U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio on Thursday became the latest Democrat to jump into the race for the party’s presidential nomination, joining a crowded field vying to challenge Republican Donald Trump in 2020.
The pool of Democratic candidates for the White House is among the largest and most diverse ever.
It includes female U.S. senators, a current and a former governor, African-Americans, a Hispanic and a young gay mayor, and is likely to grow before the U.S. primary season gets underway next year.
The Democratic nominating convention opens on July 13, 2020, in Milwaukee, Wis. Here are the party’s main contenders vying to be on the ballot.
Tim Ryan
Ryan, 45, was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio in November 2002 at age 29. He has won re-election seven times and currently serves on the Appropriations Committee.
Ryan launched his campaign for president on a platform of investing in public education and providing affordable health care.
A moderate Democrat, Ryan mounted an unsuccessful challenge in 2016 for the Democratic leadership of the House against Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California.
Beto O’Rourke
During a frenetic if failed campaign for the U.S. Senate last year in Texas, O’Rourke, 46, used his youth, energy and camera-friendly looks to become a media darling while setting fundraising records and drawing support from a range of celebrities.
Despite a reputation forged in his three terms in Congress as a pragmatic centrist, O’Rourke launched his campaign in Iowa on a decidedly left-leaning platform, calling for health and immigration reform, a higher minimum wage and an all-out battle to curb climate change.
His resolutely positive message, with calls for “kindness and decency” — along with criticisms of an “unfair, unjust and racist capitalist economy” — have drawn large and often youthful crowds wherever he appears.
Kirsten Gillibrand
The New York senator, 52, had made a name campaigning against sexual abuse, especially in the military, even before the #MeToo movement gained national prominence. A fierce Trump critic, Gillibrand is making gender and women’s issues a hallmark of her campaign.
She has called for a more egalitarian society and wants to improve the nation’s health and education systems.
Bernie Sanders
The self-described democratic socialist, 77, was an outsider when the 2016 Democratic primaries began. But he gave favorite Hillary Clinton a run for her money with his calls for a “political revolution” and battled her down to the wire.
Sanders won passionate support among young liberals with his calls for universal health care, a $15 minimum wage and free public university education.
Amy Klobuchar
The 58-year-old granddaughter of an iron miner, Klobuchar is a former prosecutor with an unpretentious demeanor.
She has quietly gained attention in Washington as a centrist. Klobuchar is known for putting partisanship aside to pass legislation, something that has earned her a devoted following in Minnesota.
Klobuchar has promised more stringent gun laws and set a target of universal health care.
Elizabeth Warren
At 69, the U.S. Senate’s consumer protection champion from Massachusetts is on the party’s left flank. She built her reputation by holding Wall Street accountable for its missteps.
Warren is considered to have one of the best campaign organizations of any Democrat. Her campaign has been dogged, however, by her past claims of Native American heritage, and Trump mockingly refers to her as “Pocahontas.”
Cory Booker
The New Jersey senator, 49, announced his candidacy Feb. 1, evoking the civil rights movement as he promised to work to unite a divided America.
Often compared to former President Barack Obama, Booker began his career as a community activist and rose to prominence as mayor of Newark, N.J.
A talented orator, Booker was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2013, the first African-American senator from the Eastern state.
Kamala Harris
The barrier-breaking senator from California who aspires to be the nation’s first black female president announced her candidacy on a day honoring slain civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.
The daughter of an Indian immigrant medical researcher mother and a Jamaican economist father, Harris, 54, began her career as a district attorney in San Francisco before serving as California’s attorney general.
Pete Buttigieg
The South Bend, Ind., mayor, 37, joined the race with a resolutely forward-looking and optimistic message to counter Trump’s darker vision.
A Rhodes Scholar, Buttigieg would be the first openly gay presidential nominee of either major party.
A U.S. Navy Reserve officer, he put his mayoral duties aside to serve in Afghanistan in 2014.
Other candidates
Also in the race are former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, 44; U.S. Rep. John Delaney of Maryland, 55; U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, 37, of Hawaii; former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, 67; Jay Inslee, 68, the governor of Washington state; Wayne Messam, 44, the mayor of Miramar, Fla.; self-help author Marianne Williamson, 66; and technology executive Andrew Yang, 44.
Waiting in the wings
Among the big Democratic guns who have yet to commit is former Vice President Joe Biden, who leads most surveys of Democratic voters.
Biden, who combines experience and widespread popularity, would be expected to poll well in some of the blue-collar Midwestern states that propelled Trump to the presidency in 2016.
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Підконтрольний Кремлю мировий суд Білогірського району Криму 4 квітня засудив 16-річного кримського татарина Абдурамана Абдувелієва до шести місяців обмеження волі за статтею 329 Кримінального кодексу Росії ( «Наруга над державним гербом Росії або державним прапором Росії»). Про це повідомляє кореспондент проекту Радіо Свобода Крим.Реалії.
