Friday, Apr 04th
Last update06:54:23 AM GMT
In an apparent softening of his proposal to take over the Gaza Strip, US President Donald Trump asserted Wednesday that the plan does not involve expelling Palestinians.
During a press spray with Ireland’s Prime Minister Michael Martin in the Oval Office, a reporter asked the Irish leader about Trump’s plan to “to expel Palestinians out of Gaza.”
“Nobody’s expelling any Palestinians,” Trump piped in.
Russia has presented the U.S. with a list of demands for a deal to end its war against Ukraine and reset relations with Washington, according to two people familiar with the matter.
A powerful atmospheric river storm was set to wallop California on Wednesday evening, drenching large swaths of the state with rain and bringing several feet of snow to the mountains – the latest in a wave of intense storms that new research shows are getting worse.
Much of northern California was under a winter storm warning because of the gusty winds and heavy snow in the forecast that the National Weather Service (NWS) said would lead to “difficult to impossible travel conditions”. Severe thunderstorms and high winds were predicted across the San Francisco Bay area, according to reports.
Major trade partners swiftly hit back at President Donald Trump’s increased tariffs on aluminum and steel imports, imposing stiff new taxes on U.S products from textiles and water heaters to beef and bourbon.
Canada, the largest supplier of steel and aluminum to the U.S., said Wednesday it will place 25% reciprocal tariffs on steel products and also raise taxes on a host of items: tools, computers and servers, display monitors, sports equipment, and cast-iron products.
The U.S. Department of Labor will no longer give its employees backup child care and certain other perks, according to internal announcements obtained by HuffPost.
Emergency backup day care, child care subsidies, on-site health clinics and an employee mental health program are apparently the latest casualties in efforts by billionaire Elon Musk to slash the federal bureaucracy for President Donald Trump.
Musk pledged to purge $2 trillion from the annual federal budget, and so far the Trump administration has chipped away at the goal by firing thousands of federal workers while taking smaller steps to make work less accommodating for the ones who remain, such as by reducing remote work and now by targeting even smaller perks.
The Labor Department’s internal notice said the changes would take effect early in May but that backup day care — something workers can use if their kid’s school is closed or their regular day care provider is unavailable — was already canceled last month except for previously scheduled visits.
Donald Trump has been condemned by a leading US Muslim civil rights group for seeking to use the word “Palestinian” as an insult when he attacked the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, as “not Jewish any more”.
“President Trump’s use of the term ‘Palestinian’ as a racial slur is offensive and beneath the dignity of his office,” said Nihad Awad, the national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or Cair.
“He should apologize to the Palestinian and American people. It is the continuing dehumanization of the Palestinian people that has resulted in horrific hate crimes against Palestinian-Americans, the US-enabled genocide in Gaza, and decades of denial of Palestinian human rights by successive presidential administrations.”
TVNL Comment: Let's see if the members of Congress and other 'leaders' will show outrage at more ugliness by the Donald. Again, just when you think he's hit rock botttom....
A federal judge on Wednesday said she will temporarily halt President Donald Trump's new restrictions on law firm Perkins Coie, which represented Hillary Clinton during her failed 2016 bid for the presidency.
In a March 6 executive order, Trump directed federal agencies to terminate contracts with Perkins Coie "to the extent permitted by law," to limit the firm's approximately 1,200 lawyers' access to federal buildings and federal employees, and to halt security clearances for employees at the firm. By explanation, the order claimed the law firm hired Fusion GPS to compile of dossier of information critical of Trump while it was representing Clinton, and − in reference to its workforce diversity and inclusion policies − that the firm discriminates on the basis of race in hiring decisions.
Judge Beryl Howell said at a hearing Wednesday that she would issue a temporary restraining order to block Trump's order while the firm's lawsuit challenging it plays out.
A federal judge deciding whether to pause Trump administration restrictions on transgender servicemembers chided the Defense Department on Wednesday for misrepresenting studies in an attempt to justify the ban.
“Do you agree that you can’t just pick and choose sentences from a study, right?” U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes asked the administration’s lawyers during a nearly five-hour hearing. Reyes is weighing whether to put the policy on hold while it's being challenged by transgender members of the military. She expects to decide by next week.
Reyes, who was equally blunt with the Defense Department lawyers about her concerns with their argument at a previous hearing, said the administration wants her to ignore “why someone would so misleadingly characterize a study other than to come to a preordained conclusion.”
The Department of Agriculture has cut over $1 billion in funding aimed at helping schools and food banks purchase from local farmers, according to a news report and a school nutrition nonprofit. The cuts come amid the Trump administration's push to purge federal spending.
States were notified recently that the USDA had cut the funding for the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program for 2025, the organization School Nutrition Association said in a news release.
The agency also cut funds for the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which operates similarly for the food supplies for local food banks and organizations in underserved communities, according to a report from Politico. Citing an unnamed spokesperson within the USDA, Politico reported that existing LFPA agreements would continue but that there would not be another round of funding this year.
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