Biden to Meet with Arab Leaders as US Seeks to Reassert Influence in Middle East

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U.S. President Joe Biden meets Saturday with Arab leaders in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where he will lay out his vision for U.S. engagement in the Middle East. Biden will attend the GCC+3 Summit, meeting with members of the Gulf Cooperation Council – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates – plus Egypt, Iraq and Jordan. He is also expected to discuss energy security with the leaders of the Gulf countries, but aides say there are not likely to be any announcements on oil output until next month’s meetings of OPEC+, a group of 13 OPEC membersmore

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Biden Vows to Work for Independent Palestinian State

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U.S. President Joe Biden met with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem on Friday before traveling to Saudi Arabia. Biden said he remains committed to an independent Palestinian state even if the time isn’t right to restart negotiations. Abbas condemned the Israeli occupation of the West Bank but said Palestinians are prepared to restart peace talks. Linda Gradstein reports from Jerusalem. …

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US House Votes to Restore Abortion Rights; Senate Odds Dim

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The U.S. House has voted to restore abortion rights nationwide in Democrats’ first legislative response to the Supreme Court’s landmark decision overturning Roe v. Wade.  The bill has little chance of becoming law, with the necessary support lacking in the 50-50 Senate. Yet voting marks the beginning of a new era in the debate as lawmakers, governors and legislatures grapple with the impact of the court’s decision.  The legislation passed 219-210. The House also passed a second bill to prohibit punishment for a woman or child who decides to travel to another state to get an abortion, 223-205.  “Just threemore

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Texas Sues to Block Federal Guidance on Abortions to Save Mother’s Life 

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Texas sued the federal government on Thursday over new guidance from the Biden administration directing hospitals to provide emergency abortions regardless of state bans on the procedure that came into effect in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s reversal of its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the lawsuit argued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services was trying to “use federal law to transform every emergency room in the country into a walk-in abortion clinic.” The lawsuit focused on guidance issued Monday advising that a federal law protecting patients’ accessmore

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Poll: Fewer Than Half of Republican Primary Voters Would Support Trump in 2024

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Just over half of Republicans likely to vote in their party’s 2024 presidential primary say that they would prefer someone other than former President Donald Trump as the party’s presidential candidate, a poll released on Tuesday by The New York Times and Siena College found.  After identifying Republicans likely to vote in the primary, the survey gave respondents a choice between Trump and five other potential GOP nominees. Only 49% of respondents chose Trump, despite the fact that the former president carried 94% of all Republican votes in the 2020 election, which he lost to current President Joe Biden.  Trump’smore

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Investigators: Trump Tweet Pivotal Motivation for Attack on US Capitol

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U.S. lawmakers’ investigation into the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol resumed Tuesday with an examination of former President Donald Trump’s encouragement to far-right extremist groups to subvert the democratic process. As VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson explains, investigators argue Trump’s claims of election fraud directly led to the attack. Produced by: Katherine Gypson …

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Most Democrats Would Prefer Biden Not Run Again in 2024, Poll Finds

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A large majority of Democrats would prefer that their party nominate someone other than incumbent President Joe Biden as its candidate in the 2024 presidential election, a new poll from The New York Times and Siena College found.  The poll asked respondents who plan to vote in the Democratic primary elections whether they want the party to renominate Biden. Only 26% said that they would like to see Biden on the ballot again, compared to 64% who said they would prefer someone else.  The poll’s findings paint a grim picture for the incumbent president, whose standing with the public ismore

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New US Capitol Riot Hearing to Focus on Extremist Group Links to Trump, Associates

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The congressional panel investigating the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol last year is set to hear testimony Tuesday linking far-right extremist groups to the mayhem as they attempted to block the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election over then-incumbent Donald Trump. The House of Representatives committee has yet to say who will testify at its latest high-profile hearing, but one is expected to be Jason Van Tatenhove, a self-described “propagandist” for the Oath Keepers, an anti-government militia. Its members were among about 2,000 Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol. Other testimony is expected tomore

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Ex-Trump Aide Bannon Offers to Testify in US Probe of January 6 Riot

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Donald Trump’s former close adviser Steve Bannon has told the congressional panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol that he is ready to testify, a change of heart days before he is due to be tried for contempt of Congress. In a letter to the committee seen by Reuters, Bannon’s lawyer, Robert Costello, wrote to say the former president would waive the claim of executive privilege that Bannon had cited in refusing to appear before the committee.  Bannon, a prominent figure in right-wing media circles who served as Trump’s chief strategist in 2017, is scheduled tomore

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US House January 6 Panel to Hold Next Scheduled Hearing This Week

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The select House of Representatives Committee investigating the January 6th attack on the United States Capitol by supporters of then-President Trump is set to hold its next scheduled hearing Tuesday. Committee members say the hearing will focus on white nationalist groups’ participation in the attack. As VOA’s Arash Arabasadi reports, the seventh hearing follows a closed-door session last week with a former top White House lawyer. …

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Blinken’s Talks in Bangkok to Focus on Myanmar

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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Bangkok, where Myanmar is expected to feature prominently in meetings Sunday with Thailand’s leaders. The main topic of their discussions will likely be the crisis in Myanmar, said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Kritenbrink, adding the U.S. would continue to “condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the Burmese military regime’s brutal actions since the coup d’état, the killing of nearly 2,000 people and displacing more than 700,000 others.” Myanmar is also known as Burma. Blinken is to meet with Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai.more

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Incomplete Grade? Columbia Loses Ranking over Dubious Data

