…

washington — The White House is weighing ways to provide temporary legal status and work permits to immigrants in the U.S. illegally who are married to American citizens, three sources familiar with the matter said on Monday, a move that could energize some Democrats ahead of the November elections.

Democratic lawmakers and advocacy groups have pressured President Joe Biden to take steps to protect immigrants in the country illegally as Biden simultaneously considers executive actions to reduce illegal border crossings.

Immigration has emerged as a top voter concern, especially among Republicans ahead of the Nov. 5 election pitting Biden, a Democrat, against his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump. Trump has said Biden’s less restrictive policies have led to a rise in illegal immigration.

The White House in recent months has considered the possibility of executive actions to block migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border if crossings reach a certain threshold, sparking criticism from some Democrats and advocates.

The Biden administration also has examined the possible use of “parole in place” for spouses of U.S. citizens, the sources said, requesting anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The temporary status would provide access to work permits and potentially a path to citizenship. No actions are imminent or finalized, the sources said.

A White House spokesperson said the administration “is constantly evaluating possible policy options” but declined to confirm discussions around specific actions.

“The administration remains committed to ensuring those who are eligible for relief can receive it quickly and to building an immigration system that is fairer and more humane,” the spokesperson said.

The Wall Street Journal first reported the possible moves.

An estimated 1.1 million immigrants in the U.S. illegally are married to U.S. citizens, according to data by advocacy organization FWD.us.

A group of 86 Democrats sent a letter to Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas last year urging them to protect spouses of U.S. citizens and create a family reunification process for those outside the country.

Speaking at an advocacy press conference in Washington on Monday, Philadelphia resident and U.S. citizen Allyson Batista said her Brazilian-born husband still lacks legal immigration status after 20 years of marriage.

Batista and her husband have three children together and run a construction company, she said, pleading with Biden to act.

“Year after year, we continue to live in trauma and fear of separation,” she said, “especially if an unfriendly administration takes over again.”
…

…

las vegas — A $12 billion high-speed passenger rail line between Las Vegas and the Los Angeles area has started construction, officials said Monday, amid predictions that millions of ticket-buyers will be boarding trains by 2028.

“People have been dreaming of high-speed rail in America for decades,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement released to coincide with a ceremony at the future site of a terminal to be built just south of the Las Vegas Strip.

Buttigieg predicted the project will bring “thousands of union jobs, new connections to better economic opportunity, less congestion on the roads, and less pollution in the air.”

Brightline West, whose sister company already operates a fast train between Miami and Orlando in Florida, aims to lay 351 kilometers of new track between Las Vegas and another new facility in Rancho Cucamonga, California. Almost the full distance is to be built in the median of Interstate 15, with a station stop in San Bernardino County’s Victorville area.

Brightline Holdings founder and Chairperson Wes Edens dubbed the moment “the foundation for a new industry.”

“This is a historic project and a proud moment,” Edens said in the statement. “Today is long overdue.”

Brightline aims to link other U.S. cities that are too near to each other for air travel to make sense and too far for people to drive the distance.

Company CEO Mike Reininger has said the goal is to have trains operating in time for the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028.

Brightline received $6.5 billion in backing from the Biden administration, including a $3 billion grant from federal infrastructure funds and approval to sell another $2.5 billion in tax-exempt bonds. The company won federal authorization in 2020 to sell $1 billion in similar bonds.

The project is touted as the first true high-speed passenger rail line in the nation, designed to reach speeds of 186 mph (300 kph), comparable to Japan’s Shinkansen bullet trains.

The route between Vegas and L.A. is largely open space, with no convenient alternate to I-15. Brightline’s Southern California terminal will be at a commuter rail connection to downtown Los Angeles.

The project outline says electric-powered trains will cut the four-hour trip across the Mojave Desert to a little more than two hours. Forecasts are for 11 million one-way passengers per year, or some 30,000 per day, with fares well below airline travel costs. The trains will offer restrooms, Wi-Fi, food and beverage sales and the option to check luggage.

Las Vegas is a popular driving destination for Southern Californians. Officials hope the train line will relieve congestion on I-15, where drivers often sit in miles of crawling traffic while returning home from a Las Vegas weekend.

The Las Vegas area, now approaching 3 million residents, draws more than 40 million visitors per year. Passenger traffic at the city’s Harry Reid International Airport set a record of 57.6 million people in 2023. An average of more than 44,000 automobiles per day crossed the California-Nevada state line on I-15 in 2023, according to Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority data.

Florida-based Brightline Holdings launched the Miami-to-Orlando line in 2018 with trains reaching speeds up to 125 mph (200 kph). It expanded service to Orlando International Airport last September. It offers 16 roundtrips per day, with one-way tickets for the 235-mile (378-kilometer) distance costing about $80.

Other fast trains in the U.S. include Amtrak’s Acela, which can top 241 kph while sharing tracks with freight and commuter service between Boston and Washington, D.C.

Passenger trains to Las Vegas ended in 1997, when Amtrak ended service.

Ideas for connecting other U.S. cities with high-speed passenger trains have been floated in recent years, including Dallas to Houston; Atlanta to Charlotte, North Carolina; and Chicago to St. Louis. Most have faced delays.

In California, voters in 2008 approved a proposed 805-kilometer rail line linking Los Angeles and San Francisco, but the plan has been beset by rising costs and routing disputes. A 2022 business plan by the California High-Speed Rail Authority projected the cost had more than tripled to $105 billion.
…

Pentagon — The United States may send additional military advisers to its embassy in Kyiv to advise and support the Ukrainian government and military, Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder told VOA Monday.

The troops would serve in a “non-combat” role, Ryder said.   

“Throughout this conflict, the DOD (Department of Defense) has reviewed and adjusted our presence in-country, as security conditions have evolved. Currently, we are considering sending several additional advisers to augment the Office of Defense Cooperation (ODC) at the embassy,” Ryder said in a statement.

Two U.S. defense officials, speaking to VOA on the condition of anonymity to discuss plans that were not finalized, said the number of advisers was “small” and could fluctuate slightly based on embassy requirements. A source familiar with the considerations said the number of troops was “fewer than two dozen.”

The troops could advise on missions ranging from logistics, maintenance, communications and sustainment, the defense officials added.

