Category Archives: News

Worldwide news. News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different media: word of mouth, printing, postal systems, broadcasting, electronic communication, or through the testimony of observers and witnesses to events. News is sometimes called “hard news” to differentiate it from soft media

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New Gene Editing Tool May Yield Bigger Harvests

Bread and chocolate are staples of the American diet. And a scientific team in California is working hard to make sure the plants they’re made from are as robust as possible. They’re using a recently discovered bacterial gene-editing tool called CRISPR to create more pest-resistant crops.

CRISPR is a feature of the bacterial defense system. The microbes use it like a molecular pair of scissors, to precisely snip out viral infections in their DNA.

Scientists at the Innovative Genomics Institute in Berkeley, California, are using CRISPR to manipulate plant DNA. Managing director, Susan Jenkins, says the technique is so much faster and precise than other plant transformation methods, it will likely increase the speed of creating new plant varieties by years, if not decades. “What CRISPR is going to allow,” she explains, “is for us to go in and make these changes, and then within one generation of the plant actually have the trait we want.”

Rust-resistant wheat

 

While CRISPR speeds up plant breeding, Jenkins says it’s not a magic wand — changing a plant takes a lot of steps. She points to the Institute’s efforts to develop a wheat variety that resists a fungal rust that can reduce yields by nearly 50 percent.

First, scientists had to figure out just which gene was making the wheat vulnerable to fungal rust. Then they used CRISPR to remove that gene.

“So in this case, we use CRISPR to actually knock out a gene that is in the wheat,” Jenkins says. And because “snipping out” a gene does not add foreign material to a plant, last week, the USDA ruled that gene-changing methods like this do not require special regulatory approval.

 

Plant transformation expert Myeong-Je Cho says they started with a single gene-edited rust-resistant wheat cell, and grew it in the lab into wheat “clones” for further testing. After just over a year, some clones are now stalks of wheat, and Cho adds, “we have grownup plants in the greenhouse,” complete with normal stalks and robust seed heads.

While the Institute introduced no foreign genetic material into the wheat, CRISPR technology can also be used to introduce genes, even genes from other species, as is done with more traditional GMO crops. However, in standard GMO techniques, scientists use a “shotgun” approach to force new genes into a plant’s DNA in random places. Then, they choose which random change is most likely to grow healthy plants. In contrast, CRISPR is used when scientists want to add a specific gene at a specific location in the DNA. CRISPR offers that level of precision.

Protecting cacao trees

The bacterial gene known as Cas9 evolved to snip viruses out of bacterial DNA. Now Institute scientists want to use it to fight a virus that’s attacking cacao trees in West Africa.

The swollen shoot virus evolved in other plants, then, half a century ago, “jumped species” to cacao trees, which it can kill in just three years. So Jenkins says, the Institute is working to add virus resistance to cacao tree DNA, by inserting the Cas9 resistance gene. After all, she says, “If the bacteria have already evolved this to fight this viral infection, we are just going to take that mechanism and put it directly into the plant.”

 

The Institute plans to start growing cacao trees resistant to swollen shoot virus within a year. That is fast, according to Institute Science Director, Brian Staskawicz. He points out, “What this technology can do is to allow us work with the elite cultivars of a plant and basically change them for drought resistance and cold tolerance and disease resistance in a more rapid fashion than classical plant breeding.”

 

Staskawicz says that modifying cacao tree DNA is an exciting project from a technical standpoint, because cacao plants are unusually difficult to clone and genetically transform.

Public attitudes towards genetically modified crops

However, some challenges will go beyond whether the changes are technically possible. Those other challenges become evident at the Diablo Farmer’s market near Berkeley, where vendors like chocolatier Eli Curtis pride themselves on selling craft, organic foods. Curtis suspects we could increase cocoa yields by helping farmers be better stewards of wild cacao trees. He’s not sure consumers will like the idea of gene-edited chocolate, but if CRISPR leads to more pest-resistant crops, he says, “I definitely understand the value. But I also understand consumer apprehension.”

 

Nevertheless, Staskawicz says we need faster plant-breeding techniques like CRISPR because we are in a race, one we need to win, because there are currently 7.3 billion people on earth.

“By 2050 there are going to be nine billion people, and the estimates are that we actually need to increase food production by 70 percent. So we are going to need a way to actually increase the yield of these plants to feed the population of the world.”

CRISPR can help do that. He and his team hope, within a decade, CRISPR’d crops may be ingredients in many things, including bread and chocolate.
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Asian Markets Move Lower After US Stock Plunge

Stock markets in Asia fell Tuesday, but did not suffer losses as steep as those Monday in U.S. markets where continued fears about a U.S.-China trade war and a verbal attack on an online retailer by President Donald Trump sent stocks lower.

Markets in Japan and Hong Kong fell by more than one percent in early trading, but by midday had rebounded to make back half the losses.

The U.S. Down Jones Industrial Average closed down 1.9 percent Monday, while the Standard & Poor’s 500 dropped 2.3 percent and the NASDAQ fell nearly three percent.

Trump has strongly criticized online giant Amazon three times in the last few days. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos also owns The Washington Post, whose revelatory stories on Trump and his administration frequently draw the president’s ire.

The U.S. leader says Amazon’s large-scale operations are detrimental to the business success of small retailers that cannot compete with its high-volume sales. Trump has also complained that the fees Amazon pays to the U.S. Postal Service to deliver merchandise the retailer sells are too low, costing the quasi-governmental agency hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue, although the Postal Service says its contract with Amazon is profitable.

“Only fools, or worse, are saying that our money losing Post Office makes money with Amazon,” Trump said in his latest broadside against Amazon. “THEY LOSE A FORTUNE, and this will be changed. Also, our fully tax paying retailers are closing stores all over the country…not a level playing field!” 

Since Trump started verbally attacking Amazon, the company has lost more than $37 billion in market value.

China’s announcement that it is increasing duties on 128 categories of U.S. imports worth $3 billion in annual trade also worried investors. They fear Beijing’s response to the Trump tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese imports could spark an all-out trade war between the world’s two biggest economies.

“The importance of tariff announcements by both the U.S. and China lies in what they may portend for overall bilateral trade and investment relations between the two countries,” said Atsi Sheth, an analyst for Moody’s Investors Service.

Late Monday, White House deputy press secretary Lindsay Walters issued a statement saying, in part, that China needs to stop “its unfair trading practices which are harming U.S. national security and distorting global markets.”
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US vs. China: a ‘Slap-Fight,’ Not a Trade War — So Far

First, the United States imposed a tax on Chinese steel and aluminum. Then, China counterpunched Monday with tariffs on a host of U.S. products, including apples, pork and ginseng. 

On Wall Street, the stock market buckled on the prospect of an all-out trade war between the world’s two biggest economies. But it hasn’t come to that – not yet, anyway.

“We’re in a trade slap-fight right now,” not a trade war, said Derek Scissors, resident scholar and China specialist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

China is a relatively insignificant supplier of steel and aluminum to the United States. And the $3 billion in U.S. products that Beijing targeted Monday amount to barely 2 percent of American goods exported to China.

But the dispute could escalate, and quickly. Already, in a separate move, the United States is drawing up a list of about $50 billion in Chinese imports to tax in an effort to punish Beijing for stealing American technology or forcing U.S. companies to hand over trade secrets. 

China could respond by targeting American commercial interests uniquely dependent on the Chinese market: the aircraft giant Boeing, for example, and soybean farmers.

The possibility that the U.S. and China will descend into a full-blown trade war knocked the Dow Jones industrial average down as much as 758 points in afternoon trading. The Dow recovered some ground and finished down 458.92 points, or 1.9 percent, at 23,644.19.

For weeks, in fact, President Donald Trump’s aggressive trade actions have depressed the stock market.

But many trade analysts suggested that the Wall Street sell-off may be an overreaction. 

China’s swift but measured retaliation to the U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs is meant to show “that it will not be pushed around but that it does not want a trade war,” said Amanda DeBusk, chair of the international trade department at the law firm Hughes Hubbard & Reed. “It is possible for the countries to pull back from the brink.”

“It seems to be pretty measured and proportional,” agreed Wendy Cutler, a former U.S. trade official who is now vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute. “They didn’t seem to overreach, and they didn’t hit our big-ticket items like planes and soybeans.”

