Sunday marks the one year anniversary of the violent “Unite The Right” protests in Charlottesville, Virginia. Last year’s protest, organized by white supremacists upset over the removal of a statue of a Confederate hero, left one person dead and 19 injured. White nationalists are planning a protest to mark the occasion in Washington. Meanwhile, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam and the city of Charlottesville declared a state of emergency ahead of the anniversary. Anush Avetisyan reports.
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The head of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is stepping down after a 14-month tenure in which the agency proposed broad changes to rules governing protections for thousands of species and pushed for more hunting and fishing on federal lands, officials said Thursday.

Greg Sheehan will leave the agency next week to return to his family and home in Utah, spokesman Gavin Shire said. He has led the wildlife service since last June as the senior political official appointed under President Donald Trump in a newly created deputy director position.

Under his tenure, the wildlife service moved recently to end a long-standing practice that automatically gave the same protections to threatened species as it gives more critically endangered species. The proposal also limits habitat safeguards meant to shield recovering species from harm and would require consideration of the economic impacts of protecting a species.

That’s alarmed wildlife advocates who fear a weakening of the Endangered Species Act, which has been used to save species as diverse as the bald eagle and the American alligator. The proposed changes were cheered by Republican lawmakers and others who say the endangered species law has been abused to block economic development and needs reform.

A request to interview Sheehan was declined.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke had sought to make Sheehan acting director of the 9,000-employee wildlife service, which would have given him certain legal authorities. However, Sheehan was barred from that role because he did not have the science degree required for the position under federal law, Shire said.

Vacancies at Interior

His departure comes amid a spate of vacancies at the Interior Department more than a year and a half after Trump took office. Those include the heads of the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service and the assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks.

Before coming to the federal government, Sheehan worked for 25 years in Utah’s Division of Wildlife Resources, including five years as its director.

National Wildlife Federation President Collin O’Mara — who considers Sheehan a friend — said during his watch the service had done good work collaborating with state officials and conservation groups. But O’Mara said there needed to be less emphasis on removing regulations and more on making sure wildlife issues are considered, such as during decisions on energy development.

“Given the magnitude of the wildlife crisis, there’s always more that can be done,” O’Mara said.

Another conservation group, the Center for Biological Diversity, had a more critical response, saying Sheehan’s departure was “welcome news for America’s wildlife.”

“In just one year in office, he inflicted incredible harm on imperiled animals by consistently putting special interests ahead of science and the environment,” said Brett Hartl, the group’s government affairs director.

The Interior Department issued a statement saying Sheehan was “an incredible asset to the Interior team and was tremendous in helping Secretary Zinke expand access for hunting and fishing on over a quarter-million acres of public lands across the country.”

Deputy Operations Director Jim Kurth will lead the agency pending another appointment, Shire said.
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President Donald Trump discussed prison reform with governors and state attorneys general at his New Jersey golf club Thursday, part of an effort to increase education, vocational training and other opportunities to make it less likely that inmates will commit new offenses. 

The United States has the largest prison population and the highest per-capita incarceration rate in the world. The majority of inmates are held in state facilities, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. 

White House officals said the group represents states that have implemented reforms similar to those backed by Trump. The mostly Republican group included governors from Kentucky, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and North Dakota, as well as attorneys general from Florida and Texas. 

Trump is pushing a bill that has passed the House of Representatives that would provide $250 million over five years to fund education, vocational training and rehabilitation programs within the federal prison system. Participating inmates get credits toward early release or serving the rest of their sentences in halfway houses or home confinement. 

The prison reform bill, “Formerly Incarcerated Re-enter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act,” is also known by its acronym the First Step Act. 

Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, has been working with congressional allies to move the First Step program forward. 

First Step Act

Ryan Streeter, director of domestic policy studies with the American Enterprise Institute, said First Step uses “evidence-based interventions to help people get the kind of training they need, the attachment to the community they need, and the things that we’ve seen actually work in a research-based environment.”

He says there is growing congressional consensus on the need for sentencing reform, but initiatives have faced roadblocks. Streeter sees the legislation as an effort to ensure that when inmates reach the end of their sentences, they don’t end up back behind bars within five years, which is what happens with more than 75 percent of the prison population. 

The First Step Act is a “back end” type of prison reform, meaning it focuses on cutting prison time once people are incarcerated. A “front end” initiative focuses on reducing the amount of people sent to prison and the amount of time they spend there by making changes in the process of arrest, prosecution and sentencing.

The bill focuses solely on the federal prison system, which is only a small part of the overall U.S. prison system. Critics say the bill does not address the main causes of mass incarceration: prison sentences that are too long, and too many incarcerated people. For example, the bill would not reduce or limit mandatory minimum sentences for minor drugs offenses. 

A separate piece of legislation — a broader criminal justice reform bill co-written by senators Chuck Grassley and Richard J. Durbin — is also moving though the Senate and has received bipartisan support.

​The Washington Post is reporting that administration officials are pushing for a deal that would combine the Senate bill and the First Step Act, including provisions that would allow judges to issue sentences shorter than mandatory minimums for low-level crimes. 

The deal may face opposition from within Trump’s own administration, particularly from Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who has come out in strong opposition to any measures that would change mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines. 

Support from minorities

Racial disparity is a huge problem in the U.S. criminal justice system. African-Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of whites.

 According to the Sentencing Project, 1 in every 10 black men in his 30s is in prison or jail on any given day.

Last week at the White House, Trump met with a group of urban pastors to discuss prison reform. Attendees said the president essentially came out in support of broad-based reforms to the criminal justice system.

Criminal justice reform

A number of polls, including one by the American Civil Liberties Union Campaign for Smart Justice, have shown that the majority of Americans support criminal justice reforms and believe the country’s criminal justice system needs significant improvements. 

The U.S. makes up about 5 percent of the world’s population but has 21 percent of the world’s prisoners.  According to the World Prison Brief, an online database providing information on prison systems around the world, 655 people were incarcerated in the U.S. per 100,000 population in 2016.
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In U.S. politics, President Donald Trump and Republicans are claiming victory in a special congressional election in Ohio seen as a possible bellwether for the November midterm elections. While the race officially remains too close to call, both major political parties see encouraging signs in the results, as we hear from VOA National correspondent Jim Malone in Washington.
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President Donald Trump and his Republican supporters are claiming victory in a special congressional election in Ohio, even though officially the race remains too close to call. The race was seen by many as a possible bellwether for the midterm congressional elections in November.

Republican Troy Balderson leads Democrat Danny O’Connor by about 1,700 votes, but a few thousand provisional ballots remain to be counted.

Even if the Republican eventually emerges victorious in the Ohio race, opposition Democrats also see plenty to be optimistic about as they look ahead to the November midterms, when all 435 House seats will be at stake along with 35 of the 100 U.S. Senate seats.

​Tipping by Trump

President Trump held a rally in Ohio a few days before the voting on behalf of Balderson, and many analysts believe that may have tipped the election in Balderson’s favor.

Trump was quick to take credit on Twitter Wednesday, claiming that Balderson’s fortunes took “a big turn for the better” after his speech Saturday night. In a second tweet, the president boasted that “As long as I campaign and/or support Senate and House candidates (within reason), they will win!”

Trump also promised to campaign on behalf of Republican candidates in the midterm elections and predicted, “We will have a giant Red Wave!”

In remarks to his supporters Tuesday night, Balderson was quick to pay tribute to the president for his last-minute help.

“I’d like to thank President Trump,” Balderson said to cheers. “America is on the right path and we are going to keep it going that way.”

​Democratic surge

Balderson benefited from large campaign contributions from the Republican Party’s campaign arm to offset heavy Democratic spending in the race on behalf of Danny O’Connor.

For the most part, O’Connor tried to stay focused on economic issues and health care and was less interested in making Trump the central issue in the race.

“I heard over and over again that the people of central Ohio are sick and tired of the same old Washington politics,” O’Connor told supporters Tuesday night. “Folks want new leadership.”

O’Connor’s strong showing came in a district that Republicans have held for more than three decades and which Trump carried in the 2016 election by more than 11 points.

In his rally Saturday on behalf of Balderson, Trump laid out a template for future campaign attacks as he strove to take the focus off of him and aim squarely at opposition Democrats.

“If the Democrats get in, they are going to raise your taxes, you are going to have crime all over the place and you are going to have people pouring across the border,” Trump told supporters. “So why would that be a blue wave? I think it could be a red wave, really I think it should be a red wave.”

