After more than three months in office without passing any major legislation, President Donald Trump faces a week that offers the possibility of averting a government shutdown and progress on health care. Trump has spent his first 100 days coming to terms with the slow grind of government even in a Republican-dominated capital, and watching…
read moreU.S. Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, the first Cuban-American elected to Congress, is retiring at the end of her term next year, saying it’s time to move on after 38 years in office. The 64-year-old Republican was elected last November to Florida’s redrawn 27th district, a stretch of southeast Miami-Dade County that is heavily Democratic.…
read moreOnce they acclimate to their new environment, overcoming language, social and cultural barriers, refugees in the U.S. often thrive. Some translate their experiences into assets that are valuable to their new community, as did Parvin and Yadollah Jamalreza. VOA’s June Soh visited their popular tailoring shop in Charlottesville, Virginia. …
read moreThe White House press corps gathered Saturday for its annual black-tie dinner, a toned-down affair this year after Donald Trump snubbed the event, becoming the first incumbent U.S. president to bow out in 36 years. Without Trump, who scheduled a rally instead to mark his 100th day in office, the usually celebrity-filled soiree hosted by…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump has promised “a big decision” on the Paris climate agreement in the next two weeks. He spoke on his 100th day in office, at a rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He spoke in an arena that holds up to 10,000 people where his audience was supportive, greeting him with cheers of “USA!…
read more“Are y’all ready for an old-fashioned Troll Storm?” Andrew Anglin, white supremacist and follower of what has been branded the alt-right in American political thought, wrote those words on his blog The Daily Stormer on December 16, 2016. With that, the hate messages and death threats to Tanya Gersh and the people around her starting…
read moreWashington’s once-glitzy “nerd prom” was briefly upstaged Saturday as comedians and Hollywood stars gathered for jokes and jests about President Donald Trump for a tongue-in-cheek event to counter the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Late-night TV star Samantha Bee pulled in celebrities for the first “Not the White House Correspondents’ Dinner’”: Alysia Reiner of “Orange…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump will spend part of his 100th day in office Saturday in the politically friendly state of Pennsylvania, as anti-Trump protesters actively attempt to diminish the symbolic milestone. The president will sign an executive order at a shovel factory in central Pennsylvania, directing his administration to review the nation’s trade agreements. The…
read moreHis birthplace in a small village outside Mumbai, India, in a home with no running water or electricity, is a far cry from the technology-filled cubicles Pete Tapaskar has come to know well as an information technology (IT) worker. Tapaskar’s journey from India to the United States through Canada came courtesy of an H1B immigrant…
read moreThousands of environmental activists marched in the U.S. capital Saturday to try to draw support for climate-related causes. The People’s Climate March was meant to coincide with President Donald Trump’s 100th day in office, according to its organizers, who have condemned what they see as the administration’s lack of concern for environmental issues. “The Trump…
read moreThe U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is updating its website to reflect the views of the Trump administration. The agency has removed several pages from the Obama administration explaining the science behind climate change. The EPA said in a statement the website is “undergoing changes that reflect the agency’s new direction under President Donald Trump and…
read moreU.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Friday that Washington would not rule out a military response to future North Korean aggression and that it would seek to increase the rogue nation’s financial and international isolation. VOA’s Margaret Besheer has more from the United Nations, where the secretary chaired a meeting of the Security Council…
read moreThe Republican-led Congress on Friday passed a bill to avert a government shutdown at midnight and give U.S. lawmakers another week to work out federal spending through the end of the fiscal year, with tricky issues like military spending still unresolved. The Senate passed the stopgap measure by voice vote without opposition after the House…
read morePresident Donald Trump is re-opening for oil exploration areas that President Barack Obama had closed, a move that environmental groups have promised to fight. In an executive order Friday, the president reversed the Obama administration’s decision to prohibit oil and gas drilling in the Arctic waters off Alaska. The order also instructs the Interior Department…
read moreThe best-selling author of “Hillbilly Elegy” says Republicans bear the responsibility of, in his words, “keeping the American dream alive.” J.D. Vance spoke Thursday at a Lincoln Day dinner of Mahoning County Republicans in Ohio near Youngstown. The Vindicator newspaper reports Vance signed copies and shared stories from his book, which became a popular resource…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump fiercely defended the right to gun ownership on Friday, telling the National Rifle Association “the eight-year assault on your Second Amendment freedoms has come to a crashing end.” An estimated 10,000 NRA delegates welcomed the president with thunderous applause in Atlanta, Georgia, where he became the first president to address the…
read moreLove him or hate him, President Donald Trump engenders strong feelings, and with his presidency reaching the symbolic 100-day milestone at a moment of international tensions, battle lines are sharply drawn on the effectiveness of his still-developing foreign policy. As an understaffed White House team navigates through a spate of early tests, the outlines of…
read morePresident Donald Trump’s former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn faces a Pentagon inquiry, the top Democrat on the House of Representatives Oversight Committee revealed Thursday. The new investigation follows bipartisan concerns about Flynn’s contacts with foreign governments and the Trump administration’s ties to Russia. VOA’s Congressional reporter Katherine Gypson has more. …
read moreHe misses driving, feels as if he is in a cocoon, and is surprised how hard his new job is. President Donald Trump on Thursday reflected on his first 100 days in office with a wistful look at his life before the White House. “I loved my previous life. I had so many things going,”…
read moreThe House won’t vote on Republican legislation scuttling much of President Barack Obama’s health care law until at least next week, a GOP leader said Thursday. The decision deals a setback to the White House, which has pressured congressional Republicans to pass the bill by Saturday, President Donald Trump’s 100th day in office. “As…
read moreTrump administration officials will likely meet in May to reach a final decision on whether the United States should stay in the Paris climate deal, after holding an initial meeting Thursday at the White House, an administration source said. The group of advisers, which includes Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, and…
read moreEmployers can legally pay women less than men for the same work based on differences in the workers’ previous salaries, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday. The decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower-court ruling that said pay differences based exclusively on prior salaries were discriminatory under the federal Equal…
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