Even if China’s tariffs don’t have a huge impact on America’s $20 trillion economy, they will bring pain to specific communities. 

Take Marathon County in Wisconsin, where 140 local families grow ginseng, a root that is used in herbal remedies and is popular in Asia. Around $30 million – or 85 percent – of the area’s ginseng production went to China as exports or gifts. The county, which gave Trump nearly 57 percent of its vote in 2016, holds an international ginseng festival in September, crowning a Ginseng Queen and drawing visitors from China and Taiwan.

China’s new 15 percent tariff on ginseng is “definitely going to hit the growers hard if this happens,” said Jackie Fett, executive director of the Ginseng Board of Wisconsin. “It is the livelihood of many people. … We’re still holding on to a little bit of hope” that the tariffs can be reversed.

Jim Schumacher, co-owner of Schumacher Ginseng in Marathon, Wisconsin, said the 15 percent tax will hurt: “You’ve got to be price-competitive, even if you have the top-quality product. We’re definitely concerned. We hope something can be resolved.”

Trump campaigned on a promise to overhaul American trade policy. In his view, what he calls flawed trade agreements and sharp-elbowed practices by China and other trading partners are in part responsible for America’s gaping trade deficit – $566 billion last year. The deficit in the trade of goods with China last year hit a record $375 billion.

In his first year in office, Trump’s talk was tougher than his actions on trade. But he has gradually grown more aggressive. In January, he slapped tariffs on imported solar panels and washing machines. Last month, he imposed duties on steel and aluminum imports – but spared most major economies except China and Japan.

Now he is moving toward steep tariffs to pressure Beijing into treating U.S. technology companies more fairly. In the meantime, his administration has lost two voices that cautioned against protectionist trade policies: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and White House economic adviser Gary Cohn. 

“Given the increasingly hostile rhetoric backed up by tangible trade sanctions already announced by both the U.S. and China, it will take a determined effort on both sides to come up with a mediated compromise that tamps down trade tensions and allows both sides to save face,” said Eswar Prasad, professor of trade policy at Cornell University.

If the dispute escalates, China can pick more vulnerable targets. In the year that ended last Aug. 31, America’s soybean farmers, for instance, sent $12.4 billion worth of soybeans to China. That was 57 percent of total U.S. soybean exports.

Brent Bible, a soybean and corn farmer in Lafayette, Indiana, has appeared in TV ads by the advocacy group Farmers for Free Trade, calling on the Trump administration to avoid a trade war. 

“We’re kind of caught in the crossfire,” he said.
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Library Helps ‘Left-behind’ Nepali Women Gain Cash, Confidence

For farmers trying to figure out how to heal a sick cow or grow tomatoes commercially in this Himalayan community, help is at hand in the form of a crumbling, earthquake-scarred library.

In a rural area where searching for information online or paying for expert advice is rarely an option, the library is a first stop for female farmers daunted by their new role: running the family farm while their husbands are away looking for work.

“Most of the men have migrated for money now in Nepal. It’s a very huge problem,” said Meera Marahattha, the “human Google” who runs the library.

But there’s an upside. “Because of this male migration, females have the opportunity to lead,” she added – sometimes for the first time.

Migration is growing around the world among families hit by disasters, conflict or shifting weather patterns. In Nepal – and many other places – women are often left behind in rural areas as men seek work in cities or overseas.

Taking on all the work can be exhausting, and being alone is dangerous for some women. But for others, the absence of men can open up opportunities to try out their own ideas, learn new skills and gain confidence.

In Nepal, the Tribeni community library in Bhimdhunga is one of 22 that are part of a “Practical Answers” program jointly run by READ Nepal, a literacy and anti-poverty organization, and Practical Action, a British charity.

Besides providing resource books, the hubs collect queries from across the community, log them and set about providing tailored answers to farming and other technical challenges.

In Bhimdhunga, the library offers a computer suite, a children’s nursery and a women’s health section, attracting about 200 active members from the mountainous neighborhood.

Marahattha, the library head who is a community member herself, often travels house-to-house visiting remote mountain-top farms to field questions and train female farmers.

“We have a lot of inquiries,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, proudly flicking through log books filled with neat rows of curling Nepali scrawl.

During the planting season, she might receive as many as 1,000 questions a month – but on average it is closer to 500, she said. They range from how to treat crop diseases to how to use a computer or market goods in town.

While the library is open to all, Marahattha has found more interest from women – in particular those suddenly put in charge of their households as their husbands or sons migrate abroad in search of work.

That change has offered some women a chance to try out their own farming ideas, becoming more confident and boosting their family’s finances in the process.

But there are “some negatives too”, Marahattha admitted.

Women often complain to her of feeling overwhelmed, as if “all the responsibilities are on their head”, looking after both land and children.

And the shift in family dynamics, together with the disruption to family life that accompanies migration, has led to a rise in the number of divorces, Marahattha said.

Self-Sufficient

Wearing a red shawl draped across her shoulder to match her bright red bindi and lipstick, Urumila Lama, 33, still has a youthful face – though her back bent from toil makes her seem older.

She lives with her 11-year-old son on a remote farm on a steep hillside overlooking the lush Kathmandu Valley. But their living quarters are a tin shack, hastily built after a powerful earthquake in 2015 reduced their home, and many others in the area, to rubble.

The disaster killed nearly 9,000 people and disrupted the lives of more than 8 million.

“After the earthquake, our whole house collapsed. Everything went bad and my husband went to a foreign country to earn,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

But then she heard about the agricultural training being offered by Marahattha at the library and went along.

“I immediately took up the practices in my own house and have since been vegetable farming seriously,” said Lama, who has constructed a number of large plastic-covered tunnels and makeshift greenhouses to boost her vegetable production.

“I realized we can have a good income from this,” she said.

Initially, she earned about $60 a month from growing vegetables such as sweet peppers and tomatoes.

Today she makes triple that amount, and can pay for her son’s school fees and the family’s daily expenses without having to ask her husband for money.

“I was here alone. It was not my husband’s decision but my own to construct the greenhouses and start doing vegetable farming,” she said proudly.

“When my husband came back to visit he was surprised at what I was doing and how I’d gained knowledge,” she said. He urged her to “build a bigger greenhouse and grow more!”, she recalled.

The community library – although a simple idea – has proved hugely popular with the community, said Rakesh Khadka, a project officer with the Practical Answers program in Nepal.

Established in 2011, the facility was at first little used, but by 2013 “we were inundated”, he said.

Sometimes the library refers tough questions to Kathmandu, where experts can better advise on technical issues. But answers are often found locally, with women sharing solutions among themselves, Khadka said.

Little by little, women are becoming more self-sufficient and using the library less often or coming mainly to socialize, he added.

‘Cash Cows’

Crossing her sandy yard in bare feet, Chini Khadka, 55, pushes back a loose door to reveal a baby calf, closely guarded by its mother.

Khadka, who is illiterate and was married at just 9 years old, was happy to show off the cattle that have made her a respected businesswoman in her remote Himalayan village.

“After my husband left me, I lived with my mother-in-law, who took pity on me. But she died a few years ago. We had many expenses for my children’s studies, so I had to make an income,” she said.

She heard about the library and started training with the other women. “Then I got interested in dairy farming because I have very limited land,” she said.

Khadka learned to rear cows, build sheds and calculate the correct nutrient requirements for her animals. She now has eight cows, some of which are pregnant, with each fully grown animal worth about $1,000 at market, she said.

She also sells milk in town and manure as fertilizer to other farmers.

“As I grew in confidence, I leased land from a neighbor and have been planting some food crops too,” she said. “I’m very, very happy doing this. It fulfills me.”

Khadka earns about 30,000 Nepalese rupees ($288) a month.

That’s more than her son, who works as a teacher, she boasts – and is even enough for her to hire another female farmhand to help tend the vegetables.

“Before I used to have very low self-esteem,” she said, smiling. “Now I feel like society respects me and treats me better.”

($1 = 104.2200 Nepalese rupees)
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Trump Muddles DACA Program in Anti-immigrant Twitter Comments

While President Donald Trump has said illegal immigrants heading toward the United States are trying to take advantage of an Obama-era policy that shields certain people from deportation, the program known as DACA is actually not open to new entrants.