Warning signs

The fact that Democrat O’Connor ran a close race in a strongly Republican district, however, strikes experts as yet another warning sign for Republicans in November.

“It is more evidence that in race after race throughout this year, Republicans have been underperforming the levels that they were at in 2016, which has to spell trouble for them moving forward,” said Brookings Institution analyst John Hudak.

Balderson also received help from Ohio Governor John Kasich. On Sunday on ABC’s This Week, Kasich predicted a narrow Republican victory in the election, but he also warned that Trump remains a polarizing figure for the broader electorate.

“The chaos that seems to surround Donald Trump has unnerved a lot of people. So suburban women in particular here are the ones who are really turned off,” Kasich told ABC.

Double-edged weapon

So on one hand, the Ohio results suggest the president can tip a close race into the Republican column. 

“Oh, I believe the president does think that his ability to weigh in and endorse a candidate can have an effect,” said analyst Hudak.

But Hudak also argued that in addition to motivating his own base, Trump also is proving to be a turnout motivator for Democrats who want to show their displeasure with him.

“While his intervention or maybe Governor Kasich’s intervention or someone else’s intervention may well have made the difference in this 1,700-vote margin in Ohio, the president has probably also played a significant role in the shift from Republicans toward Democrats in a race like this.”

No matter who is declared the eventual winner of Tuesday’s special election, Balderson and O’Connor are expected to face off again in November when it is likely that Trump will once again be the pivotal issue for voters in midterm elections where the control of Congress is at stake.
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The U.S. Army has stopped discharging immigrant recruits who enlisted seeking a path to citizenship, at least temporarily.

A memo shared with The Associated Press Wednesday and dated July 20 spells out orders to high-ranking Army officials to stop processing discharges of men and women who enlisted in the special immigrant program, effective immediately.

It was not clear how many recruits were affected by the action, and the Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment about the memo.

“Effective immediately, you will suspend processing of all involuntary separation actions,” read the memo signed by Acting Assistant Secretary of the Army for Manpower and Reserve Affairs Marshall Williams.

Dozens of discharges 

The disclosure comes one month after the AP reported that dozens of immigrant enlistees were being discharged or their contracts were canceled. Some said they were given no reason for their discharge. Others said the Army informed them they’d been labeled as security risks because they have relatives abroad or because the Defense Department had not completed background checks on them.

Early last month, the Pentagon said there had been no specific policy change and that background checks were ongoing. And in mid-July, the Army reversed one discharge, for Brazilian reservist Lucas Calixto, 28, who had sued. Nonetheless, discharges of other immigrant enlistees continued. Attorneys sought to bring a class action lawsuit last week to offer protections to a broader group of reservists and recruits in the program, demanding that prior discharges be revoked and that further separations be halted.

A judge’s order references the July 20 memo, and asks the Army to clarify how it impacts the discharge status of Calixto and other plaintiffs. As part of the memo, Williams also instructed Army officials to recommend whether the military should issue further guidance related to the program.

Margaret Stock, an Alaska-based immigration attorney and a retired Army Reserve lieutenant colonel who helped create the immigrant recruitment program, said Wednesday the memo proves there was a policy.

“It’s an admission by the Army that they’ve improperly discharged hundreds of soldiers,” she said. “The next step should be go back and rescind the people who were improperly discharged.”

Discharged recruits and reservists reached Wednesday said their discharges were still in place as far as they knew.

One Pakistani man caught by surprise by his discharge said he was filing for asylum. He asked that his name be withheld because he fears he might be forced to return to Pakistan, where he could face danger as a former U.S. Army enlistee.

Security requirements

The reversal comes as the Defense Department has attempted to strengthen security requirements for the program, through which historically immigrants vowed to risk their lives for the promise of U.S. citizenship.

President George W. Bush ordered “expedited naturalization” for immigrant soldiers after 9/11 in an effort to swell military ranks. Seven years later the Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest program, known as MAVNI, became an official recruiting program.

It came under fire from conservatives when President Barack Obama added DACA recipients — young immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children — to the list of eligible enlistees. In response, the military layered on additional security clearances for recruits to pass before heading to boot camp.

The Trump administration added even more hurdles, creating a backlog within the Defense Department. Last fall, hundreds of recruits still in the enlistment process saw their contracts canceled.

Government attorneys called the recruitment program an “elevated security risk” in another case involving 17 foreign-born military recruits who enlisted through the program but have not been able to clear additional security requirements. Some recruits had falsified their background records and were connected to state-sponsored intelligence agencies, the court filing said.

Eligible recruits are required to have legal status in the U.S., such as a student visa, before enlisting. More than 5,000 immigrants were recruited into the program in 2016, and an estimated 10,000 are currently serving. Nearly 110,000 members of the Armed Forces have gained citizenship by serving in the U.S. military since Sept. 11, 2001, according to the Defense Department.
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A record number of women are running for the US Congress in November, a surge that follows a year marked by the #MeToo movement and defiance of President Donald Trump.

After another round of primary voting in several states on Tuesday, 183 women will fight for a seat in the House of Representatives in November’s midterm election.

“It’s official,” the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) said after the voting in Kansas, Michigan and Missouri. “We’ve broken the record for women major party nominees for US House in any year.”

Until now the record was 167.

In another record, at least 11 women are running for state governor, the advocacy group said on Twitter. Until now that number had peaked at 10, in 1994.

In June, women also set a record for how many are running for the Senate. It is 42 — 24 Democrats and 18 Republicans. The previous record was 40, set in 2016, said the CAWP.

Several women candidates in races that they have a good chance of winning are from minorities with little or no representation in Congress.

They include Rashida Tlaib, who won a Democratic primary Tuesday in Michigan and is now poised to become the first Muslim woman elected to Congress.

Several Native American women are also running for seats.

“A Native American woman has never been elected to the US Congress,” CAWP said.

The strong number of female candidates comes midway through the term of Trump, whose inauguration in January 2017 was met the next day with a huge march in Washington favor of women’s rights.

It also comes as the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment of women by men in powerful positions has marked a watershed moment in US society.
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Federal prosecutors have filed insider trading charges against Republican Congressman Chris Collins, who was arrested and is scheduled to appear in federal court in Manhattan.

The lawmaker from New York, one of the first members of Congress to support then-candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential election, turned himself in to the Federal Bureau of Investigation early Wednesday.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York charged Collins in connection with an alleged insider trading scheme involving his investments in the Australian biotech company Innate Immunotherapeutics Ltd.

Earlier this year, an Office of Congressional Ethics report said Collins may have committed a federal crime by disclosing proprietary information about the company with investors, including his son, who was also charged. The office voted unanimously to send the case to the House Ethics Committee.

His son, Cameron Collins, allegedly passed the information to another alleged conspirator, Stephen Zarsky, the father of the junior Collins’ fiancee. 

The three men are charged with conspiracy, wire fraud, securities fraud and making false statements to the FBI. They also face civil charges by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Collins served on the company’s board and owned 16.8 percent of the company’s stock. His son was also a “substantial” shareholder, prosecutors said.

Indictment details

The indictment says Collins allegedly learned in an email from Innate’s chief executive that a trial for a multiple sclerosis drug had failed. Collins then disclosed the information to his son, who passed it on to his fiancee, Zarsky and a friend. Zarsky tipped off his brother, his sister and a friend, the indictment said.

“Congressman Christopher Collins is charged with insider trading and lying to the FBI, as are his son, Cameron Collins and Stephen Zarsky, the father of Cameron’s fiancee,” U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said.  “Representative Collins, who, by virtue of his office, helps write the laws of this country, acted as if the law did not apply to him.”

The indictment also says Collins did not trade his own Innate stock, which lost millions of dollars in value, maintaining he was “virtually precluded” from doing so due, in part, to the fact he already faced a congressional ethics investigation related to his Innate holdings. Prosecutors said, however, others avoided nearly $770,000 in losses as a result of the information.

Collins’ attorneys said in a statement they “will mount a vigorous defense to clear his good name” and added, “It is notable that even the government does not allege that Congressman Collins traded a single share of Innate Therapeutics stock.”

Midterm elections

House Republican leader Paul Ryan said the allegations against Collins “demand a prompt and thorough investigation by the House Ethics Committee” and added that Collins would no longer serve on the House Energy and Commerce Committee “until this matter is settled.”

Collins is running for re-election in November and has raised more than $1.3 million dollars for his re-election bid, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission. 

