In Defiant Return Speech, Trump Digs in on Claim of Election Fraud
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Leave a commentFormer U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday repeated his false claim that he won the 2020 election during a wide-ranging policy speech that marked his defiant return to Washington – and hinted at his possible return to politics. “I always say I ran the first time and I won,” he said, speaking to about 600 well-heeled supporters in a hotel ballroom just a mile from The White House. “Then I ran a second time, and I did much better. We got millions and millions more votes. And you know what? That’s going to be a story for a long time.more
Leave a commentU.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s potential plan to visit Taiwan during her trip to Asia in August has prompted a belligerent response from China, with the spokesman for the Foreign Ministry warning that Beijing would “act strongly to resolutely respond” and “take countermeasures” if Pelosi traveled to the island. In a news conference on Monday, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian confirmed a report in the Financial Times over the weekend that said China’s warnings were “significantly stronger” over the House speaker’s potential visit than during the previous times it had been unhappy with U.S. policy toward Taiwan. “The Chinese sidemore
Leave a commentCalling semiconductors “the building blocks for the modern economy,” President Joe Biden on Monday asked Congress to move quickly and send him a bipartisan bill designed to boost the computer chips industry and high-tech research in the United States. The Senate was originally expected to take a critical vote in the evening to advance the legislation, but Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced that storms on the East Coast had disrupted travel plans for several senators and that he would be delaying the vote until Tuesday morning. The bill needs support from at least 60 senators to clear proceduralmore
Leave a commentCongresswoman Liz Cheney, one of the leaders of the investigation into the January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol last year, said Sunday that Donald Trump engaged in the “most serious misconduct” of any U.S. president in history by inciting the mayhem and then refusing for more than three hours to call off the rioters. Trump is broadly hinting at another run for the White House in 2024 but Cheney, the vice chairperson of the congressional investigative committee, told CNN’s “State of the Union” show on Sunday there is “no doubt in my mind he’s unfit” for elected office andmore
Leave a commentHere is a summary of Native American-related news around the U.S. this week: Haaland not hindered by leg injury Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico, is recovering from an injury she incurred while hiking in Virginia’s Shenandoah National Park on Sunday. An Interior Department statement released Monday said she had been treated at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for a broken tibia of her left leg. That didn’t stop her from returning to work Monday when she hosted tribal and Native Hawaiian community leaders as part of the administration’s Tribalmore
Leave a commentCalifornia’s governor signed into law Friday new gun control legislation modeled on a legal approach used in Texas to curb access to abortions. Last year, well before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the nationwide right to an abortion, the Republican-controlled state of Texas enacted a new law allowing individuals to sue anyone helping to terminate a pregnancy, if a fetal heartbeat could be detected. The Texas law allowed the individuals who filed the civil complaints, if they won their case, to receive “damages” of at least $10,000. Officials in the heavily Democrat-leaning state of California, where there is solid supportmore
Leave a commentAs the war in Ukraine approaches the end of its fifth month and Russian attacks on civilian sites are reported on a near-daily basis, pressure is mounting on the Biden administration to officially designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. This week, according to reporting by Politico, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Secretary of State Antony Blinken that if he does not exercise the power delegated to him by Congress to make the designation, lawmakers themselves will do so. Russia is already under crippling sanctions, imposed by the U.S. and a host of other countries, but official designation asmore
Leave a commentThe January 6 Committee wrapped up its first round of public hearings Thursday with a minute-by-minute examination of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s actions during the attack on the U.S. Capitol. As VOA Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson reports, the investigation provided new insight into Trump’s actions. …
Leave a commentU.S. lawmakers investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol last year said then-President Donald Trump chose not to act for more than three hours as thousands of his supporters rampaged through the Capitol trying to block the certification of Joe Biden’s electoral victory. “President Trump sat at his dining table and watched the attack on television while his senior-most staff, closest advisers and family members begged him to do what is expected of any American president,” Representative Elaine Luria, a Democratic committee member, said. Representative Adam Kinzinger, another committee member, said Trump failed to act because the mobmore
Leave a commentThe White House says President Joe Biden has tested positive for COVID-19 and is experiencing “very mild symptoms.” The president’s diagnosis comes amid another wave of the coronavirus in the United States, driven this time by the BA.5 variant. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports. …
