President Donald Trump declined to say Tuesday whether he had confidence in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, escalating pressure on the Justice Department as his White House negotiated rare access to classified documents for his congressional allies. Asked before a private meeting with the president of South Korea if he had confidence in Rosenstein, who…
read moreFormer Democratic presidents remembered Richard Goodwin on Tuesday, a political strategist and speechwriter for Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, who died of cancer at age 86. “Dick Goodwin was a citizen in the truest sense of the word — someone who, with joy and purpose, joined all who came before in that…
read moreThe United Arab Emirates said Tuesday that it did not try to influence the 2016 presidential election in Donald Trump’s favor. UAE Foreign Minister Anwar Gargash tweeted the denial following U.S. news reports that Donald Trump Jr. met with Saudi and UAE envoys in 2016. “Attention needs to be paid to facts over innuendo and…
read moreThe Trump administration is preparing to publish on Thursday long-delayed proposed rule changes for the export of U.S. firearms, a State Department official said on Tuesday. The rule changes would move the oversight of commercial firearm exports from the U.S. Department of State to the Department of Commerce. The action is part of a broader…
read moreThe United States on Tuesday gave American customers of Russia’s biggest van manufacturer GAZ more time to comply with sanctions, further backing away from its initially uncompromising stance on GAZ’s owner, Russian tycoon Oleg Deripaska. The United States slapped sanctions on Deripaska and his companies — including GAZ — and some other Russian tycoons in…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday “there is no deal” yet to lift the seven-year ban on the sale of American-made components to the giant Chinese telecommunications company ZTE, but that there might be a settlement as part of ongoing trade talks between the world’s two biggest economies. Trump told reporters at the White House…
read moreGlancing constantly at his rear view mirror, truck driver “El Flaco” journeys the highways of Mexico haunted by the memory of when he was kidnapped with his security detail by bandits disguised as police officers two years ago. Back then, El Flaco, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, was beaten, blindfolded…
read moreFormer CIA officer Gina Haspel has become the first woman to head the U.S. spy agency after a swearing-in ceremony Monday. Haspel has overcome the criticism by lawmakers of both parties for her involvement in the torture of terror suspects after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump…
read moreA commemorative coin featuring U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has been struck by the White House Communications Agency ahead of their planned summit next month. In a statement, deputy spokesman Raj Shah insisted that “the White House did not have any input into the design and manufacture of the coin.”…
read moreAn upcoming report from the Justice Department’s internal watchdog is expected to criticize senior FBI leaders for not moving quickly enough to review a trove of Hillary Clinton emails discovered late in the 2016 campaign, according to people familiar with the findings. The FBI’s timing has been a sore point for Clinton supporters, who say…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump and South Korean leader Moon Jae-in are set to meet at the White House Tuesday amid increasing skepticism of the chances for a successful U.S.-North Korea summit and doubts the meeting will take place as planned. During Tuesday’s scheduled two hours of talks, Moon is expected to try to reassure Trump…
read moreThe Justice Department will expand its investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to include President Donald Trump’s claims that the FBI planted an informant to spy on his campaign, the White House said Monday. The announcement came after Trump’s demand for a probe and his meeting Monday with Deputy Attorney General…
read moreThe U.S. Justice Department, under pressure from President Donald Trump, is asking its inspector general to explore whether political motivation played a role in how the FBI conducted its counterintelligence investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. The Justice Department acted after Trump on Sunday demanded the agency look into whether the Federal…
read moreU.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has unveiled a far-reaching list of demands for any new nuclear deal with Iran, and threatened economy-crushing sanctions if Tehran does not change its behavior. The 12-point list of demands came in a Monday speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation that laid out the Trump administration’s strategy after pulling…
read moreU.S. President Donald Trump says American farmers will be big beneficiaries of more trade with China. “Under our potential deal with China, they will purchase from our Great American Farmers practically as much as our Farmers can produce,” Trump said Monday on Twitter. In another comment, he said China “has agreed to buy massive amounts…
read moreChina’s state media are playing up what it says is a trade war truce and de-escalation in tensions after negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed to hold off on tariffs and “substantially reduce” the U.S. trade deficit. However, economists and business leaders argue that there is more to managing the relationship than balancing imports and exports.…
read moreThe voting age in the United States is 18. But teenagers in Washington, D.C. want local authorities to lower it to 16. More than half of the city council members have already agreed to support a bill that, if approved, would make Washington the first U.S. city to allow 16-year-olds to vote in both local…
read moreWashington is digesting China’s stated intention to purchase more American goods and reduce the trade imbalance between the two countries. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, last week’s talks between U.S. and Chinese negotiators did not yield specific commitments from Beijing in dollar figures, sparking criticism from some lawmakers in Washington. …
read morePresident Donald Trump says he will order an investigation Monday into claims an FBI informant infiltrated his 2016 election campaign – setting up a potential showdown with the Justice Department. “I hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the…
read moreFacebook and European Union officials were locked in high-stakes negotiations Sunday over whether founder Mark Zuckerberg will appear Tuesday before EU lawmakers to discuss the site’s impact on the privacy rights of hundreds of millions of Europeans, as well as Facebook’s impact on elections on both sides of the Atlantic and the spreading of fake…
read moreThe U.S. and China have agreed to back away from imposing tough new tariffs on each other’s exports, a day after reaching a deal for China to buy more American goods to “substantially reduce” the huge trade deficit with the U.S. U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told Fox News the world’s two biggest economic powers…
read moreWild animal sounds were heard recently in the halls of the U.S. Capitol. But these were not the calls of escaped animals. They were the sounds of endangered animals serving as the animal world’s ambassadors to commemorate “Endangered Species Day.” Their presence in the Capitol was intended to encourage legislators to support efforts to protect…
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