Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is rejecting criticism that his “redesign” of the 70,000-person State Department caused staff morale to plummet since the start of the Trump administration. During a meeting Monday with Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Tillerson told journalists “This department is performing extraordinary well, and I take exception…
read moreThe U.S. Justice Department is suing to stop AT&T’s multi-billion dollar bid to take over another communications giant, Time Warner, calling it illegal and likening it to extortion. “The $108 billion acquisition would substantially lessen competition, resulting in higher prices and less innovation for millions of Americans,” a Justice Department statement said Monday. “The combined…
read moreThe White House confirms the weekly presidential radio address — a fixture for decades — is on indefinite hiatus. “We received quite a few comments and a lot of feedback that the weekly address wasn’t being used to its full potential,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in response to a VOA question during Monday’s…
read moreAfter years of being shielded from deportation from the United States while their country recovers from a devastating 2010 earthquake, tens of thousands of Haitians will lose that security status. “It was assessed overall that the extraordinary but temporary conditions that served as the basis of Haiti’s most recent designation has sufficiently improved such that…
read moreConservation groups sued the U.S. government on Monday over a plan to allow hunters to bring home elephant and lion trophies from Zimbabwe, following changing statements about the possible move by President Donald Trump’s administration. The lawsuit in federal court in Washington was the latest move in a saga that began last week when a…
read moreU.S. stocks are higher Monday as technology and industrial companies, banks and retailers all make modest gains. Drugmakers and other health care companies are trading lower. Companies that make opioid pain medications are down sharply after the government released a much higher estimate of the costs of the ongoing addiction crisis. Keeping score The Standard…
read moreFed Chair Janet Yellen says she will leave the U.S. central bank’s board when her successor is sworn in early next year. Jerome Powell was chosen by President Donald Trump to head the Federal Reserve when Yellen’s term expires. Powell must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate before he can take office, but analysts say…
read moreThe European Union went back to its roots Monday by picking cities from two of its founding nations — France and the Netherlands — to host key agencies that will have move once Britain leaves the bloc in 2019. During voting so tight they were both decided by a lucky draw, EU members except Britain…
read moreRegulators in the U.S. state of Nebraska have voted to approve a route for TransCanada Corp’s Keystone XL pipeline – the last major obstacle to complete the oil pipeline that President Donald Trump has supported. The regulatory body, which by state law could not consider the risk of leaks or potential environmental impacts, voted to…
read moreThe Alabama woman who has accused Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of sexually abusing her four decades ago when she was 14 and he was 32 said Monday it took her decades before she regained her sense of trust and confidence in herself. Leigh Corfman, now 53, told NBC’s Today show that she was…
read morePresident Donald Trump isn’t campaigning for Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore because of “discomfort” with the sexual misconduct allegations made by several women but isn’t calling on the controversial judge to drop out of the race because the state’s voters should decide, the White House says. Ultimately, Trump doesn’t know who to believe following decades-old…
read moreTwo of President Donald Trump’s leading economic advisers sent mixed signals Sunday on the fate of a health care provision in the Senate version of a $1.5 trillion measure to overhaul business and personal income taxes that is expected to be voted on after Thanksgiving. The provision to repeal a requirement that everyone in the…
read moreOpioid drug abuse, which has ravaged parts of the United States in recent years, cost the economy as much as $504 billion in 2015, White House economists said in a report made public on Sunday. The White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) said the toll from the opioid crisis represented 2.8 percent of gross…
read moreTalks to update the North American Free Trade Agreement appeared to be in danger of grinding toward a stalemate amid complaints of U.S. negotiators’ inflexibility, people familiar with the process said on Sunday. The United States, Canada and Mexico are holding the fifth of seven planned rounds of talks to modernize NAFTA, which U.S. President…
read moreThe U.S. ambassador to Russia has attacked Moscow’s move toward forcing nine United States government-funded news operations to register as “foreign agents” as “a reach beyond” what the U.S. government did in requiring the Kremlin-funded RT television network to register as such in the United States. Ambassador Jon Huntsman said during a visit Friday to…
read moreThe U.S. ambassador to Russia on Sunday attacked Moscow’s move toward forcing nine United States government-funded news operations to register as “foreign agents” as “a reach beyond” what the U.S. government did in requiring the Kremlin-funded RT television network to register as such in the United States. Ambassador Jon Huntsman said the Russian reaction is…
read moreBritain will submit its proposals on how to settle its financial obligations to the European Union before an EU Council meeting next month, finance minister Philip Hammond said on Sunday. British Prime Minister Theresa May was told on Friday that there was more work to be done to unlock Brexit talks, as the European Union…
read moreBrexit is still well over year away but two European cities on Monday will already be celebrating Britain’s departure from the European Union. Two major EU agencies now in London — the European Medicines Agency and the European Banking Authority — must move to a new EU city because Britain is leaving the bloc. The two…
read moreLaToya Cantrell, a City Council member who first gained a political following as she worked to help her hard-hit neighborhood recover from Hurricane Katrina, won a historic election Saturday that made her the first woman mayor of New Orleans. The Democrat will succeed term-limited fellow Democrat Mitch Landrieu as the city celebrates its 300th…
read moreWhen it comes to cars, generally there are three options, there is gas, a gas-battery hybrid, or a full electric car. But for a fourth option, some car companies are banking on hydrogen as the fuel of the future. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports. …
read moreNegotiators at high stakes talks to update NAFTA have so far kept their tempers but are not making much progress on tough U.S. demands that could sink the 1994 trade pact, a well-placed source said Saturday. Officials from the United States, Canada and Mexico are meeting in Mexico City for the fifth of seven planned…
read moreThe top U.S. nuclear commander was quoted as saying Saturday that he would resist President Donald Trump if he ordered an “illegal” launch of nuclear weapons. CBS News said Air Force General John Hyten, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), told an audience at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia, Canada, that…
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