Leave a commentThe Senate this week took a key step toward passing a bill meant to provide $52 billion in subsidies to the semiconductor industry in the United States, part of an effort that lawmakers have characterized as protecting the country from supply shortages such as those that struck during the coronavirus pandemic. The bill, called the CHIPS for America Act, also seeks to make the U.S. more competitive with China. Semiconductors, commonly known as chips, are essential elements of modern manufacturing. They are used in computers, cellphones and automobiles as well as in various other capacities. During the pandemic, chip shortagesmore
Leave a commentAs the congressional committee examining the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol wraps up its first round of public hearings this week, the Justice Department faces rising pressure to prosecute former President Donald Trump in connection with the bloody assault. The Justice Department has charged more than 800 Trump supporters involved in the riot and is investigating others tied to the plot. But it remains unclear whether the department will take the unprecedented step of charging a former president based on the findings of a committee. “We don’t know whether there will be prosecutions that are going tomore
Leave a commentThe Jan. 6 committee will wrap up its first round of public hearings this week with a minute-by-minute examination of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s actions during the attack on the U.S. Capitol. VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson looks at what happens next. …
Leave a commentA bipartisan group of senators agreed Wednesday on proposed changes to the Electoral Count Act, the post-Civil War-era law for certifying presidential elections that came under intense scrutiny after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election. Long in the making, the package introduced by the group led by Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Joe Manchin of West Virginia is made up of two separate proposals. One would clarify the way states submit electors and the vice president tallies the votes in Congress. The other would bolster security for state andmore
Leave a commentPresident Joe Biden on Wednesday announced new steps to combat climate change and promised more robust action to come, saying, “This is an emergency and I will look at it that way.” The president stopped short, though, of declaring a formal climate emergency, which Democrats and environmental groups have been seeking after one Democratic senator quashed hopes for sweeping legislation to address global warming. Biden hinted such a step could be coming. “Let me be clear,” Biden said, “climate change is an emergency, and in the coming weeks I’m going to use the power I have as president to turnmore
Leave a commentA supporter of former U.S. President Donald Trump was selected by Republican voters in the eastern state of Maryland as their choice for governor. State legislator Dan Cox overwhelmingly won Tuesday’s preliminary elections, far outpacing his nearest opponent, Kelly Schulz, who once served in the cabinet of outgoing Republican Governor Larry Hogan. He is one of many Republican candidates endorsed by the former president ahead of the upcoming midterm elections who have supported Trump’s false claims that he lost the 2020 presidential election to Democrat Joe Biden due to a fraudulent process. Cox attended Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally onmore
Leave a commentThe U.S. congressional panel probing the riot at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 of last year expects to be able to look at text messages sent by Secret Service agents from the day before the mayhem and as it unfolded, a member of the investigative committee said Sunday. “We expect to get them by this Tuesday,” Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren told ABC’s “This Week” show. “We need all of the texts from the fifth and sixth of January.” The riot unfolded as about 2,000 supporters of then-President Donald Trump, a Republican, stormed into the Capitol to try to block Congressmore
Leave a commentPresident Joe Biden is promising “strong executive action” to combat climate change, despite dual setbacks in recent weeks that have restricted his ability to regulate carbon emissions and boost clean energy, such as wind and solar power. The Supreme Court last month limited how the nation’s main anti-air pollution law can be used to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Then late Thursday, Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia said he wants to delay sweeping environmental legislation that Democrats have pushed as central to achieving Biden’s ambitious climate goals. Biden, who has pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissionsmore
Leave a commentHere is a summary of Native American-related news around the U.S. this week: Interior secretary Haaland hears emotional testimony on boarding schools U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland heard from former students of federally backed Indian boarding schools as part of a year-long “Road to Healing” initiative. At the Riverside Indian School in Anadarko, Oklahoma, July 9, elders from different states and tribes shared stories of physical and emotional punishment, sexual abuse and other indignities suffered as part of an educational program designed to sever children from families and tribes and assimilate them into mainstream U.S. society. Tribal elders recallmore
Leave a commentU.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
Leave a commentU.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. …
Leave a commentThe 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
Leave a commentTexas 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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