The three-term congressman represents a largely Republican district that most political analysts believed would not be ripe for a Democratic takeover in the November midterm elections.

Zarsky attorney Amanda Bassen declined to comment, and lawyers for Cameron Collins could not be immediately reached.

Innate, which is based in Sydney, also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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A U.S. senator says he has delivered a letter from President Donald Trump to Russian President Vladimir Putin calling for more talks and exchanges between the two countries.

Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, a Trump supporter who has been in Moscow in recent days holding discussions with Russian lawmakers, said Wednesday, “I was honored to deliver a letter from President Trump to President Vladimir Putin’s administration.”

In a Twitter remark, Paul said the letter “emphasized the importance of further engagement in various areas including countering terrorism, enhancing legislative dialogue and resuming cultural exchanges.”

The White House said the letter was requested by Paul.

“At Senator Paul’s request, President Trump provided a letter of introduction. In the letter, the President mentioned topics of interest that Senator Paul wanted to discuss with President Putin,” White House Deputy Press Secretary Hogan Gidley said.

Both Trump and Putin have invited each other to their respective capital cities in the aftermath of last month’s Helsinki summit between the two leaders. But no new meeting has been scheduled and the White House said it was delaying a Putin visit to Washington until 2019, by which time it said it expects special counsel Robert Mueller’s criminal investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to be completed.

Trump was widely criticized in the U.S. for his performance at the Helsinki summit as he appeared to embrace Putin’s denial that Russia had interfered in the election, equating the Russian leader’s stance with the U.S. intelligence community’s finding that Russia had sought to help Trump win. In a joint news conference with Trump, Putin said he did want Trump to win because then-candidate Trump had said he wanted to improve U.S.-Russian relations.

Back in Washington, Trump clarified his remarks and has said that Russia interfered, but has continued to call the claim that Russia tried to help him win and Mueller’s investigation “a big hoax.”

 
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A record number of openly lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people are standing in elections for public office in the United States, a nonprofit group that supports them said Tuesday.

The Victory Institute said gay and transgender people were still underrepresented in political life, but it was aware of more than 400 LGBT candidates so far in 2018 — a higher number than ever before.

“It’s a really exciting time,” Sean Meloy, the Victory Institute’s political director, told Reuters.

“We believe that representation is power and when someone is in the room and helping to make decisions, they will automatically bring an LGBTQ perspective.”

Earlier this year, the Victory Institute said 0.1 percent of all elected public officials currently serving — or 559 — were openly LGBT.

It said an estimated 5 percent of U.S. citizens identified as LGBT, though a recent major poll suggested the figure could exceed 20 percent among young adults.

The majority of the LGBT candidates coming forward are Democrats, and many are standing in November’s midterm elections.

They are running for positions ranging from state governor to local government officials.

Among them is Alexandra Chandler, a Democrat transgender woman and former military intelligence officer running for Congress in Massachusetts.

She said a more diverse group of officials would better reflect society and bring better policy, but that she did not believe her identity was a concern for most voters.

“They want the person that gets the job done,” she said. “The gender identity or sexual identity, it’s part of someone’s biography, it’s part of the whole person they bring to the table, but it’s only a part.”

Public policy expert Patrick Egan said the figures reflected an increasing tolerance of LGBT people among the U.S. public.

“Gay people have always been involved with electoral politics and many of them ran for office,” said Egan, associate professor of politics and public policy at New York University.

“What we are seeing now is the slow receding in stigma against gay people in that they can not only run for office but run openly as LGBT.”
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Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s right-hand man testified at trial on Tuesday that Manafort instructed him not to tell their firm’s bookkeeper about payments from accounts in Cyprus that held millions of dollars in earnings from  consulting work for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine.

Rick Gates, the U.S. government’s star witness in Manafort’s trial on tax fraud and bank fraud charges, told a federal court jury in Alexandria, Virginia, that there were hundreds of emails showing Manafort approved payments out of the Cypriot accounts.

Gates’ testimony on the trial’s sixth day was part of the prosecution’s effort to prove that Manafort was responsible for financial maneuverings that he and other witnesses have testified include filing false tax returns and failing to report foreign bank accounts.

Gates, Manafort’s long-time business partner, is expected to face a tough cross-examination later on Tuesday by defense lawyers in the first trial to arise from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election. The Kremlin denies election meddling.

While outside the scope of the trial, Mueller is also investigating whether Trump campaign members coordinated with Moscow, an allegation President Donald Trump denies.

Manafort’s defense is seeking to pin the blame on Gates himself, who has acknowledged embezzling from Manafort’s firm.

Manafort, 69, has pleaded not guilty to 18 counts of bank fraud, tax fraud and failing to disclose foreign bank accounts.

Gates, who also was an official on Trump’s campaign, pleaded guilty in February to lying to investigators and conspiring to defraud the United States and agreed to cooperate.

On Tuesday, Gates also testified about “modified” invoices for payments to U.S. vendors that he said he created at Manafort’s request. The invoices were created to meet document requirements of a bank, Gates said, adding that the payments were legitimate.

He testified about a complex scheme in which earnings from Manafort’s political work in Ukraine would be paid by Ukrainian businessmen using companies in Cyprus to other Cyprus-based companies controlled by Manafort.

Prosecutors showed contracts laying out that Manafort would be paid $4 million a year in quarterly installments of $1 million, all channeled through Cyprus. The funds were logged as loans, but Gates testified they were in fact compensation to Manafort.

Money from the Ukraine work dried up after pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych was forced from power in 2014, Gates testified. A $1 million payment for work in 2014 was “significantly past due” and “Mr. Manafort was quite upset the money had not been sent,” Gates told the court.

Manafort’s Kiev-based aide Konstantin Kilimnik was able to collect $500,000, Gates said, but “to my knowledge it was never paid in full.” Kilimnik was indicted in the Mueller investigation in June.

Gates, 46, testified on Monday that he helped falsify Manafort’s tax returns and hide his foreign bank accounts. He testified that he has met with prosecutors about 20 times. It is unclear what other information he may have provided to Mueller’s team.

Gates admitted on Monday that he did steal money through inflated expense reports, but he said it was hundreds of thousands of dollars, not millions as defense lawyers stated.

Manafort’s lawyers are expected to use the theft to try to undermine Gates’ credibility as a witness. They also are likely to bring up his making false statements to investigators.

One issue that could be a challenge for prosecutors on Tuesday is the extent to which they are allowed to admit evidence about Manafort’s Ukraine work and the oligarchs who paid him. On Monday, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis repeatedly clashed with prosecutors about the relevance of such testimony and once again urged them to speed things along.

 
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U.S. national security adviser John Bolton accused North Korea Tuesday of failing to move ahead with denuclearization pledged by Pyongyang leader Kim Jong Un at his Singapore summit in June with U.S. President Donald Trump.

“What we really need is not more rhetoric,” Bolton said in an interview on Fox News. “What we need is performance from North Korea on denuclearization.”

He said that since the summit, North Korea “has not taken the steps we feel are necessary to denuclearize.”

Bolton said the U.S. is not considering relaxation of its economic sanctions against Pyongyang.

The key White House official said that Trump, in a recent letter to Kim, proposed sending U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo back to the North Korean capital for further talks. Trump also said he was willing to hold a second summit with Kim.

It was the second time in three days that Bolton expressed irritation at Pyongyang’s slow moves in implementing Kim’s vague pledge to Trump to denuclearize the Korean peninsula. His attacks came as U.S. news reports said North Korea was continuing to build missiles and produce plutonium.

‘Waiting to see evidence’

On Sunday, in another interview on Fox, Bolton said that “there’s nobody” in Trump’s administration that is “starry-eyed about the prospects of North Korea actually denuclearizing.”

He said the “point may well come” when the U.S. concludes that Kim does not intend to give up his country’s nuclear weapons.

Bolton said Trump is giving Kim ample time to move toward denuclearization, which Trump administration officials are hopeful of completing by the end of the president’s first term in the White House in early 2021.

“The president is giving Kim Jong Un a master class on how to hold a door open for somebody,” Bolton said, “and if the North Koreans can’t figure out how to walk through it, even the president’s fiercest critics will not be able to say it’s because he didn’t open it wide enough.”

The national security adviser said, “If they make a strategic decision to give up nuclear weapons, they can do it within a year. We are waiting to see evidence that in fact that strategic decision has been made.”