Per the Pentagon, the ODC performs a variety of advisory and support missions and is embedded within the U.S. Embassy under the chief of the mission.  

Politico was first to report the additional troop consideration.

The Pentagon’s latest troop discussion comes after the U.S. House of Representatives on Saturday passed a four-part, $95 billion foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, structured the bills so that they could be combined into one after each bill was approved, to prevent opposition to any one piece from derailing the entire deal. Johnson had declined to bring the aid packages to the floor for a vote for months. The Senate had passed a supplemental aid bill in February, as Ukraine said ammunition shortages were causing its forces to pull back in areas.

The newly-passed House legislation includes $61 billion for Kyiv’s ongoing war against Moscow’s invasion, as well as $26 billion for Israel and humanitarian aid for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza, and $8 billion for the Indo-Pacific region.

President Joe Biden in a statement Saturday urged the Senate to “quickly send this package to my desk so that I can sign it into law, and we can quickly send weapons and equipment to Ukraine to meet their urgent battlefield needs.”

He said the bills advanced U.S. national security interests and sends “a clear message about the power of American leadership on the world stage.”
…

…

…

…

new york — Mary J. Blige,Cher, Foreigner, A Tribe Called Quest, Kool & The Gang and Ozzy Osbourne have been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, a class that also includes folk-rockers Dave Matthews Band and singer-guitarist Peter Frampton.

Alexis Korner, John Mayall and Big Mama Thornton earned the Musical Influence Award, while the late Jimmy Buffett, MC5, Dionne Warwick and Norman Whitfield will get the Musical Excellence Award. Pioneering music executive Suzanne de Passe won the Ahmet Ertegun Award.

“Rock ‘n’ roll is an ever-evolving amalgam of sounds that impacts culture and moves generations,” John Sykes, chairman of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, said in a statement. “This diverse group of inductees each broke down musical barriers and influenced countless artists that followed in their footsteps.”

The induction ceremony will be held October 19 at the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in the city of Cleveland in the U.S. state of Ohio. It will stream live on Disney+ with an airing on ABC at a later date and available on Hulu the next day.

The music acts nominated this year but didn’t make the cut included Mariah Carey, Lenny Kravitz, the late Sinead O’Connor, soul-pop singer Sade, Britpoppers Oasis, hip-hop duo Eric B. & Rakim, and alt-rockers Jane’s Addiction.

There had been a starry push to get Foreigner — with the hits “Urgent” and Hot Blooded” — into the hall, with Mark Ronson, Jack Black, Slash, Dave Grohl and Paul McCartney all publicly backing the move. Ronson’s stepfather is Mick Jones, Foreigner’s founding member, songwriter and lead guitarist.

Osbourne, who led many parents in the 1980s to clutch their pearls with his devil imagery and sludgy music, goes in as a solo artist, having already been inducted into the hall with metal masters Black Sabbath.

Four of the eight nominees — Cher, Foreigner, Frampton and Kool & the Gang — were on the ballot for the first time.

Cher — the only artist to have a Number 1 song in each of the past six decades — and Blige, with eight multi-platinum albums and nine Grammy Awards, will help boost the number of women in the hall, which critics say is too low.

Artists must have released their first commercial recording at least 25 years before they’re eligible for induction.

Nominees were voted on by more than 1,000 artists, historians and music industry professionals. Fans voted online or in person at the museum, with the top five artists picked by the public making up a “fans’ ballot” that was tallied with the other professional ballots.

Last year, Missy Elliott, Willie Nelson, Sheryl Crow, Chaka Khan, “Soul Train” creator Don Cornelius, Kate Bush, and the late George Michael were some of the artists who got into the hall.
…

…

los angeles, california — Terry Anderson, the globe-trotting Associated Press correspondent who became one of America’s longest-held hostages after he was snatched from a street in war-torn Lebanon in 1985 and held for nearly seven years, has died at 76.

Anderson, who chronicled his abduction and torturous imprisonment by Islamic militants in his best-selling 1993 memoir “Den of Lions,” died Sunday at his home in Greenwood Lake, New York, said his daughter, Sulome Anderson.

The cause of death was unknown, though his daughter said Anderson recently had heart surgery.

“He never liked to be called a hero, but that’s what everyone persisted in calling him,” said Sulome Anderson. “I saw him a week ago and my partner asked him if he had anything on his bucket list, anything that he wanted to do. He said, ‘I’ve lived so much, and I’ve done so much. I’m content.'”

After returning to the United States in 1991, Anderson led a peripatetic life, giving public speeches, teaching journalism at several prominent universities and, at various times, operating a blues bar, Cajun restaurant, horse ranch and gourmet restaurant.

He also struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder, won millions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets after a federal court concluded that country played a role in his capture, then lost most of it to bad investments. He filed for bankruptcy in 2009.

Upon retiring from the University of Florida in 2015, Anderson settled on a small horse farm in a quiet, rural section of northern Virginia he had discovered while camping with friends.

“I live in the country and it’s reasonably good weather and quiet out here and a nice place, so I’m doing all right,” he said with a chuckle during a 2018 interview with The Associated Press.

In 1985 he became one of several Westerners abducted by members of the Shiite Muslim group Hezbollah during a time of war that had plunged Lebanon into chaos.

After his release, he returned to a hero’s welcome at AP’s New York headquarters.

As the AP’s chief Middle East correspondent, Anderson had been reporting for several years on the rising violence gripping Lebanon as the country fought a war with Israel, while Iran funded militant groups trying to topple its government.

Chained to wall, threatened with death

On March 16, 1985, a day off, he had taken a break to play tennis with former AP photographer Don Mell and was dropping Mell off at his home when gun-toting kidnappers dragged him from his car.

He was likely targeted, he said, because he was one of the few Westerners still in Lebanon and because his role as a journalist aroused suspicion among members of Hezbollah.

“Because in their terms, people who go around asking questions in awkward and dangerous places have to be spies,” he told the Virginia newspaper Orange County Review in 2018.

What followed was nearly seven years of brutality during which he was beaten, chained to a wall, threatened with death, often had guns held to his head and often was kept in solitary confinement.

Anderson was the longest held of several Western hostages Hezbollah abducted over the years, including Terry Waite, the former envoy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who had arrived to try to negotiate his release.

