PoliticsThe IndependentJill Biden spent her first week as First Lady reshaping the role. Melania Trump spent hers isolated in a tower
Dr Biden tapped former US Ambassador to Uruguay Julissa Reynoso Pantaleon to serve as her chief of staff before Inauguration Day could even arrive. The political strategist and prominent attorney who previously worked under former President Barack Obama would help the new first lady roll out her agenda, which included the relaunch of Joining Forces, an initiative she co-founded with former First Lady Michelle Obama providing support for military families. Whereas the national gaze is typically cast on the new president during their first days in office, the first lady's presence could be felt in a recently unfamiliar way.
WorldAssociated PressIran's president criticizes prosecution of telecom minister
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday criticized Iran's hard-liner dominated judiciary over last week's prosecution of the countrys telecommunications minister. Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi was released on bail after he was summoned for prosecution. Judiciary officials cited his refusal to block Instagram and impose limitations on the bandwidth of other foreign social media and messaging systems.
PoliticsReutersAnalysis: A 'transitory way to govern' - Biden reverses Trump's orders with the stroke of a pen
In his first week in office, U.S. President Joe Biden has rolled out a wave of executive orders to fulfill a roster of campaign promises, underscoring just how easy it is to reverse some of the policies of his predecessor, Donald Trump. As of Wednesday morning, Biden had cranked out some 40 executive orders, nearly half of them overturning Trump mandates. With one stroke of the pen, the United States rejoined the Paris climate accord and with another, Biden blocked funds for a border wall with Mexico.
WorldAssociated PressPakistani suspect admits to role in Daniel Pearl’s beheading
After 18 years of denial, the Pakistani suspect convicted and later acquitted in the 2002 beheading of American journalist Daniel Pearl has told a court he played a “minor" role in the killing, the Pearl family lawyer said Wednesday. A letter handwritten by Ahmad Saeed Omar Sheikh in 2019, in which he admits limited involvement in the killing of the Wall Street Journal reporter, was submitted to Pakistan's Supreme Court nearly two weeks ago. It wasn't until Wednesday that Sheikh's lawyers confirmed their client wrote it.
PoliticsThe IndependentGiuliani election witness who went viral after testimony says she’s running for office
A conservative activist who was widely mocked after she was called to testify by Rudy Giuliani during a hearing on election fraud in December says she is running for office. Melissa Carone, who was an IT contractor for Dominion Voting Systems on election day, testified before a Michigan House panel in December 2020 that she had witnessed electoral fraud take place in favour of the Democrats on 3 November's presidential election. In testimony that went viral, Ms Carone claimed that tens of thousands of votes had been counted twice, but offered no proof to back up her claims.
PoliticsReutersBiden takes sweeping measures to curb climate change, vows job creation
President Joe Biden on Wednesday signed a new raft of executive actions to combat climate change, including pausing new oil and gas leases on federal land and cutting fossil fuel subsidies, as he pursues green policies he billed as a boon for job creation. The orders map out the direction for the Democratic president's climate change and environmental agenda and reverse the policies of his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, who sought to maximize U.S. oil, gas and coal output by removing regulations and easing environmental reviews. "In my view, we've already waited too long to deal with this climate crisis," Biden told a White House ceremony, noting the threats the nation faces from intensifying storms, wildfires, floods and droughts linked to climate change as well as air pollution from burning fossil fuels.
PoliticsAssociated PressBrazil's Bolsonaro cries foul over reports on condensed milk
Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro delivered a profanity-laced attack on the media Wednesday after reports that his administration spent $3 million on cans of condensed milk in 2020 sparked outrage and ridicule. Bolsonaro issued expletives and insults against journalists while addressing dozens of supporters at a restaurant in Brasilia, adding the 2.5 million cans of condensed milk, one of his favorite desserts, will feed more than 370,000 members of the armed forces, among others. “This (the cans of condensed milk) is to stick up your rears, you in the press!” Bolsonaro said in a video published on multiple social media channels, as his supporters and ministers cheered him on.
WorldReutersEU demands AstraZeneca plan to break vaccine deadlock
The European Union failed to make a breakthrough in crisis talks with AstraZeneca on Wednesday and demanded the drugmaker spell out how it would supply the bloc with reserved doses of COVID-19 vaccine from plants in Europe and Britain. The EU is making more comprehensive checks on vaccines before approval, which means a slower rollout of shots than former EU member Britain and growing public frustration. The issue has been exacerbated by Anglo-Swedish AstraZeneca and Pfizer of the United States both announcing delivery hold-ups in recent weeks.
