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Top White House aides ignored repeated warnings they could be breaking the law as they worked with former U.S. officials and a close friend of President Donald Trump to advance a multi-billion-dollar plan to build nuclear reactors in the Middle East, Democratic lawmakers alleged in a report released Tuesday.

The House of Representatives Oversight Committee report said former national security adviser Michael Flynn and two aides promoted the plan with Tom Barrack, the chairman of Trump’s inaugural committee, and a consortium of U.S. firms led by retired military commanders and former White House officials.

The effort, the report said, began before Trump took office and continued after his inauguration in January 2017 despite National Security Council staff warnings that a proposed transfer of U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia was being fast-tracked around a mandatory approval process in possible breach of the Atomic Energy Act.

John Eisenberg, the top NSC lawyer, had ordered the work halted because of concerns that Flynn could be breaking a conflict of interest law as he advised the consortium while serving on Trump’s campaign and transition team, said the report, which is based on documents and whistleblower accounts.

Administration support for the project, however, appears to have continued to the present, with Trump meeting consortium representatives in the Oval Office last week, the committee report said.

“The committee is now launching an investigation to determine whether the actions being pursued by the Trump administration are in the national security interests of the United States, or rather, serve those who stand to gain financially,” the report said.

The report, compiled by the Democratic staff of the panel chaired by Representative Elijah Cummings, comes as Democrats expand inquiries into alleged administration wrongdoing after winning a majority in the House in November elections.

The nuclear project is being promoted by IP3 International, a consortium of U.S. technology firms founded by retired Navy Rear Admiral Michael Hewitt, retired Army General John Keane, and Robert McFarlane, a former national security adviser to

President Ronald Reagan. The board includes former senior U.S. civilian and military officials.

The report said the companies include reactor manufacturer Westinghouse, which emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year.

The White House, Flynn and IP3 had no immediate response to the report.

Plan for dozens of reactors

Working with the U.S. government, the consortium would build dozens of power reactors in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other U.S. Arab allies, according to the IP3 website. In doing so, the project would help restore U.S. influence in the Middle East while boosting regional economic and political stability, according to the website.

Flynn, a retired Army general, promoted the plan on two 2015 trips to Saudi Arabia, and listed himself on government documents as an IP3 advisor during a period in 2016 while he was working for Trump’s campaign and transition, the report said.

He is cooperating with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Flynn was an early target of the investigation and is awaiting sentencing for lying to FBI agents.

Barrack was represented in the plan, the report said, by the then-head of his firm’s Washington office, Rick Gates, a former political consultant and Trump’s deputy campaign manager. Gates pleaded guilty last year to financial fraud and lying to the FBI and also is now cooperating with Mueller.

Documents appended to the report included a draft presidential memorandum appointing Barrack as a special envoy to oversee implementation of the project that McFarlane sent to Flynn and his then-deputy, K.T. McFarland, on Jan. 28, 2017.

Also included with the committee’s report was a document authored by Barrack titled “The Trump Middle East Marshall Plan” that promoted the plan and was sent to NSC staff on March 28, 2017, by IP3 board member Frances Fragos Townsend, who served as homeland security adviser to President George W. Bush.

A current senior administration official was among the unnamed whistleblowers who came forward “with significant concerns about the potential procedural and legal violations connected with rushing through a plan to transfer nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia,” the report said.

The whistleblowers, it said, also warned about political appointees ignoring the advice of “top ethics advisers at the White House who repeatedly and unsuccessfully ordered senior Trump Administration officials to halt their efforts.”

In addition to McFarland, Flynn’s top Middle Easy adviser, Derek Harvey, played a key role in promoting the plan in the White House, doing so despite warnings of possible ethics and criminal law violations, the report said.
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America’s suburbs are today’s great political battleground, long seen as an independent pivot between the country’s liberal cities and conservative small towns and rural expanse.

But it’s not that simple. It turns out that these places in-between may be the most politically polarized of all — and when figuring out the partisan leanings of people living in the suburbs, where they came from makes a difference.

Fewer suburbanites describe themselves as politically independent than do residents of the nation’s urban and rural areas, according to a survey released Tuesday by the University of Chicago Harris School for Public Policy and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. The poll also found that the partisan leanings of suburban residents are closely linked to whether they have previously lived in a city.

“In the last decade, particularly in the past five years, I’ve felt a shift in having some liberal neighbors,” said Nancy Wieman, 63, a registered Republican and staunch conservative who has lived in suburban Jefferson County outside of Denver her entire life. “The ones who are markedly liberal have moved from Denver or other cities.”

Suburbanites who previously lived in a city are about as likely as city-dwellers to call themselves Democrats, the survey found. Similarly, Americans living in suburbs who have never resided in an urban area are about as likely as rural residents to say they are Republican.

Just 15 percent of suburban Americans say they are independent and do not lean toward a party, compared with 25 percent of urban Americans and 30 percent of rural Americans who call themselves politically independent.

That divide extends to the White House: 72 percent of ex-urban suburbanites disapprove of President Donald Trump’s performance in office, as do 77 percent of city residents. That compares with the 57 percent of suburbanites who have not previously lived in a city and 54 percent of rural Americans who say they disapprove of the president.

Kevin Keelan moved from Denver to the sprawling suburbs of Jefferson County 16 years ago. Once a political independent, the 49-year-old registered as a Democrat a few years ago.

“Now it’s not even an option. I’d vote Democratic or independent, but there’s no way I can vote Republican anymore,” Keelan said. “It’s just being more open-minded, and I’d be that way if I was living here or in a loft downtown.”

Jefferson County is a cluster of subdivisions and strip malls huddled under the Rocky Mountain foothills. Once a right-leaning county, it has been reshaped by an influx of transplants from coastal, urban states. It now leans Democratic: The party swept countywide offices and won most of the state legislative districts there in 2018, and Hillary Clinton won the county by 7 percentage points in 2016.

Yet under that surface, election results from 2016 show it is a deeply polarized place. In 118 precincts in Jefferson County, one of the candidates won by more than 10 points. Clinton won 60 precincts and Trump 58.

“The chasm between the two sides is greater than ever,” said Libby Szabo, a Republican county commissioner. “It’s harder at this point, because the ideals are so different, to even change parties.”

The UChicago Harris/AP-NORC poll points to how that split between urban and rural America echoes through the suburbs.

About two-thirds of city dwellers say that legal immigration is a net benefit to the United States, much as the 7 in 10 former city residents now living in the suburbs who say the same. A smaller majority of suburbanites who have never lived in cities, 58 percent, and half of rural residents think the benefits of legal immigration outweigh the risks.

Urban residents are somewhat more likely than rural residents to think the U.S. should be active in world affairs, 37 percent to 24 percent. That mirrors the split between suburbanites who used to live in cities and those who never have: 32 percent of the former favor an active U.S. role, compared with 23 percent of the latter.

About 6 in 10 urban residents and ex-urban suburbanites say that the way things are going in the U.S. will worsen this year, while less than half of rural residents or suburbanites with no city experience believe the same.

S.A. Campbell is a general contractor who lives in the Kansas City suburbs of Johnson County, Kansas, which swung toward the Democrats in 2018 as it replaced a four-term Republican congressman with a Democratic woman who is an openly gay Native American. It is often compared to Jefferson County, with its highly educated population, high-quality schools and influx of previous city dwellers.

Campbell, 60, said his childhood in Kansas City is part of what made him a supporter of Democrats; his parents were both teachers active in their union, and his mother was a supporter of Planned Parenthood.

“When you’ve been raised in a certain fashion, your view of the world is more open than if you grew up in a household that wasn’t that,” he said.

Greg Stern, the newly elected clerk in Jefferson County, has lived in New York City and spent parts of his childhood on a remote Colorado ranch. He sees partisan attitudes hardening in the suburbs much as they have in urban and rural parts of the country.

But, he said, there’s a key difference: While there may be fewer independents in the suburbs, the mixture of loyal Democrats and Republicans found there means it’s still a place for both sides.

“You’re welcome regardless of your political beliefs,” said Stern, a Democrat and volunteer firefighter in a suburban department with a wide range of political views in the station. “It becomes harder to live in rural or urban areas if your political beliefs don’t match those of the majority of the people who live there.”