By his and other hostages’ accounts, he was also their most hostile prisoner, constantly demanding better food and treatment, arguing religion and politics with his captors, and teaching other hostages sign language and where to hide messages so they could communicate privately.

He managed to retain a quick wit and biting sense of humor during his long ordeal. On his last day in Beirut, he called the leader of his kidnappers into his room to tell him he’d just heard an erroneous radio report saying he’d been freed and was in Syria.

“I said, ‘Mahmound, listen to this, I’m not here. I’m gone, babes. I’m on my way to Damascus.’ And we both laughed,” he told Giovanna DellOrto, author of “AP Foreign Correspondents in Action: World War II to the Present.”

He learned later his release was delayed when a third party who his kidnappers planned to turn him over to left for a tryst with the party’s mistress and they had to find someone else.

Trauma lasted for years

Anderson’s humor often hid the PTSD he acknowledged suffering for years afterward.

“The AP got a couple of British experts in hostage decompression, clinical psychiatrists, to counsel my wife and myself and they were very useful,” he said in 2018. “But one of the problems I had was I did not recognize sufficiently the damage that had been done.

“So, when people ask me, you know, ‘Are you over it?’ Well, I don’t know. No, not really. It’s there. I don’t think about it much these days, it’s not central to my life. But it’s there.”

At the time of his abduction, Anderson was engaged to be married and his future wife was six months pregnant with their daughter, Sulome.

The couple married soon after his release but divorced a few years later, and although they remained on friendly terms Anderson and his daughter were estranged for years.

“I love my dad very much. My dad has always loved me. I just didn’t know that because he wasn’t able to show it to me,” Sulome Anderson told the AP in 2017.

Father and daughter reconciled after the publication of her critically acclaimed 2017 book, “The Hostage’s Daughter,” in which she told of traveling to Lebanon to confront and eventually forgive one of her father’s kidnappers.

“I think she did some extraordinary things, went on a very difficult personal journey, but also accomplished a pretty important piece of journalism doing it,” Anderson said. “She’s now a better journalist than I ever was.”

Chose Marines over Michigan

Terry Alan Anderson was born Oct. 27, 1947. He spent his early childhood years in the small Lake Erie town of Vermilion, Ohio, where his father was a police officer.

After graduating from high school, he turned down a scholarship to the University of Michigan in favor of enlisting in the Marines, where he rose to the rank of staff sergeant while seeing combat during the Vietnam War.

After returning home, he enrolled at Iowa State University where he graduated with a double major in journalism and political science and soon after went to work for the AP. He reported from Kentucky, Japan and South Africa before arriving in Lebanon in 1982, just as the country was descending into chaos.

“Actually, it was the most fascinating job I’ve ever had in my life,” he told the Orange County Review. “It was intense. War’s going on — it was very dangerous in Beirut. Vicious civil war, and I lasted about three years before I got kidnapped.”

Anderson was married and divorced three times. In addition to his daughter, he is survived by another daughter, Gabrielle Anderson, from his first marriage.
…

…

New York — “Civil War,” Alex Garland’s ominous American dystopia, remained the top film in theaters in its second week of release, according to studio estimates Sunday.

The A24 election-year gamble, the indie studio’s biggest budgeted film yet, took in $11.1 million in ticket sales at 3,929 theaters over the weekend. The $50 million film, set in a near-future U.S. in which Texas and California have joined in rebellion against a fascist president, has grossed $44.9 million in two weeks.

Its provocative premise — and A24’s marketing, which included images of U.S. cities ravaged by war — helped keep “Civil War” top of mind for moviegoers.

But it was a painfully slow weekend in theaters — the kind sure to add to concern over what’s thus far been a down year for Hollywood at the box office.

Going into the weekend, Universal Pictures’ “Abigail,” a critically acclaimed R-rated horror film about the daughter of Dracula, had been expected to lead ticket sales. It came in second with $10.2 million in 3,384 theaters.

That was still a fair result for a film that cost a modest $28 million to make. “Abigail,” which remakes the 1936 monster film “Dracula’s Daughter,” is about a 12-year-old girl taken by kidnappers who soon realize they’ve made a poor choice of hostage. It’s directed by the duo Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett whose production company goes by the name Radio Silence.

More concerning was the overall tepid response for a handful of new wide releases — and the likelihood that there will be more similar weekends throughout 2024. Last year’s actors and writers’ strikes, which had a prolonged effect on the movie pipeline, exacerbated holes in Hollywood’s release schedule.

Horror films, in recent years among the most reliable cash cows in theaters, also haven’t thus far been doing the automatic business they previously did. According to David A. Gross, who runs the consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research, horror releases accounted for $2 billion in worldwide sales in 2023.

Guy Ritchie’s “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare” debuted with $9 million in 2,845 theaters. In the based-on-a-true-story Lionsgate release, which reportedly cost $60 million to produce, Henry Cavill leads a World War II mission off the coast of West Africa.

Though Ritchie has been behind numerous box-office hits, including the live-action “Aladdin” and a pair of Sherlock Holmes films, his recent movies have struggled to find big audiences. The Lionsgate spy comedy “Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre” grossed $48 million against a $50 million budget, while MGM’s “The Covenant,” also released last year, made $21 million while costing $55 million to make.

A bright sign for “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare” — audiences liked it. The film earned an A-minus CinemaScore.

The anime “Spy x Family Code: White,” from Sony’s Crunchyroll, also struggled to stand out with audiences. Though the adaptation of the Tatsuya Endo manga TV series “Spy x Family” has already been a hit with international moviegoers, it debuted below expectations with $4.9 million in 2,009 U.S. theaters.

The mightiest film globally, though, continues to be “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire.” The Warner Bros. monster movie has for the past month led worldwide ticket sales. It added another $9.5 million domestically and $21.6 million internationally to bring its four-week global total to $485.2 million.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Civil War,” $11.1 million.

2. “Abigail,” $10.2 million.

3. “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire,” $9.5 million.

4. “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare,” $9 million.

5. “Spy x Family Code: White,” $4.9 million.

6. “Kung Fu Panda 4,” $4.6 million.

7. “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire,” $4.4 million.

8. “Dune: Part Two,” $2.9 million.

9. “Monkey Man,” $2.2 million.