At issue is the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which the Republican president last September ordered rescinded. Under DACA, hundreds of thousands of young adults dubbed “Dreamers” who were brought into the United States illegally as children have been shielded from deportation and given work permits.

On Sunday, apparently in reference to a caravan of 1,500 Central Americans who are journeying through Mexico toward the United States, Trump wrote on Twitter: “These big flows of people are all trying to take advantage of DACA. They want in on the act!”

But there is no “act” to get in on. Newly arriving illegal immigrants cannot win protections under DACA, created in 2012 by Trump’s Democratic predecessor Barack Obama, for two reasons.

Anyone admitted into the program had to have been living continuously in the United States since June 15, 2007, along with other requirements. In addition, Trump himself ordered an end to the program, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is not accepting new applicants.

Under Trump’s action, DACA was supposed to have begun winding down last month. But courts have ruled that Trump acted improperly and that the hundreds of thousands of immigrants currently enrolled still qualified for protections while the legal fight over DACA unfolds.

When he announced he was ending DACA, Trump urged Congress to come up with a legislative fix. Referring to the Dreamers, Trump said, “I have a great heart for the folks we’re talking about, a great love for them.”

Seven months later, DACA participants are living with the uncertainty over whether they will be protected or targeted for deportation. 

Meanwhile, following a series of failed negotiations with Democrats and some Republicans in Congress, Trump has been fuming over the refusal of lawmakers to fully fund a $25 billion wall he wants to build on the U.S.-Mexican border. The wall became a bargaining chip in DACA replacement legislation.

“NO MORE DACA DEAL!,” Trump said on Twitter as he blamed Democrats for the situation. “DACA is dead.”

Matthew Wright, a government professor at American University in Washington, called Trump’s tweets “not connected to reality.” Wright noted that Trump rejected several Democratic offers to address DACA, including at one point a deal that would have provided $25 billion for his wall.

Last month, Senator Angus King, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats, said Trump’s rejection of that offer was the “high-water mark” for the wall’s prospects in Congress, where support for it is tepid at best.
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US Gubernatorial Races to Feature Record Number of Women

A record number of women are running for governors’ offices in the U.S. this year.

The Center for American Women and Politics said Monday that 40 Democratic or Republican women have filed candidacy papers in 19 states where the deadline has passed. The number is likely to rise because filing remains open in 17 other states.

The center at Rutgers University in New Jersey says the previous high mark for major party female gubernatorial candidates was 34, set in 1994. This year’s field includes 24 Democrats and 16 Republicans.

At least one woman is running for governor in each state where filing has ended. Colorado and Maine have the most, with five female candidates.

The candidates include three incumbents, 15 challengers and 22 running for open seats in eight states.
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Legal Defense Funds for Undocumented in US Create Another Front in Immigration Conflict

While the U.S. federal government is working to detain and deport undocumented immigrants, some U.S. states and cities have started legal funds to defend them, opening up a new front in the conflict over immigration.

About 13 jurisdictions have joined a network to expand legal representation for immigrants facing detention and deportation — the ultimate line of defense, officials said.

The Safe Cities Network pledges to keep communities “safe and strong by protecting due process and providing legal representation to immigrants facing deportation.”

“We’re not just talking about one person going through. One person going to court. One in detention and going through the deportation process. You’re talking about families, entire families and communities being impacted,” Annie Chen, program director at the New York-based VERA Institute of Justice, a data center that partners with local and state government officials to change the U.S. justice system.

WATCH: Washington, US States at Odds Over Immigration Policy

“I would say with increased immigration enforcement, changes, harsher immigration enforcement policies, I think that city and county officials are more aware of this, and they see the impact in their communities,” Chen said.

The city of Baltimore in Maryland became one of the most recent jurisdictions to establish a legal defense fund in March when the city allocated $100,000 to help immigrants fight deportation.

The money was added to a pool of private money and was matched by funding from VERA.  

Catalina Rodriguez, director of the Baltimore Mayor’s Office of Immigrant and Multicultural Affairs, said following the increase in immigration enforcement that started in February 2017, the city received calls from residents.

“All of these individuals [arrested] were not necessarily criminals. Their ‘crime’ was they were here [in the U.S.] undocumented, and they had already a deportation order. However, they were members of our city, business owners, and contributors. So, there was a lot of panic in our city,” Rodriguez said.

Being in the U.S. unlawfully is a civil violation, not a criminal one. Rodriguez said Baltimore learned from New York, the first U.S. city to have a legal fund pilot program. The Baltimore fund is expected to help about 40 people going through removal proceedings.

Pros and cons

The immigration data tracker TRAC reports that out of 304,642 immigrants detained from 2002 to February 2018, only 62,697 had legal representation. 

According to immigration lawyers and advocates, access to legal representation “greatly” increases an immigrant’s chance of winning his/her case.

“In the criminal justice system, if you can’t afford an attorney, you get a public defender. In immigration court, you don’t. You have the right to pay for your own attorney. And if you can’t afford one, you do not have access to the same due process,” Chen told VOA.

Not everyone agrees with public money going into a legal defense fund.

Through a spokesman, Maryland’s Republican party chairman Dirk Haire told The Baltimore Sun that Maryland Republicans “questioned whether the money is being wisely spent, given funding shortfall issues in Baltimore, such as public schools without heat.”

“My hunch is that the vast majority of Baltimore residents would prefer to have that money spent on heat and air conditioning in Baltimore public schools instead of legal fees,” Haire said.

Baltimore city councilman Zeke Cohen told the Sun that in Southeast Baltimore, the area he represents, a small-business owner, a popular barber and a father dropping off a child at school were among the arrests.

“First, we lost a barber, then a small-business owner. Finally, a father was handcuffed and detained after dropping off his 9-year-old at school. The child’s mother is back in Honduras. What kind of a country do we live in that would orphan a child in order to enforce its broken immigration laws?” Cohen said.

Data from the New American Economy, a coalition of business leaders and mayors working toward immigration reform, shows that in the Baltimore metro area, there are 281,109 immigrant residents, or 10 percent of the population. In 2014, immigrants paid about $3.4 billion in taxes and had a spending power of $7.7 billion in the same region.

Feds vs. states

The legal fund network places some local jurisdictions at still greater odds with the federal government.

Governor Jerry Brown said in early March that the federal government was “basically going to war against the state of California” after U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions sued California over its so-called sanctuary state law.

On Saturday, President Donald Trump fired back via Twitter.

California is not the only state considered sanctuary, along with its numerous cities and counties. While the term “sanctuary” does not have a legal established meaning, it is generally applied to jurisdictions that choose not to participate with federal immigration agents.

“What happens is, if you don’t have someone complying with this and working with us, a criminal alien will be released from prison,” Tyler Q. Houlton, U.S. Department of Homeland Security press secretary, told reporters during an off-camera, on-the-record conversation.

Houlton said though cooperation is not a “mandatory thing,” immigration officers try to work with law enforcement to get undocumented immigrants off the street. He added that it is “much safer to pick up criminal aliens at the jail than it is on the streets.”

Many states and local jurisdictions support the federal government’s approach to immigration. Last week, the Orange County Board of Supervisors joined the U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) lawsuit that condemns California’s sanctuary law, calling it unconstitutional. 

Justice Department spokesman Devin O’Malley said in a statement that DOJ “welcomes” Orange County’s decision.

“Orange County’s residents have experienced firsthand the negative effects of SB 54 [California’s sanctuary law], which mandates releasing criminal aliens back into their communities instead of into the custody of federal immigration authorities,” O’Malley said.
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Facebook Faces Calls to Further Protect User Privacy

Facebook is a company in a hurry.

 

Since the world learned about the latest customer data controversy at Facebook, the social media network has unleashed a swarm of changes. But it’s unclear whether Facebook’s own reckoning will be enough to satisfy regulators and lawmakers.

 

“We’ve reached a tipping point with Facebook and privacy,” said Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a public interest advocacy group. “What’s most interesting at this moment are the number of forces — political, economic and social — that are converging. And I think the practical consequences is that something big will change.”

 

With more than 2 billion customers, Facebook has been in the hot seat in recent weeks over how an outside researcher gave the data of 50 million users to the political research firm Cambridge Analytica.

What if anything Cambridge Analytica has done with the data is unclear — the company claims it deleted it. But the situation has shone a spotlight on how much personal data is available on Facebook and how it is handled.