 

 

 
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U.S. President Donald Trump, in a speech partly intended to be heard by members of the military of Venezuela, called for the end of socialism in that country, saying the United States seeks “a peaceful transition of power but all options are open.”

Trump, in Miami, appealed to Venezuelan soldiers to ignore orders from President Nicolas Maduro and accept the amnesty offer made by the head of the national assembly, Juan Guaido, who is now recognized as Venezuela’s president by the United States and about 50 other countries.

“You will find no safe harbor, no easy exit and no way out,” Trump warned the soldiers. “You’ll lose everything.”

The White House, ahead of Trump’s speech to the Venezuelan-American community, said, “The United States knows where military officials and their families have money hidden throughout the world.”

Trump also warned members of the Venezuelan military to not block foreign aid intended for the country.

Three U.S. military transport planes loaded with humanitarian aid for Venezuela landed in Cucuta, Colombia on Saturday, adding to the tons food and medicine waiting to cross the border.

The aid sent from the U.S. and many other countries, however, has not yet reached any Venezuelans, but instead sits in towns in Colombia, Brazil and Curacao.

Maduro says the aid is unnecessary and illegal and that to allow it to enter Venezuela would presage a U.S. military invasion.

Venezuela suffers from shortages of food, medicine and other daily necessities and also has the worst inflation rate in the world. Three million people — about 10 percent of the country’s population — have fled the country.

Trump, with hundreds of those who have fled Venezuela and Cuba in the audience, repeatedly linked those two countries, contending Havana’s military is protecting Maduro.

“The ugly alliance between the two dictatorships is coming to a rapid end,” said Trump, decrying Maduro as “a Cuban puppet.”

The president concluded his remarks by predicting that when Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua are no longer under Socialist or Communist regimes, “this will become the first free hemisphere in all of human history.”

Trump’s warnings throughout the speech about socialism, which he declared is “about one thing only — power for the ruling class,” were also intended to rally his political base as he faces a re-election campaign next year.

“There’s no doubt that today’s speech was part of his electoral campaign and he was speaking not to the Venezuelan people but to the voters in Florida. And that is disappointing,” Dany Behar, an economist from Venezuela at the Brookings Institution, tells VOA News.

Anti-Trump activists in the Democratic socialist movement, including a freshman member of Congress, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez from New York, are galvanizing young and disillusioned voters, who could be a pivotal force in the 2020 presidential election.  

 “There’s nothing less democratic than socialism,” Trump declared. “America will never be a socialist country.”
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Protesters around the U.S. spent Presidents Day rallying against President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration as at least a dozen states planned a lawsuit to block Trump’s latest ploy to fund his long-promised border wall.

 

“Trump is the national emergency!” chanted a group of hundreds lined up Monday at the White House fence while Trump was out of town in Florida. Some held up large letters spelling out “stop power grab.” In downtown Fort Worth, Texas, a small group carried signs with messages including “no wall! #FakeTrumpEmergency.”

 

Meanwhile, Colorado and New Mexico became the latest states to join with California and other states in challenging the declaration to fund a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Gov. Jared Polis and Attorney General Phil Weiser, both Democrats, said in a statement that the wall project could divert tens of millions of dollars from military construction projects in Colorado.

 

A crowd of more than 100 protesters gathered in frigid weather at the state Capitol in Denver roared with approval when Weiser told them his office was joining the multi-state lawsuit.

 

“There is zero real-world basis for the emergency declaration, and there will be no wall,” New Mexico Gov. Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, said in a statement.

 

Organized by the liberal group MoveOn and others, Monday’s demonstrations took the occasion of the Presidents Day holiday to assail Trump’s proclamation as undemocratic and anti-immigrant.

 

Kelly Quirk, of the progressive group Soma Action, told a gathering of dozens in Newark, New Jersey that “democracy demands” saying “no more” to Trump.

 

“There are plenty of real emergencies to invest our tax dollars in,” said Quirk.

 

In New York City, hundreds of people at a Manhattan park chanted “No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here” as several of them held up letters spelling out, “IMPEACH.”

 

There were some counter-protesters, including in Washington, where there was a brief scuffle in the crowd.

 

Trump’s declaration Friday shifts billions of dollars from military construction to the border. The move came after Congress didn’t approve as much as Trump wanted for the wall, which the Republican considers a national security necessity.

 

His emergency proclamation calls the border “a major entry point for criminals, gang members, and illicit narcotics.”

 

Illegal border crossings have declined from a high of 1.6 million in 2000. But 50,000 families are now entering illegally each month, straining the U.S. asylum system and border facilities.

 

Trump’s critics have argued he undercut his own rationale for the emergency declaration by saying he “didn’t need to do this” but wanted to get the wall built faster than he otherwise could. In announcing the move, he said he anticipated the legal challenges.

 

“President Trump declared a national emergency in order to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on his border wall obsession,” Manar Waheed of the American Civil Liberties Union told protesters rallying in a Washington park before heading to the nearby White House fence. The ACLU has announced its intention to sue Trump over the issue.

 

Ana Maria Archila, co-executive director of the left-leaning Center for Popular Democracy, said the president had undertaken to “steal money that we desperately need to build a country of our dreams so that he can build a monument to racism along the border.”

 

At one point during the rally, a counter-protester walked through the crowd toting a sign saying “finish the wall” on one side and “protect the poor” on the other. Another man snatched his sign from him, sparking a short scuffle.
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Kamala Harris had the best campaign roll-out. Amy Klobuchar’s snowy debut showed grit. Elizabeth Warren’s opening campaign video was a bit odd. Take it from an unlikely armchair pundit sizing up the 2020 Democratic field: President Donald Trump.

In tweets, public remarks and private conversations, Trump is making clear he is closely following the campaign to challenge him on the ballot. Facing no serious primary opponent of his own — at least so far — Trump is establishing himself as an in-their-face observer of the Democratic Party’s nominating process — and no will be surprised to find that he’s not being coy about weighing in.

Presidents traditionally ignore their potential opponents as long as possible to maintain their status as an incumbent floating above the contenders who are auditioning for a job they already inhabit.

Not Trump. He’s eager to shape the debate, sow discord and help position himself for the general election. It’s just one more norm to shatter, and a risky bet that his acerbic politics will work to his advantage once again.

This is the president whose 240-character blasts and penchant for insults made mincemeat of his 2016 Republican rivals. And Brad Parscale, Trump’s campaign manager, said the president aims to use Twitter again this time to “define his potential opponent and impact the Democrat primary debate.”

 

 But often Trump’s commentary reflects a peculiar sense of disengagement from the events of the day, as though he were a panelist on the cable news shows he records and watches, rather than their prime subject of discussion. He puts the armchair in armchair punditry. In an interview with The New York Times, Trump assessed Harris’ campaign like a talk show regular, declaring her opening moves as having a “better crowd, better enthusiasm” than the other Democrats.

Crowd size was also at play last week when he held a rally in El Paso, Texas, that was countered a few blocks away by one led by former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, a potential 2020 candidate.

“So we have let’s say 35,000 people tonight, and he has 200 people, 300 people,” Trump observed, wildly exaggerating both numbers. “Not too good. In fact, what I would do is, I would say, that may be the end of his presidential bid.”

When Sen. Klobuchar announced her candidacy on a frigid day in her home state of Minnesota, Trump anointed her with a nickname of sorts, and a benign one at that: “By the end of her speech she looked like a Snowmanlwoman]!”

Inside the West Wing and in conversations with outside allies, Trump has been workshopping other attempts to imprint his new adversaries with lasting labels, according to two people on whom the president has tested out the nicknames. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations with the president. He is also testing out lines of attack in public rallies, exploring vulnerabilities he could use against them should they advance to the general election.

No candidate has drawn more commentary and criticism from Trump than Sen. Warren, the liberal Massachusetts Democrat. Warren’s past claims of Native American heritage prompted Trump to brand her “Pocahontas” and he has shown no qualms about deploying racially charged barbs harking back to some of the nation’s darkest abuses.