PoliticsTimeWhat Rand Paul’s Procedural Failure Says About Donald Trump’s Survival
Sen. Rand Paul attends the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on the nomination of Linda Thomas-Greenfield to be the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, on Capitol Hill on Jan. 27, 2021. Sen. Rand Paul lost the very first procedural vote of former President Donald Trump's second impeachment trial. “The impeachment trial is dead on arrival,” the Kentucky Republican and regular Trump ally declared yesterday after his attempt to short-circuit the impeachment trial on the grounds it is unconstitutional failed by a 55-45 vote.
PoliticsReutersU.S. reviewing China genocide ruling to make sure it sticks
The U.S. State Department is reviewing a Trump administration determination that China has committed genocide by repressing Uighur Muslims in its Xinjiang region to make sure that it sticks, President Joe Biden's pick for U.N. ambassador said on Wednesday. "The State Department is reviewing that now because all of the procedures were not followed," Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made the move last week, one day before Biden took office, "after careful examination of the available facts," accusing the Chinese Communist Party of crimes against humanity targeting the Uighurs and other Muslim minorities.
LifestyleArchitectural DigestHere Are The Brightest Decor Buys of the Season
Let's get loud Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
U.S.Associated PressFeds withheld info on virus cases following executions
At least two journalists tested positive for coronavirus after witnessing the Trump administration's final three federal executions, but the Bureau of Prisons knowingly withheld the diagnoses from other media witnesses and did not perform any contact tracing, The Associated Press has learned. The AP is not identifying the journalists, but has confirmed they both received positive coronavirus tests following the executions earlier this month at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana. The Bureau of Prisons just completed a record number of executions under former President Donald Trump, more than any previous administration.
WorldBBCCoronavirus: Why South Africa has yet to roll out vaccines
South Africa has been seeking to source vaccines in three ways: via the World Health Organization-backed Covax scheme via arrangements made by the African Union through bilateral contracts with vaccine manufacturers Covax is a global initiative in which countries pool their resources to support the development of vaccines with a view to ensure that all countries receive a fair supply of effective vaccines. South Africa expects to acquire doses for around 10% of the population through Covax and has been told it will receive them from April through to June. The African Union established the African vaccine acquisition task team last year to source vaccine doses for the continent.
PoliticsReutersExplainer: Why Trump's post-presidency perks, like a pension and office, are safe for the rest of his life
The impeachment proceeding against Donald Trump on a charge of inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol has fueled speculation online that he could lose some of the benefits extended to former presidents. But according to legal experts, under the laws currently in effect, Trump will retain perks including a pension, office space and security detail even in the unlikely event that he is convicted by the Senate in its impeachment trial. Trump can thank a relatively obscure law, the Former Presidents Act.
U.S.USA TODAYReturn letter from Biden again shows Texas kindergarten students 'their voice matters,' teacher says
EL PASO, Texas – An El Paso teacher received a letter from President Joe Biden after her kindergarten class wrote to congratulate him for winning the 2020 election. Barron Elementary teacher Martha Tavarez and her class wrote to the then president-elect and Jill Biden after she gave a lesson to her students about the presidential election, including hosting a mock election, according to a news release on the El Paso Independent School District's website. The letter her class received in response bore the official seal of the Office of the President-Elect and some words of appreciation from the man elected as America's 46th president.
- NewsYahoo News Video
Video resurfaces of Marjorie Taylor Greene harassing Parkland survivor
In a video that was recorded before she was a member of Congress, Marjorie Taylor Greene can be seen harassing David Hogg, a survivor of the Parkland school shooting.
WorldAssociated PressEXPLAINER: Why India's farmers are revolting against PM Modi
Most of the protesters are farmers from northern Punjab and Haryana states, the two biggest agricultural producers. They are demanding the repeal of laws passed by Parliament in September that they say will favor large corporate farms, devastate the earnings of many farmers and leave those who hold small plots behind as big corporations win out. Modi has billed the laws as necessary to modernize Indian farming.