Таке рішення виніс мировий суддя Олександр Алейник.
За версією російського слідства, Абдувелієв 21 травня 2018 року зняв три російських прапора з сільради села Курське, пам’ятника, який знаходиться біля школи, і клубу в цьому ж селі. Через два місяці в районі пройшов ряд обшуків в зв’язку з цією справою.
«Інші хлопці, які були з братом в той день виступають або в якості свідків, або в якості обвинувачів, брат вчиться в школі, яка знаходиться в Судакському районі. У зв’язку з рішенням суду незрозуміло, яким чином брат буде відвідувати школу. Тому що він повинен знаходитися півроку в межах нашого села і кожного разу повідомляти про свій намір виїхати», – прокоментувала рішення суду сестра Абдурамана Есма Абдувелієва.
Після російської анексії у Криму почастішали масові обшуки у незалежних журналістів, громадських активістів, активістів кримськотатарського національного руху, членів Меджлісу кримськотатарського народу, а також кримських мусульман, підозрюваних у зв’язках із організацією «Хізб ут-Тахрір», яку в Росії заборонено.
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Kyiv on Thursday renamed one of its streets after John McCain, in a gesture of honor to the late U.S. senator who supported Ukraine’s pro-Western leadership in the standoff with Russia.
McCain, who died last year at age 81, backed Kyiv’s popular uprising which in 2014 ousted Ukraine’s pro-Kremlin president as well as supported sanctions over Moscow’s annexation of Crimea.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko praised McCain, who was a frequent visitor to the country, as “a great friend and advocate of Ukraine.”
He noted McCain’s “historic importance” in building a “new independent Ukraine” during the meeting with his widow Cindy McCain on Monday in Kyiv.
On Thursday, Kyiv City Council decided to rename one of the streets in the Ukrainian capital after McCain.
Seventy-one Kyiv lawmakers voted to rename Ivana Kudri street — a Soviet security service officer — after McCain. Four voted against.
The celebrated Republican politician and Vietnam War veteran was a sharp critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin and irked Moscow with his support for pro-Western leaders in ex-Soviet Georgia and Ukraine.
In particular, McCain urged President Donald Trump to provide Ukraine with defensive weapons to counter the Russian-backed insurgency in the country’s east, which has claimed more than 13,000 lives.
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«Панове кандидати. Дебати – за «Законом про вибори президента України». В студії Суспільного мовника. З модератором Суспільного мовника. За правилами Суспільного мовника»
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U.S. lawmakers of both parties say hurdles remain for approving a new trade pact between the United States, Canada and Mexico, rejecting President Donald Trump’s call for prompt votes on a replacement for the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA.
Last year, the administration made good on one of Trump’s main campaign promises – negotiating a replacement for NAFTA, which went into effect in 1994, with a new trade accord, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA.
Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California made headlines Tuesday demanding changes to the pact to strengthen enforcement provisions and announcing the chamber will not vote on the accord until Mexico approves and implements tougher labor standards.
“No enforcement, no treaty,” Pelosi said at a Politico event, adding, “It’s a big issue, how workers are treated in Mexico.”
Senate Democrats echoed the speaker.
“There’s still work to do [on the USMCA]“ Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen told VOA. “I agree with Speaker Pelosi that Mexico needs to fully enact the labor rights reform measures. There are also a number of issues on the environmental front, and we need to make sure we have an effective enforcement mechanism.”
“We’re waiting to see whether or not the proposal will have a lot more fortified enforcement provisions, that’s my top concern,” Democratic Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania said. “That’s always been a major concern of trade agreements generally. That’s why I have always been an aggressive skeptic, and I remain so.”
Democrats are not alone in expressing reservations. Forty-six House Republicans wrote a letter to the White House opposing language in the USMCA proposed by Canada to protect the rights of LGBT sexual minorities.
“A trade agreement is no place for the adoption of social policy,” conservative Freedom Caucus members said in the letter.
Devil in the details
Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio said he, like all lawmakers, needs time to assess the USMCA’s impact on economic sectors in his state.
“Trade deals are generally difficult to get votes on because, the bigger they are, the likelier there are individual industries affected by some detail of the deal – Florida included, with our vegetable growers [who complete with Mexico],” Rubio said.
To go into effect, the USMCA would have to be approved by legislatures in the United States, Mexico and Canada. Some on Capitol Hill railed against any delay.
“It would be a killer, a big mistake” the Senate’s number two Republican, John Thune of agriculture-rich South Dakota, told VOA. “That’s a very carefully negotiated agreement we got signed, sealed and delivered. Now it’s just a function of signing off on it. And we just need to get it done.”