 
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The statue of the unnamed Confederate soldier has stood since 1909 in front of the courthouse in Louisiana’s East Feliciana Parish, hands resting on his rifle looking down on the flow of lawyers, jurors and defendants going into the white columned building.

Ronnie Anderson, an African-American man charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, illegal possession of a stolen firearm, and speeding, was one such defendant and the statue gave him cause for concern.

“It’s just intimidating to walk into a courthouse that’s supposed to be a place of equality, fair justice and to see this monument that made me feel like … I don’t stand a chance,” Anderson said.

Anderson wants his case to be moved to another parish without such a memorial; his motion to change venue argues he can’t get a fair trial in the same place where a “symbol of oppression and racial intolerance” stands.

​Confederate flags and monuments – long a part of the Southern landscape – have come under renewed scrutiny following the 2015 shooting by Dylann Roof of nine black churchgoers in South Carolina and the 2017 deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Supporters say the statues are a part of history honoring their ancestors; detractors say they, in effect, honor slavery and in many cases were erected during the Jim Crow era to intimidate black people and bolster white supremacy.

Confederate monuments dot the lawns of many Southern courthouses. In addition to the one in East Feliciana, a database compiled by the Southern Poverty Law Center lists 11 more in front of Louisiana courthouses.

Ben Cohen, a lawyer with the New Orleans-based Promise of Justice Initiative that advocates for reforming Louisiana’s criminal justice system, says so far it’s rare for defendants to use the legal argument Anderson is making.

Cohen represented a defendant appealing a conviction in a Caddo Parish murder case in which a prospective juror objected to the Confederate flag in front of the courthouse.

The state Supreme Court ultimately upheld the conviction but Cohen said he anticipates this argument being used more often.

“I think people are looking at these monuments in a new light,” he said.

Officials in Caddo Parish voted last October to remove theirs. They concluded that citizens would be better served if it was not in front of the courthouse “where justice is to be administered fairly and impartially.” A lawsuit stalled the move, but was recently dismissed by a federal judge.

The East Feliciana Parish District Attorney, Sam D’Aquilla says its “ridiculous” to think a statue would affect the fairness of Anderson’s trial and questions why an out-of-town defendant and lawyer are stirring up trouble in the primarily rural parish, located about 30 miles (48 kilometers) north of Baton Rouge. Anderson is from Plaquemines Parish to the southeast and was driving through when he was pulled over. His lawyer, Niles Haymer is based in Baton Rouge.

D’Aquilla said he doesn’t have an opinion on the statue but regardless of whether it’s there the people inside strive for colorblind justice. He also points out the racial diversity of the elected officials across the parish.

“All the elected officials that I know of, your judges, your clerk of court, your sheriff, we all strive for racial equality. And we work hard for that,” he said.

This is not the first time the East Feliciana Parish statue has come under scrutiny.

In 2016, retired physician Paul Jackson Jr. asked the parish to move the statue to a local Confederate cemetery. He says having the statue on the courthouse grounds signals that the Confederacy was for justice: “But it wasn’t. They’re for slavery obviously.”

His suggestion was debated during a parish meeting and ultimately rejected. Jackson said he lost two friends over the issue. He said he supports Anderson’s change-of-venue motion.

Lataya Johnson, who lives and works in the parish, sympathized with Anderson’s argument and dismissed the idea that most people don’t pay attention to the statue.

“You walk by and you think about it. Because if you’re African-American do you look at it and say, ‘My fate is already destined because of this statue … Judgment has already been made because of this statue,”’ she said.

But parish president Louis Kent said Anderson is “very mistaken” in believing he will not get a fair trial in East Feliciana.

“I have been in this parish all my life. We don’t have a race problem. We never have and we’re not going to create one,” he said.

Anderson’s lawyer, Niles Haymer, says he’s already heard from other lawyers interested in filing similar motions, and he may be filing the same motion for another client. For him, this case could become a catalyst for change. A hearing on the motion is expected Tuesday.

“I feel like if we flood the criminal justice system with these motions, they’re going to have to deal with this monument issue,” he said.
…

Portland police were accused Sunday of being heavy-handed against people protesting a rally by extreme-right demonstrators, reportedly injuring some counter-protesters and prompting the city’s new police chief to order a review of officers’ use of force.

Police in riot gear tried to keep the two groups apart, many of whom had come on Saturday dressed for battle in helmets and protective clothing. Dozens of the extreme-right protesters were bussed to Portland, one of America’s most liberal cities, from nearby Vancouver, Washington.

Saturday’s clashes were the most recent of several this year in the city as right-wing militants converged, met by counter-protesters, including members of anti-fascist, or “antifa,” groups. City officials have struggled with striking a balance between free speech and keeping events from spiraling out of control.

But on Saturday, some said police seemed to act mostly against those protesting the presence of the extreme-right demonstrators, using stun grenades and what appeared to be rubber bullets against them.

Police “targeted Portland residents peacefully counter-protesting against racist far-right groups, including white supremacists, white nationalists, and neo-Nazi gangs,” the Oregon chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Portland chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America said in a statement. It called on officials to investigate.

Police ordered the counter-protesters to disperse, then moved in behind a volley of stun grenades. One of the rounds reportedly hit a counter-protester in the head, becoming embedded in his helmet and injuring him. One woman was taken to a hospital after being hit in the arm and chest with a “flash-bang” grenade, local media reported. The blasts echoed through downtown Portland.

Four people were arrested.

Police Chief Danielle Outlaw, who assumed command less than a year ago as Portland’s first African-American female police chief, said in a statement Sunday she takes all use-of-force cases seriously.

Outlaw directed the professional standards division to begin gathering evidence to determine if the force used was within policy and training guidelines. The Office of Independent Police Review will be provided with the information for review and investigation.

Saturday’s incidents started with demonstrators aligned with Patriot Prayer and an affiliated group, the Proud Boys, gathering in a riverfront park. The Proud Boys has been characterized as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is “dedicated to fighting hate and bigotry and to seeking justice for the most vulnerable members of society.”

Hundreds of counter-demonstrators faced them from across the street, holding banners and signs with messages such as “Alt right scum not welcome in Portland.” Some chanted “Nazis go home.”

Officers stood in the middle of a four-lane boulevard, essentially forming a wall to keep the two sides separated.

The counter-protesters were made up of a coalition of labor unions, immigrant rights advocates, democratic socialists and other groups.

Patriot Prayer also has held rallies in many other cities around the U.S. West, including Berkeley, California, that have drawn violent reactions.

Saturday’s rally, organized by Patriot Prayer leader Joey Gibson, was the third to roil Portland this summer. Two previous events ended in bloody fistfights and riots.

Gibson disputed the group’s classification as a hate group.

“We’re here to promote freedom and God. That’s it,” Gibson told Portland TV station KGW. “Our country is getting soft.”
…

President Donald Trump on Sunday acknowledged that the 2016 Trump Tower meeting between a Kremlin-connected lawyer and his son was to collect information about his political opponent, casting new light on a moment central to the special counsel’s Russia probe.

Trump, amid a series of searing tweets sent from his New Jersey golf club, tore into two of his favorite targets, the news media and Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation into possible links between the president’s campaign and Russia. Trump unleashed particularly fury at reports that he was anxious about the Trump Tower meeting attended by Donald Trump Jr. and other senior campaign officials.

“Fake News reporting, a complete fabrication, that I am concerned about the meeting my wonderful son, Donald, had in Trump Tower,” Trump wrote. “This was a meeting to get information on an opponent, totally legal and done all the time in politics – and it went nowhere. I did not know about it!”

But 13 months ago, Trump gave a far different explanation for the meeting. A July 2017 statement dictated by the president read: “We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago.”

But since then, the story about the meeting has changed several times, eventually forced by the discovery of emails between the president’s eldest son and an intermediary from the Russian government offering damaging information about Trump’s opponent, Hillary Clinton. Betraying no surprise or misgivings about the offer from a hostile foreign power, Trump Jr. replied: “If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer.”

Sunday’s tweet was Trump’s clearest statement yet on the purpose of the meeting, which has become a focal point of Mueller’s investigation even as the president and his lawyers try to downplay its significance and pummel the Mueller probe with attacks. On Sunday, Trump again suggested without evidence that Mueller was biased against him, declaring, “This is the most one sided Witch Hunt in the history of our country.”

And as Trump and his allies have tried to discredit the probe, a new talking point has emerged: that even if that meeting was held to collect damaging information, none was provided and “collusion” — Trump’s go-to description of what Mueller is investigating — never occurred.