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U.S. News & World Report has unranked Columbia University from its 2022 edition of Best Colleges, saying in a statement that the Ivy League institution failed to substantiate certain 2021 data it previously submitted, including student-faculty ratios and class size. The decision to rescind the school’s No. 2 rating among national universities in the 2022 edition came about a week after Columbia announced it would not be submitting data for the 2023 edition of Best Colleges after one of its mathematics professors recently raised questions about the accuracy of past submissions.  The 2022 edition was first published in September 2021.more

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Former Trump White House Counsel Meets With January 6 Panel

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Former White House counsel Pat Cipollone met for a private interview with the January 6 committee for about eight hours Friday regarding his role in trying to prevent then-President Donald Trump from challenging the 2020 presidential election and joining the violent mob that laid siege to the Capitol. Cipollone, once a staunch presidential confidant who had defended Trump during his first impeachment trial, had been reluctant to appear formally for an on-record interview. Like other former White House officials, it is possible he claimed his counsel to the Republican president as privileged information he was unwilling to share with themore

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Native American News Roundup, July 3 – 9, 2022

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Here is a summary of Native American-related news around the U.S. this week: Cherokee veteran receives highest military honor President Joe Biden awarded Cherokee Nation citizen Dwight Birdwell America’s highest military decoration during a White House ceremony Tuesday. Birdwell, 74, was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Tet Offensive, a series of shock and awe attacks by North Vietnamese forces in January 1968. “I’m grateful for all you have given our country and that at long last your story is being honored as it should have been always,” Biden told Birdwell (see video below), noting thatmore

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Biden Seeks to Balance Interests, Ideology in Mideast Trip

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In his visit to the Middle East next week, President Joe Biden is set to push for Israel’s deeper integration in the region and urge Gulf countries to pump more oil to alleviate pressure on the global energy market. Observers will watch how Biden balances these U.S. interests with American values of human rights, in light of the killings of journalists Jamal Khashoggi and Shereen Abu Akleh. VOA White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has the story. …

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Liz Cheney: If Warranted, Justice Department Should Not Hesitate to Prosecute Trump Over US Capitol Riot

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One of the key lawmakers investigating the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol last year says that if the Justice Department concludes that former President Donald Trump fomented the mayhem to block Congress from certifying his 2020 reelection loss — it should not hesitate to prosecute him. Congresswoman Liz Cheney, the vice chairperson on the panel investigating the insurrection and a vocal anti-Trump Republican, acknowledged to ABC News that the prosecution of a former U.S. president would be unprecedented and “difficult” for an already politically divided country. But the Wyoming Republican said that not prosecuting Trump, if it weremore

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High Court Marshal Seeks Enforcement of Anti-Picketing Laws

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The marshal of the U.S. Supreme Court has asked Maryland and Virginia officials to enforce laws she says prohibit picketing outside the homes of the justices who live in the two states. “For weeks on end, large groups of protesters chanting slogans, using bullhorns, and banging drums have picketed Justices’ homes,” Marshal Gail Curley wrote in the Friday letters to Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and two local elected officials. Curley wrote that Virginia and Maryland laws and a Montgomery County, Maryland, ordinance prohibit picketing at justices’ homes, and she asked the officials to direct police tomore

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US Capitol Riot Panel Hints at Criminal Referrals for Witness Tampering 

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Lawmakers investigating the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol last year are signaling they could send referrals to the Justice Department for prosecution of illegal tampering with witnesses who have testified to the panel. Representative Liz Cheney, vice chairperson of the House of Representatives investigative panel, displayed Tuesday two messages from notes sent to hearing witnesses saying that former President Donald Trump was keeping a close eye on the hearings and was counting on continued loyalty. The senders of the notes weren’t identified. The panel is probing how the insurrection unfolded and Trump’s role in trying to upend hismore

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Native Americans Bristle at Suggestions They Offer Abortions on Tribal Land

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Shortly after the leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion to end women’s constitutional right to abortion, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt appeared on Fox News suggesting Native American tribes in his state, looking to get around Oklahoma’s tough new abortion ban, might “set up abortion on demand” on any of the 39 Indian reservations in that state. “You know, the tribes in Oklahoma are super liberal,” Stitt said, “They go to Washington, D.C. They talk to President (Joe) Biden at the White House. They kind of adopt those strategies.” The U.S. government recognizes tribes as sovereign nations, and as such,more

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US Visa Called Too Expensive for Afghan Students

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For Breshna Salaam, the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan last year meant a return to the same extreme poverty she and her mother had experienced under the Taliban’s first time in control of the country.   In 1996, the Taliban fired Salaam’s mother from a public service job, denying the widow and her daughter their only source of income. In August 2021, with her mother retired, the Taliban fired Salaam from a job at the Ministry of Agriculture.   Deprived of work and education in her own country, she applied for graduate programs abroad and was offered a scholarshipmore

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Jackson to be Sworn in as Breyer Retires From Supreme Court

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Nearly three months after she won confirmation to the Supreme Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson is officially becoming a justice. Jackson, 51, will be sworn as the court’s 116th justice Thursday, just as the man she is replacing, Justice Stephen Breyer, retires. The judicial pas de deux is set to take place at noon, the moment Breyer said in a letter to President Joe Biden on Wednesday that his retirement will take effect after nearly 28 years on the nation’s highest court. The court is expected to issue its final opinions earlier Thursday in a momentous and rancorous term that includedmore

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January 6 Panel Subpoenas Former White House Counsel

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The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection issued a subpoena Wednesday to former White House counsel Pat Cipollone, who is said to have stridently warned against former President Donald Trump’s efforts to try to overturn his election loss. It’s the first public step the committee has taken since receiving the public testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, the onetime junior aide who accused Trump of knowing his supporters were armed on Jan. 6 and demanding that he be taken to the U.S. Capitol that day. Cipollone, who was Trump’s top White House lawyer, is said to have raised concerns about themore

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