe that the campaign was already preparing for a final between the two candidates, and would define Wu as a big picture progressive whose focus on topics such as the environment and transportation were unrealistic and unrelated to the day-to-day duties as mayor.

Essaibi George had laid a groundwork of putting social workers in schools and focusing on education and public safety. Police unions are helping fund a superPAC that has already poured a half-million dollars into her campaign.

But Wu has ridden the very progressive moment that has led to an ideological shift in Boston, as voters identify as more liberal and progressive, according to recent polls. A city councilor since 2014, and the first woman of color elected council president, she has also built a platform of addressing housing inequities, and addressing racial and economic disparities.

Wu’s also popular among newer and younger voters, in a city that has seen its population grow by over 60,000 people over the last decade, according to a recent Globe poll.

The poll of 500 likely voters shows that what they care about most is education (20 percent), followed by housing (19 percent), racism and equity (17 percent) and the economy and jobs (14 percent).

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Danny McDonald, John Ellement, Milton Valencia, Stephanie Ebbert, Meghan Irons, Dugan Arnett, Joshua Miller, and Laura Crimaldi of the Globe staff, and Globe correspondent Julia Carlin contributed to this report.

Emma Platoff can be reached at emma.platoff@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @emmaplatoff. Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com or 617-929-1579. Follow her on Twitter @talanez. John R. Ellement can be reached at john.ellement@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @JREbosglobe. Travis Andersen can be reached at travis.andersen@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @TAGlobe.

Source Article from https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/09/15/metro/wu-essaibi-george-look-be-top-candidates-historic-race-boston-mayor-results-slowly-roll/

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Mounting legal threats surround Trump as nearly every organization he has led is under investigation – The Washington Post

December 15 at 1:43 PM

Two years after Donald Trump won the presidency, nearly every organization he has led in the past decade is under investigation.

Trump’s private company is contending with civil suits digging into its business with foreign governments and with looming state inquiries into its tax practices.

Trump’s 2016 campaign is under scrutiny by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, whose investigation into Russian interference has already led to guilty pleas by his campaign chairman and four advisers.

Trump’s inaugural committee has been probed by Mueller for illegal foreign donations, a topic that the incoming House Intelligence Committee chairman plans to further investigate next year.

Trump’s charity is locked in an ongoing suit with New York state, which has accused the foundation of “persistently illegal conduct.”

The mounting inquiries are building into a cascade of legal challenges that threaten to dominate Trump’s third year in the White House. In a few weeks, Democrats will take over in the House and pursue their own investigations into all of the above — and more.

President Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen exits federal court in Manhattan on Nov. 29. (Andrew Kelly/Reuters)

The ultimate consequences for Trump are still unclear. Past Justice Department opinions have held that a sitting president may not be charged with a federal crime.

House Democrats may eventually seek to impeach Trump. But, for now, removing him from office appears unlikely: It would require the support of two-thirds of the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans.

However, there has been one immediate impact on a president accustomed to dictating the country’s news cycles but who now struggles to keep up with them: Trump has been forced to spend his political capital — and that of his party — on his defense.

On Capitol Hill this week, weary Senate Republicans scrambled away from reporters to avoid questions about Trump and his longtime fixer Michael Cohen — and Cohen’s courtroom assertion that he had been covering up Trump’s “dirty deeds” when he paid off two women who claimed they had affairs with the president before he was elected.

“I don’t do any interviews on anything to do with Trump and that sort of thing, okay?” said Sen. James E. Risch (R-Idaho).

“There’s no question that it’s a distraction from the things that obviously we would like to see him spending his time on, and things we’d like to be spending our time on,” said Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.). “So that’s why I’m hoping that some of this stuff will wrap up soon and we’ll get answers, and we can draw conclusions, and we can move on from there.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), summed it up another way: “It’s been a bad week for Individual Number One,” referring to the legal code name prosecutors in Manhattan used in court filings to refer to the president.

Trump attorney Rudolph Giuliani did not respond to a request for comment. Neither did White House or Trump Organization officials.

As the bad news has rolled in, the president has cut back his public schedule. He spent more time than usual in his official residence this week, with more than two dozen hours of unstructured “executive time,” said a person familiar with his schedule.