Thune added, “Any attempt to go back and rewrite it is a non-starter.”
Thune’s impatience matches that of the White House, which is pressing Congress to act on the USMCA as soon as next month to get the vote out of the way before the 2020 U.S. election cycle fully heats up, at which point trade votes could be even more dicey.
Administration officials have sought to reassure wavering lawmakers that their concerns can be addressed in side agreements with Canada and Mexico, rather than reopening negotiations on the pact itself.
Pelosi rejected such assurances.
“We’re saying that enforcement has to be in the treaty,” the House speaker said. “[I]f you don’t have enforcement, you ain’t got nothing.”
Enforcement is key
American business and labor groups are weighing in, as well.
“This agreement right now, for it to be voted on, would be premature,” Richard Trumka, president of America’s largest labor federation, the AFL-CIO, told Bloomberg TV. “The Mexican government has to change their [labor] laws, then they have to start effectively enforcing them, and then they have to demonstrate that they have the resources necessary to enforce those laws, because if you can’t enforce a trade agreement, it’s useless.”
The U.S. Farm Bureau, by contrast, urged swift implementation of the USMCA.
“Farmers know a good deal when we see one,” Farm Bureau president Zippy Duvall wrote in a statement. “Without USMCA, our most critical markets hang in the balance. Both Canada and Mexico have already signed another deal that does not include the United States.”
The USMCA would replace NAFTA, a pact implemented under the Clinton administration in the 1990s. NAFTA has been credited with vastly expanding trade in North America, but also blamed for accelerating the pace of manufacturing job losses in the United States.
Trump repeatedly blasted NAFTA as a disastrous trade deal for America during his successful 2016 campaign — a view Pelosi and other Democrats have echoed.
“I, myself, voted for NAFTA the first time,” the speaker said at the Politico forum. “I do think I was burned by it. I don’t think it lived up [to its promises].”
your ad hereJoyce Huang contributed to this report.
BEIJING – An online campaign protesting the long hours Chinese high-tech employees work has gone viral on the Internet in China. At the same time, it is putting an uncomfortable light on the labor practices of China’s biggest high-tech firms.
The campaign known as 996.icu may have been small when it started on Microsoft’s code sharing website Github.com, but now, it is the second highest bookmarked project on the open source collaborative site. It has also spread quickly on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, where it is a hotly discussed topic. One posting alone had more than half a million views.
Chinese programmers came up with the ironic name 996.icu to draw attention to a work schedule reality and problem. The name is a pithy way of saying if you work the 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. six-day-a-week work schedule, you’ll end up in the intensive care unit of a hospital.
And while the campaign takes aim at some of China’s biggest tech firms and includes a blacklist that details labor practices, organizers have been careful in their approach to addressing the problem.
“This is not a political movement,” the campaign said, in a bullet point outline of its principles and purposes. “We firmly uphold the labor law and require employers to respect the legitimate rights and interests of their employees.”
Beyond guidelines
China’s labor law states that employers can request employees to work overtime for an hour or even three hours a day, but no more than 36 hours of overtime in total over a month’s period.
Clearly, 72 hours a week, goes far beyond that guideline. Labor activists and lawyers, note however, that companies have many ways of getting around the law.
According to 996.icu, the 72-hour work week schedule has long been practiced in “secret,” but recently more companies have been openly discussing the arrangement.
The campaign notes that in March, e-commerce company J.D. Com said it had begun adopting 996 or 995 work schedules for some departments. Other companies made similar pledges at the beginning of the year.
Commenting on its 996 work schedule, J.D. Com said that it was not a mandatory policy, but that all of its employees should be fully committed (to their work).
Tougher times
Tech companies have always pushed their employees very hard and that has been a problem for many years, said Geoffrey Crothall, of the Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin.
What’s interesting about the anti-996 pushback is that wages in the tech sector were always much higher than anywhere else, he said.
“But now people are being laid off, people are not getting the same kind of bonuses, they are not getting the same pay increases that they are used to and so people are saying I am not getting paid as much, why should I work as hard,” Crothall said.
How big the movement’s impact will be remains to be seen. Crothall said it is still too early to say whether the campaign will be a game changer or short-term phenomenon.
Game changer?
The key goal of the anti-996 campaign is to get employers to buy into the movement by attaching an Anti-996 license to software to show their support for labor standards. A push that reportedly is already gaining some traction.
Going forward, getting the campaign to move from online to offline will be a big challenge.
It is also unclear how long the debate online will be allowed to continue in China’s tightly controlled cyberspace. Already, internet users have reported that some Chinese-made browsers are blocking access to the 996.icu page on Github.