10. “The First Omen,” $1.7 million.
    …

…

HONOLULU — A single mother of two, Amy Chadwick spent years scrimping and saving to buy a house in the town of Lahaina on the Hawaiian island of Maui. But after a devastating fire leveled Lahaina in August and reduced Chadwick’s home to white dust, the cheapest rental she could find for her family and dogs cost $10,000 a month.

Chadwick, a fine-dining server, moved to Florida where she could stretch her homeowners insurance dollars. She’s worried Maui’s exorbitant rental prices, driven in part by vacation rentals that hog a limited housing supply, will hollow out her tight-knit town.

Most people in Lahaina work for hotels, restaurants and tour companies and can’t afford $5,000 to $10,000 a month in rent, she said.

“You’re pushing out an entire community of service industry people. So no one’s going to be able to support the tourism that you’re putting ahead of your community,” Chadwick said by phone from her new home in Satellite Beach on Florida’s Space Coast. “Nothing good is going to come of it unless they take a serious stance, putting their foot down and really regulating these short-term rentals.”

The August 8 wildfire killed 101 people and destroyed housing for 6,200 families, amplifying Maui’s already acute housing shortage and laying bare the enormous presence of vacation rentals in Lahaina. It reminded lawmakers that short-term rentals are an issue across Hawaii, prompting them to consider bills that would give counties the authority to phase them out.

Gov. Josh Green got so frustrated he blurted an expletive during a recent news conference.

“This fire uncovered a clear truth, which is we have too many short-term rentals owned by too many individuals on the mainland and it is b———t,” Green said. “And our people deserve housing, here.”

Vacation rentals are a popular alternative to hotels for those seeking kitchens, lower costs and opportunities to sample everyday island life. Supporters say they boost tourism, the state’s biggest employer. Critics revile them for inflating housing costs, upending neighborhoods and contributing to the forces pushing locals and Native Hawaiians to leave Hawaii for less expensive states.

This migration has become a major concern in Lahaina. The Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement, a nonprofit, estimates at least 1,500 households — or a quarter of those who lost their homes — have left since the August wildfire.

The blaze burned single family homes and apartments in and around downtown, which is the core of Lahaina’s residential housing. An analysis by the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization found a relatively low 7.5% of units there were vacation rentals as of February 2023.

Lahaina neighborhoods spared by the fire have a much higher ratio of vacation rentals: About half the housing in Napili, about 11 kilometers north of the burn zone, is short-term rentals.

Napili is where Chadwick thought she found a place to buy when she first went house hunting in 2016. But a Canadian woman secured it with a cash offer and turned it into a vacation rental.

Also outside the burn zone are dozens of short-term rental condominium buildings erected decades ago on land zoned for apartments.

In 1992, Maui County explicitly allowed owners in these buildings to rent units for less than 180 days at a time even without short-term rental permits. Since November, activists have occupied the beach in front of Lahaina’s biggest hotels to push the mayor or governor to use their emergency powers to revoke this exemption.

Money is a powerful incentive for owners to rent to travelers: a 2016 report prepared for the state found a Honolulu vacation rental generates 3.5 times the revenue of a long-term rental.

State Rep. Luke Evslin, the Housing Committee chair, said Maui and Kauai counties have suffered net losses of residential housing in recent years thanks to a paucity of new construction and the conversion of so many homes to short-term rentals.

“Every alarm bell we have should be ringing when we’re literally going backwards in our goal to provide more housing in Hawaii,” he said.

In his own Kauai district, Evslin sees people leaving, becoming homeless or working three jobs to stay afloat.

The Democrat was one of 47 House members who co-sponsored one version of legislation that would allow short-term rentals to be phased out. One objective is to give counties more power after a U.S. judge in 2022 ruled Honolulu violated state law when it attempted to prohibit rentals for less than 90 days. Evslin said that decision left Hawaii’s counties with limited tools, such as property taxes, to control vacation rentals.

Lawmakers also considered trying to boost Hawaii’s housing supply by forcing counties to allow more houses to be built on individual lots. But they watered down the measure after local officials said they were already exploring the idea.

Short-term rental owners said a phase-out would violate their property rights and take their property without compensation, potentially pushing them into foreclosure. Some predicted legal challenges.

Alicia Humiston, president of the Rentals by Owner Awareness Association, said some areas in West Maui were designed for travelers and therefore lack schools and other infrastructure families need.

“This area in West Maui that is sort of like this resort apartment zone — that’s all north of Lahaina — it was never built to be local living,” Humiston said.

One housing advocate argues that just because a community allowed vacation rentals decades ago doesn’t mean it still needs to now.

“We are not living in the 1990s or in the 1970s,” said Sterling Higa, executive director of Housing Hawaii’s Future. Counties “should have the authority to look at existing laws and reform them as necessary to provide for the public good.”

Courtney Lazo, a real estate agent who is part of Lahaina Strong, the group occupying Kaanapali Beach, said tourists can stay in her hometown now but many locals can’t.

“How do you expect a community to recover and heal and move forward when the people who make Lahaina, Lahaina, aren’t even there anymore?” she said at a recent news conference as her voice quivered. “They’re moving away.”
…

…

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Taiwan’s defense ministry said Sunday it will discuss with the United States how to use funding for the island included in a $95 billion legislative package mostly providing security assistance to Ukraine and Israel. 

The United States is Taiwan’s most important international supporter and arms supplier despite the absence of formal diplomatic ties. 

Democratically governed Taiwan has faced increased military pressure from China, which views the island as its own territory. Taiwan’s government rejects those claims. 

The defense ministry expressed thanks to the U.S. House of Representatives for passing the package on Saturday, saying it demonstrated the “rock solid” U.S. support for Taiwan. 

The ministry added it “will coordinate the relevant budget uses with the United States through existing exchange mechanisms and work hard to strengthen combat readiness capabilities to ensure national security and peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.” 

Taiwan has since 2022 complained of delays in deliveries of U.S. weapons such as Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, as manufacturers focused on supplying Ukraine to help the country battle invading Russian forces. 

Underscoring the pressure Taiwan faces from China, the ministry said Sunday morning that during the previous 24 hours 14 Chinese military aircraft had crossed the sensitive median line of the Taiwan Strait. 