In several tweets on Thursday, Trump sought to cast doubt on two former advisers who have cooperated with investigators. Cohen, Trump said, just wanted a reduced prison sentence. Former national security adviser Michael Flynn, he said, was the victim of scare tactics by the FBI.

Then — after wordy explanations of how both men had gone wrong — Trump tried to sum up his increasingly complex problems with a simple explanation.

“WITCH HUNT!” he wrote.

“He’s just never been targeted by an investigation like this,” said Timothy L. O’Brien, a reporter who wrote a biography of Trump, adding that the longtime real estate mogul had contended with extensive litigation in his business career, but never legal threats of this scale. “The kind of legal scrutiny they’re getting right now — and the potential consequences of that scrutiny — are unlike anything Donald Trump or his children have ever faced.”

Mueller’s investigation began in May 2017 after Trump fired FBI Director James B. Comey. The special counsel’s mandate: to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 campaign and whether the Kremlin worked with Trump associates. Mueller is also examining whether the president has sought to obstruct the Russia probe.

So far, Mueller has charged 33 people. That includes 26 Russian nationals — some of whom allegedly stole emails and other data from U.S. political parties, others of whom allegedly sought to influence public opinion via phony social media postings.

Several Trump aides have also pleaded guilty.

Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, was found guilty in August of tax and bank fraud charges and pleaded guilty in September to conspiracy and obstruction charges unrelated to his work for the campaign. He agreed to cooperate with Mueller’s investigation — though the special counsel’s office recently asserted he has been lying to investigators.

[Who’s been charged in Mueller-linked probes, and why]

Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser, admitted to lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador. Rick Gates, Trump’s former deputy campaign chairman, admitted to conspiracy and lying to the FBI. Former foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his Russian contacts. Cohen admitted to lying about efforts to build a Trump project in Moscow that lasted into Trump’s presidential run. All agreed to cooperate with investigators.

It’s unclear where Mueller’s inquiry is headed — and whether it will end with a spate of indictments reaching further into Trump’s world or with a written report submitted to the Justice Department.

Trump has repeatedly denied there was any “collusion” between his associates and Russia and has attacked the investigation as a fishing expedition led by politically biased prosecutors. Advisers said he has recently ramped up his attacks — hoping to undermine confidence in Mueller’s work — because he believes the probe is at a critical stage.

Separately, federal prosecutors in Manhattan have pursued another investigation that emerged out of the 2016 campaign: hush-money payments Cohen made to two women who said they’d had extramarital affairs with Trump.

Cohen, who was sentenced Wednesday to three years in prison for what a judge called a “veritable smorgasbord of criminal conduct,” pleaded guilty to campaign-finance violations in connection to the payments.

Cohen also named who told him to pay off the women: Trump.

“He was very concerned about how this would affect the election,” Cohen told ABC News in an interview that aired Friday.

Trump has denied he directed Cohen to break the law by buying the silence of former Playboy playmate Karen McDougal and adult-film star Stormy Daniels. He also said Cohen, as his lawyer, bore responsibility for any campaign finance violations.

“I never directed him to do anything wrong,” Trump told Fox News on Thursday. “Whatever he did, he did on his own.”

Prosecutors also revealed Wednesday they had struck a non-prosecution agreement with AMI, the company that produces the National Enquirer tabloid, for its role in the scheme.

The company admitted it had helped pay off one of Trump’s accusers during the campaign. It said it had done so in “cooperation, consultation, and concert with” one or more members of Trump’s campaign, according to court filings.

It is unclear whether prosecutors will pursue charges against campaign or Trump Organization officials as part of the case.

But at the White House, advisers have fretted that this case — and not Mueller’s — could be the biggest threat to Trump’s presidency. House Democrats have already indicated the campaign-finance allegations could be potential fodder for impeachment proceedings.

The nearly $107 million donated to Trump’s inaugural committee has drawn the attention of Mueller, who has probed whether illegal foreign contributions went to help put on the festivities.

The special counsel already referred one such case to federal prosecutors in Washington. In late August, an American political consultant, W. Samuel Patten, admitted steering $50,000 from a Ukrainian politician to the inaugural committee through a straw donor.

