The Feel-Good Moment for Infrastructure Is Over, Now Comes the Wait 

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Last week’s passage of a major bipartisan infrastructure spending package in the House of Representatives was broadly seen as a victory for President Joe Biden at a time when he desperately needed one. But unlike some of Biden’s earlier legislative wins, this one is not likely to produce immediate changes in the lives of most Americans. In the early months of his presidency, Biden was able to secure major stimulus packages that sent cash flowing from the federal government directly into the bank accounts of millions of Americans, many of whom were facing financial struggles due to the coronavirus pandemic.more

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Hong Kong Student Group Shutdown Seen as Move Against Critics

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Hong Kong’s universities have been under fire in a series of student arrests and university organization clampdowns since the territory’s controversial national security law was implemented in 2020. In the latest episode, the student union at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, one of Hong Kong’s most prestigious universities, dissolved itself in October under pressure to register legally as an independent organization rather than just being recognized by the university. Established half a century ago, the student organization became history after the collective resignation of its student council – its governing body – and the organization’s decision to dissolve itself.more

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Latest Exit From Fed’s Board Gives Biden Three Slots to Fill 

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Randal Quarles announced Monday that he will resign from the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors at the end of the year after completing a four-year term as its top bank regulator, opening up another vacancy on the Fed’s influential board for President Joe Biden to fill. Quarles has served as the Fed’s first vice chair of supervision, which gave him wide-ranging authority over the banking system. In that role, he oversaw a broad loosening of some of the financial regulations that were put in place after the 2008-2009 global financial crisis and recession.  Quarles’ deregulatory approach prompted criticism from somemore

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Bomb Threats Investigated at Brown, Columbia, Cornell

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Bomb threats at three Ivy League college campuses caused evacuations and police investigations Sunday, with at least two schools saying the threats there were unfounded. Cornell, Columbia and Brown universities alerted students to the threats. Authorities at Columbia and Brown said campus buildings had been cleared Sunday evening. In Ithaca, New York, Cornell police cordoned off the center of campus on Sunday after receiving a call that bombs were placed in four buildings. In New York City, Columbia University police issued a campuswide emergency alert after receiving bomb threats at university buildings about 2:30 p.m. The university deemed the threatsmore

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US Supreme Court to Hear Case of Surveillance of Muslims

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The U.S. Supreme Court is hearing arguments Monday whether the U.S. government can invoke the protection of “state secrets” to withhold information about its surveillance of Muslims at mosques in California. The dispute began a decade ago when three Muslim men filed suit against the Federal Bureau of Investigation, alleging the top U.S. law enforcement agency deployed a confidential informant who claimed to be a convert to Islam to spy on them based solely on their religious identity. The U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom of the practice of one’s religion. But the government is claiming in this case that it canmore

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White House ‘Confident’ Its Vaccination Mandate Will Be Upheld

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The White House said Sunday it is confident that the courts will eventually approve President Joe Biden’s mandate that U.S. businesses with 100 workers or more insist their workers either be vaccinated against the coronavirus or be frequently tested despite an initial court ruling halting the vaccination requirement.  White House chief of staff Ron Klain told NBC’s “Meet the Press” show, “I’m quite confident that when this finally gets fully adjudicated, not just a temporary order, the validity of this requirement will be upheld.”  Klain characterized the Biden vaccination order, which affects 84 million private sector workers and is setmore

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Ivy League President Calls College, University Rankings ‘Daft’

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The president of Princeton University, which routinely leads the lists of best colleges and universities, advises applicants to be wary of choosing a school based on ranking lists. “My university has now topped the U.S. News & World Report rankings for 11 years running. Given Princeton’s success, you might think I would be a fan of the list,” wrote Christopher Eisgruber in The Washington Post on October 21. “Not so. I am convinced that the rankings game is a bit of mishegoss — a slightly daft obsession that does harm when colleges, parents or students take it too seriously,” Eisgruber wrote,more

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Musk Asks Twitter if He Should Sell 10% of His Tesla Stock 

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Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk on Saturday asked his 62.5 million followers on Twitter if he should sell 10% of his Tesla stock.  “Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock,” Musk wrote in a tweet referring to a “billionaires’ tax” proposed by Democrats in the U.S. Senate.  Musk tweeted that he would abide by the results of the poll.  The poll received more than 700,000 responses in one hour since he posted it, with nearly 56% of respondents approving the proposal to sell the shares. more

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Are Democrats Playing a Budget ‘Shell Game’ with Biden’s $1.75 Trillion Spending Plan?