 

Pulling advertising

 

Sonos, a consumer electronics firm, Pep Boys, an auto parts and service retailer, Mozilla, the maker of the Firefox web browser, all stopped advertising on Facebook in response to the controversy.

 

“We would like to see a bit more transparency to the consumer and a bit more choice to the consumer,” said Denelle Dixon, chief operating officer at Mozilla.

 

Her message to Facebook: “When you start taking this a bit more seriously and you start focusing and making changes, we’ll go back.”

In a Facebook post and an appearance on CNN, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg apologized for the controversy and vowed to do more to protect user data. “This was a major breach of trust, and I’m really sorry that this happened,” he said.

The company also placed ads in Britain and the U.S. apologizing for a “breach of trust.”

A bevy of self-imposed changes

 

As state and federal regulators opened investigations and several congressional committees called on Zuckerberg to testify, Facebook has been busy rolling out changes.

 

The company made it easier for users to change privacy settings and has given them a quick way to download all the data that Facebook has on them. It has also cut off major data brokers.

 

Facebook may know soon whether its efforts will be enough.

 

Regulation or self-government?

 

Silicon Valley firms have long held that self-regulation, rather than government-imposed rules and regulations, would best allow for innovation. But the company also faces a bevy of state, federal and international regulators, which all may act against the firm.

 

In the U.S., Facebook’s chief concern is the Federal Trade Commission, which confirmed last month that it had opened an investigation into the company’s practices.

 

A key question will be if Facebook violated a 2011 consent decree it has with the consumer protection agency to obtain users’ permissions for everything it does with users’ data. Each violation is supposed to come with a $40,000 fine, which some analysts have speculated could cost Facebook billions.

 

In addition to the FTC, several state attorneys general have opened up an investigation into Facebook.

 

Beyond regulators, lawmakers in Washington and in state houses around the country are discussing what can be done to better protect social media customers. Zuckerberg is expected to testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee next week.

 

Meanwhile, the company faces possible investigations in Britain and Canada.

 

Outside scrutiny

 

It is not just Facebook that deserves more scrutiny but all of the “advertising-powered web,” said Gennie Gebhart, a researcher with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital civil liberties organization.

 

“While Facebook is in the spotlight right now for very good reason, this is not just a Facebook problem,” Gebhart said. “We have a surveillance based business model that powers much of the web that cannot continue to coexist with privacy rights.”

 

She calls for independent audits done by a “party who is not accountable to Facebook but accountable to users.”

 

Rotenberg of EPIC said governments around the world shouldn’t leave it to U.S. and European regulators and lawmakers to regulate social media and user privacy.

 

“Coming up with new solutions that provide for the benefits of technology but at the same time address the real risks is a very good undertaking,” he said. “I think you’ll see throughout Asia, South America, the African continent robust debate about Facebook and other social media.”
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Amazon Shares Fall 4 Percent as Trump Renews Attack

Shares of Amazon.com Inc fell 4 percent on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump again attacked the online retailer over the pricing of its deliveries through the United States Postal Service and promised unspecified changes.

“Only fools, or worse, are saying that our money losing Post Office makes money with Amazon,” Trump tweeted.

“They lose a fortune, and this will be changed. Also, our fully tax paying retailers are closing stores all over the country … not a level playing field!”

Trump has been vocal about his opposition to Amazon’s use of the postal service and Monday’s tweet adds to investor worries that the company could see more regulation.

Amazon did not immediately respond to requests for a comment.

Details of Amazon’s payments to the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) are not publicly known, but some Wall Street analysts have estimated it pays the postal service roughly half what it would to United Parcel Service Inc or FedEx Corp to deliver a package.

“President Trump’s comments are consistent with industry sources we have spoken to in the shipping industry, who often label Amazon’s deal with the USPS as a sweetheart deal,” DA Davidson analyst Tom Forte wrote in a note.

“An argument, however, could be made that the USPS was losing billions before it expanded its service offerings for Amazon and would, still, likely lose billions if Amazon discontinued its use of the USPS tomorrow,” Forte said.

Trump last Thursday accused Amazon of not paying enough tax, making the postal system lose money and putting small retailers out of business.

But he offered no evidence to back up his criticisms and did not suggest any actions he would take.

Amazon shares have gained nearly 20 percent this year giving the company a market value of about $700 billion.
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Promises, Promises: Facebook’s History with Privacy

“We’ve made a bunch of mistakes.” “Everyone needs complete control over who they share with at all times.” “Not one day goes by when I don’t think about what it means for us to be the stewards of this community and their trust.”

 

Sound familiar? It’s Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressing a major privacy breach — seven years ago.

 

Lawmakers in many countries may be focused on Cambridge Analytica’s alleged improper use of Facebook data, but the social network’s privacy problems back more than a decade. Here are some of the company’s most notable missteps and promises around privacy.

2007

 

The social media darling unveils its Facebook Platform to great fanfare. Zuckerberg says app developers can now access the web of connections between users and their friends, a set of connections Facebook calls the “social graph.”

 

“The social graph is changing the way the world works,” he says.

That November, Facebook launches Beacon, which shares what users are doing on other websites with their Facebook friends. Many users find it intrusive and difficult to disable. Massachusetts resident Sean Lane buys his wife a diamond ring for Christmas on Overstock.com, but Facebook ruins the surprise , an incident leading to a class-action lawsuit.

 

In December, Zuckerberg apologizes and enables users to shut off Beacon. “I know we can do better,” he says .

 

2008

 

Facebook launches Facebook Connect , aiming to correct Beacon’s mistakes by requiring users to take deliberate action before they share activity from other websites when logged in using Facebook. More than 100 websites use the tool at launch, including CNN and TripAdvisor.

 

2009

 

Facebook announces “privacy improvements” after a yearlong review by Canada’s Office of the Privacy Commissioner found that it geared its default privacy settings toward openness, failed to inform users their data would be used to serve ads, and leaked data to third party developers, including when their friends used apps. Facebook vows to encourage “users to review their privacy settings” but does not agree to all the recommendations.

 

Beacon is officially shut down, settling Lane’s class action lawsuit.

 

The American Civil Liberties Union warns people that Facebook’s default settings mean that when a friend uses an app or takes a quiz, the quiz- or app-maker can peer into your profile, even if you’ve made it private.

 

2010

 

App-makers exhibit a sophisticated grasp of data they can scoop from Facebook’s social graph.

 

The Wall Street Journal reports that many popular apps are transmitting personalized Facebook data to dozens of advertising and internet companies, among them, Zynga’s breakout game FarmVille. Facebook responds by shutting down some apps.

 

Prior to the Journal report, Facebook says it has redesigned its privacy tools, giving its 400 million users “the power to control exactly who can see the information and content they share.”

 

2011

 

The Federal Trade Commission reaches a consent decree with Facebook after an investigation of its broken privacy promises to consumers.

 

The FTC alleges, among other things, that:

 

  • Facebook made its users’ friend lists public in December 2009, even if they had been set to private, without telling them.

 

  • Even if users limited data sharing to “friends only,” data was actually shared with third party apps that friends used.

 

  • Facebook failed to verify the security of apps it put on a “verified apps” list.

 

  • Facebook promised not to share personal information with advertisers, but did.

 

Facebook promises to submit to a privacy audit every two years for the next 20 years, and Zuckerberg owns up to mistakes.

 

2012

 

Facebook introduces new methods to help advertisers reach people in ways “that protect your privacy,” including an encryption tool called Custom Audiences that lets marketers match the email addresses of sales leads to the addresses that Facebook users used to set up their accounts.

 

Facebook also rolls out new privacy tools aimed at simplifying its convoluted and confusing privacy controls. Among other things, it narrows the scope of app permissions so they don’t suck in as much user data automatically.

 

2013

 

Facebook shares two-year-old anonymized data on billions of friendships between countries with Cambridge researcher Aleksandr Kogan and co-authors a research paper with him (published in 2015).

 

Kogan creates a quiz app, installed by around 300,000 people , giving him access to tens of millions of their friends’ data.

 

2014

 

Facebook says it dramatically limits the access apps have to friend data, preventing the type of data scoop Kogan and others were capable of. It also requires developers to get approval from Facebook before accessing sensitive data.