Patten pleaded guilty to failing to register as a foreign lobbyist and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

On Friday, Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), the incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said his panel plans to investigate possible “illicit foreign funding or involvement in the inauguration.”

[Schiff says House Intelligence panel will examine possible foreign funding of Trump’s inaugural committee]

The Wall Street Journal reported this week that federal prosecutors in New York are examining whether the inaugural committee misspent funds. The Washington Post has not independently confirmed that report.

Officials with the committee, which was chaired by Trump’s friend Tom Barrack, said they were in full compliance “with all applicable laws and disclosure obligations” and have not received any records requests from prosecutors.

White House spokesman Hogan Gidley told reporters this week that questions about the committee’s practices have “nothing to do with the president of the United States.”

Trump also faces a pair of civil lawsuits alleging he has violated the Constitution by doing business with foreign and state governments while in office.

Trump still owns his private company, though he says he’s given up day-to-day control to his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump. Since the 2016 election, Trump’s businesses have hosted parties for foreign embassies, hosted Malaysia’s prime minister and Maine’s governor, and rented more than 500 rooms to lobbyists paid by the Saudi government.

The lawsuits allege that such transactions violate a Constitutional ban on presidents taking emoluments, or payments, from foreign or state governments. One complaint was filed by congressional Democrats; the other by the Democratic attorneys general of Maryland and the District of Columbia.

“What we want to do is be able to tie the flow of money from foreign and domestic sovereigns into Donald Trump’s pocketbook,” said Karl A. Racine (D), the D.C. attorney general. He called the emoluments clauses “our country’s first corruption law.”

The plaintiffs are seeking to have Trump barred from doing business with governments. But the more immediate threat for Trump and his company is the legal discovery process, in which the plaintiffs are seeking documents detailing his foreign customers, how much they paid — and how much wound up in the president’s pocket.

So far, Trump — who is represented by the Justice Department and a private attorney — has failed to get the cases dismissed or block discovery.

Earlier this month, the two attorneys general sent Trump’s company a raft of subpoenas. They expect to get answers early next year.

In New York, where Trump’s business is based, incoming Attorney General Letitia James (D) is preparing to launch several investigations into aspects of his company.

“We will use every area of the law to investigate President Trump and his business transactions and that of his family as well,” James told NBC News.

She said she wanted to look into whether Trump had violated the emoluments clause by doing business with foreign governments in New York and examine allegations detailed by the New York Times that Trump’s company engaged in questionable tax practices for decades.

New York state’s tax agency has also said it is considering an investigation into the company’s tax practices.

Earlier this year, New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood filed suit against Trump and his three eldest children, alleging “persistently illegal conduct” at the Donald J. Trump Foundation, a case spurred by reporting by The Post in 2016.

Trump is accused of violating several state charity laws, including using his charity’s money to pay off legal settlements for his for-profit businesses. He used the foundation to buy a portrait of himself that was hung up at one of his resorts. Trump also allegedly allowed his presidential campaign to dictate the charity’s giving in 2016 — despite laws that bar charities from participating in campaigns.

The attorney general has asked for Trump to pay at least $2.8 million in penalties and restitution and that he be barred from running a charity in New York for 10 years.

Trump has called the suit politically motivated and “ridiculous.”

Last month, a New York state judge denied a request by Trump’s attorneys to throw out the suit.

Meanwhile, a defamation suit against Trump by former “Apprentice” contestant Summer Zervos has also quietly advanced through the New York courts.

A judge has allowed Zervos to seek discovery — including possibly deposing the president — as the two sides wait for a panel of New York appellate judges to rule on Trump’s latest move to block the lawsuit.

Trump has argued that, as a sitting president, he is immune from the claims in both the foundation and Zervos case. He maintains that the 1997 Supreme Court decision in Clinton v. Jones — which said that presidents do not have immunity from civil litigation — does not apply in state courts.

Alice Crites, Josh Dawsey, Jonathan O’Connell, Tom Hamburger, Michael Kranish, Carol D. Leonnig, Elise Viebeck and John Wagner contributed to this report.

Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mounting-legal-threats-surround-trump-as-nearly-every-organization-he-has-led-is-under-investigation/2018/12/15/4cfb4482-ffbb-11e8-862a-b6a6f3ce8199_story.html

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Kyle Rittenhouse claims he’s looking into legal action after acquittal – New York Post

Kyle Rittenhouse took jabs at “the left” and said he’s looking into legal action against people who he feels misrepresented his case.

Rittenhouse, recently acquitted on all charges in a racially-charged multiple homicide trial, stood by his stance that he was acting in self-defense when he killed two people and injured one other in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

The 18-year-old blamed the charges against him on “a mob mentality” during an interview with Tucker Carlson that aired Monday night.

“And apparently, a lot of people on the left, it’s criminal to want to protect your community,” Rittenhouse said.

The exonerated teen said he’s hoping to lead a quiet life as an Arizona State University student, even as he receives numerous threats and feels his life has been “extremely defamed” by the case.

Kyle Rittenhouse said he’s looking into legal action.

Fox News

Carlson asked if the shooter was confident the government would protect him, and Rittenhouse replied “I hope so, but we all know how the FBI works.”

Rittenhouse was 17-years-old when he went armed with a semiautomatic rifle to Kenosha on Aug. 25, 2020 amid anti-police brutality and anti-racism protests.

He has claimed he was protecting a local business when he shot a man who threatened him and tried to take his gun. He ran, but was pursued by other protesters and clashed with them, ultimately shooting two more people before running toward police.

Tucker Carlson asked if the shooter was confident the government would protect him.

Fox News

Rittenhouse said he plans to take legal action amid what he felt were media misrepresentations and people who called him a white supremacist.

“I have really good lawyers who are taking care of that right now,” Rittenhouse said. ”So, I’m hoping one day there will be some, there will be accountability for the actions that they did.”

Carlson replied, “You’re intent you’re not going to let that go?”

Kyle Rittenhouse sits for an interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

Courtesy of Fox News via AP

“Like I said, I have really good lawyers handling that,” Rittenhouse said.

Early in the interview, Rittenhouse described his version of events throughout the night and his experiences in a juvenile detention facility and jail as he awaited trial. He said even after his deadly confrontation and walking to police to tell them he had shot people, he didn’t expect the charges against him.

“I didn’t know I was gonna be arrested for defending myself because everything was on video,” he claimed. “But part of the reason I think I was arrested is because of the mob mentality. And they were like, ‘oh yeah we’re just gonna arrest him’ even though there was videos already out showing I was attacked and having to defend myself.”

Kyle Rittenhouse carries a weapon as he walks along Sheridan Road in Kenosha, Wis., during a night of unrest following the weekend police shooting of Jacob Blake, Aug. 25, 2020.

Adam Rogan/The Journal Times via AP

He described telling his parents about the confrontation, saying his mother “was in shock.”

“She wanted to go into hiding and I said no the right thing to do would be to turn myself in, I didn’t do anything wrong,” Rittenhouse said.

He blamed his original legal team, who he later dropped, for pushing a narrative that he was in an unorganized militia, a claim he denied.

Kyle Rittenhouse also told Tucker Carlson that he felt President Joe Biden had “defamed” him.

Fox News

“I’m not a racist person, I support the BLM movement,” Rittenhouse said. “I support peacefully demonstrating and I believe there needs to be changed. I believe there’s a lot of prosecutorial misconduct not just in my case but in other cases.

“It’s just amazing to see how much a prosecutor can take advantage of somebody,” he added. “Like if they did this to me, imagine what they could have done to a person of color who maybe doesn’t have the resources I do or is not widely publicized like my case.”

Rittenhouse also told Carlson that he felt President Joe Biden had “defamed” him when he tweeted out a video implying that he was a white supremacist.

Source Article from https://nypost.com/2021/11/22/kyle-rittenhouse-claims-hes-looking-into-legal-action/

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How Trump Got Trolled by a Couple of Fascists – Rolling Stone

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Nuevas protestas autonomistas en Ucrania – Página 12

Los manifestantes exigieron que el Parlamento local convocara a una sesión extraordinaria y ordenara la realización de un referendo, que decida la ruptura de la provincia con Ucrania y el ingreso a la Federación Rusa, como ocurrió en Crimea.