“The question is what law, statute or rule or regulation has been violated, and nobody has pointed to one,” said Jay Sekulow, one of Trump’s attorneys, on ABC’s “This Week.”

But legal experts have pointed out several possible criminal charges, including conspiracy against the United States and aiding and abetting a conspiracy. And despite Trump’s public Twitter denial, the president has expressed worry that his son may face legal exposure even as he believes he did nothing wrong, according to three people close to the White House familiar with the president’s thinking but not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations.

Sekulow acknowledged that the public explanation for the meeting has changed but insisted that the White House has been very clear with the special counsel’s office. He said he was not aware of Trump Jr. facing any legal exposure.

“I don’t represent Don Jr.,” Sekulow said, “but I will tell you I have no knowledge at all of Don Jr. being told that he’s a target of any investigation, and I have no knowledge of him being interviewed by the special counsel.”

Trump’s days of private anger spilled out into public with the Twitter outburst, which comes at a perilous time for the president.

A decision about whether he sits for an interview with Mueller may also occur in the coming weeks, according to another one of his attorneys, Rudy Giuliani. Trump has seethed against what he feels are trumped-up charges against his former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, whose trial began last week and provided a visible reminder of Mueller’s work.

And he raged against the media’s obsession with his links to Russia and the status of Michael Cohen, his former fixer, who is under federal investigation in New York. Cohen has indicated that he would tell prosecutors that Trump knew about the Trump Tower meeting ahead of time.

Despite a show of force from his national security team this week as a warning against future Russian election meddling, Trump again deemed the matter a “hoax” this week. And at a trio of rallies, he escalated his already vitriolic rhetoric toward the media, savaging the press for unflattering coverage and, he feels, bias.

“The Fake News hates me saying that they are the Enemy of the People only because they know it’s TRUE,” Trump tweeted Sunday. “I am providing a great service by explaining this to the American People. They purposely cause great division & distrust. They can also cause War! They are very dangerous & sick!”

The fusillade of tweets came from Bedminster, Trump’s golf course, where he is ensconced in a property that bears his name at every turn and is less checked in by staffers. It was at the New Jersey golf club where a brooding Trump has unleashed other inflammatory attacks and where, in spring 2017, he made the final decision to fire FBI Director James Comey, the move that triggered the Russia probe.

Trump was joined for his Saturday rally in Ohio by former White House communications director Hope Hicks, who departed the administration earlier this year. Her unannounced presence raised some eyebrows as Hicks has been interviewed by Mueller and was part of the team of staffers that helped draft the original statement on the Trump Tower meeting.

Multiple White House officials have been interviewed while still working at the White House and have remained in contact with the president.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday defended the 2016 meeting his oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., held  with a Kremlin-linked lawyer to “get information” on his opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton, saying it was “totally legal and done all the time in politics.”

In his most definitive statement on the meeting at his Trump Tower campaign headquarters in New York, Trump said on Twitter that he did not know about the talks ahead of time that his son held with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and that the meeting “went nowhere.”

President Trump a year ago dictated a misleading statement about the meeting his son held with Veselnitskaya, saying it was about the adoption of Russian children. The younger Trump later acknowledged that the meeting was set up on the premise that the Trump campaign would get incriminating information about Clinton, saying in one email that he would “love it” to get the anti-Clinton material.

Trump called news accounts in recent days “a complete fabrication” that he was concerned about the legal liability his son could face for arranging the Trump Tower meeting.

Trump’s latest denial that he knew ahead of time about the meeting comes in the face of news accounts saying his former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, is prepared to tell special counsel Robert Mueller that he heard Trump’s son tell his father in advance about the meeting.

“Too bad a large portion of the Media refuses to report the lies and corruption having to do with the Rigged Witch Hunt — but that is why we call them FAKE NEWS!” Trump said.

Mueller is in the midst of a 15-month investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Trump campaign ties to Russia and whether Trump, as president, obstructed justice by trying to thwart the investigation. Trump has repeatedly denied collusion with Russia or any other wrongdoing.

The term “collusion” is not mentioned in the U.S. legal code of criminal offenses, but Mueller is believed to be investigating whether anyone in the Trump campaign coordinated with Russian officials, which could result in criminal charges if they conspired to interfere with the election.

Trump railed again Sunday about Mueller’s probe, calling it “the most one sided Witch Hunt in the history of our country. Fortunately, the facts are all coming out, and fast!” 

In the midst of a working vacation at his Bedminster golf resort in New Jersey, Trump also unleashed a new barrage of attacks on the national news media, saying it was “very dangerous & sick!”

Trump’s latest offensive against stories he does not like about his 18-month presidency came hours after he rallied supporters in the Midwestern state of Ohio. He campaigned for a Republican candidate facing a tough race Tuesday for a seat in the House of Representatives, the last special election before the nationwide November 6 voting, when the entire 435-member House is being contested and a third of the 100-member Senate.

Republicans have held the seat in a suburban enclave just outside the Ohio capital of Columbus for three decades, but fear losing it could presage loss of their majority House bloc in the November voting.

“They’re talking about this blue wave,” Trump said referring to way Democrats are depicted on electoral maps. Shaking his head, he added, “I don’t think so. I don’t think so.”

Trump described the Republican candidate, state legislator Troy Balderson, as “really smart” and a “really hard worker,” while disparaging his Democratic opponent, local official Danny O’Connor, as a would-be pawn of national Democratic officials and “a low-level person that did nothing.”

On Sunday, Trump also defended tariffs he has imposed on imports into the U.S.

“Tariffs are working big time,” he tweeted. “Every country on earth wants to take wealth out of the U.S., always to our detriment. I say, as they come,Tax them. If they don’t want to be taxed, let them make or build the product in the U.S. In either event, it means jobs and great wealth.” 

He claimed the tariffs would help pay down “large of the $21 Trillion in debt that has been accumulated” and “At minimum, we will make much better Trade Deals for our country.”
…

U.S. President Donald Trump, in the midst of a working vacation, unleashed a new barrage of attacks on the national news media Sunday, saying it was “very dangerous & sick!”

“The Fake News hates me saying that they are the Enemy of the People only because they know it’s TRUE,” Trump tweeted from his Bedminster golf resort in New Jersey. “I am providing a great service by explaining this to the American People. They purposely cause great division & distrust. They can also cause War!”

Trump called news accounts “a complete fabrication” that he was concerned about the legal liability his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., could face for arranging a June 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer said to have dirt on Trump’s opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton.

“This was a meeting to get information on an opponent, totally legal and done all the time in politics – and it went nowhere,” Trump said on Twitter. “I did not know about it!”

The president has denied knowledge of the meeting at his Trump Tower campaign headquarters in New York in the face of news accounts saying his former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, is prepared to tell special counsel Robert Mueller that he heard Trump’s son tell his father in advance about the meeting.

“Too bad a large portion of the Media refuses to report the lies and corruption having to do with the Rigged Witch Hunt – but that is why we call them FAKE NEWS!” Trump said.

Mueller is in the midst of a 15-month investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Trump campaign ties to Russia and whether Trump, as president, obstructed justice by trying to thwart the investigation. Trump has repeatedly denied collusion with Russia or any other wrongdoing.

Trump railed again Sunday about Mueller’s probe, calling it “the most one sided Witch Hunt in the history of our country. Fortunately, the facts are all coming out, and fast!”

Trump’s latest offensive against stories he does not like about his 18-month presidency came hours after he rallied supporters in the midwestern state of Ohio. He campaigned for a Republican candidate facing a tough race Tuesday for a seat in the House of Representatives, the last special election before the nationwide November 6 voting, when the entire 435-member House is being contested and a third of the 100-member Senate.

Republicans have held the seat in a suburban enclave just outside the Ohio capital of Columbus for three decades, but fear losing it could presage loss of their majority House bloc in the November voting.

“They’re talking about this blue wave,” Trump said referring to way Democrats are depicted on electoral maps. Shaking his head, he added, “I don’t think so. I don’t think so.”

Trump described the Republican candidate, state legislator Troy Balderson, as “really smart” and a “really hard worker,” while disparaging his Democratic opponent, local official Danny O’Connor, as a would-be pawn of national Democratic officials and “a low-level person that did nothing.”

On Sunday, Trump also defended tariffs he has imposed on imports into the U.S.