 

2015

 

Facebook says it learns from Guardian journalists that Kogan has shared data with Cambridge Analytica in violation of its policies. It bans the app and asks Kogan and Cambridge Analytica to certify they had deleted the data.

 

It rolls out “Security Checkup,” a new tool aimed at simplifying its convoluted and confusing privacy controls.

 

2017

 

Facebook introduces “Privacy Basics,” a Frequently Asked Questions site aimed at simplifying its convoluted and confusing privacy controls.

 

2018

 

Facebook says it learns from The Guardian and other media outlets that Cambridge Analytica did not delete improperly obtained Facebook data and suspends the company, Kogan, and whistleblower Christopher Wylie from its service.

Zuckerberg tells CNN that “I’m really sorry that this happened.” He promises to audit app makers that gathered massive amounts of data prior to 2014 and to notify affected users. Amid calls for investigations in the U.S. and U.K., the FTC begins investigating whether Facebook broke its 2011 consent decree.

 

“Our responsibility now is to make sure that this doesn’t happen again,” Zuckerberg says.

 

Facebook redesigns its privacy settings menu on mobile devices and says in a blog post, “It’s time to make our privacy tools easier to find.”
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China Raises Tariffs on US Pork, Fruit in Trade Dispute

China raised import duties on a $3 billion list of U.S. pork, fruit and other products Monday in an escalating tariff dispute with President Donald Trump that companies worry might depress global commerce.

The Finance Ministry said it was responding to a U.S. tariff hike on steel and aluminum that took effect March 23. But a bigger clash looms over Trump’s approval of possible higher duties on nearly $50 billion of Chinese goods in a separate argument over technology policy.

The tariff spat is one aspect of wide-ranging tensions between Washington and Beijing over China’s multibillion-dollar trade surplus with the United States and its policies on technology, industry development and access to its state-dominated economy.

Forecasters say the immediate impact should be limited, but investors worry the global recovery might be set back if it prompts other governments to raise import barriers. Those fears temporarily depressed financial markets, though stocks have recovered some of their losses.

On Monday, stock market indexes in Tokyo and Shanghai were up 0.5 percent at midmorning.

Beijing faces complaints by Washington, the European Union and other trading partners that it hampers market access despite its free-trading pledges and is flooding global markets with improperly low-priced steel and aluminum. But the EU, Japan and other governments criticized Trump’s unilateral move as disruptive.

The United States buys little Chinese steel and aluminum following earlier tariff hikes to offset what Washington says is improper subsidies. Still, economists expected Beijing to respond to avoid looking weak in a high-profile dispute.

Effective Monday, Beijing raised tariffs on pork, aluminum scrap and some other products by 25 percent, the Finance Ministry said. A 15 percent tariff was imposed on apples, almonds and some other goods.

The tariff hike has “has seriously damaged our interests,” said a Finance Ministry statement. 

“Our country advocates and supports the multilateral trading system,” said the statement. China’s tariff increase “is a proper measure adopted by our country using World Trade Organization rules to protect our interests.”

The White House didn’t respond to a message from The Associated Press on Sunday seeking comment.

China’s government said earlier its imports of those goods last year totaled $3 billion.

The latest Chinese move targets farm areas, many of which voted for Trump in the 2016 presidential election.

U.S. farmers sent nearly $20 billion of goods to China in 2017. The American pork industry sent $1.1 billion in products, making China the No. 3 market for U.S. pork.

“American politicians better realize sooner rather than later that China would never submit if the U.S. launched a trade war,” said the Global Times, a newspaper published by the ruling Communist Party.

Washington granted EU, South Korea and some other exporters, but not ally Japan, exemptions to the steel and aluminum tariffs on March 22. European governments had threatened to retaliate by raising duties on American bourbon, peanut butter and other goods.

Beijing has yet to say how it might respond to Trump’s March 22 order approving possible tariff hikes in response to complaints China steals or pressures foreign companies to hand over technology.

Trump ordered U.S. trade officials to bring a WTO case challenging Chinese technology licensing. It proposed 25 percent tariffs on Chinese products including aerospace, communications technology and machinery and said Washington will step up restrictions on Chinese investment in key U.S. technology sectors.

Trump administration officials have identified as potential targets 1,300 product lines worth about $48 billion. That list will then be open to a 30-day comment period for businesses.

Beijing reported a trade surplus of $275.8 billion with the United States last year, or two-thirds of its global total. Washington reports different figures that put the gap at a record $375.2 billion.
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Trumps to Host Annual Easter Egg Roll

U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump host the annual Easter Egg Roll Monday on the South Lawn of the White House. 

People attending the event won their tickets through a public lottery held in February. 

The White House says the day will be “filled with family activities.” 

As part of the festivities, children and families usually push wooden eggs across the White house lawn using oversized spoons. Military bands and games are also part of the customary trappings of the event.

The White House Easter Egg Roll has a long tradition, dating back to 1878 when President Rutherford B. Hayes hosted the first one. 

There were no egg rolls between 1917 to 1920 because of World War One. Similarly, during World War Two, no egg rolls were held from 1943 to 1945. 

Food conservation efforts and then construction on the White House also brought a halt to the celebrations from 1946 to 1952. 

However, President Dwight Eisenhower reinstated the White House Easter Egg Roll in 1953. 
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Coral Farms Revive the Reefs

Coral reefs cover less than one percent of the world’s ocean beds, yet they are home to a quarter of all marine life on the planet. But they are facing serious challenges that threaten their survival. As Faiza Elmasry tells us, beneath the waters of the Indian Ocean island nation of the Seychelles, conservationists are coming up with new ways to save the reefs. VOA’s Faith Lapidus narrates.
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Trump Nixes DACA Deal, Citing ‘Caravans’ of Illegal Immigrants

U.S. President Donald Trump called for tougher immigration laws Sunday, vowing that there would be no deal for DACA recipients.

“Border Patrol Agents are not allowed to properly do their job at the Border because of ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws like Catch & Release,” Trump wrote on Twitter Sunday morning.

“Getting more dangerous. “Caravans” coming. Republicans must go to Nuclear Option to pass tough laws NOW. NO MORE DACA DEAL!”

“These big flows of people are all trying to take advantage of DACA. They want in on the act!” he said in a follow-up tweet.

Commentary on the Fox news channel earlier Sunday had used a headline referring to “caravans” of illegal immigrants to the U.S.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, was enacted under the Obama administration and had allowed children brought illegally to the United States to remain here and legally study and work.

The Trump administration ended the program in September, but gave Congress six months to come up with a permanent plan for the program recipients.

Despite Democrats’ efforts, the recent spending $1.3 trillion spending bill, signed by Trump last week, made no mention of protections for these so-called Dreamers. Democrats had called on Republican leaders to bring to a vote on the House floor a range of proposals to fix DACA. Meanwhile, federal judges have ordered the Trump administration to keep in place certain parts of DACA while legal challenges make their way through the court system.

Trump had initially said that he would agree on protections for DACA recipients if Congress approved funding for a proposed wall along the U.S. southern border with Mexico.

In another tweet Sunday morning, Trump blamed Mexico for “doing very little, if not NOTHING” to stop the flow of migrants into the United States, threatening to “stop” the North American Free Trade Agreement.

 

Officials from the U.S., Canada and Mexico are supposed to meet in the United States next month for the eighth round of talks about NAFTA, although Washington has not announced dates yet.

 
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AP Fact Check: No New Work on the Wall; Shaky Amazon Claim

President Donald Trump hailed the start of his long-sought U.S.-Mexico border wall this past week, proudly tweeting photos of the “WALL!” 

Actually, no new work got underway. The photos showed the continuation of an old project to replace 2 miles of existing barrier.

And Saturday, he ripped Amazon with a shaky claim that its contract with the post office is a “scam.”

Trump and his officials departed from reality on a variety of subjects in recent days: the census, Amazon’s practices and the makeup of the Supreme Court among them. Here’s a look at some statements and their veracity:

TRUMP: “Great briefing this afternoon on the start of our Southern Border WALL!” — tweet Wednesday, showing photos of workers building a fence.

TRUMP: “We’re going to be starting work, literally, on Monday, on not only some new wall — not enough, but we’re working that very quickly — but also fixing existing walls and existing acceptable fences.” — Trump, speaking the previous week after signing a bill financing the government.