Los prorrusos amenazaron con disolver el actual gobierno provicial y elegir a nuevos diputados que representen a “todos los sectores políticos” de la región oriunda del destituido presidente Yanukovich.

Durante la movilización, los manifestantes se dirigieron a los edificio gubernamentales y, pese a estar protegidos por policías antimotines, lograron ingresar a algunas de las sedes, donde izaron la bandera rusa.

Por su parte, las autoridades provinciales no intentaron recuperar el control de los edificios por la fuerza y se limitaron a abrir una causa penal contra los manifestantes.

La moderación demostrada por las autoridades designadas por el nuevo gobierno interino en Kiev se puede explicar por el temor que aún existe de que Moscú utilice la represión o muerte de algún rusoparlante como excusa para intervenir en el este de Ucrania, una región que posee importantes comunidades de origen ruso.

El presidente Vladimir Putin repitió más de una vez que está dispuesto a utilizar “todos los medios necesarios” para defender a las comunidades de origen ruso en el este de Ucrania.

Source Article from http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/ultimas/20-243543-2014-04-06.html

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Rebeldes sirios activan ‘por error’ bomba al tomarse una selfie – Noticias MVS

Source Article from http://www.noticiasmvs.com/#!/noticias/rebeldes-sirios-activan-por-error-bomba-al-tomarse-una-selfie-298

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Birds at border prompt South Korea to launch jets, issue alert – AOL

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Ending a brief media frenzy, South Korea’s military said it turned out to be a flock of birds that prompted it to launch fighter jets and alert journalists that it had detected an unidentified object flying near the border with North Korea on Monday.

The South’s earlier announcement on the flying object left many media outlets scrambling, with the incident coming a day after U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met at a different portion of the heavily fortified Korean border.

South Korea’s military has been under fire for a possible security gap after a boat carrying four North Koreans arrived undetected recently at a South Korean port. Observers say the South’s military had likely released the inconclusive information about the flying object to media to avoid similar criticism of its surveillance posture.

The South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff had said earlier Monday that its radar found “the traces of flight by an unidentified object” over the central portion of the Demilitarized Zone, a de facto border between the two Koreas.

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South Korean media, citing unidentified military officials, quickly speculated that it was likely be a North Korean helicopter flying across the border into South Korea. But pilots of the several fighter jets deployed to the area later found that the object was a group of about 20 birds, a South Korean military official said, requesting anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak to reporters on the issue.

South Korea sent North Korea a message about its fighter jets’ launches to avoid unnecessary tensions, the official said.

The DMZ, which was created after fighting ended in the 1950-53 Korean War, is peppered with an estimated 2 million mines and guarded by combat troops, razor wire fences, anti-tank traps and guard posts on both sides. The two Koreas have occasionally traded exchanges of gunfire there, though animosities have eased since North Korea entered talks on its nuclear program.

Sunday’s meeting between Trump and Kim, their third, took place at the border village of Panmunjom, located inside the DMZ. Trump stepped across Panmunjom’s military demarcation line into North Korea with Kim, becoming the first sitting U.S. president to set foot in North Korea. He and Kim then turned back to Panmunjom’s southern part before sitting down for a meeting.

Earlier Monday, South Korea’s government said it hoped the diplomatic momentum created by the latest Trump-Kim meeting would help revive inter-Korean dialogue and engagement that stopped amid an impasse in nuclear negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang.

“Since it’s expected that the nuclear negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang would bounce back, the government will … strengthen its efforts to create a virtuous cycle between inter-Korean relations, denuclearization and North Korea-U.S. relations,” Lee Sang-min, spokesman for South Korea’s Unification Ministry, told reporters.

North Korea’s state media described Kim’s meeting with Trump as “an amazing event” and that both leaders expressed great satisfaction over the result of their talks

The latest Trump-Kim meeting may have created momentum for further diplomacy, including working-level talks aimed at hammering out the terms of a mutually acceptable deal. But experts say it remains unclear whether the negotiations would successfully address the fundamental differences between Washington and Pyongyang that were exposed in a previous summit in Hanoi in February.

North Korea significantly reduced diplomatic activity and exchanges with the South following that summit. North Korea conducted tests of short-range missiles that could potentially threaten the South and demanded that Seoul break away from Washington and resume inter-Korean economic projects held back by U.S.-led sanctions against the North.