“Tariffs are working big time,” he tweeted. “Every country on earth wants to take wealth out of the U.S., always to our detriment. I say, as they come,Tax them. If they don’t want to be taxed, let them make or build the product in the U.S. In either event, it means jobs and great wealth.”

He claimed that “because of Tariffs we will be able to start paying down large amounts of the $21 Trillion in debt that has been accumulated, much by the Obama Administration, while at the same time reducing taxes for our people. At minimum, we will make much better Trade Deals for our country.”

​
…

President Donald Trump’s strategy of becoming aggressively involved in the midterm elections is prompting concern among some Republicans who worry he’s complicating the political calculus for GOP candidates trying to outrun his popularity.

Those Republicans worry their statewide candidates may rise or fall based on Trump’s standing, muddling their path to maintain control of Congress.

But Trump has no plans to step out of the spotlight. He held a rally Saturday night in Ohio and plans to host two fundraisers at the Trump National Golf Course in Bedminster, New Jersey, next week, benefitting Senate and House candidates, according to a campaign official with knowledge of the president’s events. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details about the fundraisers that haven’t yet been publicly released.

​Star of the midterms

The president is casting himself as the star of the midterms, eagerly inserting himself into hotly contested primaries, headlining rallies in pivotal swing states and increasing his fundraising efforts for Republicans. Last week, Trump agreed to donate a portion of his re-election fund to 100 GOP candidates running in competitive House and Senate races.

He’s expected to be even more aggressive in the fall. White House officials say he’s reserving time on his schedule for a midterm travel and fundraising schedule likely to surpass that of former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

“This is now about Donald Trump,” said Al Cardenas, a former Florida Republican chairman. “It’s a high-risk, high-stakes proposition.”

Enough to win?

The question facing Republicans is whether turning out those Trump loyalists is enough to win in toss-up congressional districts or if their path to victory depends more on capturing a share of independents and suburban women turned off by Trump’s tumultuous first term. It’s a dilemma they will confront in 2018 and beyond.

“If we lose the governor’s race for the first time in 20 years, all of a sudden President Trump’s chances of winning in 2020 diminish with a Democratic governor,” Cardenas said. “You can’t win a presidential election if you’re a Republican without winning Florida.”

Trump aides argue no one energizes Republicans like the president, pointing to the throngs of thousands who wait in long lines to attend his rallies — he’s held 17 since taking office. The aides say the White House is taking a two-pronged approach, sending Trump to mobilize the base while other officials, such as his daughter Ivanka, can generate local headlines and help with voters who may not like the president’s aggressive style. The goal is to ensure that the occasional voters who turned out for Trump in 2016 cast ballots in the midterms.

​Worrisome signs

But there are some signs that Trump’s unpopularity with the general electorate may hamper more than help individual Republican candidates.

While Republicans have won a series of special elections since Trump took office, they’ve captured smaller margins than in previous years.

The GOP is worried about a special congressional election Tuesday in a central Ohio district that Trump won by 11 percentage points in 2016. A Monmouth University poll released this week showed the race tightening, leaving Republican Troy Balderson with a 1-point edge. The survey found 46 percent of likely voters approved of Trump, while 49 percent disapproved.

Hoping to shore up GOP support, Trump is hosting a rally in the district Saturday night. His visit follows a Monday stop by Vice President Mike Pence.

The president’s team keeps a close eye on data assessing whether Americans believe the country is headed in the right direction under Trump. And they point to Trump’s strength among Republican voters and an upbeat attitude about the nation’s economic climate as evidence Republicans will avoid the rough midterm elections that have afflicted previous administrations.

But some Republicans warn Trump’s outsized media presence drowns out the messages of congressional candidates, who believe the path to victory lies with a focus on local issues, the Republican tax cuts and the prospect of Nancy Pelosi becoming House speaker again. In Ohio, Balderson and his GOP allies have tried to tie Democrat Danny O’Connor to Pelosi. O’Connor has repeatedly said he would like to see a new generation of leadership in the House.

“Part of the reason why the Nancy Pelosi attacks are so important is that they’re a way to motivate the Republicans who might not love Trump,” said Ohio GOP strategist Terry Casey.

Democrats energized

Still, Republicans are often forced to fend off questions about Trump-sparked controversies. In recent days, Trump publicly mused about a government shutdown sometime in the fall — a possibility that Republican congressional leaders fear would significantly hamper their electoral prospects.

In Pennsylvania on Thursday, Trump said he was “little bit torn” about whether it would be better to shut down the government before or after the midterm elections to secure funding for his border wall. 

“Whether it’s before or after, we are getting it or we are closing down government,” he told thousands of supporters at a rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pa.

That kind of uncertainty only serves to further embolden Trump’s opposition, say Democrats.

“Clearly he lights the fire when it comes to energized Democrats,” said Ohio Democratic party chairman David Pepper. “He’s going to come and give a rambling, over-the-top speech that has nothing to do with this district or Troy Balderson. It may hurt more than it helps.”

The president’s decision to intervene in recent GOP primaries is also raising concerns among some state party officials and politicians, who fear he’s siding with candidates who could prove weaker in general elections. Trump has relished doling out endorsements, sometimes blasting out several a day, even for those who don’t need his backing right now.

On Thursday, he tweeted support for Rep. Steve Stivers, an Ohio congressman who chairs the campaign committee for the House GOP, urging people to back him in a primary contest next week. Stivers’ primary was held in May and he ran unopposed. The tweet was quickly deleted.

​Winning streak

The president has compiled a winning streak in recent primaries in which he has endorsed, helping favored candidates in South Carolina, Alabama and Georgia.

His rally this week in Tampa, Florida, represented his most ambitious attempt to nationalize two races crucial to Republicans’ midterm hopes.

Trump stood onstage with Rep. Ron DeSantis, a 39-year-old three-term congressman, imploring his supporters to back his campaign for governor. DeSantis was little-known to Republican voters until Trump first tweeted support for him in December. Since then, he’s made his ties to Trump a centerpiece of his primary race, focused on Fox News appearances and ads. In recent weeks, he’s opened up a double-digit lead against state Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, a longtime fixture in Florida politics.

DeSantis said he was grateful for Trump’s support but added, “I appreciate more the leadership you’re showing for our great country.”

The president also repeatedly praised Gov. Rick Scott, a Trump ally running for Senate, and attacked his opponent, Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson. Trump, who spends winter weekends at his estate in Palm Beach, claimed the only time he sees the senator is “five months before every election.”

“After a while, you forget who’s the senator,” Trump said.
…

The first week of Paul Manafort’s trial ended Friday, with prosecutors calling a bevy of witnesses to testify about the former Trump campaign chairman’s alleged financial crimes. 

Manafort, 69, is accused of filing false tax returns, failing to disclose foreign bank accounts to U.S. authorities, and obtaining fraudulent bank loans after his earnings dried up from his political consultancy business for pro-Russia politicians. 

The trial is the first to arise from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and whether Donald Trump’s campaign colluded with Moscow. 

Manafort’s former business partner, Rick Gates, who was indicted along with Manafort, has pleaded guilty and has become a cooperating witness. Manafort’s lawyers, through their opening statement and cross-examination of witnesses, sought to pin the blame on Gates.

Here are highlights from the first four days of the trial:

Day 1: The trial started with the selection of a jury of six men and six women pulled from a pool of several dozen randomly summoned citizens. Manafort’s fate rests in their hands.

Prosecutors and defense lawyers then delivered their opening statements to the jury, laying out their sides of the story.

Prosecutor Uzo Asonye said Manafort committed tax and bank fraud, believing “the law did not apply to him.”

Manafort’s lawyers responded by blaming the crimes on Gates. “We’re primarily here because of one man. That man is Rick Gates,” defense lawyer Thomas Zehnle said in his opening statement.

The day featured testimony from the prosecution’s first witness, Tad Devine, a Democratic political consultant who worked with Manafort on campaigns in Ukraine. His testimony was aimed at demonstrating that Manafort worked for the Party of Regions and its leader, former Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych.

Day 2: The second day of the trial was focused on Manafort’s lavish lifestyle, with testimonies aimed at showing his taste for luxury and establishing his need for money and motive to commit fraud.

Several vendors, including a high-end New York men’s clothier, a landscaper and a home technology executive, testified how Manafort spent millions of dollars on luxury goods and services, almost always paying with wire transfers from foreign accounts.