A post on Zhihu.com, a Chinese question and answer website that asked what the electronics chain Suning’s view was on the debate was shut down. Earlier posts remain, but a message at the top of the discussion page reads: “this question has been closed for infringing on company rights.”
Chinese state media seemed to voice support for the concerns of young high-tech workers and long work hours.
An editorial in the state-run China Youth Daily newspaper portrayed young tech workers as being besieged by the 996-work week. The piece argued that it was time for labor regulators to get more actively involved. It also noted that the 996-work week was not just a problem facing high-tech employees, but something workers in other sectors face as well.
your ad hereBritain’s government redoubled its efforts Thursday to win over the main opposition party in a last-gasp bid to avoid a chaotic exit from the European Union next week.
The latest round of talks came after lawmakers tried to safeguard against a doomsday ending to the 46-year partnership by fast-tracking a bill Wednesday night seeking to delay Brexit.
May is racing against the clock in a desperate search for votes that could push her ill-loved divorce deal with the other 27 EU leaders through parliament on the fourth attempt.
May’s spokesman said there would be “intensive discussions over the course of today”, noting the “urgency” of the situation.
Britain’s latest deadline is April 12 and resistance to May’s plan remains passionately strong.
But increasingly weary EU leaders — tired of Britain’s political drama and eager to focus on Europe’s own problems — want to see either a done deal or a new way forward from May before they all meet in Brussels on Wednesday.
Her European counterparts will decide whether to grant May’s request to push back Brexit until May 22 — the day before nations begin electing a new European Parliament.
One alternative is to force her to accept a much longer extension that could give Britain time to rethink Brexit and possibly reverse its decision to leave.
The other is to let Britain go without a deal on April 12 in the hope that the economic disruption is short-lived and worth the price of eliminating long-term Brexit uncertainties.
‘Sense of resignation’
May dramatically ended her courtship of her own party’s holdouts and resistant Northern Irish allies by turning to the main opposition Labour Party this week.
The premier met Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on Wednesday for a reported 100 minutes of talks both sides described as “cordial” but inconclusive.
The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier on Thursday welcomed the cross-party effort to resolved the deadlock.
“It’s time for decisions,” he tweeted.
But May’s decision to hear out Corbyn’s demands for a closer post-Brexit alliance with the bloc that includes membership in its customs union has enraged Britain’s right-wing and seen two junior ministers resign.
One senior minister said May had no other choice.
“It’s very simple — there’s nowhere else to go,” the unnamed cabinet minister told the news website Politico.
“There’s a sense of resignation about her that ‘we get this through and I take the flak’.”
Pro-European members of May’s team also insisted that it was time to compromise on long-standing political beliefs for the benefit of safe resolution of Britain’s biggest crisis in decades.
“Both parties have to give something up,” finance minister Philip Hammond told ITV.
“There is going to be pain on both sides.”
Competing visions
May and Corbyn have competing visions of Britain’s place in Europe and neither has shown much willingness to compromise in the past.
Corbyn said late Wednesday that he did not see “as much change as I expected” from May.
The Times newspaper quoted an unnamed government source as saying that May’s office thought it more likely than not that the negotiations would fail.
May has resisted the customs union idea because it bars Britain from striking its own independent trade agreements with nations such as China and the United States.
And Corbyn is under pressure from Labour’s pro-EU wing to push for a second referendum that would pit May’s final deal against the option of staying in the bloc.
Corbyn has shied away from backing another vote due in part to his own sceptical view of Brussels.
The Labour-backing Mirror newspaper said May and Corbyn would let their teams negotiate Thursday before deciding on whether to meet again face to face Friday.
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Foreign and interior ministers from the Group of Seven countries are gathering in France this week to try to find ambitious solutions to world security challenges. Putting a dampener on that are two glaring American absences: U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.
The fact that ranking U.S. officials are skipping the Thursday-Saturday meetings in Paris and the resort of Dinard raises questions about the G-7’s relevance and effectiveness at solving the very international issues it has laid out as crucial, including fighting terrorism and human trafficking.
The interior ministers’ meetings started Thursday in Paris with a lunch focusing on migration issues, human trafficking and the fight against smugglers.
U.S. President Donald Trump has made no secret of his disdain for the G-7, especially since Russia was pushed out of the gathering of major world economies after its annexation of Crimea in 2014. The U.S. absences signal that the Trump Administration has downgraded the group — which also includes France, Canada, Japan, Germany, Italy and the U.K. — in its list of priorities.
Pompeo is in Washington this week, far from French shores, hosting NATO’s foreign ministers to mark the alliance’s 70th anniversary. Nielsen is staying behind to deal with border issues in the U.S.
Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, meanwhile, announced she is attending both the NATO meeting and the G-7 summit in Dinard.