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As Democrats in the House of Representatives struggled Friday to schedule votes for two pieces of legislation vital to President Joe Biden’s domestic agenda, there were complaints from members of both parties about the decision to move forward before lawmakers had an official budget “score” for the larger of the two bills. Republicans staged a press conference Friday morning on the grounds of the Capitol, calling on Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to postpone a planned vote on the president’s Build Back Better package of climate and social services spending until the budget score, which is prepared by the Congressionalmore

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Roads, Transit, Internet: What’s In the Infrastructure Bill

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The House has passed a $1 trillion bipartisan plan to rebuild roads and bridges, modernize public works systems and boost broadband internet, among other major improvements to the nation’s infrastructure. The legislation now goes to President Joe Biden for his signature. Once it is signed by Biden, the new law will reach virtually every corner of the country — a historic investment that the president has compared with the building of the transcontinental railroad and Interstate Highway System. The White House is projecting that the investments will add, on average, about 2 million jobs per year over the coming decade.more

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US Democrats Pass $1 Trillion Infrastructure Bill, Ending Daylong Standoff

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After a daylong standoff, Democrats set aside divisions between progressives and centrists to pass a $1 trillion package of highway, broadband and other infrastructure improvement, sending it on to President Joe Biden to sign into law. The 228-206 vote late Friday is a substantial triumph for Biden’s Democrats, who have bickered for months over the ambitious spending bills that make up the bulk of his domestic agenda. Biden’s administration will now oversee the biggest upgrade of America’s roads, railways and other transportation infrastructure in a generation, which he has promised will create jobs and boost U.S. competitiveness. Democrats still havemore

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First Black US Secretary of State Laid to Rest

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Hundreds, including the current and former U.S. presidents, gathered in Washington on Friday to pay their final respects to Colin Powell, America’s first Black secretary of state and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The four-star general and statesman known worldwide died Oct. 18 of complications from COVID-19. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti has more on the funeral service. Camera: Shoaib Zada and Tezcan Taskiran …

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3- and 4-Year-Olds in a Washington School Ahead of the Game

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The 3- and 4-year-olds who attend prekindergarten at Two Rivers Public Charter School in Washington are part of the roughly 60% of U.S. children who go to preschool. U.S. President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better spending plan aims to make pre-K free and universal, expanding it to millions more youngsters. VOA’s Laurel Bowman has our story. Camera: Adam Greenbaum Produced by: Adam Greenbaum …

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US Indicts Russian Analyst Who Contributed to ‘Steele Dossier’

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A U.S. federal grand jury has indicted the Russian analyst who contributed to the “Steele dossier” alleging potential ties between Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign and Russia, a special prosecutor investigating the matter said Thursday. Analyst Igor Danchenko is accused of five counts of making false statements to the FBI relating to sources for the material he gave a British firm that prepared the dossier, said John Durham, the special prosecutor appointed by the U.S. Justice Department during Trump’s administration. At a brief hearing on Thursday in Alexandria, Virginia, U.S. Magistrate Judge Theresa Buchanan ordered Danchenko’s pretrial release on $100,000more

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Texas Law Renews Contentious US Fight Over Abortion

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Texas’ abortion law has landed in the nation’s capital this week, as the U.S. Supreme Court weighs whether limitations on a woman’s ability to terminate her pregnancy are legal. Lawmakers heard from experts Thursday who urged the high court to strike it down. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more. Producer: Katherine Gypson. …

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Democrats’ Virginia Losses Could Spell Trouble for 2022

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U.S. Republicans won big Tuesday in at least one off-year state election. As VOA’s Carolyn Presutti reports, some see Democrats’ losses in the state of Virginia as a warning sign for the party ahead of next year’s midterm elections, when all seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and a third of the U.S. Senate will be up for grabs. …

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Russian Analyst Who Helped Compile Trump-Russia Dossier Arrested by US Authorities