The median line once served as an unofficial border between the two sides, which neither military crossed. But China’s air force now regularly sends aircraft over it. China says it does not recognize the line’s existence. 

On Saturday, Taiwan’s defense ministry said China had again carried out “joint combat readiness patrols” with Chinese warships and warplanes around Taiwan. 

China’s defense ministry did not answer calls seeking comment outside of office hours Sunday. 

The island’s armed forces are dwarfed by those of China’s, especially the navy and air force. 
…

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon could get weapons moving to Ukraine within days once Congress passes a long-delayed aid bill. That’s because it has a network of storage sites in the U.S. and Europe that hold the ammunition and air defense components that Kyiv desperately needs.

Moving fast is critical, CIA Director Bill Burns said this past week, warning that without additional aid from the U.S., Ukraine could lose the war to Russia by the end of this year.

“We would like very much to be able to rush the security assistance in the volumes we think they need to be able to be successful,” Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said.

The House approved $61 billion in funding for the war-torn country Saturday. It still needs to clear the Senate and President Joe Biden’s signature.

Once that happens, “we have a very robust logistics network that enables us to move material very quickly,” Ryder told reporters this past week. “We can move within days.”

Ready to go

The Pentagon has had supplies ready to go for months but hasn’t moved them because it is out of money. It has spent the funding Congress previously provided to support Ukraine, sending more than $44 billion worth of weapons, maintenance, training and spare parts since Russia’s February 2022 invasion.

By December, the Pentagon was $10 billion in the hole, because it is going to cost more now to replace the systems it sent to the battlefield in Ukraine.

As a result, the Pentagon’s frequent aid packages for Ukraine dried up because there had been no guarantee that Congress would pass the additional funding needed to replenish the weapons the U.S. has been sending to Ukraine.

The lag in weapons deliveries has forced Ukrainian troops to spend months rationing their dwindling supply of munitions.

How US can quickly move weapons

When an aid package for Ukraine is announced, the weapons are either provided through presidential drawdown authority, which allows the military to immediately pull from its stockpiles, or through security assistance, which funds longer-term contracts with the defense industry to obtain the systems.

The presidential drawdown authority, or PDA, as it’s known, has allowed the military to send billions of dollars’ worth of ammunition, air defense missile launchers, tanks, vehicles and other equipment to Ukraine.

“In the past, we’ve seen weapons transferred via presidential drawdown authority arrive within a matter of days,” said Brad Bowman, director at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies center on military and political power.

Those stocks are pulled from bases or storage facilities in the U.S. or from European sites where the U.S. has surged weapons to cut down on the amount of time it will take to deliver them once the funding is approved.

Storage in US

The military has massive weapons storage facilities in the U.S. for millions of rounds of munitions of all sizes that would be ready to use in case of war.

For example, the McAlester Army Ammunition Plant in Oklahoma sprawls across more than 16,000 hectares connected by rail and has a mission to surge as many as 435 shipping containers — each able to carry 15 tons worth of munitions — if ordered by the president.

The facility is also a major storage site for one of the most used munitions on Ukraine’s battlefield, 155 mm howitzer rounds.

The demand by Ukraine for that particular shell has put pressure on U.S. stockpiles and pushed the military to see where else it could get them. As a result, tens of thousands of 155 mm rounds have been shipped back from South Korea to McAlester to be retrofitted for Ukraine.

Storage in Europe

According to a U.S. military official, the U.S. would be able to send certain munitions “almost immediately” to Ukraine because storehouses exist in Europe.

Among the weapons that could go very quickly are the 155 mm rounds and other artillery, along with some air defense munitions. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss preparations not yet made public.

A host of sites across Germany, Poland and other European allies also are helping Ukraine maintain and train on systems sent to the front. For example, Germany set up a maintenance hub for Kyiv’s Leopard 2 tank fleet in Poland, near the Ukrainian border.

The nearby maintenance hubs hasten the turnaround time to get needed repairs done on the Western systems. 
…

Washington — Republican Mike Johnson came out of nowhere six months ago to become speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, before emerging as an ardent defender of military aid to Ukraine, which the chamber approved Saturday.  

The evolution of this 52-year-old Southerner with carefully coiffed hair has been stunning.  

An arch-conservative Christian from Louisiana, he shot to the top leadership position in the House in October after the unprecedented ouster of then-speaker Kevin McCarthy in a rebellion by far-right lawmakers allied with Donald Trump.  

After several candidates were proposed, then discarded, Johnson’s name came up — he was a virtual unknown to the American public — and with the blessing of Trump, Johnson become leader of the House and of a Republican congressional caucus at war with itself.

Johnson had for months blocked a vote on the aid desperately needed by Ukraine’s army as it defends against Russian invasion forces.

But recently his tone began to soften. And then, in a head-spinning shift, Johnson last week emerged as a passionate defender of a long-delayed aid package.  

That culminated in the vote Saturday in which his chamber, by a strong bipartisan majority, passed more than $60 billion of additional military and financial support for Ukraine.  

Metamorphosis

What was behind Johnson’s metamorphosis?  

“I believe Johnson has been convinced, gradually, that America must support Ukraine in our own interests, and that the far-right Republicans demanding otherwise were simply wrong,” Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia, told AFP.  

In December, as previously approved U.S. funding for Kyiv was drying up, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine made a last-ditch visit to Washington to plead for a new aid package.  

Zelenskyy made his way through the halls of Congress accompanied by the Senate’s top Democrat and Republican, both vocal supporters of President Joe Biden’s request for $60 billion.  

But his meeting with Johnson was held behind closed doors.  

Johnson afterward said Biden was asking for “billions of additional dollars with no appropriate oversight, no clear strategy to win, and none of the answers that I think the American people are owed.”

Since then, however, a series of U.S. and world figures — including British Foreign Secretary David Cameron — worked to persuade Johnson of the high stakes, with some warning that Ukraine could fall by year’s end unless the U.S. aid came through.

One concession  

On Monday, Johnson announced the House would, after all, take up separate bills to provide aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, and that he would support them.  

Johnson did make one concession to Trump — who had demanded that aid to Ukraine be at least partly in the form of loans — making a part of the package subject to repayment.  

But the debt can still be forgiven, and the aid package is almost exactly for the amount requested months ago by Biden.