In fact, alliances are fraying everywhere, even at NATO as Pompeo shines a spotlight on America’s involvement in the military alliance. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg acknowledged internal NATO disagreements this week on trade, climate change and the Iran nuclear deal, but insisted the 29 allies are united in their commitment to defend each other.
France, which took over the G-7’s presidency in January, is hosting a summit of interior ministers in Paris on Thursday and Friday, which overlaps with a summit of G-7 foreign ministers on Friday and Saturday in Dinard.
U.S. Homeland Security official Claire Grady is standing in for Nielsen at the interior ministers’ meetings. Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan will stand in for Pompeo, discussing “a broad range of issues, including the deteriorating situation in Venezuela, destabilizing Iranian behavior in the Middle East, the responsible conduct of states in cyber space, and the final denuclearization of North Korea,” the State Department said.
It said these conversations will “set the stage” for the August G-7 summit France will host in the southwestern city of Biarritz.
Last June, Trump roiled the G-7 meeting in Canada by first agreeing to a group statement on trade only to withdraw from it while complaining that he had been blindsided by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s criticism of Trump’s tariff threats at a news conference. In an extraordinary set of tweets aboard Air Force One, Trump threw the G-7 summit into disarray and threatened to escalate his trade war just as Canada released the G-7’s official communique.
France’s Foreign Ministry listed the main issues under discussion this week as cybersecurity, the trafficking of drugs, arms and migrants in Africa’s troubled Sahel region, and fighting gender inequality. That includes ways to prevent rape and violence against women, especially in Africa.
The French presidency says the interior ministers’ meeting aims to set joint commitments on security and counter-terrorism, including how to deal with citizens who have joined Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq, or their wives and children.
Many IS fighters have been captured and imprisoned in those countries.
A top official at the French Interior Ministry stressed that the instability of the region, after U.S.-backed forces declared military victory over the Islamic State group in Syria last month, still poses a challenge. The problem has grown more urgent since Trump announced his intention to reduce the U.S. military presence in Syria.
“We need to coordinate our policies to prevent that risk. We must avoid a dispersion of foreign fighters, avoid that they gather together elsewhere,” the official said, speaking anonymously ahead of the meeting in accordance with French government practice.
The U.S. has called for countries to take back their citizens and put them on trial, if necessary, but Western countries have largely refused to take back their detained citizens. France says French fighters must be tried wherever they committed their crimes.
U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters, who are holding some of the IS fighters, have called for an international tribunal for IS detainees.
The G-7 interior ministers will also discuss ways to fight terrorism and extremism on the internet, possibly by imposing regulations on internet giants like Facebook, Twitter and Google.
Interior ministers from Niger and Burkina Faso are joining Thursday’s lunch on migration to put a focus on Africa’s Sahel region, a source of migration to Europe as well as a transit region and destination for smuggling.
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Pope Francis on Thursday named Atlanta Archbishop Wilton Gregory as the new archbishop of Washington D.C., choosing a moderate, and the first African-American, to lead the archdiocese that has become the epicenter of the clergy sex abuse crisis in the U.S.
Gregory, 71, replaces Cardinal Donald Wuerl, who resigned last year after being implicated in covering up abuse by a Pennsylvania grand jury report.
Gregory headed the U.S. bishops conference when it adopted a “zero-tolerance” abuse policy in 2002 to respond to the first wave of the scandal. He has run the Atlanta archdiocese since 2005 and is seen as a pastor very much in line with Francis’ progressive vision of the church.
The appointment was first reported by Catholic News Agency.
It is the third major move by Francis to reshape the U.S. hierarchy, which over the previous two papacies took on a culture war-influenced conservative tilt. Francis began elevating more moderate pastors in 2014, when he named Cardinal Blase Cupich as Chicago archbishop and followed up two years later by moving Joseph Tobin to Newark, New Jersey, and making him a cardinal.
While relatively small, the Washington archdiocese has always punched above its weight in influence given its location in the nation’s capital. Its archbishops traditionally are made cardinals, meaning Gregory could become the first African-American cardinal.
The archdiocese, though, has become embroiled in the abuse crisis since its previous two leaders — Wuerl and his predecessor Theodore McCarrick — have been implicated in the scandal.
Francis in February defrocked McCarrick after a Vatican-backed investigation concluded he sexually abused minors and adults over his long career. It was the first time a cardinal had been dismissed from the priesthood for abuse.
Francis reluctantly accepted Wuerl’s resignation in October after he lost the trust of his priests and parishioners in the months following the release of the Pennsylvania grand jury report. The report accused Wuerl of helping to protect some child-molesting priests while he was bishop of Pittsburgh from 1988 to 2006. Simultaneously, Wuerl faced widespread skepticism over his insistence that he knew nothing about McCarrick’s misconduct, which was an open secret in U.S. and Vatican circles.