THE FACTS: Trump’s wrong. No new work began Monday or any other time this past week. And the photos Trump tweeted were misleading. They showed work that’s been going on for more than a month on a small border wall replacement project in Calexico, California, that has nothing to do with the federal budget he signed into law last week.

The Calexico project began Feb. 21 to replace a little more than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) of border wall was financed during the 2017 budget year. A barrier built in the 1990s mainly from recycled metal scraps is being torn down and replaced with bollard-style barriers that are 30 feet (9.1 meters) high.

Ronald D. Vitiello, acting deputy commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, defended the president’s statements, saying Friday “there’s construction” underway.

U.S. Post Service

TRUMP: “If the P.O. ‘increased its parcel rates, Amazon’s shipping costs would rise by $2.6 Billion.’ This Post Office scam must stop. Amazon must pay real costs (and taxes) now!” — tweet Saturday.

TRUMP: “I have stated my concerns with Amazon long before the Election. Unlike others, they pay little or no taxes to state & local governments, use our Postal System as their Delivery Boy (causing tremendous loss to the U.S.), and are putting many thousands of retailers out of business!” — tweet Thursday.

THE FACTS: Trump is misrepresenting Amazon’s record on taxes, the U.S. Postal Service’s financial situation and the contract that has the post office deliver some Amazon orders. Federal regulators have found that contract to be profitable for the Postal Service.

People who buy products sold by Amazon pay sales tax in all states that have a sales tax. Not all third-party vendors using Amazon collect it, however.

As for the post office, package delivery has been a bright spot for a service that’s lost money for 11 straight years. The losses are mostly because of pension and health care costs, not the business deal for the Postal Service to deliver packages for Amazon. 

Boosted by e-commerce, the Postal Service has enjoyed double-digit increases in revenue from delivering packages, but that hasn’t been enough to offset declines in first-class letters and marketing mail, which together make up more than two-thirds of postal revenue.

While the Postal Service’s losses can’t be attributed to its package business, Trump’s claim that it could get more bang for its buck may not be entirely far-fetched. A 2017 analysis by Citigroup concluded that the Postal Service was charging below-market rates as a whole for parcels. The post office does not use taxpayer money for its operations.

Trump is upset about Amazon because its owner, Jeff Bezos, owns The Washington Post, one of the targets of his “fake news” tweets.

Pentagon and the wall

TRUMP: “Because of the $700 & $716 Billion Dollars gotten to rebuild our Military, many jobs are created and our Military is again rich. Building a great Border Wall, with drugs (poison) and enemy combatants pouring into our Country, is all about National Defense. Build WALL through M!” — tweets Sunday and Monday.

THE FACTS: Trump is floating the idea of using “M” — the Pentagon’s military budget — to pay for his wall with Mexico. Such a move would almost certainly require approval from Congress and there’s plenty of reason to be skeptical about the notion of diverting military money for this purpose.

Only Congress has the power under the Constitution to determine federal appropriations, leaving the Trump administration little authority to shift money without lawmakers’ approval.

Pentagon spokesman Chris Sherwood referred all questions on the wall to the White House. Spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders declined to reveal specifics, but said Trump would work with the White House counsel to make sure any action taken was within his executive authority.

Veterans Affairs

DAVID SHULKIN, citing reasons Trump fired him as Veterans Affairs secretary: “I have been falsely accused of things by people who wanted me out of the way. But despite these politically based attacks on me and my family’s character, I am proud of my record and know that I acted with the utmost integrity.” — op-ed Thursday in The New York Times.

THE FACTS: His statement that he and his family were subjected to politically based attacks is disingenuous, though politics contributed to his dismissal.

White House support for Shulkin eroded after a blistering report in February by VA’s internal watchdog, a nonpartisan office. The inspector general’s office concluded that he had violated ethics rules by accepting free Wimbledon tennis tickets. The inspector general also said Shulkin’s chief of staff had doctored emails to justify bringing the secretary’s wife to Europe with him at taxpayer expense.

It is true that Shulkin encountered resistance from about a half-dozen political appointees at the VA and White House who rebelled against him. In an extraordinary telephone call, John Ullyot, a top communications aide, and VA spokesman Curt Cashour asked the Republican staff director of the House Veterans Affairs Committee to push for Shulkin’s removal after the release of the inspector general’s report. The staff director declined to do so. Those political appointees were not involved in drafting the inspector general’s report.

Shulkin expressed regret for the “distractions” caused by the report and agreed to pay more than $4,000 to cover the costs of his wife’s coach airfare and the Wimbledon tickets. He continues to insist he did nothing wrong and point to what his staff did in doctoring his emails as a “mistake.”

Second Amendment

TRUMP: “THE SECOND AMENDMENT WILL NEVER BE REPEALED! As much as Democrats would like to see this happen, and despite the words yesterday of former Supreme Court Justice Stevens, NO WAY. We need more Republicans in 2018 and must ALWAYS hold the Supreme Court!” — tweet Wednesday.

THE FACTS: As a basics civics lesson, Trump’s tweet falls short. The Supreme Court is the unelected branch of government and no party can “hold” it. That said, both parties try to win confirmation of justices who are considered likely to vote the way they want.

Republican-nominated justices have formed a majority of the Supreme Court for nearly 50 years. The five more conservative justices were appointed by Republicans while the four more liberal justices were Democratic nominees.

Republicans would have the opportunity to cement ideological balance in their favor if Justice Anthony Kennedy, the most moderate of the conservatives, or one of the older and more liberal justices were to retire with Trump in office and Republicans in control of the Senate.

Trump was citing retired Justice John Paul Stevens, who called in a New York Times article for repeal of the Second Amendment to allow for gun control legislation. Democratic leaders are not proposing repeal of the amendment, as Trump implies. Also noteworthy: Stevens was nominated by a Republican president, Gerald Ford.

Census and citizenship

WHITE HOUSE SPOKESWOMAN SARAH SANDERS, on the Trump administration’s decision to ask people about their citizenship in the 2020 census: “This is a question that’s been included in every census since 1965 with the exception of 2010, when it was removed. … And again, this is something that has been part of the census for decades and something that the Department of Commerce felt strongly needed to be included again.” — press briefing Tuesday.

COMMERCE DEPARTMENT: “Between 1820 and 1950, almost every decennial census asked a question on citizenship in some form.” — statement on Monday.

THE FACTS: Sanders is incorrect. The Commerce Department statement is also problematic. Both are trying to play down the risk of a severe undercount of the population if many immigrants, intimidated by the citizenship question, refuse to participate.

The Census Bureau hasn’t included a citizenship question in its once-a-decade survey sent to all U.S. households since 1950, before the Civil Rights era and passage of a 1965 law designed to help ensure minority groups in the count are fully represented.

The nation’s count is based on the total resident population, both citizens and noncitizens, and used to determine how many U.S. representatives each state gets in the U.S. House.

The citizenship question was not in the 1960 census, according to a copy of the form posted on the Census Bureau website, and no census was held in 1965.

From 1970 to 2000, the question was included only in the long-form section of the census survey, sent to a portion of U.S. households. After 2000, the question has been asked on the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, a separate poll designed to replace the census long form and sent only to a sample of U.S. households.

The Commerce Department’s assertion that the citizenship question was asked on “almost” every decennial census between 1820 and 1950 also pushes the limits of reality. According to the Census Bureau, the question wasn’t asked in four of those censuses —1840, 1850, 1860 or 1880.

Between 1820 and 1950, a total of 14 censuses were held. That means more than 1 in 4 surveys during that time period lacked the citizenship question.

Not exactly “almost.”
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Accused of Allowing Misconduct, Congresswoman Urged to Resign

The cries for embattled U.S. Rep. Elizabeth Esty to step down for not protecting female staffers who said they experienced violence, death threats and sexual harassment by her former chief of staff intensified Saturday, with fellow Democrats saying the allegations were shocking and she needed to “do the right thing.”

Esty, an outspoken advocate for the #MeToo movement, was put in the awkward position of having to apologize for not protecting the staffers in her Washington office. But she has repeatedly dismissed calls for her to resign, and Saturday her office said she was standing by her statement from a day earlier: She’s not leaving.