What was behind Johnson’s rethinking?

“He didn’t want the fall of Ukraine on his hands,” Sabato said.

Johnson provided further insight during a news conference Wednesday.  

“To put it bluntly, I would rather send bullets to Ukraine than American boys,” he said, before adding, his voice choking with emotion, that his son is about to enter the U.S. Naval Academy.

“This is a live-fire exercise for me, as it is for so many American families,” Johnson said.

It remains unclear whether some of the far-right legislators behind last year’s ouster of McCarthy might work to unseat Johnson after the perceived betrayal.

The House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, struck a philosophic tone when describing Johnson’s thorny choices.

“This,” he said, “is a Churchill or Chamberlain moment” — referring first to the wartime British prime minister known for his steely determination and then to Churchill’s predecessor, his name forever linked to a policy of appeasement.

Without quite casting himself in those terms, Johnson said he views himself as “a wartime speaker.”

In a somber tone, he added, “We have to do the right thing — and history will judge us.” 
…

Washington — U.S. officials are considering a request from Vietnam to be removed from a list of “nonmarket” economies, a step that would foster improved diplomatic relations with a potential ally in Asia but would anger some U.S. lawmakers and manufacturing firms.

The Southeast Asian country is on the list of 12 nations identified by the U.S. as nonmarket economies, which also includes China and Russia because of strong state intervention in their economies.  

Analysts believe Hanoi is hoping for a decision before the November U.S. election, which could mean a return to power of Donald Trump, who during his previous term as president threatened to boost tariffs on Vietnam because of its large trade surplus with the United States.

Under the Trump administration, the Department of Treasury also put Vietnam on a list of currency manipulators, which can lead to being excluded from U.S. government procurement contracts or other remedial actions. The Treasury, under the Biden administration, removed Vietnam from this list.

On the eve of President Joe Biden’s September visit to Hanoi, where he and Vietnamese Secretary-General Nguyen Phu Trong elevated the U.S.-Vietnam relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership.

Vietnam formally asked U.S. Department of Commerce to remove it from the list of nonmarket economies on the grounds that it had made economic reforms in recent years.  

The Biden administration subsequently initiated a review of Vietnam’s nonmarket economy (NME) status. The Department of Commerce is to issue a final decision by July 26, 270 days after initiating the review.  

“Receiving market economy status is the highest diplomatic priority of the Vietnamese leadership this year, especially after last fall’s double upgrade in diplomatic relations,” said Zachary Abuza, a professor at National War College where he focuses on Southeast Asian politics and security issues.

He told VOA Vietnamese that the Vietnamese “are really linking the implementation of the joint vision statement to receiving that status.”

The U.S. is Vietnam’s most important export market with two-way trade totaling more than $125 billion in 2023, according to U.S. Census data. But Washington has initiated more trade defense investigations with Vietnam than with any other country, mainly anti-dumping investigations. Vietnam recorded 58 cases subject to trade remedies of the U.S. as of August 2023, in which 26 were anti-dumping, according to the Vietnam Trade Office in the U.S.

Vietnam has engaged a lobbying firm in Washington to help it win congressional support for a status upgrade. A Foreign Agents Registration Act’s statement filed to the U.S. Department of Justice shows that Washington-based Steptoe is assisting the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade and supporting the Vietnamese government in “obtaining market economy status in antidumping proceedings.”

“I understand why Vietnamese are lobbying,” said Murray Hiebert, a senior associate of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

“One reason is U.S.-Vietnam relations have come so far, and to hold the non-market [status] is a little bit disingenuous because most of the countries that have this status are countries like China, Russia, North Korea, who are not so friendly with the United States. So I think [the U.S. recognition of Vietnam as a market economy] would be a sign that relations have improved.”

US election key

Both Abuza and Hiebert believe that Vietnam is pushing hard to secure the upgrade before the November U.S. election that could bring Trump back into office.

“Trump began an investigation of Vietnam’s dumping just before the end of his administration. He may again start that process,” said Hiebert, who was senior director for Southeast Asia at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce before joining CSIS.

But Vietnam’s campaign faces opposition from within the U.S.

More than 30 U.S. lawmakers in January sent joint letters to U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo urging the Biden administration not to grant market economy status to Vietnam. They argued that Vietnam did not meet the procedural requirements for a change of status and that granting Hanoi’s wish would be “a serious mistake.”

The U.S. designated Vietnam as a nonmarket economy in 2002 during an anti-dumping investigation into Vietnamese catfish exports. Over the past 21 years, the U.S. has imposed anti-dumping duties on many Vietnamese exports, including agricultural and industrial products.

In a request sent to Raimondo to initiate a changed circumstances review, the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade said that over the past 20 years, the economy of Vietnam “has been through dramatic developments and reforms.” It said 72 countries recognize Vietnam as a market economy, notably the U.K., Canada, Australia and Japan.

‘Unfairly traded Chinese goods’

U.S. manufacturing groups have expressed opposition to Vietnam’s request, arguing that Vietnam continues to operate as a nonmarket economy. In comments sent to Raimondo, the Alliance for American Manufacturing (AMM) said that Vietnam “cannot reasonably be understood to demonstrate the characteristics of a market economy.”

“There’s still heavy intervention by the governing Communist Party [of Vietnam],” said Scott Paul, president of AMM. “There’s a lot of indication that China may be using Vietnam as a platform to also export to the U.S., which is obviously concerning to firms here,” he said.

In a letter dated January 28, eight senators wrote “Granting Vietnam market economy status before it addresses its clear nonmarket behavior and the severe deficiencies in its labor law will worsen ongoing trade distortions, erode the U.S. manufacturing base, threaten American workers and industries, and reinforce Vietnam’s role as a conduit for goods produced in China with forced labor.”  

Many Chinese products have been found to be disguised or labeled as “Made in Vietnam” to avoid U.S. tariffs since Trump launched a trade war with China in 2018. Vietnam has promised to crack down on the practice.

Abuza pointed out what he called a contradiction in U.S. policy.

“Vietnam is too important to the United States economically in terms of trade and foreign direct investment, and we cannot look to Vietnam for supply chain diversification out of China if it doesn’t have market economy status.”