Admonished by the judge on Tuesday that “it isn’t a crime to make a lot of money and be profligate in your spending,” prosecutor Asonye said that while it isn’t “a crime to have a lot of money,” it is a crime to not pay taxes.

Asonye made a stir on Wednesday by suggesting Gates might not be asked to take the stand. But prosecutors later put the speculation to rest, saying they had “every intention” of calling Gates to testify.

Day 3: The prosecution’s focus shifted on the third day of the trial from Manafort’s extravagant lifestyle to his financial history, and how he kept his bookkeepers and tax preparers in the dark about his overseas accounts.

Longtime Manafort bookkeeper Heather Washkuhn took the stand, testifying that she did not know about Manafort’s foreign bank accounts and relied on him for determining whether to report something as income or a loan. Contradicting the defense’s argument that Manafort was too busy to be involved in his finances, she said Manafort “approved every penny of everything we paid.”

Day 4: Accountants Philip Ayliff and Cindy Laporte, who prepared Manafort’s tax returns for several years, testified that they had no knowledge that Manafort controlled foreign corporate entities and bank accounts. They told the jury they asked Manafort every year about his foreign holdings and he told them he had none.

Laporte testified that she changed Manafort’s tax return in 2014 to lower his taxes by as much as $500,000 and two years later helped him falsify documents in order to get bank loans.

Like several other witnesses, Laporte has been given immunity from prosecution in exchange for her testimony.

Defense lawyer Kevin Downing questioned the prosecution’s claim that Manafort willfully hid his foreign accounts from his financial advisers, saying the firm kept documents containing details about them. “Only a fool would give that information to his accountant if he was trying to conceal it” from the Internal Revenue Service, Downing said.

The trial resumes on Monday afternoon with the cross-examination of Laporte by defense lawyers.
…

Small scuffles broke out Saturday as police in Portland, Oregon, deployed “flash bang” devices and other means to disperse hundreds of right-wing and self-described anti-fascist protesters.

Just before 2 p.m., police in riot gear ordered people to leave an area downtown, saying demonstrators had thrown rocks and bottles at officers.

“Get out of the street,” police announced via loudspeaker.

There were arrests, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many. There was also debris left in the streets by various protesters.

Demonstrators aligned with Patriot Prayer and an affiliated group, the Proud Boys, gathered around midday in a riverfront park.

The hundreds of opposing demonstrators faced them from across the street, holding banners and signs. Many of them yelled out chants such as “Nazis, go home.”

Officers stood in the middle of the four-lane boulevard, essentially forming a wall to keep the two sides separated.

The counterprotesters were made up of a coalition of labor unions, immigrant rights advocates, democratic socialists and other groups. They included people dressed as clowns and a brass band blaring music.

The rally organized by Patriot Prayer leader Joey Gibson was the third to roil Portland this summer. Two previous events ended in bloody fistfights and riots, and one counterprotester was sent to the hospital with a skull fracture.

This time, Gibson changed the venue from a federal plaza outside U.S. District Court to a waterfront park so some of his Oregon supporters could carry concealed weapons as they demonstrated.

Protesters saw a significant police presence that included bomb-sniffing dogs and weapons-screening checkpoints. In a statement, police said weapons might be seized if there was a violation of law and added that it is illegal in Portland to carry a loaded firearm in public unless a person has a valid Oregon concealed-handgun license. Many protesters were expected to be from out of state.

Gibson’s insistence on bringing his supporters repeatedly to this politically liberal city has crystallized a debate about the limits of free speech in an era of stark political division. Patriot Prayer also has held rallies in many other cities around the U.S. West, including Berkeley, California, that have drawn violent reactions.

But the Portland events have taken on outsized significance after a Patriot Prayer sympathizer was charged with fatally stabbing two men who came to the defense of two young black women — one in a hijab — whom the attacker was accused of harassing on a light-rail train in May 2017.

A coalition of community organizations and a group representing more than 50 tribes warned of the potential for even greater violence than in previous rallies if participants carried guns. The coalition called on officials to denounce what it called “the racist and sexist violence” of Patriot Prayer and protect the city.

Gibson, who is running a long-shot campaign to unseat Democratic U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington state, said in a live video on Facebook earlier this week that he wouldn’t stop bringing his followers to Portland until they could express their right-wing views without interference.

“I refuse to do what Portland wants me to do, because what Portland wants me to do is to shut up and never show up again. So, yeah, I refuse to do that, but I will not stop going in, and I will not stop pushing, and I will not stop marching until the people of Portland realize that and realize that their methods do not work,” he said.

Self-described anti-fascists, or “antifa,” have been organizing anonymously online to confront Patriot Prayer and the Proud Boys in the streets.

 A broader counterprotest organized by a coalition of labor unions, immigrant rights groups and artists planned to gather at City Hall before the Patriot Prayer rally. Organizers say that while Patriot Prayer denies being a white supremacist group, it affiliates itself with known white supremacists, white nationalists and neo-Nazi gangs.

“Patriot Prayer is continuing to commit violence in our city, and their events are becoming more and more violent,” said Effie Baum of Pop Mob, a coalition of community groups organizing the counterdemonstration. “Leaving them a small group to attack in the streets is only going to allow them to perpetuate their violence.”

Dueling protests a month ago ended with Portland police declaring a riot and arresting four people. A similar Patriot Prayer event on June 4 devolved into fistfights and assaults by both sides as police struggled to keep the groups apart.
…

The Washington Post is reporting that an alleged Russian agent who cultivated close ties with U.S. gun rights groups was also socializing with a former Trump aide in the weeks before the presidential election.

The paper said Maria Butina sought out interactions with J.D. Gordon, who served for six months as the Trump campaign’s director of national security and who was later offered a job with the presidential transition team. It said the two exchanged several emails in September and October 2016 and said Butina also attended Gordon’s birthday party in October 2016.

The Post says the new information puts Butina in closer contact with the Trump campaign than was previously known.

Prosecutors say Butina, 29, who was a graduate student at American University, attempted to infiltrate U.S. political organizations at the direction of a senior Russian official.

When asked by the Post for comment, Gordon said his contacts with Butina were innocuous.

“From everything I’ve read since her arrest last month, it seems the Maria Butina saga is basically a sensationalized click bait story meant to smear a steady stream of Republicans and NRA members she reportedly encountered over the past few years,” he said in a statement to the paper.

Federal prosecutors accuse Butina of conspiring with two American citizens, one of whom she cohabited with, and a top Russian official to influence U.S. policy toward Russia by infiltrating the National Rifle Association gun rights group and other conservative special interest groups potentially influential on the Trump administration.

Butina was charged last month with acting as an agent for the Kremlin, but was not formally charged with espionage, most likely because her role was not to steal state and military secrets but allegedly to insinuate her way into U.S. political circles to advance Russia’s policy aims.

Butina’s lawyer, Robert Driscoll, denied in a statement that she was “an agent of the Russian Federation.” He described Butina as a Russian national in the U.S. on a student visa.
…

An accountant for Paul Manafort, U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, testified Friday that she prepared his tax returns despite her concerns about the propriety of classifying money he had transferred from overseas as loans.

U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis asked the accountant, Cynthia Laporta, whether she was testifying under an immunity agreement with the government because she was concerned that she could be prosecuted. She answered, “Correct.”

Laporta testified she knew an accounting treatment for a loan was wrong when preparing Manafort’s tax return for 2014. “I very much regret it,” she told the courtroom.

Her testimony came on the trial’s fourth day as prosecutors sought to drive home their case that Manafort tried to hide millions of dollars he earned working for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine. Manafort, 69, has pleaded not guilty to charges of bank fraud, tax fraud and failing to disclose foreign bank accounts.

The trial in federal court in Alexandria is the first arising from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. election.

Both Laporta and fellow accountant Philip Ayliff, her predecessor who handled Manafort’s tax filings at the firm KWC, testified that they had no knowledge that Manafort controlled foreign bank accounts. Such accounts must be reported to tax authorities if they contain $10,000 or more.

Laporta said she asked Manafort directly about any such holdings and was told there were none.

Prosecutors have tried to make their case first by presenting testimony about Manafort’s lavish lifestyle and then detailing his financial maneuvering.

Defense attorneys have signaled they will seek to blame the financial charges against Manafort on his business partner, Rick Gates, who was Trump’s deputy campaign chairman in the 2016 presidential election.

Alleged order from Gates

Laporta testified that Gates, in a conference call with her and another accountant at the firm, instructed them to alter a loan amount to lower Manafort’s tax bill because it was too high for Manafort to pay.