Last month, South Korean Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo issued a public apology amid criticism that the country’s military failed to detect a North Korean fishing boat that crossed deep into South Korean waters, about 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of the maritime sea border, before reaching a port in Samcheok uninterrupted. South Korea sent two of the four North Korean fishermen aboard the boat back to the North, while the other two stayed in the South after expressing their desire to defect.

Some experts say the incident occurred because South Korea’s security posture has been weakened under the current liberal government of President Moon Jae-in, which seeks greater rapprochement with North Korea. But others note similar incidents, such as North Korean soldiers fleeing undetected to South Korea via the DMZ, had occasionally happened when South Korea was ruled by conservatives before Moon’s inauguration in 2017.

Source Article from https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/07/01/birds-at-border-prompt-s-korea-to-launch-jets-issue-alert/23760763/

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Illegal Border Crossings Soar to Record High, New Data Shows – The New York Times

Over the past year, there was a significant jump in the number of migrants — mostly families — from Brazil, which has been in the grips of the worst Covid crisis in South America. More migrants also arrived from Venezuela, Nicaragua and India, among many others.

Southern border apprehensions previously reached such high levels in the late 1990s, peaking in 2000, when many migrants who entered the country unlawfully were drawn to jobs in construction, food processing and restaurants.

As in the past year, most of those who entered were single adults from Mexico. Many of them tried more than once to sneak into the country, usually until they succeeded, because they did not face significant legal consequences, said Jessica Bolter, an analyst with the Migration Policy Institute. She added that there were “lots of incentives for migrants to try to cross over and over.”

When the Trump administration first invoked the current public health rule, known as Title 42, officials said it was needed to avoid the spread of the coronavirus in the United States. But it has had the unintended consequence of encouraging hundreds of thousands of desperate people to make repeated attempts to enter the country. Many of those subjected to the rule are expeditiously returned to Mexico, often by bus, only to try again a few days later.

Before the public health rule was put in place at the beginning of the pandemic, migrants caught entering the country without authorization could be criminally prosecuted and detained for months.

In September, about 25 percent of the arrests were of repeat crossers.

The high rate of recidivism suggests the majority of border crossers in recent years have been caught, which was not the case during previous peaks. The number of Border Patrol agents has increased substantially in the last decade, and technology like heat sensors, cameras and drones makes it difficult to evade capture.

“There were not nearly as many agents, they had little technology, and there were a lot of easy places to cross,” said Jeff Passel, a demographer at the nonpartisan Pew Research Center who studies the population of those who enter without authorization. “Data shows the Border Patrol now catch almost everybody who tries to cross illegally.”

Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/22/us/politics/border-crossings-immigration-record-high.html

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Rand Paul to insist name of alleged whistleblower Eric Ciaramella be read on Senate floor – Washington Examiner

Sen. Rand Paul will insist the name of the whistleblower be revealed during the question and answer phase of President Trump’s Senate impeachment trial.

“Senator Paul will insist on his question being asked during today’s trial,” tweeted Paul’s staffer, Sergio Gor. “Uncertain of what will occur on the Senate floor, but American people deserve to know how this all came about…”

The Kentucky Republican attempted to include the whistleblower’s name as part of a question he posed to the floor during Wednesday’s session, but Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts refused to allow the inquiry to be heard.

Paul, 57, has been a vocal advocate of naming the whistleblower, who he suggested is former CIA analyst Eric Ciaramella. “I think Eric Ciaramella needs to be pulled in for testimony,” said Paul during the House impeachment investigation.

The confirmed identity of the whistleblower remains a mystery as Trump faces trial in the Senate after the House of Representatives passed two articles of impeachment for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

Senator Paul will insist on his question being asked during today’s trial. Uncertain of what will occur on the Senate floor, but American people deserve to know how this all came about…

— Sergio Gor (@SergioGor)
January 30, 2020

Source Article from https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/rand-paul-will-insist-whistleblower-name-be-read-on-senate-floor

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Russian generals reportedly discuss using nuclear weapons in Ukraine; Russia rejoins grain deal: Live updates – USA TODAY

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