Gregory, by contrast, is still credited for his leadership of the U.S. church during a moment of crisis, when as president of the U.S. bishops conference he persuaded church leaders to adopt toughened penalties for abusers in 2002.
“Gregory has impeccable credentials for dealing with the sex abuse crisis, which is essential for healing the church,” the Rev. Thomas Reese, an expert on the American church, said in a column Thursday at Religion News Service.
Gregory also won praise from another American Jesuit, the Rev. James Martin, who was invited last year by Gregory to give a talk in Atlanta on how the church should better minister to the LGBT community. The initiative drew criticism from some conservatives who accused Gregory of not upholding church teaching on homosexuality.
In a statement, Martin said Gregory was a “superb choice” for Washington given his leadership on the abuse crisis and because he is “someone who knows how to reach out to marginalized populations.”
Gregory has responded to the latest outbreak of the scandal by expressing his own anger, shame and disillusionment at the failures of the hierarchy. In an August statement to the faithful after McCarrick resigned as a cardinal, he acknowledged his own esteem and respect for McCarrick had been “clearly misplaced.”
He conceded that, going forward, oversight of bishops by laity “may well provide the only credible assurance that real and decisive actions are being taken.”
In Atlanta, Gregory was embroiled briefly in a scandal of his own in 2014 after the archdiocese used $2.2 million in donations to buy and renovate a swank new home for the archbishop. The archdiocese later sold the mansion and Gregory apologized following an outcry from parishioners who cited Francis’ frugality as a model other church leaders should follow.
A native of Chicago, Gregory is a protege of the late Chicago Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, who consecrated him as a bishop in 1983. Gregory was bishop of Belleville, Illinois, from 1994 until his installation in Atlanta in 2005.
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Голова Комітету державних доходів Палати представників Конгресу США демократ Річард Ніл звернувся з офіційним запитом до Податкового управління передати йому особисті й корпоративні податкові декларації Дональда Трампа за останні шість років.
Білий дім, ймовірно, спробує в судовому порядку перешкодити передачі документів, оскільки, як зауважив сам президент США, його податкові декларації зараз проходять аудиторську перевірку.
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Звернення Річарда Ніла є лише частиною широкого наступу на Трампа, початого демократами в нижній палаті парламенту США. Так, юридичний комітет вчора ж уповноважив свого голову вимагати від Міністерства юстиції оприлюднення в повному обсязі звіту спецпрокурора Роберта Мюллера про російський слід у президентській кампанії 2016 року.
Республіканці стверджують, що їхні противники перетворюють податковий кодекс на знаряддя політичної боротьби. Позиція республіканців зводиться до того, що всім американцям гарантована конфіденційність фінансової інформації, що міститься в їхніх податкових деклараціях.
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Віце-президент США Майк Пенс попередив Туреччину і Німеччину про неприпустимість укладення угод із Росією.
За словами Пенса, угода Анкари про купівлю російських зенітно-ракетних комплексів С-400 є «необдуманий крок», а Берлін ризикує стати «в’язнем» Москви, якщо і далі підтримуватиме проект «Північний потік-2».
«Це просто неприйнятно для найбільшої економіки Європи продовжувати ігнорувати загрозу російської агресії і нехтувати своєю обороною і нашою спільною обороною на такому рівні. І також неправильно для Німеччини дозволяти собі ставати енергетично залежною від Росії», – заявив Пенс 3 квітня у Вашингтоні під час заходів до 70-річчя заснування НАТО.
«Купівля Туреччиною російських зенітно-ракетних комплексів С-400 на 2,5 мільярда доларів становить значну загрозу для НАТО і для міцності альянсу… Туреччина мусить вибрати, чи вона хоче залишатися важливим партнером у найбільш успішному військовому альянсі в історії, чи вона хоче ризикнути безпекою цього партнерства, ухвалюючи необдумані рішення, які підривають наш альянс?», – наголосив віце-президент США.
Туреччина уклала контракт з Росією на постачання С-400 в 2017 році, попри критику США.
«Північний потік-2» має доставляти газ з Росії до Німеччини за допомогою газопроводу через Балтійське море.
США, Україна, як і низка країн Євросоюзу, переважно східноєвропейських, балтійських і скандинавських виступають проти «Північного потоку-2». Вони наголошують, що проект суто політичний, бо збільшує залежність Європи від російського газу, і економічно не обґрунтований.
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A House committee chairman on Wednesday formally asked the IRS to provide six years of President Donald Trump’s personal and business tax returns as Democrats try to shed light on his complex financial dealings and potential conflicts of interest.
The request by Massachusetts Rep. Richard Neal, who heads the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, is the first such demand for a sitting president’s tax information in 45 years. The unprecedented move is likely to set off a huge legal battle between Democrats controlling the House and the Trump administration.