“Rick said it was too high” and that Manafort “didn’t have that money,” Laporta said in response questions by prosecutor Uzo Asonye.

Gates, who pleaded guilty in February of conspiracy and lying to the FBI, is cooperating with Mueller’s probe, and is expected to testify later in the trial.

The charges against Manafort largely predate the five months he worked for Trump, some of them as campaign chairman, during a pivotal period in the race for the White House.

Trial consultant Roy Futterman, who is following the trial but not involved in it, said, “The prosecution is doing a very good job of keeping a brisk pace, putting witnesses on for short direct examinations, keeping it lively and keeping very tight messages for each witness.”

Manafort’s defense attorneys do not seem to have scored a lot of points on cross-examination, Futterman said, but added that the witnesses who have testified so far are not “the main targets.”

Prosecutors asked Ayliff about Manafort’s accounting of a $1.5 million transfer in 2012 from Peranova Holdings Ltd. as a loan, even as records showed that no interest or principal was paid on it in subsequent years. Peranova is one of numerous Cypriot entities that prosecutors have said Manafort controlled.

Ayliff testified that KWC did not know Manafort controlled Peranova, and that if the transfer was a payment related to his consulting work, it would have been treated as income — not as a loan — on his tax returns.

Kevin Downing, Manafort’s attorney, signaled Friday that his defense strategy might also involve raising questions about whether Manafort in fact had willfully deceived his accountants. One way to do that could be to show that documents Manafort had provided to the accountant contained details about foreign bank accounts.

“Only a fool would give that information to his accountant if he was trying to conceal it” from the Internal Revenue Service, Downing said, referring to whether the accountant had names of the Cyprus-based entities in his files and had retained them for his records.

Late on Thursday, Manafort filed an objection to the government’s bid to block his legal team from raising the fact that he and his companies were never audited by the IRS. Mueller’s team has argued that any such civil action is separate from the criminal charges at hand.
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Less than two months after a landmark U.S.-North Korea summit in  Singapore, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo flew back to the city state on Friday and suggested that continued work on weapons programs by North Korea was inconsistent with its leader’s commitment to denuclearize.

Pompeo was asked en route to Singapore about his statement in the U.S. Senate last month that North Korea was continuing to make bomb fuel and reports that North Korea, led by Kim Jong Un, was building new missiles.

“Chairman Kim made a commitment to denuclearize,” Pompeo told reporters. “The world demanded that they [North Korea] do so in the U.N. Security Council resolutions. To the extent they are behaving in a manner inconsistent with that, they are a) in violation of one or both the U.N. Security Council resolutions and b) we can see we still have a ways to go to achieve the ultimate outcome we’re looking for.”

Pompeo thanked ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) at a meeting in Singapore for their efforts in enforcing sanctions on North Korea.

In a landmark summit with U.S. President Donald Trump in Singapore on June 12, Kim, who is seeking relief from tough sanctions, committed to work towards denuclearization, but Pyongyang has offered no details on how it might go about this.

Pompeo told a Senate committee hearing on July 25 that North Korea was continuing to produce fuel for nuclear bombs in spite of its pledge.

Renewed activity

On Monday, a senior U.S. official said U.S. spy satellites had detected renewed activity at the North Korean factory that produced the country’s first intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States.

The Washington Post reported on Monday that North Korea appeared to be building one or two new liquid-fueled intercontinental ballistic missiles at the research facility, citing unidentified officials familiar with intelligence reporting.

North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho is also in Singapore and will attend the same regional meeting as Pompeo on Saturday, but the State Department has not said whether the two will meet.

Following his talks with Ri, China’s top diplomat, State Councillor Wang Yi, said he hoped North Korea and the United States would continue to move forward to implement their leaders’ agreement.

“China all along has believed that the consensus reached by U.S. and North Korea’s leaders meeting in Singapore is very precious,” Wang told reporters.

“That is, at the same time as realizing denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, to establish a peace mechanism. This direction is without a doubt correct,” he said.

China is North Korea’s most important economic and diplomatic supporter and fought for the North in the 1950-53 Korean War against the U.S.-led United Nations forces that backed South Korea.

Previous talks

Pompeo, who has led the U.S. negotiating effort with North Korea, visited Pyongyang from July 5-7 for inclusive talks aimed at agreeing a  denuclearization roadmap. Pompeo said at the time he had made progress on key issues, only for North Korea to accuse his delegation hours later of making “gangster-like” demands.

Trump hailed the Singapore summit as a success and went as far as saying that North Korea no longer posed a nuclear threat, but questions have been mounting about Pyongyang’s willingness to give up its weapons programs.

Trump has pointed to North Korea’s freeze on nuclear and missile tests and its agreement to return the remains of American troops killed in the 1950-53 Korea War.

The White House said on Thursday Trump had received a letter from Kim and had responded with a note that should be delivered shortly. But it said no second meeting was currently planned.
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China warned Friday it would impose new tariffs on $60 billion worth of U.S. goods if the Trump administration follows through with its latest trade threats.

The Commerce Ministry said the proposed tariffs of 5 percent to 25 percent on more than 5,200 U.S. goods are restrained and maintained it has the right to take retaliatory action in the escalating trade war between the world’s two largest economies.

China’s warning came shortly after U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met Friday with Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Singapore. The two men did not speak to the press after the meeting, and reporters were ushered out of the room before the talks began.

On Thursday, the Chinese Foreign Minister told reporters the U.S. needed to calm down and consider its own consumers, responding to threats by the Trump administration to raise its proposed tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods from the initially planned 10 percent to 25 percent. Wang Yi said raising tariffs would hurt U.S. consumers and businesses located in China.

“Instead of achieving one’s own goal by doing this, we believe it will only hurt one’s own interests,” said Wang.

The U.S. says it wants China to stop stealing U.S. corporate secrets and stop subsidizing Chinese companies with cheap loans that give them an unfair advantage.

Natural disasters

Before meeting with Wang, Pompeo co-chaired an ASEAN ministerial meeting with Singapore’s Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan. Pompeo started off by expressing his sorrow for a number of devastating natural disasters in the region.

“On behalf of the United States, let me also offer my condolences to the people of Laos for the loss of life and devastation caused by the dam breach,” said Pompeo.

He said the U.S. government is providing assistance to respond to this disaster and welcomes the support already provided by the ASEAN Humanitarian Assistance Center. Pompeo also expressed his condolences to Indonesia, where a powerful earthquake struck; and to Myanmar, for the casualties suffered in recent flooding and landslides.

Security issues

Economic opportunities in the Indo-Pacific region are a major focus of Pompeo’s visit, but security issues also are high on the agenda of the ASEAN meetings, as Pompeo made clear.

“On security, we appreciate ASEAN’s ongoing efforts to promote peace and stability in the region, support the rule of law in the South China Sea, and to strictly enforce sanctions on North Korea. We are also working with ASEAN member-states to counter the threat of terrorism and violent extremism in the region.”

Pompeo wrapped up a full day with a meeting with Singapore’s prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, at the Istana in Singapore.

Malaysia visit

He started his Southeast Asia tour Thursday in Malaysia.

Pompeo was the first senior U.S. official to visit Malaysia since Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad took office following a May election dubbed “quite historic” by a senior State Department official. Pompeo met with Mahathir early Friday, and congratulated the people of Malaysia on their democratic transition.

It was the first stop of his Asian tour, focused on promoting free trade and pressuring North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons. After holding ASEAN meetings in Singapore, Pompeo will head to Indonesia.

Detained pastor

Earlier Friday in Singapore, Pompeo met with his Turkish counterpart in an effort to obtain the release of Andrew Brunson, a detained U.S. pastor who Turkey accuses of backing terrorism. The Trump administration has placed sanctions on Turkish officials because of Brunson’s detention. Turkey says the sanctions are unacceptable.

Pompeo and Mevlut Cavusoglu met on the sidelines of a meeting of regional ministers in Singapore.

The top U.S. diplomat said “Brunson needs to come home, as do all the Americans being held by the Turkish government. Pretty straightforward. They’ve been holding these folks for a long time. These are innocent people.”

Turkey has also detained three Turkish employees of the U.S. consulate in Istanbul.

The Turkish foreign ministry has called the sanctions a “disrespectful intervention in our legal system” that would harm “the constructive efforts toward resolving problems between the two countries.”

Wayne Lee, William Gallo and Fern Robinson contributed to this report.
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