Among those suggesting Esty leave office were former Connecticut Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz, who said the emerging story of “battery, harassment and threatening” from Esty’s ex-chief of staff and Esty’s handling of the response were “very troubling.”

​’Do the right thing and resign’

Bysiewicz, who has two daughters in their 20s, said employers should provide safe work environments and Congress should hold itself to an even higher standard but, “Sadly, this is clearly not the case, and this needs to change immediately.”

“I know Congresswoman Esty to be a woman of action rather than words, and in this case, words are not enough,” said Bysiewicz, who is exploring a run for the governor’s office. “I believe that under the circumstances, Congresswoman Esty must step down from her position.”

Connecticut Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney said Esty has long been a leader in the fight against workplace harassment and abuse but if recent news stories are true “Congresswoman Esty should do the right thing and resign.”

“The heartbreaking stories of so many victims only reinforce the need to ensure that we must do all within our power to protect those who depend on us and ensure safe work environments so that no one at her or his place of employment ever feels exposed to discrimination, harassment or retaliation of any kind,” Looney said in an emailed statement.

Esty has issued press releases calling for tougher harassment protections for congressional staffers and was among those demanding that then-U.S. Rep. John Conyers, of Michigan, resign amid allegations of misconduct. She issued her own public mea culpa Thursday following newspaper reports she didn’t suspend or fire her chief of staff until three months after learning about allegations against him in 2016.

Apology and regrets

She said she regrets not moving along an internal investigation, which revealed more widespread allegations of abuse, and regrets providing “even the slightest assistance to this individual as he sought a new job.”

In her apology, she said she was “horrified and angry” to learn of allegations that a former employee had been harassed and physically harmed by former chief of staff Tony Baker. She said she demanded Baker receive counseling and then conducted an internal review of her office practices, later learning “the threat of violence was not an isolated incident” but a pattern of behavior by Baker affecting many female staffers.

Baker went to work as the Ohio state director of Sandy Hook Promise, an anti-gun violence advocacy group created after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Esty’s district, but he no longer works there. A spokesman for Baker told Hearst Connecticut Media and the Washington Post that he denies some of the allegations. A phone number listed for a Tony Baker in Columbus, Ohio, was disconnected.

State Sens. Mae Flexer and Cathy Osten also said Esty should resign, as did several Republicans. The state’s Republican Party sent out emails accusing Esty of being “complicit in covering up assault.”

Esty’s Republican challenger in the 5th Congressional District, Manny Santos, said Esty had committed a “gross mishandling of abuse within her office.” He said she claimed to be “a champion of women’s rights” but “did everything possible to hide this terrible abuse perpetrated by her own chief of staff.”

Esty received mild criticism from fellow Democratic members of Connecticut’s congressional delegation, with nearly all noting that Esty acknowledged she had made mistakes.

“I’m deeply disappointed,” U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said.

Asked whether Esty should resign, Blumenthal said it was “really a decision for her constituents.”
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Tech Startups Add Automation, Drones to Aid Construction Industry

Having robots to do the dirty, tedious parts of the job is a dream come true in the construction business. Automation technology developers say robotics are transforming the industry, making it safer, and helping companies take on more projects and finish them faster. Faiza Elmasry has the story. Faith Lapidus narrates.
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Exhibit Highlights Inclusive Design for People with Disabilities

More than 1 billion people around the world have some sort of disability. Rong Shi of VOA’s Mandarin service toured an exhibit in New York that showcases the latest gadgets and inventions designed to help those with a range of physical, sensory or cognitive abilities lead more independent lives and engage more fully in the world. Faith Lapidus reports.
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Facebook Faces Calls for Change

The fallout continues for Facebook over how it handles user data and privacy. U.S. and European lawmakers are calling for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify, and regulators have opened investigations. Michelle Quinn reports on how the social media giant is facing a tipping point when it comes to dealing with user privacy.
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Tesla Says Vehicle in Deadly Crash Was on Autopilot 

A vehicle in a fatal crash last week in California was operating on Autopilot, making it the latest accident to involve a self-driving vehicle, Tesla has confirmed.

The electric car maker said the driver, who was killed in the accident, did not have his hands on the steering wheel for six seconds before the crash, despite several warnings from the vehicle. Tesla Inc. tells drivers that its Autopilot system, which can maintain speed, change lanes and self-park, requires drivers to keep their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel in order to take control of the vehicle to avoid accidents. 

Tesla said its vehicle logs show the driver took no action to stop the Model X SUV from crashing into a concrete lane divider. Photographs of the SUV show that the front of the vehicle was demolished, its hood was ripped off  and its front wheels were scattered on the freeway.

The vehicle also caught fire, though Tesla said no one was in the vehicle when that happened. The company said the crash was made worse by a missing or damaged safety shield on the end of the freeway barrier that is supposed to reduce the impact into the concrete lane divider.

The crash happened in Mountain View, in California’s Silicon Valley. The driver was Walter Huang, 38, a software engineer for Apple.

“None of this changes how devastating an event like this is or how much we feel for our customer’s family and friends,” Tesla said on its website late Friday.

Earlier this month, a self-driving Volvo SUV being tested by ride-hailing service Uber struck and killed a pedestrian in Arizona.

Tesla Inc. defended its Autopilot feature, saying that while it doesn’t prevent all accidents, it makes them less likely to occur than is the case for vehicles without it.

Federal investigators are looking into last week’s crash, as well a separate crash in January of a Tesla Model S that may have been operating under the Autopilot system.
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AP Analysis: Blacks Largely Missing From High-Salary Positions

Jonathan Garland’s fascination with architecture started early: He spent much of his childhood designing Lego houses and gazing at Boston buildings on rides with his father away from their largely minority neighborhood. 

But when Garland looked around at his architectural college, he didn’t see many who looked like him. There were few black faces among students, and fewer teaching skills or giving lectures. 

 

“If you do something simple like Google ‘architects’ and you go to the images tab, you’re primarily going to see white males,” said Garland, 35, who’s worked at Boston and New York architectural firms. “That’s the image, that’s the brand, that’s the look of an architect.”

And that’s not uncommon in other lucrative fields, 50 years after the Reverend Martin Luther King, a leader in the fight for equal employment opportunities, was assassinated.

An Associated Press analysis of government data has found that black workers are chronically underrepresented compared with whites in high-salary jobs in technology, business, life sciences and engineering, among other areas. Instead, many black workers find jobs in low-wage, less prestigious fields where they’re overrepresented, such as food service or preparation, building maintenance and office work, the AP analysis found.

‘Other America’

In one of his final speeches, King described the “Other America,” where unemployment and underemployment created a “fatigue of despair” for African-Americans. Despite economic progress for blacks in areas such as incomes and graduation rates, some experts say many African-Americans remain part of this “Other America,” with little hope of attaining top professional jobs, thanks to systemic yet subtle racism.

The AP analysis found that a white worker had a far better chance than a black one of holding a job in the 11 categories with the highest median annual salaries, as listed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The ratio of white-to-black workers is about 10-to-1 in management, 8-to-1 in computers and mathematics, 12-to-1 in law and 7-to-1 in education — compared with a ratio of 5.5 white workers for every black one in all jobs nationally. The top five high-salary fields have a median income range of $65,000 to $100,000, compared with $36,000 for all occupations nationwide.

In Boston, a hub for technology and innovation and home to prestigious universities, white workers outnumber black ones by about 27-to-1 in computer- and mathematics-related professions, compared with the overall ratio of 9.5-to-1 for workers in the city. Overall, Boston’s ratio of white-to-black workers is wider than that of the nation in six of the top 10 high-income fields.

Boston, where King had deep ties, earning his doctorate and meeting his wife, has a history of racial discord. Eight years after King’s assassination, at the height of turbulent school desegregation, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph from an anti-busing rally at City Hall showed a white man attacking a black bystander with an American flag.

The young victim was Theodore Landsmark. He’s now 71, a lawyer, an architect and director of Northeastern University’s Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy.

Why progress lags

He said “structural discrimination” is the overarching cause of disproportionate race representation in high-salary fields. Landsmark and others say gains are elusive for myriad reasons: Substandard schools in low-income neighborhoods. White-dominated office cliques. Boardrooms that prefer familiarity to diversity. Discriminatory hiring practices. Companies that claim a lack of qualified candidates but have no programs to train minority talent.