Wading into a Twitter frenzy over an Instagram video Warren posted after she announced her exploratory committee while sharing a beer with her husband at their kitchen table, Trump jeered: “Best line in the Elizabeth Warren beer catastrophe is, to her husband, `Thank you for being here. I’m glad you’re here’ It’s their house, he’s supposed to be there!”

“If Elizabeth Warren, often referred to by me as Pocahontas, did this commercial from Bighorn or Wounded Knee instead of her kitchen, with her husband dressed in full Indian garb, it would have been a smash!” Trump tweeted.

Even in the midst of the partial government shutdown, those tweets mocking Warren were widely joked about by White House staff weary from the protracted closure, according to one aide who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations. The person said the president repeatedly ridiculed Warren’s video in private conversations with aides and outside advisers.

Attention from Trump can drive up fundraising and elevate a candidate above a crowded field. But responding to attacks also distracts from a candidate’s message.

Trump’s rivals in the 2016 GOP primary learned that lesson as he bedeviled them with name-calling. Trump goaded Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida into making a thinly veiled insult of his manhood that quickly backfired, and weeks later he sucked Texas Sen. Ted Cruz into a brutal back-and-forth about an insult he had leveled at Cruz’s wife.

“The president has an ability to use social media to define his opponents and influence the primary debate in a way no sitting president before him has,” said former White House spokesman Raj Shah. “I expect him to take full advantage.”

On Friday, hours after declaring a national emergency on the U.S.-Mexico border, Trump tweeted a video made by a supporter that featured the president’s Democratic critics in Congress. Harris, Bernie Sanders and Cory Booker were shown sitting dourly during the State of the Union address, set to the R.E.M. ballad “Everybody Hurts.”

The mocking video may have been taken down later in the day after a copyright complaint by the band, and re-cut using Trump-supporter Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A.” But the message to Trump’s would-be 2020 rivals, and people girding for another wild presidential cycle, remained anchored to the lyrics of that R.E.M. song: “Hold on.”
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Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe says Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was “absolutely” supportive of the decision to launch investigations into whether President Donald Trump was inappropriately aligned with the Russians or whether he had obstructed justice.

 

McCabe also said in an interview aired Sunday on “60 Minutes” that the FBI had good reason to investigate whether Trump was in league with Russia following the May 2017 firing of FBI Director James Comey.

McCabe cited what he said were Trump’s efforts to publicly undermine the investigation into potential coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia.

A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment Sunday night.

In excerpts released last week by CBS News, McCabe also described a conversation about invoking the Constitution to remove Trump from office.
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Can U.S. President Donald Trump laugh at a joke at his own expense?

Not if it’s coming from NBC’s satirical Saturday Night Live show and Trump impersonator Alec Baldwin, who has periodically contorted his face and snarled his way to fame mocking the 45th president.

On Saturday night Baldwin was jabbing at Trump again, a day after Trump declared a national emergency to divert money in the government’s budget to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border without congressional authorization.

“You all see why I gotta fake this emergency, right? I have to because I want to,” Baldwin said as the sketch show opened. “It’s really simple.

We have a problem. Drugs are coming into this country through no wall.”

But Baldwin as Trump said, “Wall works, wall makes safe. You don’t have to be smart to understand that  in fact it’s even easier to understand if you’re not that smart.”

The fake president mimicked Trump’s singsong voice during part of his Friday news conference announcing the national emergency.

“I’ll immediately be sued and the ruling will not go in my favor and then it will end up in the Supreme Court and then I’ll call my buddy [Brett] Kavanaugh (a justice appointed by Trump) and I’ll say, It’s time to repay the Donny,’ and he’ll say, new phone, who dis?'” Baldwin joked.

But by then, Baldwin-as-Trump said, a report by special counsel Robert Mueller, who has been investigating links between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia, “will be released, crumbling my house of cards and I can plead insanity and do a few months in the puzzle factory and my personal hell of playing president will finally be over.”

The show also lampooned the results of Trump’s recent annual physical exam.

“I’m still standing 6-7, 185 pounds — shredded,” Baldwin said, although Trump actually is several centimeters shorter and weighs more than 110 kilograms, defined by U.S. health standards as obese.

Trump gave the sketch and the show a thumbs down.

“Nothing funny about tired Saturday Night Live on Fake News NBC!” Trump said on Twitter. “Question is, how do the Networks get away with these total Republican hit jobs without retribution? Likewise for many other shows? Very unfair and should be looked into. This is the real Collusion!”

“THE RIGGED AND CORRUPT MEDIA IS THE ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE!” he tweeted minutes later.
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Washington has been plunged into a power struggle between the executive and legislative branches of government — one that America’s third branch, the courts, ultimately may resolve. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration aims to jumpstart wall construction along the U.S.-Mexico border that Congress did not authorize.
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State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert on Saturday said she has withdrawn her name from consideration for the post of U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

In December, President Donald Trump had announced he was picking Nauert to fill the vacancy caused when Nikki Haley stepped down from that position, leaving at the end of 2018.

Media reports said late Saturday Nauert has withdrawn due to complications surrounding her employment of a nanny who was in the country legally, but not legally allowed to work. 

According to The Washington Post, the nanny had worked for the Nauerts for 10 years and was paid in cash, but she had not paid taxes.  When the family discovered that taxes had not been paid, The Post reported, the Nauerts demanded that the tax bill be paid. 

Earlier Saturday, before news of the the nanny complication emerged, Nauert said, in a statement, “I am grateful to President Trump and Secretary (Mike) Pompeo for the trust they placed in me for considering me for the position of U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. However, the past two months have been grueling for my family and therefore it is in the best interest of my family that I withdraw my name from consideration.

“Serving in the Administration for the past two years has been one of the highest honors of my life and I will always be grateful to the President, the Secretary, and my colleagues at the State Department for their support,” Nauert said in a statement released by the State Department Saturday.

In the statement, Secretary of State Pompeo praised Nauert for performing her duties with “unequalled excellence,” and wished her the best “in whatever role she finds herself.” 

In nominating Nauert, Trump said she was “very talented, very smart, very quick. And I think she’s going to be respected by all.”

 

Broadcast journalist

Nauert joined the State Department in April 2017 after a career in broadcast journalism, first serving under former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and then under Pompeo. In addition to serving as spokesperson, Nauert also served as acting undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs from March to October of this year. 

 

She came to State from Fox News, where she co-anchored Fox and Friends, the morning program that Trump says he watches regularly. The president’s other recent hires from Fox News include White House communications chief Bill Shine and national security adviser John Bolton. 

 

Nauert likely would have faced tough questioning during her Senate confirmation hearings about her apparent lack of diplomatic or policymaking experience. 

 

The Wilson Center’s Aaron David Miller said Nauert had a different profile from past U.S. ambassadors to the United Nations. 

 

“I think Heather Nauert is smart. She is a quick study. She will learn the brief. But, I think it [the U.S. ambassador job] is not going to be what it was under Nikki Haley, which was a serious competitor under a vacuum at the NSC [National Security Council] and at the State Department under Tillerson.” 

 

Miller, who advised several secretaries of state under Republican and Democratic administrations, said Haley took advantage of the “empty space” created by media-averse Tillerson to stake out positions on a whole range of foreign policy issues, and that was not likely going to be the case with Nauert. 

Smaller role seen

 

“Heather Nauert is not going to be a big-time player in the deliberations on substance in the administration,” he said. “I doubt, on an issue like Syria, unless it pertains to the U.N., that the president is going to call her up and say, ‘What do you think?’ ” 

 

Both Trump and Pompeo have been highly critical of the United Nations and other multilateral institutions, with Pompeo noting in a Brussels speech earlier this week that “multilateralism has become viewed as an end unto itself. The more treaties we sign, the safer we supposedly are. The more bureaucrats we have, the better the job gets done.” 

 

During Nauert’s twice-weekly briefings at the State Department and her own trips, she has shown a passion for human rights issues. While serving with Tillerson, Nauert took trips on her own initiative, visiting Myanmar and Bangladesh last year to meet with Rohingya refugees. 

 

She also visited Israel and strongly defended Trump’s controversial decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem. 

 

Nauert is a graduate of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and Mount Vernon College in Washington. The 48-year-old is a wife and mother of two young sons, and was born in Rockford, Ill. 