Hiebert said the U.S. “should do this and get moving” as Vietnam is “one of the U.S.’ best friends in Asia and Southeast Asia and help stand up to China.”
…

State Department — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is heading to China April 24 through 26 for talks with senior officials in Shanghai and Beijing.

Blinken’s second trip to China comes as the United States warns it against enabling Russia in its war on Ukraine, with Chinese firms directly supplying critical components for Russia’s defense industrial base.

Other pressing matters on the agenda include counternarcotics, bolstering military-to-military communication, establishing talks on artificial intelligence risks and safety, and exploring ways to strengthen people-to-people ties, according to the State Department.

A senior State Department official said in a briefing Friday the U.S. is “realistic and clear eyed about the prospects of breakthroughs” on any of the issues on the agenda. Some analysts said they do not anticipate any major advances to emerge from the talks.

China aiding Russia in Ukraine war

In a joint statement this week, foreign ministers from the G7 leading industrialized nations urged China to stop transferring dual-use materials and weapons components that Russia is using to advance its military production.

U.S. officials said those materials include significant quantities of microelectronics, unmanned aerial vehicles, cruise missile technology, and nitrocellulose, which Russia uses to make propellants for weapons.

“China can’t have it both ways” — helping Russia and keeping good relations with Europe, Blinken told reporters at a press conference in Capri, Italy, Friday.

A senior State Department official told VOA during a virtual briefing Friday that the United States is “prepared to take steps” when necessary, against Chinese firms that “severely undermine security in both Ukraine and Europe.”

The United States may sanction Chinese banks that facilitate the transfer of these materials, according to analysts. Washington has sanctioned Chinese individuals and companies that provide material support to Russia, and is enlisting European allies for similar measures.

“In contrast to the United States, the European Union has not really sanctioned Chinese individuals or companies to the same degree,” Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Stimson Center, told VOA.

Grieco said the U.S. is working with other G7 members to garner more support from European nations to take similar actions.

Beijing dismissed what Chinese officials labeled as Washington’s attempt to “smear” or “attack the normal relations between China and Russia.”  

China maintains it regulates the export of dual-use materials to Russia in accordance with laws.  The U.S. “should not harm the legitimate rights and interests of China and Chinese companies,” Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for China’s Foreign Affairs Ministry, said during a recent briefing.

Taiwan

Blinken’s visit to China is scheduled just weeks before the inauguration of Taiwan’s president-elect Lai Ching-te on May 20.

The U.S. is sending an unofficial delegation to attend his inauguration, which includes former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Laura Rosenberger, who chairs the American Institute in Taiwan. 

Blinken will underscore America’s enduring interest in preserving peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait. 

“During this important and sensitive time leading up to the May 20 inauguration, all countries will contribute to peace and stability, avoid taking provocative actions that may raise tensions and demonstrate restraint. That will be our message going forward,” the senior State Department official said.

Counternarcotics

Fentanyl is the leading cause of death of Americans between the ages of 18 to 49.

China remains the primary source of fentanyl-related substances trafficked through international mail and express consignment operations, serving as the main source for all fentanyl-related substances entering the United States, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

“It’s in China’s interest to cooperate in reducing and ending the flow of chemical precursors to the United States,” the State Department official said. 

He added that the U.S. delegation traveling to China next week will “get down to detailed implementation” of the agreement reached in November 2023 to restart cooperation, particularly focusing on “concrete progress” between the law enforcement agencies of the two countries to curb the flow of these chemical precursors.

Some analysts said the extent and durability of the cooperation is yet to be seen.

“China sees counternarcotics and more broadly international law enforcement cooperation as strategic tools that it can leverage to achieve other objectives,” wrote Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution.

“Even though China’s current goal is to reduce tensions, China’s drug cooperation is vulnerable to new crises in the bilateral relationship,” she added.

Blinken’s visit to China is the latest in a flurry of high-level diplomacy aimed at stabilizing China-U.S. relations.  It follows Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s recent trip to Guangzhou, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan’s meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Munich in February, and U.S. President Joe Biden’s talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Woodside, California, in November.

China said it welcomes the top U.S. diplomat’s visit soon.
…

Washington — The U.S. House of Representatives on Saturday passed with bipartisan support a four-part, $95 billion foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, putting the long-beleaguered legislation on track for enactment following a long, difficult path through Congress. 

The legislation includes $60 billion for Kyiv’s ongoing war against Moscow’s invasion, as well as $26 billion for Israel and humanitarian aid for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza, and $8 billion for the Indo-Pacific region.

“Today, members of both parties in the House voted to advance our national security interests and send a clear message about the power of American leadership on the world stage. At this critical inflection point, they came together to answer history’s call, passing urgently-needed national security legislation that I have fought for months to secure,” President Joe Biden said in a statement Saturday.

“I urge the Senate to quickly send this package to my desk so that I can sign it into law and we can quickly send weapons and equipment to Ukraine to meet their urgent battlefield needs,” he noted.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, structured the bills so that they can all be combined into one after each individual bill is approved, to prevent opposition to any one piece from derailing the entire deal.

The Democratic-majority Senate is expected to take up the legislation as soon as Tuesday and then send it to President Joe Biden’s desk to be signed into law. 

“The world is watching what the Congress does,” the White House said in a statement on Friday. “Passing this legislation would send a powerful message about the strength of American leadership at a pivotal moment. The administration urges both chambers of the Congress to quickly send this supplemental funding package to the president’s desk.”

The bill imposing new limits on the social media platform TikTok was the first of the four measures to pass on Saturday, with a vote of 360-58. That measure requires Bytedance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, to sell its stake within a year or face a ban in the United States. It would also allow the president to level new sanctions against Russia and Iran. 

The second bill, which passed with a bipartisan majority of 385-34 votes, provided billions in aid to the Indo-Pacific region. The $8 billion bill is intended to counter China through investing in submarine infrastructure and helping Taiwan through military financing.

The third to pass was a significant aid package — $60 billion — for Ukraine in its ongoing war against Russia. The bill passed with a vote of 311-112. 

The bill has important implications not just for Ukraine but for all of Europe, according to Steven Moore, founder of the Ukraine Freedom Project, which delivers humanitarian and military aid to the front lines.