Neal made the request in a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig, asking for Trump’s personal and business returns for 2013 through 2018.
Trump told reporters Wednesday he “would not be inclined” to provide his tax returns to the committee.
Democrats insist that obtaining Trump’s tax filings falls within their mandate of congressional oversight. Republicans have denounced it as a political witch hunt and invoked privacy concerns.
The legal battle set to ensue could take years to resolve, possibly stretching beyond the 2020 presidential election.
Trump broke with decades of tradition for presidential candidates by refusing to release his income tax filings during his 2016 campaign. He has said he won’t release them because he is being audited, even though IRS officials have said taxpayers under audit are free to release their returns. Trump claimed at a news conference following the November election that the filings are too complex for people to understand.
The IRS has a policy of auditing the tax returns of all sitting presidents and vice presidents, “yet little is known about the effectiveness of this program,” Neal said in a statement Wednesday evening. “On behalf of the American people, the Ways and Means Committee must determine if that policy is being followed, and if so, whether these audits are conducted fully and appropriately.”
Neal continued, “In order to fairly make that determination, we must obtain President Trump’s tax returns and review whether the IRS is carrying out its responsibilities.”
Neal is one of only three congressional officials authorized under to make a written request to the Treasury secretary for anyone’s tax returns. The Internal Revenue Service is part of the Treasury Department. A rarely used 1924 law says the Treasury chief “shall furnish” the requested material to members of the Ways and Means Committee for them to examine behind closed doors.
This is a breaking story. Please check back for updates.
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South Korea on Friday launches the world’s first nationwide 5G mobile networks, a transformational leap that has superpowers sparring for control of an innovation that could change the day-to-day lives of billions of people.
The fast communications heralded by fifth-generation wireless technology will ultimately underpin everything from toasters to telephones, from electric cars to power grids.
But while Seoul has won the race to be first to provide the user experience, that is only one part of a wider battle that has pitted the United States against China and ensnared giants including Huawei.
Hyper-wired South Korea has long had a reputation for technical prowess, and Seoul has made the 5G rollout a priority as it seeks to stimulate stuttering economic growth.
The system will bring smartphones near-instantaneous connectivity — 20 times faster than existing 4G — allowing users to download entire movies in less than a second.
In the same way that 3G enabled widespread mobile web access and 4G made new applications work ranging from social media to Uber, 5G will herald a new level of connectivity, empowered by speed.
It is crucial for the future development of devices ranging from self-driving vehicles that send data to one another in real time to industrial robots, drones and other elements of the Internet of Things.
That makes it a vital part of the infrastructure of tomorrow, and the 5G standard is expected to bring about $565 billion in global economic benefits by 2034, according to the London-based Global System for Mobile Communications, an industry alliance.
‘1 million devices’
But the implications of the new technology have pitted Washington against Beijing in an increasingly bitter standoff.
The U.S. has pressed its allies and major economies to avoid 5G solutions from Chinese-owned telecom giant Huawei, citing security risks that technological back doors could give Beijing access to 5G-connected utilities and other components.
But Chinese firms dominate 5G technology.
Huawei, the global leader, has registered 1,529 5G patents, according to data analysis firm IPlytics.
Combined with manufacturers ZTE and Oppo, plus the China Academy of Telecommunications Technology, Chinese entities own a total of 3,400 patents, more than a third of the total, according to the research firm.
South Korea comes next, with its companies holding 2,051 patents.
In contrast, U.S. firms have 1,368, IPlytics said, 29 fewer than Finland’s Nokia alone.
All three of South Korea’s mobile operators — KT, SK Telecom and LG UPlus — will go live with their 5G services on Friday.
“5G’s hyperspeed can connect 1 million devices within a 1-square-kilometer zone simultaneously,” KT said in a report.
Neither KT nor SK Telecom uses Huawei technology in its 5G network, but Huawei is a supplier to LG UPlus, the companies told AFP.
On the same day, Samsung Electronics will release the Galaxy S10 5G, the world’s first available smartphone using the technology, and rival phonemaker LG will follow with the V50s two weeks later.
Deployment in US
Until now, no mobile networks have offered nationwide 5G access.
U.S. network carrier Verizon said Wednesday that it had become the first carrier in the world to deploy a 5G network — in Chicago and Minneapolis, with more cities due to follow this year. The system will work with Lenovo’s Moto Z3 smartphone.
“Verizon customers will be the first in the world to have the power of 5G in their hands,” said Hans Vestberg, Verizon’s chairman and chief executive officer. “This is the latest in our string of 5G firsts.”
Rival US carrier AT&T deployed what it called its 5G E network in 12 cities last year with speeds faster than 4G networks but below those being deployed in other fifth-generation systems.