 

Steve Herman at the White House, and Cindy Saine and Nike Ching at the State Department contributed to this report.
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In early November, word began to leak that Amazon was serious about choosing New York to build a giant new campus. The city was eager to lure the company and its thousands of high-paying tech jobs, offering billions in tax incentives and lighting the Empire State Building in Amazon orange.

Even Governor Andrew Cuomo got in on the action: “I’ll change my name to Amazon Cuomo if that’s what it takes,” he joked at the time.

Then Amazon made it official: It chose the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens to build a $2.5 billion campus that could house 25,000 workers, in addition to new offices planned for northern Virginia. Cuomo and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Democrats who have been political adversaries for years, trumpeted the decision as a major coup after edging out more than 230 other proposals.

But what they didn’t expect was the protests, the hostile public hearings and the disparaging tweets that would come in the next three months, eventually leading to Amazon’s dramatic Valentine’s Day breakup with New York.

Immediately after Amazon’s Nov. 12 announcement, criticism started to pour in. The deal included $1.5 billion in special tax breaks and grants for the company, but a closer look at the total package revealed it to be worth at least $2.8 billion. Some of the same politicians who had signed a letter to woo Amazon were now balking at the tax incentives.

“Offering massive corporate welfare from scarce public resources to one of the wealthiest corporations in the world at a time of great need in our state is just wrong,” said New York State Sen. Michael Gianaris and New York City Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer, Democrats who represent the Long Island City area, in a joint statement.

The next day, CEO Jeff Bezos was on the cover of The New York Post in a cartoon-like illustration, hanging out of a helicopter, holding money bags in each hand, with cash billowing above the skyline. “QUEENS RANSOM,” the headline screamed. The New York Times editorial board, meanwhile, called the deal a “bad bargain” for the city: “We won’t know for 10 years whether the promised 25,000 jobs will materialize,” it said.

Anti-Amazon rallies were planned for the next week. Protesters stormed a New York Amazon bookstore on the day after Thanksgiving and then went to a rally on the steps of a courthouse near the site of the new headquarters in the pouring rain. Some held cardboard boxes with Amazon’s smile logo turned upside down.

In this Nov. 14, 2018 file photo, protesters hold up anti-Amazon signs during a coalition rally and press conference of elected officials, community organizations and unions opposing Amazon headquarters getting subsidies to locate in New York.

They had a long list of grievances: the deal was done secretively; Amazon, one of the world’s most valuable companies, didn’t need nearly $3 billion in tax incentives; rising rents could push people out of the neighborhood; and the company was opposed to unionization.

The helipad kept coming up, too: Amazon, in its deal with the city, was promised it could build a spot to land a helicopter on or near the new offices.

At the first public hearing in December, which turned into a hostile, three-hour interrogation of two Amazon executives by city lawmakers, the helipad was mentioned more than a dozen times. The image of high-paid executives buzzing by a nearby low-income housing project became a symbol of corporate greed.

Queens residents soon found postcards from Amazon in their mailboxes, trumpeting the benefits of the project. Gianaris sent his own version, calling the company “Scamazon” and urging people to call Bezos and tell him to stay in Seattle.

At a second city council hearing in January, Amazon’s vice president for public policy, Brian Huseman, subtly suggested that perhaps the company’s decision to come to New York could be reversed.

“We want to invest in a community that wants us,” he said.

Then came a sign that Amazon’s opponents might actually succeed in derailing the deal: In early February, Gianaris was tapped for a seat on a little-known state panel that often has to approve state funding for big economic development projects. That meant if Amazon’s deal went before the board, Gianaris could kill it.

“I’m not looking to negotiate a better deal,” Gianaris said at the time. “I am against the deal that has been proposed.”

Cuomo had the power to block Gianaris’ appointment, but he didn’t indicate whether he would take that step.

Meanwhile, Amazon’s own doubts about the project started to show. On Feb. 8, The Washington Post reported that the company was having second thoughts about the Queens location.

On Wednesday, Cuomo brokered a meeting with four top Amazon executives and the leaders of three unions critical of the deal. The union leaders walked away with the impression that the parties had an agreed upon framework for further negotiations, said Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail Wholesale and Department Store Union.

“We had a good conversation. We talked about next steps. We shook hands,” Appelbaum said.

An Amazon representative did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

The final blow landed Thursday, when Amazon announced on a blog post that it was backing out, surprising the mayor, who had spoken to an Amazon executive Monday night and received “no indication” that the company would bail.

Amazon still expected the deal to be approved, according to a source familiar with Amazon’s thinking, but that the constant criticism from politicians didn’t make sense for the company to grow there.

“I was flabbergasted,” De Blasio said. “Why on earth after all of the effort we all put in would you simply walk away?”
…

U.S. President Donald Trump’s use of a national emergency declaration to get funds to build a wall along the southern U.S. border likely sets up a lengthy legal battle that could help determine the limits of U.S. presidential power. As VOA’s William Gallo reports, the move also creates a divide in the president’s own Republican Party.
…

Former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld said Friday that he was launching a presidential exploratory committee, making him the first Republican to take steps to challenge U.S. President Donald Trump for the party’s nomination in 2020.

Trump’s popularity among Republicans remains high in his third year in office. While he is not expected to face significant hurdles in his bid for a second nomination, it is rare for an incumbent president to face a notable primary challenge, with the last being George H.W. Bush.

Weld, 73, is not well-known nationally but is well-respected among officials in the GOP establishment.

He was first elected governor of Massachusetts in 1990, defeating a conservative Democratic candidate. Weld became one of the state’s more popular governors, being elected twice by comfortable margins.

While in office, he followed traditional Republican fiscal policies of trying to keep taxes and government spending low, but embraced liberal positions on abortion and gay rights. 

Nation in ‘grave peril’

In announcing his presidential aspirations Friday in Bedford, N.H., Weld said the country was in “grave peril” and described Trump as a “schoolyard bully.”

“I encourage those of you who are watching the current administration nervously, but saying nothing, to stand up and speak out when lines are crossed in dangerous ways,” Weld said.

Weld said Trump was “a president whose priorities are skewed to the promotion of himself rather than toward the good of the country.”

Asked to comment on Weld’s campaign, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders responded: “Who?”

Weld tried to win a U.S. Senate seat in Massachusetts in 1996 but lost to John Kerry. He later moved to New York and unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for governor in 2005.

In 2016, Weld joined the Libertarian Party, serving as running mate to the party’s 2016 candidate, Gary Johnson. The duo received about 4.5 million votes, or a little more than 3 percent of the national popular vote. Weld returned to the Republican Party this year, saying it was the best place from which to challenge Trump.

Several other Republicans are also reportedly considering challenging Trump in the primaries, including former Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan. More than a dozen Democrats have already announced their intentions to run in the Democratic primaries or are reported to be considering candidacies.
…

President Donald Trump on Friday declared a national emergency at the southern border while acknowledging that rapid construction of a wall is not a necessity, but rather his preference. In justifying the extraordinary step, he brushed aside his administration’s conclusions that drugs come into the country primarily at official points of entry, not over remote territory that a barrier could seal off.

Trump invoked what his aides called the “common authority” of presidents to take unilateral action through the declaration of a national emergency. But there’s nothing common about a president taking command of billions of dollars without the approval of Congress to pay for a campaign promise.

“I could do the wall over a longer period of time,” Trump said, raising questions about why he sees an emergency unfolding today. “I didn’t need to do this, but I’d rather do it much faster.”

At a Rose Garden news conference, Trump also claimed progress on wall construction that hasn’t occurred.

A look at some of his comments:

TRUMP: “I’ve built a lot of wall. I have a lot of money, and I’ve built a lot of wall.”

THE FACTS: He’s built no new miles of wall, lacking the money. His new construction to date has replaced existing barriers.

This month marks the start of construction of 14 miles (22 kilometers) of fencing in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, the first lengthening of barrier in his presidency. That’s from money approved by Congress a year ago, most of which was for renovating existing barrier.

Money approved by Congress in the new deal to avert another government shutdown would cover about 55 more miles (88 km).