“[Russian President] Vladimir Putin has made it clear that if he takes Ukraine, then NATO countries are next,” he told VOA. “This is not just about Ukraine. This is about standing up to a terrible human being who wants to subjugate the rest of Europe.”

“This sends a message to [Russian President] Vladimir Putin, to Iran, to North Korea, and to China, that we are not abdicating our role as a leader in the world,” added Moore, who is based in Kyiv. 

The bill’s passage in the House comes after a monthslong Republican effort to block additional aid to Ukraine. 

“The Republican leadership, I think, delayed this unnecessarily,” Representative Adam Smith, a Democrat from Washington state, told VOA’s Ukrainian service on Saturday. 

Smith said he expected the aid to be delivered to Ukraine “almost immediately” once the legislation is passed by the Senate and signed by President Biden. 

The final measure to pass on Saturday was a $26 billion package for Israel, including $9.1 billion for humanitarian needs.  

Biden reaffirmed support for the aid package earlier this week. 

“Israel is facing unprecedented attacks from Iran, and Ukraine is facing continued bombardment from Russia that has intensified dramatically in the last month,” he said in a statement. 

“The House must pass the package this week and the Senate should quickly follow,” Biden added. “I will sign this into law immediately to send a message to the world: We stand with our friends, and we won’t let Iran or Russia succeed.” 

The weekend votes follow a rare show of bipartisanship on Friday, when a coalition of lawmakers in the House helped the foreign aid package clear a procedural hurdle to advance the four-part legislation. That Friday vote passed 316-94. 

Johnson went ahead with the vote despite strong opposition from some factions of his party. 

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia threatened to try to force a vote to oust Johnson from the speakership if he went ahead with the Ukraine aid vote. Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky has also called for Johnson to resign.

Still, other members of the Republican Party support Johnson and the aid package.

“You’re never going to agree with every little aspect of legislation. There’s always going to be things you may quibble with, but the reality is that we need to get aid to our allies,” Representative Mike Lawler, a Republican from New York, told VOA’s Ukrainian Service. 

“The time for debate and discussion over this has long passed, and the time for action is here,” he said. 

VOA’s Kateryna Lisunova contributed to this report. Some information came from Reuters, the Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.
…

The U.S. economy is always a major factor in the presidential campaign because the president plays a key role in setting and shaping trade and economic policies. VOA’s Senior Washington Correspondent Carolyn Presutti reports on how the economy is doing and the difference between how the two presidential contenders would handle it. Camera: Mike Burke
…

WASHINGTON — After its midnight deadline, the Senate voted early Saturday to reauthorize a key U.S. surveillance law after divisions over whether the FBI should be restricted from using the program to search for Americans’ data nearly forced the statute to lapse.

The legislation approved 60-34 with bipartisan support would extend for two years the program known as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It now goes to President Joe Biden’s desk to become law. White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden “will swiftly sign the bill.”

“In the nick of time, we are reauthorizing FISA right before it expires at midnight,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said when voting on final passage began 15 minutes before the deadline. “All day long, we persisted, and we persisted in trying to reach a breakthrough and in the end, we have succeeded.”

U.S. officials have said the surveillance tool, first authorized in 2008 and renewed several times since then, is crucial in disrupting terror attacks, cyber intrusions, and foreign espionage and has also produced intelligence that the U.S. has relied on for specific operations, such as the 2022 killing of al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri.

“If you miss a key piece of intelligence, you may miss some event overseas or put troops in harm’s way,” Sen. Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said. “You may miss a plot to harm the country here, domestically, or somewhere else. So, in this particular case, there’s real-life implications.”

The proposal would renew the program, which permits the U.S. government to collect without a warrant the communications of non-Americans located outside the country to gather foreign intelligence. The reauthorization faced a long and bumpy road to final passage Friday after months of clashes between privacy advocates and national security hawks pushed consideration of the legislation to the brink of expiration.

Though the spy program was technically set to expire at midnight, the Biden administration had said it expected its authority to collect intelligence to remain operational for at least another year, thanks to an opinion earlier this month from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which receives surveillance applications.

Still, officials had said that court approval shouldn’t be a substitute for congressional authorization, especially since communications companies could cease cooperation with the government if the program is allowed to lapse.

House before the law was set to expire, U.S. officials were already scrambling after two major U.S. communication providers said they would stop complying with orders through the surveillance program, according to a person familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private negotiations.

Attorney General Merrick Garland praised the reauthorization and reiterated how “indispensable” the tool is to the Justice Department.

“This reauthorization of Section 702 gives the United States the authority to continue to collect foreign intelligence information about non-U.S. persons located outside the United States, while at the same time codifying important reforms the Justice Department has adopted to ensure the protection of Americans’ privacy and civil liberties,” Garland said in a statement Saturday.

But despite the Biden administration’s urging and classified briefings to senators this week on the crucial role they say the spy program plays in protecting national security, a group of progressive and conservative lawmakers who were agitating for further changes had refused to accept the version of the bill the House sent over last week.

The lawmakers had demanded that Majority Leader Chuck Schumer allow votes on amendments to the legislation that would seek to address what they see as civil liberty loopholes in the bill. In the end, Schumer was able to cut a deal that would allow critics to receive floor votes on their amendments in exchange for speeding up the process for passage.

The six amendments ultimately failed to garner the necessary support on the floor to be included in the final passage.

One of the major changes detractors had proposed centered on restricting the FBI’s access to information about Americans through the program. Though the surveillance tool only targets non-Americans in other countries, it also collects communications of Americans when they are in contact with those targeted foreigners. Sen. Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat in the chamber, had been pushing a proposal that would require U.S. officials to get a warrant before accessing American communications.

“If the government wants to spy on my private communications or the private communications of any American, they should be required to get approval from a judge, just as our Founding Fathers intended in writing the Constitution,” Durbin said.

In the past year, U.S. officials have revealed a series of abuses and mistakes by FBI analysts in improperly querying the intelligence repository for information about Americans or others in the U.S., including a member of Congress and participants in the racial justice protests of 2020 and the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

But members on both the House and Senate intelligence committees as well as the Justice Department warned requiring a warrant would severely handicap officials from quickly responding to imminent national security threats.

“I think that is a risk that we cannot afford to take with the vast array of challenges our nation faces around the world,” Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Friday.

 
…