A small town in the Midwestern state of Ohio finds itself at the center of a controversy involving fake news about migrants eating residents’ pet cats and dogs. VOA’s Creole Service traveled to Springfield and has this report, narrated by Elizabeth Cherneff. …
Leave a commentBrussels — Teresa Ribera will have to square up to Big Tech, banks and airlines if confirmed as Europe’s new antitrust chief, while juggling calls for looser rules to help create EU champions. Nominated Tuesday by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for the high-profile antitrust post, Ribera has been Spain’s minister for ecological transition since 2018. The 55-year-old Spanish socialist, one of Europe’s most ambitious policymakers on climate change, will have to secure European Parliament approval before taking up her post. As competition commissioner, she will be able to approve or veto multi-billion euro mergers or slap hefty finesmore
Leave a commentAmerican women are poised to play an important role in deciding the 2024 U.S. presidential election. In recent years, women have registered to vote and cast votes at higher rates than men, and in the 2020 election, female voters outnumbered male voters by several million. Although women are not a monolithic voting bloc, the trends favor one major party over the other, as Dora Mekouar reports. …
Leave a commentPARIS — When French prosecutors took aim at Telegram boss Pavel Durov, they had a trump card to wield – a tough new law with no international equivalent that criminalizes tech titans whose platforms allow illegal products or activities. The so-called LOPMI law, enacted in January 2023, has placed France at the forefront of a group of nations taking a sterner stance on crime-ridden websites. But the law is so recent that prosecutors have yet to secure a conviction. With the law still untested in court, France’s pioneering push to prosecute figures like Durov could backfire if its judges balk atmore
Leave a commentAn apparent assassination attempt on Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump over the weekend raised new questions Monday about political violence in the United States. Democratic and Republican leaders called for more resources for the U.S. Secret Service. VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson has more …
Leave a commentWASHINGTON — “I love you, China. My dear mother,” former U.S. President Donald Trump, standing in front of a mic at a lectern, appears to sing in perfect Mandarin. “I cry for you, and I also feel proud for you,” Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump’s Democratic opponent in this year’s election, appears to respond, also in perfect Mandarin. Trump lets out a smile as he listens to the lyric. The video has received thousands of likes and tens of thousands of reposts on Douyin, China’s variation of TikTok. “These two are almost as Chinese as it gets,” one comment says. Neithermore
Leave a commentSpringfield, Ohio — An Ohio city at the center of a political furor over Haitian migrants canceled its annual celebration of cultural diversity on Monday in response to days of violent threats that have closed schools and government offices. The governor, meanwhile, said resources would be surged to Springfield to help city officials deal with the fallout. Springfield’s two-day CultureFest, which highlights diversity, arts and culture, had been scheduled to begin Sept. 27 but was canceled “in light of recent threats and safety concerns,” the city announced. “We deeply regret having to cancel CultureFest, as we know it is a belovedmore
Leave a commentAmerica’s adversaries are ramping up efforts to impact the outcome of the U.S. presidential election and down-ballot races. VOA National Security Correspondent Jeff Seldin reports on the expanding array of sophisticated influence operations taking aim at U.S. voters …
Leave a commentWashington — U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said on Monday he is “personally fully committed” to ensuring all 2024 presidential election ballots are delivered in a timely fashion and vowed to respond to concerns raised by state and local officials. A group of about three dozen election officials from the National Association of State Election Directors and other groups on Wednesday raised serious concerns about USPS’s ability to deliver millions of ballots for the 2024 presidential election, citing questions “about processing facility operations, lost or delayed election mail, and front-line training deficiencies impacting USPS’s ability to deliver election mail in amore
Leave a commentLOS ANGELES — Being a venture capitalist carries a lot of prestige in Silicon Valley. Those who choose which startups to fund see themselves as fostering the next big waves of technology. So when some of the industry’s biggest names endorsed former President Donald Trump and the onetime venture capitalist he picked for a running mate, JD Vance, people took notice. Then hundreds of other venture capitalists — some high profile, others lesser-known — threw their weight behind Vice President Kamala Harris, drawing battle lines over which presidential candidate will be better for tech innovation and the conditions startups need tomore
Leave a commentwashington — For the second time in nine weeks, former President Donald Trump walked away from an assassination attempt – the latest, on Sunday afternoon, at his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida, authorities said. Officials said Trump was not hurt, and that the shooter was spotted and fired on first by members of Trump’s security detail. Various national media sources, including The Associated Press, The New York Times and Fox News Channel, cited unnamed law enforcement officials who identified the suspect as Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, of Hawaii. Those officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weremore
Leave a commentIran’s threatening behavior toward the United States and its ally Israel is one of only a few foreign policy issues addressed by U.S. presidential rivals Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in the election campaign. Michael Lipin looks at the differing approaches of Harris and Trump in facing the threat from Iran and its proxies. …
Leave a commenttokyo — A long robot entered a damaged reactor at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant on Tuesday, beginning a two-week, high-stakes mission to retrieve for the first time a tiny amount of melted fuel debris from the bottom. The robot’s trip into the Unit 2 reactor is a crucial initial step for what comes next — a daunting, decades-long process to decommission the plant and deal with large amounts of highly radioactive melted fuel inside three reactors that were damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Specialists hope the robot will help them learn more about the status ofmore
Leave a commentWhen Kamala Harris and Donald Trump faced each other on the debate stage less than two months before Election Day, the two candidates were at odds on issues ranging from the economy to tariffs and Ukraine. But on immigration, their positions were especially different. VOA immigration reporter Aline Barros brings us the story. …
Leave a commentSPRINGFIELD, Ohio — Many cities have been reshaped by immigrants in the last few years without attracting much notice. Not Springfield, Ohio. Its story of economic renewal and related growing pains has been thrust into the national conversation in a presidential election year — and maliciously distorted by false rumors that Haitian immigrants are eating their neighbors’ pets. Donald Trump amplified those lies during Tuesday’s nationally televised debate, exacerbating some residents’ fears about growing divisiveness in the predominantly white, blue-collar city of about 60,000. At the city’s Haitian Community Help and Support Center on Wednesday, Rose-Thamar Joseph said many of themore
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