He has often portrayed his wall, falsely, as largely complete, to a point where “Finish the wall” has become his rallying cry, replacing “Build the wall.” That masks a distinct lack of progress in physically sealing the border — a frustration that is now prompting him to find money outside the normal channels of congressional appropriation. Trump inherited about 650 miles (1,050 km) of physical border barrier from previous administrations.

TRUMP, on past presidents declaring national emergencies: “There’s rarely been a problem. They sign it; nobody cares.I guess they weren’t very exciting.But nobody cares. … And the people that say we create precedent — well, what do you have? Fifty-six? There are a lot of times — well, that’s creating precedent.And many of those are far less important than having a border.”

THE FACTS: Those declarations were rarely as consequential, and that’s precisely why they were mostly uncontroversial. He’s roughly correct about the numbers. But past declarations did not involve the unilateral spending of substantial sums of money that Congress — which holds the power of the purse — did not approve.

Emergency declarations by Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton were overwhelmingly for the purpose of addressing crises that emerged abroad. Many blocked foreign interests or terrorist-linked entities from access to funds. Some prohibited certain imports from or investments in countries associated with human rights abuses.

Trump’s number resembles findings from the Brennan Center for Justice, which has tracked 58 emergency declarations back to 1978.

“It’s extremely rare for a president to declare a national emergency in a bid to fund domestic construction projects, particularly one that Congress has explicitly refused to fund,” said Andrew Boyle, an attorney in the national security program at the center. “The ones that former presidents declared are of a different sort.”

Obama declared a national emergency in July 2011 to impose sanctions on transnational criminal groups, blocking any American property interests and freezing their assets, authorizing financial sanctions against anyone aiding them and barring their members from entering the United States. It authorized sanctions against criminal cartels in Mexico, Japan, Italy and Eastern Europe. It did not direct billions in spending by the U.S. treasury.

TRUMP: “And a big majority of the big drugs — the big drug loads — don’t go through ports of entry.They can’t go through ports of entry.You can’t take big loads because you have people — we have some very capable people; the Border Patrol, law enforcement — looking.

TRUMP: “We have tremendous amounts of drugs flowing into our country, much of it coming from the southern border.When you look and when you listen to politicians — in particular, certain Democrats — they say it all comes through the port of entry. It’s wrong.It’s wrong. It’s just a lie. It’s all a lie.”

THE FACTS: His own administration says illicit drugs come mainly through ports of entry. He has persistently contradicted his officials — never mind Democrats — on this point. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said in a 2018 report that the most common trafficking technique by transnational criminal organizations is to hide drugs in passenger vehicles or tractor-trailers as they drive into the U.S. at official crossings. They also use buses, cargo trains and tunnels, the report says, citing smuggling methods that would not be choked off by a border wall.

“Only a small percentage” of heroin seized by U.S. authorities comes across on territory between ports of entry, the agency says, and the same is true of drugs generally. The great majority of heroin, methamphetamines, cocaine and fentanyl is seized at ports of entry. Marijuana is one exception; significant quantities are seized between entry ports.

Even if a wall could stop all drugs from Mexico, America’s drug problem would be far from over. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says about 40 percent of opioid deaths in 2016 involved prescription painkillers. Those drugs are made by pharmaceutical companies. Some feed the addiction of people who have prescriptions; others are stolen and sold on the black market. Moreover, illicit versions of powerful synthetic opioids such as fentanyl have come to the U.S. from China, not Mexico.

TRUMP: “Take a look at our federal prison population. See how many of them, percentage-wise, are illegal aliens. Just see. Go ahead and see. ”

THE FACTS: About 40 percent of the people who entered federal prison in 2014 were foreigners, according to the most recent Bureau of Justice Statistics. The vast majority of the foreigners (20,842 of 28,821) were being held for immigration violations, not violent or property crimes. It’s not clear how many were in the country illegally. The federal prison population is not a solid yardstick of immigrant crime because it represents only 10 percent of the overall prison population of the U.S. Most people convicted of crimes are in state prison.
…

The Democratic party is not a monolith or a rubber stamp for any idea or policy position. That’s House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s oft-repeated way of describing the party she leads. But lately, a handful of House Democratic freshman have tested that approach to its limits, revealing cracks between the party’s traditional support of Israel and progressives’ vocal advocacy for Palestinians. 

Newcomer Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, a Somali-American, drew widespread condemnation for a tweet last Sunday implying Congressional support for Israel has been bought by money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a lobbying group that supports the U.S.-Israel relationship. 

“It’s all about the Benjamins baby,” Omar tweeted late Sunday, asserting that politicians’ support of Israel is driven by money.

She touched off a firestorm of complaints from Democratic and Republican leaders alike, including Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland. Omar’s comment invoked offensive tropes about money or “Benjamins”  a reference to $100 bills — that are often used against Jewish people. Her remark was magnified because the freshman holds a coveted seat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“It’s shocking to hear a member of Congress invoke the anti-Semitic trope of ‘Jewish money.’ I fully expect that when we disagree on the Foreign Affairs Committee, we will debate policy on the merits and never question members’ motives or resort to personal attacks,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel of New York said in a statement this week that reflects many of his colleagues’ reactions to the tweet.

“Criticism of American policy toward any country is fair game, but this must be done on policy grounds.” 

Omar apologized for her remarks Monday, tweeting “Anti-Semitism is real and I am grateful for Jewish allies and colleagues who are educating me on the painful history of anti-Semitic tropes.” But she went on to say that AIPAC continues to be an issue of concern, although the highly influential  organization does not make campaign contributions. 

During a Cabinet meeting Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump dismissed Omar’s apology as “lame” and called on her to resign. Omar replied by calling the president a hypocrite who has “trafficked in hate your whole life  against Jews, Muslims, Indigenous, immigrants, black people and more.”

The weeklong dust-up underscored growing divisions within a Democratic Party that for decades provided unalloyed support to the state of Israel but that now must adjust to skepticism within its ranks about the Israeli government and that country’s policies towards the Palestinians. Trump and other Republican leaders are attempting to use their insistence on unqualified support for Israel as a litmus test to drive a wedge through the Democrats, according to media reports.

Omar, 37, was born in Mogadishu and spent her formative years in Somalia. She and her family were resettled as refugees in the United States in 1995, after the start of the Somalia civil war, and subsequently moved to Minneapolis, where she learned English and went to school. She studied political science and international affairs at North Dakota State University, before launching a career in politics. She won a seat in the Minnesota House of Representatives in 2016 — which made her the first Somali-American elected to legislative office in the U.S. Then last November, she won an open seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Omar and Rashida Tlaib, a Michigan Democrat, became the first two Muslim-American women elected to Congress.

Omar has been accused of anti-Semitic language in previous tweets expressing support for BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions), a movement that aims to end international support for Israel because of what the group calls “oppression of Palestinians.” Each time, Omar has apologized and said the controversy was an opportunity for her to learn. 

This week, Omar declined requests to speak with the media following her apology on social media for her “Benjamins” comment. But she showed no signs of backing down from courting controversy on Wednesday, when she challenged U.S. Special Representative to Venezuela Elliott Abrams on his human rights record during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing. 

During the contentious exchange, Omar mistakenly referred to Abrams as “Mr. Adams” and told him she did not understand why “this committee or the American people should find any testimony that you give today to be truthful.” 

Omar is one of several high-profile Democratic freshman members of Congress who have publicly voiced their support for the BDS.

​Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from a heavily Democratic district in New York, has condemned “the occupation of Palestine.” Tlaib, the first Palestinian-American woman to serve in Congress, is currently seeking support for a congressional delegation trip or CODEL to Palestine later this year. AIPAC has a long history of organizing yearly congressional CODELs to Israel so that members can learn more about the situation on the ground. 

Rep. Brian Babin, a Republican from Texas, urged Democratic leaders in a letter sent Thursday to “please deny Rep. Tlaib’s request to sponsor and lead a CODEL to Palestinian territories and exercise your authority as chair to deny your consent to any member of your committee who seeks your approval to participate in such a misadventure.” 

Last month, 22 Senate Democrats voted against legislation that would facilitate penalties against American companies that boycott Israel. Six of those votes were from Senate Democrats who are running for president.  