Andre Fuetsch, president of AT&T Labs, said in a statement Wednesday that independent testing shows “that we are the fastest wireless network nationwide.”
Qatari firm Ooredoo says it offers 5G services in and around Doha but does not have devices available to use them.
Japan is also expected to roll out a limited deployment in 2019 before full services start in time for next year’s Tokyo Olympics.
Cost barrier
More than 3 million South Koreans will switch to 5G by the end of this year, predicted KT Vice President Lee Pil-jae.
Cost is likely to be a barrier initially for users, analysts say, as the cheapest version of the new Galaxy handset will be priced at 1.39 million won ($1,200).
“While there are many cheap 4G smartphones under $300, Samsung’s 5G phones are well over $1,000, which could be a major minus point for cost-savvy consumers,” a KT representative told AFP.
None of South Korea’s three network operators would say how much they have invested in 5G, but Seoul’s Economy Minister Hong Nam-ki estimated it would be at least $2.6 billion this year alone.
“If 5G is fully implemented,” he said, “it will greatly improve people’s lives.”
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The election of Chicago’s first black lesbian mayor and the rise to prominence of a gay presidential candidate indicate that in US politics, at least among Democrats, being LGBTQ is now accepted.
Another lesbian candidate just won the mayoral race in Madison, Wis., while a third earned a spot in a runoff to be mayor of Kansas City, Mo.
The latest victories came after a steady shift in cultural attitudes fueled a “Rainbow wave” of gay and lesbian candidates across America in 2018, even as Donald Trump’s administration has chipped away at protections of the LGBTQ community.
The number of openly gay elected officials nationwide nearly doubled last year, to 682, according to the Victory Fund, which supports the election of LGBTQ candidates.
A ‘beginning’
The group backed Lori Lightfoot, who on Tuesday won Chicago’s mayoral race despite never having held public office.
Young Americans are “watching us, and they’re seeing the beginning of something, well, a little bit different,” Lightfoot said in her victory speech.
“It doesn’t matter who you love, just as long as you love.”
That acceptance is taking hold nationwide, empowering a community that has been traditionally under-represented in U.S. politics, where sexual orientation and family values have often stirred debate.
As recently as 2006, polls showed a majority of Americans were uncomfortable or had reservations about a gay presidential candidate.
Today, 68 percent are either enthusiastic about or comfortable with such candidates, according to an NBC News survey released this week.
Congress now has a historic number of openly lesbian, gay or bisexual members, all Democrats: eight in the 435-seat House of Representatives and two in the 100-member Senate.
Last November, Colorado’s Jared Polis became the first openly gay person elected governor.
“As the nation becomes more accepting of LGBTQ people, voters are focusing less on a candidate’s sexual orientation and gender identity and more on their issue positions and their vision for the future — and they tend to like what they see,” the Victory Fund’s Elliot Imse told AFP Wednesday.
But while LGBTQ Americans make up 4.5 percent of the population, they only hold 0.1 percent of elected offices nationwide, he said.
“So it’s incredible progress being made, but the numbers that we have to make up are quite extraordinary as well.”
‘Not there yet’
The shift in American attitudes is particularly good news for presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg, the 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Ind.
Buttigieg, a Harvard graduate who put his mayoral duties on hold to serve in Afghanistan as a Navy intelligence officer, is openly gay, and has spoken warmly about his marriage to Chasten Glezman.
With voters knowing he will be rock solid on equality issues, Buttigieg is freed up to address concerns more germane to presidential contests, such as the economy, climate change and foreign policy.
Several LGBTQ Democrats embraced that approach, and it worked.
Gay lawmakers have been in the Republican Party in the past, but its lack of an openly LGBTQ lawmaker in Congress is glaring given that Trump became his party’s first nominee to mention gay rights in his nomination acceptance speech.
Trump’s pick as ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, last year became the highest-ranking openly gay official ever in a Republican administration.
But Imse said Trump has surrounded himself with officials whose anti-LGBT bias has driven his agenda, including moving to bar transgender people from the military, rolling back Barack Obama’s protections for LGBTQ workers, and supporting the right of businesses not to serve gay couples in the name of religion.
Pence’s stances
Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence, has aggressively opposed both abortion and LGBTQ rights as a lawmaker, becoming a hero of the religious right.
Pence served as Indiana governor during Buttigieg’s first years as mayor, and they clashed on social issues.
Buttigieg said he looks forward to the day being gay is seen as the least interesting thing about a politician.
“Shouldn’t it just be that I, like, show up at some event, my date’s a dude, and everybody puts it together and nobody cares?” he posited on a podcast last month.
“I think that’s the destination. But I know that we’re not there yet.”
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