U.S.ReutersExclusive: Proud Boys leader was ‘prolific’ informer for law enforcement
Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys extremist group, has a past as an informer for federal and local law enforcement, repeatedly working undercover for investigators after he was arrested in 2012, according to a former prosecutor and a transcript of a 2014 federal court proceeding obtained by Reuters. In the Miami hearing, a federal prosecutor, a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent and Tarrio's own lawyer described his undercover work and said he had helped authorities prosecute more than a dozen people in various cases involving drugs, gambling and human smuggling. Tarrio, in an interview with Reuters Tuesday, denied working undercover or cooperating in cases against others.
PoliticsAssociated PressBiden to reopen 'Obamacare' markets for COVID-19 relief
Fulfilling a campaign promise, President Joe Biden plans to reopen the HealthCare.gov insurance markets for a special sign-up opportunity geared to people needing coverage in the coronavirus pandemic. Biden is expected to sign an executive order Thursday, said two people familiar with the plan, whose details were still being finalized. Although the number of uninsured Americans has grown because of job losses due to the economic hit of COVID-19, the Trump administration resisted calls to authorize a “special enrollment period” for people uninsured in the pandemic.
WorldReutersChina sharpens language, warns Taiwan that independence 'means war'
China toughened its language towards Taiwan on Thursday, warning after recent stepped up military activities near the island that "independence means war" and that its armed forces were acting in response to provocation and foreign interference. Taiwan, claimed by China as its own territory, reported multiple Chinese fighter jets and bombers entering its southwestern air defence identification zone last weekend, prompting Washington to urge Beijing to stop pressuring Taiwan. China believes that Taiwan's democratically-elected government is moving the island towards a declaration of formal independence, though Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen has repeatedly said it is already an independent country called the Republic of China, its formal name.
WorldAssociated PressAuschwitz survivors mark anniversary online amid pandemic
A Jewish prayer for the souls of the people murdered in the Holocaust echoed Wednesday over where the Warsaw ghetto stood during World War II as a world paused by the coronavirus pandemic observed the 76th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Most International Holocaust Remembrance Day commemorations were being held online this year due to the virus, including the annual ceremony at the site of the former Auschwitz death camp, where Nazi German forces killed 1.1 million people in occupied Poland. The memorial site is closed to visitors because of the pandemic.
PoliticsThe IndependentAfter the fall of Trump, Matt Gaetz matters more than ever
Speaking when the House returned to vote on the Electoral College results, Mr Gaetz spoke up to challenge the results from Arizona. Citing unsubstantiated allegations of electoral meddling on the left, he also condemned the violence of that day – explicitly denying Mr Trump played any role in inciting it while also raising the notion that it was at least in part a false flag attack by radical leftists. I don't know if the reports are true,” he said on the floor, “but the Washington Times has just reported some pretty compelling evidence from a facial recognition company showing that some of the people who breached the Capitol today were not Trump supporters, they were masquerading as Trump s...
LifestyleArchitectural Digest47 Best Housewarming Gifts to Celebrate a New Home
Everything they need to put the horrors of moving behind them Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
WorldAssociated PressPhilippines protests new China law as `verbal threat of war’
The Philippines has protested a new Chinese law that authorizes its coast guard to fire on foreign vessels and destroy other countries' structures on islands it claims, Manila's top diplomat said Wednesday. Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said in a tweet that the new Chinese law “is a verbal threat of war to any country that defies” it. “While enacting law is a sovereign prerogative, this one — given the area involved, or for that matter the open South China Sea — is a verbal threat of war to any country that defies the law,” Locsin said.
HealthMiami HeraldMore-contagious COVID variant concentrated in South Florida but widespread, data shows
An emerging and more-contagious version of the COVID virus is circulating in 19 Florida counties, spanning the Panhandle to South Florida, new data indicates, and Miami-Dade and Broward counties had the highest number of known cases. The Florida Department of Health says it is now examining about 200 samples of the COVID virus on average every week to look for mutations in the virus, roughly quadrupling the pace it had set during the course of the pandemic, according to information the agency provided to the Miami Herald on Wednesday. Florida health officials first announced on New Year's Day that a man with no travel history had acquired the U.K. strain, or B.1.1.7, in Martin County.
“By encouraging this act of terror on our capital, Trump’s legacy is destroyed.”
“Both backers and critics of Trump agreed that he remade the federal judiciary — a change that will impact America for decades.”
“He was largely responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans who did not need to die.”
“I do know what the future should hold for this country. That is to say, a policy of Trumpism without Trump.”
“It will be decades before the consequences of his tenure are fully known.”