U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Friday said a shifting landscape will lead him to work with Democrats on immigration and financial regulation early in the new year, following a year of acrimony and partisan legislation. In an end-of-year news conference, McConnell touted a list of Republican accomplishments since President Donald Trump took office…
read moreBitcoin plunged by a quarter to below $12,000 on Friday as investors dumped the cryptocurrency in manic trading after its blistering ascent to a peak close to $20,000 prompted warnings by experts of a bubble. It capped a brutal week that had been touted as a new era of mainstream trading for the volatile digital…
read morePresident Donald Trump signed Republicans’ massive $1.5 trillion tax overhaul into law on Friday, cementing the biggest legislative victory of his first year in office, and also approved a short-term spending bill that averts a possible government shutdown. The two pieces of legislation represent Trump’s most significant accomplishment with Congress since taking office in January,…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump capped the biggest legislative accomplishment of his first year in office Friday, signing a $1.5 trillion tax overhaul into law minutes before departing Washington for holidays in Florida. Clearly in a celebratory mood after the best week of his presidency, Trump said he wanted to fulfill a pledge to sign…
read moreIn a remarkably strong show of consumer demand, nearly 9 million people signed up for “Obamacare” next year, as government numbers out Thursday proved predictions of its collapse wrong yet again. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said more than 8.8 million people have signed up in the 39 states served by the…
read moreA group of U.S. senators and a collection of more than 300 U.S. public health groups have sent letters to top U.S. public health officials asking for clarification on a controversy over “banned words” at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The Washington Post reported Thursday the letters to the Department of Health and…
read moreFor retailers, Christmas can be a make or break season, but for a small Czech family owned business, Christmas means it is time to start looking ahead to next Christmas. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports. …
read moreThe U.N. Security Council is expected to vote Friday on another round of targeted sanctions aimed at further restricting North Korea’s crude oil imports, which fuel its illicit weapons programs. The proposed sanctions come in response to Pyongyang’s November 28 launch of a newly developed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) called a Hwasong-15, which the North…
read moreThe Republican-led Congress narrowly passed a temporary spending bill to avert a government shutdown Thursday, doing the bare minimum in a sprint toward the holidays and punting disputes on immigration, health care and the budget to next year. The measure passed the House on a 231-188 vote over Democratic opposition and then cleared the Senate,…
read morePapa John’s founder John Schnatter will step down as CEO next month, about two months after he publicly criticized the NFL leadership over national anthem protests by football players — comments for which the company later apologized. Schnatter will be replaced as chief executive by Chief Operating Officer Steve Ritchie on Jan. 1, the company…
read moreHackers tried to steal 55 million rubles ($940,000) from Russian state bank Globex using the SWIFT international payments messaging system, the bank said Thursday, the latest in a string of attempted cyberheists that use fraudulent wire-transfer requests. Globex President Valery Ovsyannikov told Reuters that the attempted attack occurred last week, but that “customer funds have…
read moreRepublicans in the U.S. Congress on Thursday advanced stopgap legislation to keep the federal government operating past Friday when funding expires, seeking to avert a self-inflicted disaster shortly before the Christmas holiday season. The Republican-dominated House of Representatives voted to begin debate on a bill that would keep federal agencies humming along at current funding…
read moreA federal appeals court in Virginia on Thursday rejected a bid by President Donald Trump’s administration to prevent the U.S. military from accepting transgender recruits starting January 1. The administration had urged the appeals court to suspend an order by a federal judge in Baltimore for the armed forces to begin accepting transgender recruits on…
read moreBurkina Faso said it will immediately stop importing goods from North Korea and that it only learned of possible violations of U.N. sanctions through American news reports. The West African country was the top importer of North Korean goods in Africa in 2015, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, a website that collects and…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump is basking in his first major legislative victory, passage of a $1.5 trillion tax cut that he said “will soon be kicking in” to give American workers bigger paychecks and cut corporate tax bills. In a Twitter comment Thursday, Trump said opposition Democrats, who uniformly voted against the legislation, “want to…
read moreHouse Republicans early Thursday unveiled a new, stripped-down spending bill to prevent a government shutdown this weekend and allow quarreling lawmakers to punt most of their unfinished business into the new year. The bill would stave off a government shutdown through Jan. 19 and permit lawmakers to head home for the holidays. It would delay…
read moreThe far eastern Russian port of Nakhodka on the Sea of Japan is swathed in coal dust. It blankets the streets, clogs the air and is blamed by some for a rise in respiratory diseases among the city’s 150,000 residents. Yet despite pledges this year by Russia President Vladimir Putin to tackle coal pollution in…
read moreWith a shutdown clock ticking toward a deadline Friday night at midnight, House Republican leaders struggled Wednesday to unite the GOP rank and file behind a must-pass spending bill. Although a major obstacle evaporated after key GOP senators dropped a demand to add health insurance subsidies for the poor, a number of defense hawks offered resistance…
read moreA simple coin toss could decide whether Democrats end Republican control in the Virginia State Legislature after 17 years. A three-judge panel declared a tie Wednesday in the election for representatives from the state’s 94th District — 11,608 votes each for Democrat Shelly Simonds and Republican incumbent David Yancey. An earlier count gave Simonds the seat…
read moreU.S. Senator Mark Warner has spoken out about what he calls “a growing chorus of irresponsible and reckless” voices calling for an end to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of ties between Russia and President Donald Trump’s election campaign, saying such a move “has the potential to provoke a constitutional crisis.” WATCH: Warner on Potential Constitutional…
read moreDemocratic Senator Al Franken will leave office on Jan. 2, a spokesman for the Minnesota lawmaker said Wednesday. Franken announced his plans to resign earlier this month in the wake of several sexual harassment allegations, but did not announce a date. He said earlier Wednesday that he would deliver a series of speeches on the…
read moreWhite House staff members met with a group of senators Tuesday to talk about the future of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which has benefited hundreds of thousands of undocumented youths. The result of the private meeting, first reported by Politico, was a pledge by White House Chief of Staff John Kelly…
read more
