U.S. President Donald Trump is spurring Congress to move quickly to overhaul the country’s complex tax code, but has yet to produce a plan. Trump, in a pair of Twitter comments Wednesday, took on the role of White House cheerleader for tax changes, telling lawmakers that with the devastation caused by hurricanes Harvey and Irma,…
read moreThe U.S. Congress has approved a joint resolution urging President Donald Trump to speak out against hate groups that support racism, extremism, anti-Semitism and white supremacy. The House of Representatives passed the resolution Tuesday, a day after the Senate gave its approval. The measure now goes to Trump, who was criticized for his response to…
read morePresident Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, is facing new scrutiny over a June 2015 trip to the Middle East that he didn’t report as part of his security clearance background check. Two Democratic lawmakers say in a letter released Wednesday that business associates of Flynn confirmed he went on the trip.…
read moreLess than a year after her election loss, former U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton published a book in which she seeks to explain to her supporters what led to the outcome they did not anticipate. Clinton’s fans lined up in New York Tuesday to grab a signed copy of her book, titled What Happened. VOA’s…
read moreThe vice chairman of the controversial government commission President Donald Trump has charged with investigating alleged vote fraud in last year’s U.S. elections said Tuesday there is a “high possibility” the panel will complete its work without making any recommendations. Kris Kobach, a Republican who is the secretary of state in the Midwestern state of…
read moreU.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday cast doubt on President Donald Trump’s goal of cutting the corporate tax rate to 15 percent, even as the president moved to inject new urgency into a sluggish effort in Congress to lower taxes. “Ideally, he’d like to get it down to 15 percent. I don’t know if…
read moreSome of the ads Russians bought on Facebook last year promoted events during the U.S. presidential campaign, Facebook said Tuesday, indicating that alleged meddling ahead of the 2016 election went beyond social media. Facebook said in a statement that its takedown of what the company last week called Russian-affiliated pages included shutting down “several promoted…
read moreThe U.S. Congress was wrestling with health care again Tuesday, as lawmakers from both parties considered some approaches beyond simply repealing and replacing Obamacare. The widened health care discussion appeared unlikely to yield dramatic changes soon, but marked a shift from the long-running Republican effort to gut 2010’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, as…
read moreLawmakers from 19 states are trying to develop a plan in Arizona this week for carrying out a growing, but unlikely, national effort to amend the Constitution to require a balanced U.S. budget, a long-held goal of conservatives who believe out-of-control spending is harming the nation. The plan is to add an amendment to the…
read moreThe Trump administration has adequate legal authority to combat terrorist groups and doesn’t support a push in Congress for a new law permitting military action against the Islamic State and other militants, a senior White House official said Tuesday. The comments Tuesday by White House legislative director Marc Short came as Republican Senator Rand Paul…
read moreCalifornia and three other states sued President Donald Trump’s administration on Monday over his decision to end protections for people brought to the United States illegally as children, the latest bid by Democratic state attorneys general to salvage the policy. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said Trump’s move to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood…
read moreWhile U.S. stock indexes continue to see record breaking gains and U.S. employment numbers are encouraging, American farmers continue to struggle with high costs for fertilizer and seed at a time when demand and prices for their products are low. As VOA’s Kane Farabaugh reports, the economic hardship has a ripple effect beyond the farmers’…
read moreU.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao will unveil on Tuesday streamlined safety guidelines for automakers that want to deploy self-driving vehicles, a person briefed on the matter said Monday, as members of Congress push their own proposals to remove regulatory barriers to the technology. The new Transportation Department policy is expected to offer the lighter regulatory…
read moreVenezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said at the end of a two-day visit to Algeria Monday that his country and the North African nation were working to achieve “equitable” oil prices. Maduro said his talks with Algeria’s second-ranking official, Council of the Nation President Abdelkader Bensalah, had a “good climate.” The Council of the Nation…
read moreRussian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov has urged the United States to start finding a way to resolve the problems between the two countries. “We called for a stop to the destruction of Russia-U.S. relations and … to start finding solutions to resolve problems that are mounting through no fault of ours,” said a Russian…
read moreInternational watchdog group Global Witness says powerful political elites and security forces have controlled and secretly exploited Zimbabwe’s diamond sector for a decade. Zimbabwe’s dreaded Central Intelligence Organization and the military are among the state actors accused of holding stakes in private diamond enterprises, trading the country’s precious stones on the international market. Global Witness…
read moreIndia will provide more assistance to Afghan defense forces and implement new development projects in the war-torn country. The announcement came at the first high-level meeting held between the two countries after U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled a new Afghan strategy in which he called on India to step up its role in Afghanistan. A…
read morePope Francis is urging President Donald Trump to rethink his decision to end a program protecting young immigrants from deportation, saying anyone who calls himself “pro-life” should keep families together. “If he is a good pro-life believer he must understand that family is the cradle of life and one must defend its unity,” Francis…
read moreHurricane Irma’s path of destruction up Florida’s Gulf Coast on Sunday threatens to disrupt a thriving state tourism industry worth more than $100 billion annually just months ahead of the busy winter travel season. Some of the state’s biggest attractions have announced temporary closures, including amusement park giants Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, Universal Studios,…
read moreThe introduction of post-Brexit customs checks could cost traders more than 4 billion pounds ($5.28 billion) a year, according to a think tank report released on Monday. The British government has said it plans to leave the European Union’s customs union when it leaves the bloc, and it wants to negotiate a new relationship that…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump declared Hurricane Irma a major disaster for the state of Florida Sunday, and ordered federal government officials to make a priority of supplying aid to the worst-hit areas of the country’s third most populous state. “I hope there aren’t too many people in that path,” Trump said. “We tried to warn…
read morePresident Donald Trump will preside over his first 9/11 commemoration in office on Monday, a mostly solemn and nonpartisan occasion that may highlight his muddled claims about the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil. Trump and first lady Melania Trump planned to observe a moment of silence at the White House in remembrance of…
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