Republicans see the growing support for Palestine on the part of younger, more progressive members of Congress as a possible opportunity to divide Democratic voters ahead of next year’s presidential nomination contest. 

A January 2018 Pew Research Center poll shows the partisan divide over Israel is at its widest point in four decades and that Democrats who sympathize more with Israel than with Palestinians has dropped from 38 percent to 27 percent since 2001. 

The House Republican leadership unexpectedly added a provision to unrelated legislation Wednesday condemning anti-Semitic language, forcing Democrats to go on the record against Omar’s remarks. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California called the vote a defining moment in Congress and for the country. 

“Amid the troubling rise of anti-Semitism, including attacks on synagogues and Jewish cemeteries, it is our duty as a nation to stand firmly against intolerance and division,” McCarthy said in a statement. The provision passed unanimously, 424 to 0 vote. 

McCarthy has also faced criticism about comments invoking stereotypes about Jews. In a now deleted tweet just before the 2018 midterm elections, McCarthy accused three leading Jewish Democratic donors of trying “to buy this election.” 

Leadership in both parties will have to step carefully in the coming months, as a high-stakes 2020 presidential race heats up. Both sides will be looking for divisive tweets and off-the cuff remarks to run in campaign ads, firing up the more committed voters at the extreme ends of the parties who tend to show up at polls in early primary contests. 

Pelosi faces a tough dilemma. For the first time in decades of polling, the majority of Democrats identify themselves as liberal. The handful of progressive new House members are forcing policy discussions on a range of issues  from U.S. support of Israel to climate change to taxation rates  that is commanding media attention in a new way.
…

A U.S. judge on Friday limited the ability of people involved in the trial of Roger

Stone, a former adviser to President Donald Trump, from speaking publicly about the case in a way that may influence the outcome.

The order by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman prohibits lawyers involved in the case from speaking with news media, and prohibits other participants, like Stone himself, from making statements that may affect the case when they are near the courthouse.
…

The United States has called on Europe to abandon the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, which Washington pulled out of last year.

At a two-day conference in Warsaw, attended by more than 60 nations Thursday, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence accused European allies of trying to break American sanctions against what he called “Iran’s murderous revolutionary regime.”

“The time has come for our European partners to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal and join with us as we bring economic and diplomatic pressure necessary to give the Iranian people, the region and the world the security, peace and freedom they deserve,” Pence said at a news conference.

​Pompeo adds pressure

Also attending the conference, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said global pressure was mounting on Tehran.

“No country spoke out and denied any of the basic facts that we all have laid out about Iran, the threat it poses, the nature of regime. It was unanimous,” Pompeo said.

Unanimous, perhaps, among those countries attending the conference. Some U.S. allies, however, were notable for their absence, including the foreign ministers of France and Germany. Britain’s representative left the summit early.

All three allies have voiced strong support for the 2015 Iran nuclear deal and have launched a payment system to bypass U.S. sanctions on Tehran in an attempt to keep the agreement alive.

 

WATCH: U.S. Rebukes EU Allies Over Iran Deal

US-European divide

Warsaw-based analyst Piotr Buras of the European Council on Foreign Relations says summit host Poland and some other European states appear closer to Washington’s approach and the United States sees an opportunity.

“I have the feeling that the Trump administration doesn’t care much about Europe’s unity, or even more perhaps it really tries to exploit some divisions within Europe, or even deepen them,” he said.

Jonathan Eyal of Britain’s Royal United Services Institute argued Washington’s approach is in fact aimed at bridging transatlantic divides with European allies.

“The United States is willing to re-engage with them on a Middle East policy, especially on a very sensitive issue like the re-imposition of sanctions on Iran where the gulf between Europe and the U.S. is very big,” he sad. “And secondly it is also another attempt by the State Department to remind the White House that the friends in Europe are irreplaceable when it comes to most of America’s foreign policy objectives.”

The summit was attended by Israel and several Sunni Gulf states. Qatar, Turkey and Lebanon declined to take part. Iran, which did not attend the meeting, dismissed it as “dead on arrival.”
…

The United States has called on Europe to abandon the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, which Washington pulled out of last year. At a conference in Warsaw attended by more than 60 nations, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence accused European allies of trying to break American sanctions against what he called Iran’s ‘murderous revolutionary regime.’ Several EU states have refused to attend the meeting, as Henry Ridgwell reports.
…

Republican and Democratic members of the U.S. Senate asked the Trump administration Thursday to tell them more about the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at a Saudi consulate last year, days after a missed deadline for a detailed report on his death prompted an angry bipartisan backlash.

Ten of the 12 Republicans from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, led by Chairman Jim Risch, wrote to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo asking for more information.

“The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is committed to pursuing all information available in its oversight role and, to that end, is in the process of arranging a classified briefing for the committee,” Risch said in a statement.

All 10 committee Democrats, led by senior member Bob Menendez, along with Appropriations Committee Vice Chairman Pat Leahy, signed their own letter demanding that Pompeo brief Congress on why President Donald Trump’s administration missed last Friday’s deadline to report to Congress on whether Saudi government officials and members of the royal family, including Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, were behind the death of Khashoggi, a legal U.S. resident.

Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and critic of the Saudi government, was killed at a Saudi consulate in Turkey in October. His death fueled simmering discontent with the Saudis among many in Washington angry over the kingdom’s human rights record and heavy civilian casualties in Yemen’s civil war, where a Saudi-led coalition is fighting Iran-backed Houthi rebels.

War powers resolution

Members of Congress have been introducing legislation for months to push back against Riyadh. On Wednesday, the Democratic-led U.S. House of Representatives approved a rare war powers resolution that would end U.S. support for the Saudi Arabia-led coalition in Yemen. A Senate vote is expected within weeks.

While several Republicans had demanded more of a response from Trump last week, Risch told reporters Tuesday: “I’m really satisfied with the way they are answering questions and giving us information.”

Update provided

A State Department representative, commenting on the senators’ letters, said Pompeo had provided an update to Foreign Relations on Friday and would continue to consult with Congress.

After initially denying his death, Saudi Arabia has confirmed that its agents killed Khashoggi. Riyadh denies its senior leaders were behind the killing.
…

“I will build a great wall,” declared Donald Trump in announcing he was running for president in June 2015. “I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will make Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words.”

A wall at the U.S.-Mexico became Trump’s signature promise — a call and response at all of his campaign and post-campaign rallies, a symbol of his contempt for illegal immigrants and the centerpiece of his draconian immigration policies.

Yet, a­­s much as the billionaire former New York real estate investor says he wants it, there is still no trace of the towering, gleaming, all-encompassing border wall he originally promised.

More than two years into his first term, all Trump has to show is eight wall sections erected on a dusty plot of scrubland near San Diego. This month, previously planned construction begins on 9.5 kilometers of levee wall in the Rio Grande River Valley in Texas, marking the first wall construction during the Trump presidency.

The president’s insistence on $5.7 billion of U.S. taxpayer funds for the wall over Democrats’ objections and tepid­­ public support led to a 35-day partial government shutdown in December and January, and another one threatened for February.

The spending deal finally struck by Democratic and Republican negotiators — and expected to be approved by Trump — was an unmistakable setback for the president. It provided $1.375 billion for 88 kilometers of fencing, only a quarter of the money he sought, and a fraction of the 322 kilometers of new wall he demanded.

Trump said he was “not happy” with the compromise, but was unwilling to torpedo the agreement and trigger another shutdown. Instead, he hinted at seeking executive action to shift funding from other accounts to supplement the cost of a wall.

​​Actual wall and…

Currently, some kind of barrier exists on 1,127 kilometers of the U.S.-Mexico border, about a third of the 3,145-kilometer boundary.

While Trump’s focus on building a wall has not changed, the wall itself — or his idea of the wall — has steadily contracted.

What started out as a concrete barrier along the border “from sea to shining sea” has devolved into something “see-through” or built with metal slats, constructed where there are no natural barriers. Recently, Trump resolved to “just call them walls, and stop playing political games,” as if the term were merely a label that could be affixed to anything.

“The symbolism is more important than the reality,” the National Review’’s Jonah Goldberg wrote in December. “Immigration policy itself is something of an afterthought.”