Some also say investors are more likely to support white startups. When Rica Elysee, a lifelong Boston resident who grew up in predominantly black neighborhoods, brought her idea of an online platform linking beauty professionals with customers for in-home appointments to investors, she was shunned, she said.

“They said I didn’t belong in the program, that they couldn’t identify with it because they weren’t black,” said Elysee, 32, who initially marketed BeautyLynk to black women like herself. “I remember crying pretty harshly. They couldn’t relate to what I was doing.”

Some even advised her to move out of Boston, which had a booming innovation economy but was “not encouraging minorities in the tech space,” she said. Three years later, Elysee said BeautyLynk is slowly growing but still needs capital.

Most American metro areas are like Boston, with AP’s analysis showing that racial disparities in employment are indifferent to geography and politics. California’s Silicon Valley struggles to achieve diversity in computer fields. In Seattle, home to Amazon, whites outnumber blacks nearly 28-to-1 in computer- and math-related fields. Financial powerhouse New York has a 3-to-1 ratio of white-to-black workers in all occupations, but nearly 6-to-1 in business and finance. Hollywood shows inequality in entertainment, with almost nine whites for every black worker.

In Atlanta, King’s hometown, the proportional representation of black-to-white workers is close to even in many fields. Many reasons are cited. Atlanta has historically black colleges and universities such as King’s alma mater, Morehouse; the first black mayor, Maynard Jackson, pressed for policies helping black professionals after his 1973 election; and events like the 1996 Olympics opened doors for entrepreneurs of all races.

Nationally, it’s much different

Atlanta is an exception. For nearly all of the past half-century, black unemployment nationally has hovered at about twice that of whites.

President Donald Trump touted on Twitter that December’s 6.8 percent unemployment rate for blacks was the lowest in 45 years — a number critics say ignores a greater reality. For example, in an economy that increasingly demands advanced degrees, Department of Education data show that black representation among graduates in science, tech, engineering and mathematics peaked at 9.9 percent in 2010 and has been slowly declining.

In Boston, Democratic Mayor Marty Walsh said in a recent speech that the city is addressing the issue and is committed to placing 20,000 low-income residents in “good-paying jobs” by 2022.

Landsmark said stronger role models may be a solution. As Boston Architectural College’s president, he mentored Garland. They discussed race issues in the professional world — as when Garland, trying to land jobs in his neighborhood, realized many people who looked like him were unfamiliar with the very concept of architecture. He once had to explain to a homeowner who wanted his roof reframed: “I’m not a builder, I’m an architect.”

Today, Garland speaks at high schools and works at the DREAM Collaborative, which focuses on projects in low-income neighborhoods.

“I know the barriers exist in other folks’ minds, and I have to disprove that,” he said. “I keep myself focused on the issues.”
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Trump Blasts California Governor’s Immigrant Pardons

President Donald Trump blasted California Governor Jerry Brown on Saturday for his pardon of five ex-convicts facing deportation, including two who fled the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia with their families four decades ago.

In a tweet, Trump referred to Brown as “Moonbeam,” a nickname a newspaper columnist coined for him in the 1970s. Trump then listed the ex-convicts’ crimes; they included misdemeanor domestic violence, drug possession, and kidnapping and robbery.

Trump wrote: “Is this really what the great people of California want?”

A spokesman for Brown responded to a request for comment with more information about the five men but did not directly address Trump’s criticism.

In a news release about the pardons on Friday, the governor’s office said that “those granted pardons all completed their sentences years ago and the majority were convicted of drug-related or other nonviolent crimes.”

“Pardons are not granted unless they are earned,” the governor’s office said.

Brown’s pardons marked the third time the Democrat has intervened on behalf of immigrants who were deported or faced deportation over convictions. Brown has accused the Trump administration of “basically going to war” with California over immigration policy.

Brown’s pardons don’t automatically stop deportation proceedings, but eliminate the convictions on which authorities based their intentions.

​Pardon for Arpaio

Trump has been criticized for his own pardon, that of former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted last year of a misdemeanor contempt charge for flouting the courts in carrying out his signature immigration patrols.

Trump’s pardon spared Arpaio from a possible jail sentence. The 85-year-old longtime lawman announced a run for Senate in January.

Those pardoned Friday by Brown included Sokha Chhan and Phann Pheach, who face deportation to Cambodia, a country ruled in the 1970s by the genocidal Khmer Rouge. Chhan was convicted of two counts of misdemeanor domestic violence in 2002 and served about a year in jail. Pheach was convicted of possessing drugs and obstructing a police officer in 2005 and served six months in jail. His wife said he is in federal custody.

Also pardoned was Daniel Maher, who served five years in prison stemming from the 1994 armed robbery of a San Jose auto parts store. He was convicted of kidnapping, robbery and being a felon in possession of a firearm. Maher is facing deportation to China, where he has never lived. Maher is from Macau, which became part of China after his family immigrated to California when he was 3.

Also pardoned while facing deportation were Daniel Mena and Francisco Acevedo Alaniz. Mena served three years of probation after being convicted of possessing illegal drugs in 2003. Alaniz served five months in prison for a 1997 car theft conviction.

The governor is a former Jesuit seminarian and traditionally issues pardons close to major Christian holidays. Easter falls on Sunday.

California’s longest-serving governor has now issued 1,519 pardons, including 404 during his first two terms as governor from 1975 to 1983.
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These Burgers Are Better for the Planet, but You’d Never Know It

As the world’s population heads toward 10 billion by midcentury, experts are wrestling with how to feed the world without wrecking the planet. It’s not easy to find foods with lower environmental impact that still taste as good as the ones they are intended to replace. But chefs and environmentalists are both cheering one new menu item: the mushroom-blended burger. VOA’s Steve Baragona has more.
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Court: Trump Administration Can’t Block Immigrant Teens From Abortions

A federal court in Washington told the Trump administration Friday that the government can’t interfere with the ability of pregnant immigrant teens being held in federal custody to obtain abortions.

A judge issued an order Friday evening barring the government from “interfering with or obstructing” pregnant minors’ access to abortion counseling or abortions, among other things, while a lawsuit proceeds. The order covers pregnant minors being held in federal custody after entering the country illegally.

Lawyers for the Department of Health and Human Services, which is responsible for sheltering children who illegally enter the country unaccompanied by a parent, have said the department has a policy of “refusing to facilitate” abortions. And the director of the office that oversees the shelters has said he believes teens in his agency’s care have no constitutional right to abortion.

ACLU lawsuit

The American Civil Liberties Union brought a lawsuit on behalf of the minors, which the judge overseeing the case also Friday allowed to go forward as a class action lawsuit.

“We have been able to secure justice for these young pregnant women in government custody who will no longer be subject to the government’s policy of coercion and obstruction while the case continues,” said ACLU attorney Brigitte Amiri after the judge’s order became public.

The government can appeal the judge’s order. A Department of Justice spokesman didn’t immediately respond to an emailed request for comment Friday evening.

The ACLU and Trump administration have been sparring for months over the government’s policy. 

Texas case

In a high profile case last year, the ACLU represented a teen who entered the U.S. illegally in September and learned while in federal custody in Texas that she was pregnant. She obtained a state court order permitting her to have an abortion, but federal officials refused to transport her or temporarily release her so that others could take her to get the procedure. The teen was ultimately able to get an abortion in October as a result of the lawsuit, but the Trump administration has accused the ACLU of misleading the government during the case, a charge the ACLU has denied.

The ACLU has since represented several other teens who have sought abortions while in custody, but the organization doesn’t know of any others actively seeking abortions, Amiri said Friday night. The judge’s order now covers any teens currently in custody or who come in to custody while the lawsuit goes forward.

Policy isn’t law

In a deposition taken in December as part of the litigation, Scott Lloyd, the director of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, which oversees shelters for unaccompanied immigrant minors, said that pregnant teens in his agency’s care have no right to abortion under the Constitution. Lloyd, who has written about his own opposition to abortion, said he had not approved any abortions since becoming director in March 2017. That included refusing the abortion request of a teen who had been impregnated as a result of rape.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said in ruling Friday that Lloyd and his office are “certainly entitled to maintain an interest in fetal life, and even to prefer that pregnant” minors in their custody “choose one course over the other,” but the government can’t create or implement a policy that strips minors “of their right to make their own reproductive choices.”
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