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A Russian analyst who provided information for a dossier of research used during the Trump-Russia investigation has been arrested by U.S. authorities as part of an ongoing special counsel investigation, the Justice Department said Thursday. Igor Danchenko is the third person, and second in a two-month span, to face charges in special counsel John Durham’s probe into the origins of the Russia investigation. Danchenko functioned as a source for Christopher Steele, a former British spy who was paid by Democrats to examine ties between Russia and Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign. The research he compiled was provided tomore

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Boston Elects First Woman, Person of Color as Mayor

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Not every mayor-elect of an American city gets post-election congratulations from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Taiwan.  Soon after news broke late Tuesday that Michelle Wu won the race for mayor of Boston, Massachusetts, Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs tweeted its “heartiest congratulations to @wutrain on winning the #Boston mayoral race. We couldn’t be prouder of the 1st woman & Asian American to hold the city’s top job. More power to her as she keeps breaking those glass ceilings!” In an historic race where the four top candidates were women of color, Wu, the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants to the United States, became the city’s first woman and person of color to be elected mayor of Boston.   Seen a progressive Democrat and protégé of U.S. senator and 2020 presidential candidate Elizabethmore

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Across US, Asian American Mayoral Candidates Make Historic Gains

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As elections took place in states across America on Tuesday, Asian American candidates made history with solidified and projected victories in three major cities.  Mayoral races in Boston, Cincinnati and Seattle drew just as much national attention as the tight gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey. Michelle Wu, the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants, claimed victory in Boston’s mayoral race, as unofficial returns signaled a strong defeat of opponent Annissa Essaibi George, prompting the city councilor to concede. Wu, 36, will now become the first woman, first person of color and first Asian American to serve as Boston’s mayor, breakingmore

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Murphy Narrowly Wins Second Term as New Jersey Governor 

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New Jersey Democratic Governor Phil Murphy narrowly won reelection Wednesday, eking out a victory that spared Democrats the loss of a second gubernatorial seat. He’s the state’s first Democratic governor to get a second straight term in 44 years, defeating Republican former New Jersey General Assembly member Jack Ciattarelli.  AP called the race Wednesday evening when a new batch of votes from Republican leaning Monmouth County increased Murphy’s lead and closed the door to a Ciattarelli comeback.  Ballots left Ballots remaining to be counted included a significant number of votes from predominantly Democratic Essex County, along with mail-in votes spreadmore

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Voters Reject Replacing Minneapolis Police Department 

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Sweeping police reforms have been at the center of a debate in the United States since the May 2020 death of African American George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota. A year-and-a-half later, amid spiking violent crime rates nationwide, voters in the city rejected scrapping its police department and replacing it with a proposed Department of Public Safety.  In the first municipal election since Floyd’s death, voters rejected the referendum, known as Ballot Question 2, by a projected margin of 56% to 44%. The measure was seen as a high-profile test of support for the so-called “defund the police”more

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Divided US Democrats Call for New Strategy After Loss in Virginia 

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A loss in blue-leaning Virginia and a too-close-for-comfort race in New Jersey sent divided Democrats in Washington scrambling for answers Wednesday, and calling for new strategies to unstick a stalled legislative agenda before they sustain more political damage. Republican Glenn Youngkin edged Democratic former Gov. Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia governor’s race, erasing President Joe Biden’s 10 percentage point margin of victory just a year ago. In New Jersey, heavily favored Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy was neck-and-neck with GOP political newcomer Jack Ciattarelli in a state Biden had carried by 16 percentage points. The results were ominous for Democrats farmore

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Republican Victory in Virginia’s Governor Race Seen as Bad Omen for Democrats

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In an election with implications far beyond its borders, the state of Virginia on Tuesday elected Republican businessman and political neophyte Glenn Youngkin to serve as governor, ending a decade-long trend of Democratic domination of state-wide offices and signaling trouble for that party’s fate in next year’s congressional midterms. “Together we will change the trajectory of this commonwealth,” Youngkin told a crowd of supporters at a victory celebration early Wednesday.    Youngkin took 50.7% of the vote to best Democrat and former Governor Terry McAuliffe, who received only 48.6% in his bid to return to the job he left aftermore

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