Pundits have speculated on the symbolic meaning of Trump’s wall. “Shielding America from outside threats and uncertainty.” Trump’s “neediness.” “His presidency.” Proof that the “government is listening.” And “ruin.”

‘Big, beautiful wall’

Five days after he was sworn in as president, Trump issued an executive order authorizing the wall and earmarking whatever federal funds could be found to pay for it, to combat “a surge of illegal immigration.”

“’Wall’ shall mean a contiguous, physical wall or other similarly secure, contiguous, and impassable physical barrier,” the order specified, to be built all along the southern border.

A month later, Customs and Border Protection announced it would accept design concepts from construction companies and award contracts after reviewing their bids.

By now, spurned by Mexican officials, Trump had abandoned his fantasy that the Mexican government would pay for it.

CBP didn’t have the money. Its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, could only find $20 million in existing funds for the wall, which it estimated would cost $21.6 billion.

​The money would cover only eight prototypes — with nothing left over for actual wall construction.

Trump vowed to renew the fight when the fiscal year (FY) 2018 budget was discussed in September, and if necessary, shut down the government — a threat that would become a refrain until it became a reality.

​In defeat, double down

During the next two budget cycles, Trump exhibited a pattern: big demands, lots of posturing, and when rebuffed, an even bigger demand.

On Oct. 1, 2017, when the new budget would have taken effect, the government was operating on money provided by a short-term funding bill, the first of five that would keep the government running through March 2018, with the exception of two brief shutdowns.

In his original budget request, Trump asked for $1.6 billion as a down payment on the wall. This was approved by the Republican-dominated House of Representatives in July. But it wouldn’t pass the Senate, where the majority needed Democratic votes to clear parliamentary hurdles in passing spending measures.

Yet in early December, Trump pushed for $25 billion in wall funding.

Why had he so greatly increased his request, when Congress was already deadlocked?

A key issue at the time was the fate of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which sheltered young immigrants brought to the U.S. as children from deportation and allowed them to work.

​Trump was ending DACA in March unless Congress acted to save it. Democrats badly wanted a fix for the DACA program, which also allowed recipients to work and go to school. An obvious deal would be for Trump to support a legislative extension of DACA in return for Democratic support of wall construction.

Three’s a charm?

In the first three months of 2018, Trump had three chances to obtain full wall funding. He rejected them all.

The First. In mid-January, with the third short-term spending bill set to expire in hours, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York met with Trump over cheeseburgers to head off a government shutdown. Schumer reportedly offered $25 billion for the wall over 10 years in exchange for a path to citizenship for DACA recipients. Reports say he left thinking he had a deal. But White House Chief of Staff John Kelly later called and quashed it. A 69-hour shutdown followed. 

Three days later, Trump introduced his “Four Pillars” immigration reform plan: No deal without wall construction. An end to family-based migration. An end to the diversity visa. A solution for DACA.

The Second. In mid-February, Democrats and some Republicans introduced a bill that included $25 billion for the wall over a 10-year period, and DACA. While it contained additional immigration provisions, it did not address the other pillars.

The next day, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders put out a statement  threatening a Trump veto because the bill would “produce a flood of new illegal immigration.”

The bill subsequently failed in the Senate.

The Third. In March, with another funding deadline looming, Democrats offered $25 billion for the wall in a flat exchange for citizenship for DACA recipients. Republicans countered with a 2.5-year extension for DACA. Democrats rejected that offer as unbalanced because it called for permanent funding for the wall but only a temporary fix for DACA. 

By this time, the courts were keeping DACA going while its constitutionality was tested. There no longer was an urgency to preserve the program through congressional action.

When the budget was finally signed on March 22, lawmakers had approved only $1.375 billion for border security, none of which included construction of a border wall.

In a tweet, Trump threatened to veto the bill. But he signed the measure, vowing never to do it again.

‘Big fight’

If there was a silver lining to not getting wall authorization, it was that Trump could use the issue to whip up voters in advance of the 2018 midterm elections.

​His depiction of escalating danger at the southern border was the core of his campaign stump speeches for Republican House and Senate candidates.

While chants for the wall were vehement as ever at campaign rallies, no big constituency showed up at the polls. Republicans won a few additional seats in the Senate, but Democrats swept the House and set up a new dynamic: a divided government.

In September, outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin had promised a “big fight” over wall funding. A few weeks after the election, here it was. Trump showed his hand: DACA and the other pillars had fallen away. All he wanted was $5.7 billion for the wall. Earlier, Congress had given tentative approval to $1.6 billion.

“I am firm,” Trump said. “Politically speaking, that issue is a total winner.”

​In a bizarre, mid-December squabble with Nancy Pelosi, the presumptive new House Speaker, and Schumer at the White House, Trump declared, “I am proud to shut down the government for border security. … I will take the mantle. … I won’t blame you (Schumer) for it.”

​As a result, he owned the 35-day partial shutdown that followed, leaving 800,000 government employees without paychecks, curtailing government services and costing the economy billions of dollars.

The high-profile political clash ended where it began: the president insisting on $5.7 billion for the wall, and Pelosi firmly declaring, “There’s not going to be any wall money.”

As another government shutdown loomed this week, a bipartisan committee of 17 Senate and House members agreed on a compromise that Trump has reluctantly agreed to sign.

Negotiating downward

Two years. Two budgets. Two prolonged fights over funding for the wall. In each case, the final compromise fell short — not only of what the president was demanding, but also short of what he could have had if he’d just taken what was initially offered.

In both FY2018 and FY2019, the White House began by seeking $1.6 billion for border security. After an exhaustive six months of posturing, negotiating and shutting down the government, lawmakers agreed to less in both years, and only 88 kilometers (or 55 miles) of fencing in all.

It was almost as if Trump — long touted as a master deal maker — were reverse negotiating.
…

Accusations of extortion and blackmail made by the world’s richest man, Jeff Bezos, against a national gossip newspaper in the U.S. may have breached the legal limits of broad press freedom protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. VOA’s Brian Padden takes a look at what’s at stake.
…

Accusations of extortion and blackmail made by the world’s richest man against a national gossip newspaper may have breached the legal limits of broad press freedoms protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest man, who owns both the Amazon online shopping site and The Washington Post newspaper, recently claimed that the publishers of the National Enquirer newspaper’s parent company, American Media Inc. (AMI), threatened to publish intimate photos of Bezos unless he halted an investigation into the tabloid’s aggressive coverage of his divorce.

The Amazon founder, who is reportedly worth $136 billion, said he would “spare no expense” to investigate how the Enquirer obtained his private text messages that were published in a story alleging an extramarital affair with former news anchor Lauren Sanchez before announcing his divorce from his wife of 25 years.

 

WATCH: Amazon Blackmail Allegations and US Press Freedom

​Legal liability

AMI has denied the charges and maintains it acted lawfully in its reporting.

“It absolutely is not extortion and not blackmail. What happened was the story was given to the National Enquirer by a reliable source that had given information to the National Enquirer for seven years prior to this story. It was a source that was well-known to both Mr. Bezos and Miss Sanchez,” said Elkan Abramowitz, an attorney representing AMI.

There have been media reports speculating that Michael Sanchez, the brother of Lauren Sanchez, may have provided the Bezos texts to the Enquirer.

​Legal hot water

However, AMI chairman and CEO David Pecker and the media conglomerate could be in legal jeopardy if Bezos’ blackmail allegations can be proved, or if the Enquirer is found to have been directly involved in stealing private text messages.

“I don’t quite understand why AMI and its lawyers engaged in activity that potentially violates federal extortion laws and state criminal laws involving coercion. And potentially, depending on how they got the information, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which is an anti-federal, anti-hacking law,” said Tor Ekeland, a federal criminal defense lawyer.

Last year, Pecker admitted that before the 2016 election, AMI paid $150,000 to former Playboy model Karen McDougal to silence her allegations of an affair with Trump. The publishers avoided prosecution by agreeing to cooperate with federal prosecutors investigating campaign finance violations. Prosecutors are now looking into whether the Bezos extortion allegations violate the previous deal that was conditional on AMI not committing further crimes.

​Partisan press

The Bezos investigation is also looking into the possible political motivations behind the Enquirer’s extensive coverage, which according to the Enquirer entailed sending reporters to follow Bezos and Sanchez “across five states and 40,000 miles,” and tracking them “in private jets, swanky limos, helicopter rides.”

Bezos suggested he may have been targeted by the Enquirer in retaliation for The Washington Post’s critical coverage of President Donald Trump, and of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s alleged involvement in the killing of Saudi dissident and Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.

Trump has often criticized Amazon, The Washington Post and Bezos on Twitter, calling the newspaper “the Amazon Washington Post,” and its owner, “Bozo.”

Pecker, a longtime friend of Trump, reportedly also has ties to leaders in Saudi Arabia.

The White House and Saudi officials have denied any knowledge or involvement in the Enquirer coverage.

Press freedom

Bezos may find little legal recourse against charges he is being politically targeted by a media organization aligned with Trump.

The Enquirer’s salacious reporting on Bezos’ alleged affair, even if done for overtly partisan reasons, would likely be protected under the First Amendment.

“I have to separate out the sleaze here from the principle I think we’re trying to protect, which is, journalists have a right to publish what they know,” said Gene Policinski, director of the Freedom Forum Institute’s First Amendment Center.

And news organizations in the United States have a long history of political partisanship, of aligning with political parties and targeting opposition groups with more critical coverage.

“Political partnership, again, is part of our marketplace of ideas. It is part of what we’ve always accepted in the idea of, if you don’t like it, you can publish your own. Government stays out of the way,” Policinski said.

Bezos could also pursue a civil suit against AMI, but public figures have to cross a higher threshold to prove defamation in U.S. courts.
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U.S. President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he has made no decision on whether to sign proposed bipartisan legislation for limited new barrier construction along the U.S.-Mexico border in order to avert another partial government shutdown Friday over the dispute.

“We’ll be looking for land mines [in the bill]” but “we have not gotten it yet,” Trump said in response to reporters in the Oval Office during a meeting with Colombian President Ivan Duque. 

The president, however, indicated he was pleased with preliminary figures in the border security deal worked out by a committee of Republicans and Democrats, saying “total funding is almost up to $23 billion, it’s about 8 percent higher.”

Trump called Democrats stingy when it comes to funding for the wall.

“We’re building a lot of wall right now with money that we already have,” added Trump, explaining that there are “a lot of options” to complete the border barrier’s construction.

“We’re going to have a great wall, it’s going to be a great, powerful wall” with technology, including drones, explained the president. 

“I don’t want to see a shutdown. A shutdown would be a terrible thing,” Trump said.

The bipartisan agreement reached by lawmakers gives Trump less than a quarter of the $5.7 billion he has been demanding for wall construction, which was a centerpiece of his 2016 presidential campaign.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders, said earlier Wednesday, “It’s hard to say definitively whether or not the president’s going to sign it until we know everything that’s in it.”

Trump suggested Tuesday that he would tap other government funds for wall construction without express authorization from Congress. Such a move would invite a legal challenge from opposition Democrats and other groups.

Neither the Senate nor the House of Representatives has voted yet on the legislation as aides continue to craft final language in the measure. To avert a new shutdown, both chambers have to approve the legislation, and Trump has to sign it before Friday midnight, when numerous federal agencies, including Homeland Security — which controls border operations —again run out of money.

Under Trump, Congress has not authorized any funding for a wall, one of Trump’s prime pledges during his successful 2016 campaign for the White House. But wall repairs and replacements for deteriorating sections along the 3,200-kilometer border have been ongoing.

The top leaders in the Senate, Republican Mitch McConnell and Democrat Chuck Schumer, both called on Trump to sign the compromise barrier funding legislation.

“I strongly urge the president to sign this agreement,” Schumer said Tuesday. “No one gets everything they want in these agreements. But the president must sign it and not, not, not cause another shutdown.”

The package calls for new barriers in the Rio Grande Valley in southern Texas, as well as technology upgrades for screening at border entry points, more customs officers and humanitarian aid.
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The U.S. Senate Homeland Security Committee postponed a vote on Wednesday on whether to approve Ronald Vitiello, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.

Committee Chairman Ron Johnson did not elaborate on the reasons for the delay, but the postponement came one day after ICE’s employee union urged lawmakers to block the nomination amid concerns about past racially tinged and controversial comments Vitiello made on Twitter.

“We are going to hold over the ICE director nomination,” Johnson said. “There are some issues that continue on that, so we will not be voting on the ICE director.”

This is the second time the Senate panel has delayed voting on Vitiello’s nomination.

The committee postponed a vote last November after the union, the National ICE Council, first raised concerns about Vitiello’s fitness for leading the agency.

On Tuesday, union President Chris Crane sent a letter formally asking the panel to oppose Vitiello, saying his prior offensive tweets showed he “lacks the judgment and professionalism to effectively lead a federal agency.”
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The Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential field continued to grow this week with the formal entry of Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren.

But a new poll suggests good news for two men who are not yet in the race, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who ran in 2016, and former Vice President Joe Biden.

The Morning Consult survey found Biden atop the Democratic field with 29 percent support, followed by Sanders at 22 percent and California Senator Kamala Harris in third place at 13 percent. That is good news for Harris, who is among several Democratic newcomers who have launched campaigns in recent days, and she has gained some traction in several recent surveys.

Klobuchar’s bid

Klobuchar is the latest entrant into the quickly expanding field and she hopes to gain momentum as a moderate, deal-making Democrat who can draw support from working class voters in the Midwest.

“I don’t have a political machine. I don’t come from money. But what I do have is this: I have grit,” Klobuchar said to supporters gathered in a snowstorm Sunday in Minnesota at her official launch.

A day earlier, Warren made her candidacy official before a large crowd gathered in front of a mill building in Lawrence, Massachusetts, a city north of Boston.

Warren emphasized bridging the economic gap in the country between the very wealthy and America’s middle class.

“This is the fight of our lives. The fight to build an America where dreams are possible and an America that works for everyone!”

Another early contender who has been making the rounds in the early caucus state of Iowa is New Jersey Senator Cory Booker. He is emphasizing national unity in his pitch to Democratic voters.

“I am running for president because that garment, that fabric, has been ripped and torn and we must repair it. We must stitch it together, each of us,” Booker told a group of Democrats in Mason City, Iowa.

Diverse field

The Democratic field includes several women and minority candidates and is already shaping up as one of the most varied in history, according to Brookings Institution political scholar Elaine Kamarck.

“A lot of diversity in the field, which reflects what the Democratic Party is today. It is a pretty good field. “You have serious people who are serious about government. I don’t know who will manage to rise above the others. But so far it is a pretty solid field.”

So far, nine Democrats have either officially declared their candidacy or formed a presidential exploratory committee, and several more are expected to join the field in the weeks ahead.

Liberal views

Most of the Democratic contenders hold liberal views on the economy, the environment and social issues. Many, for example, support an approach known as “Medicare for All,” which would expand government health care coverage.

Others favor what is known as the “Green New Deal,” an environmental program that would emphasize renewable energy sources and drastically move away from fossil fuels.

Analysts say that in a field that could eventually expand to 15 or 20 candidates, the Democratic contenders early on will be looking for ways to set themselves apart from the rest of the field.

“I think the key candidates, the ones who will do well, will have a constituency either in the progressive wing of the party that is really fighting Donald Trump or especially in the African American community,” said John Fortier of the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington.

Target Trump

The candidate field may be diverse, but grassroots Democratic voters will likely be focused on one key unifying goal, according to University of Virginia expert Larry Sabato.

“When you get right down to it, what is the most important thing to Democrats? If I am to believe what I am hearing, and I do, it is that they want to pick the candidate who has the best chance of beating Donald Trump,” Sabato said via Skype.

For his part, President Trump is eager to bash the Democratic presidential field as too far to the left, as he did at his Monday night border rally in Texas. 

“The Democrat Party has never been more outside of the main stream. They are becoming the party of socialism, late-term abortion, open borders and crime,” Trump said to cheers from supporters in El Paso.

More Democrats are expected to join the race in the weeks ahead and that list could include Biden, Sanders, Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown and former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke.
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