Category Archives: Donald Trump

Jon Voight defends Trump’s film tariff plan: ‘Something has to be done’

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Oscar-winning actor gives first interview to Variety since working with Trump on plan to shake up Hollywood

Jon Voight, the actor who inspired Donald Trump’s surprise statement about placing a 100% tariff on foreign-made films, has given his first interview on the supposed plan to “give people back their dignity and their jobs”.

“Something has to be done, and it’s way past time,” the 86-year-old actor told Variety while he was, according to the magazine, “driving through what sounded like a car wash”.

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Trump plans to announce US will refer to Arabian Gulf rather than Persian Gulf

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Move sparks outrage in Iran as diplomats try to broker deal between Tehran and Washington over nuclear programme

Donald Trump plans to announce while on his trip to Saudi Arabia next week that the US will now refer to the Arabian Gulf or the Gulf of Arabia rather than the Persian Gulf.

The move has prompted outrage from Iranian leaders, and last-minute efforts are being made to persuade Trump to pull back from offending Iran in the midst of vital talks on the future of the Iranian nuclear programme. “If Trump went ahead with the proposal he would manage to unite every Iranian, pro- or anti-regime, against him, and that is a near impossible achievement,” one diplomat said.

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China to cut interest rates in response to trade war with US

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Half-point cut to be made to banks’ reserve requirement ratio and 1tn yuan released into banking system

China will cut interest rates and inject some much-needed liquidity into the domestic economy, as the country steels itself for a bruising trade war with the US.

The People’s Bank of China said on Wednesday it would make a half-point cut to the banks’ reserve requirement ratio, its benchmark interest rate, and release 1tn yuan (£103.6bn) into the banking system.

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Biden accuses Trump of ‘modern-day appeasement’ towards Russia

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In his first interview since leaving office, former US president told the BBC he fears for US-Europe relations

Joe Biden has accused Donald Trump of “modern-day appeasement” in his approach to Russia and expressed fears that Europe would “lose confidence in the certainty of America” in his first interview since leaving the White House in January.

“He [Vladimir Putin] believes it [Russia] has historical rights to Ukraine,” Biden told the BBC. Anybody who thought the Russian president would stop if Kyiv conceded territory, as recently proposed by Trump, “is just foolish”, he said.

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Trump says three Israeli hostages held in Gaza have died

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US president reports three deaths and laments ‘terrible situation’ but does not provide further details

Donald Trump said Tuesday that three more hostages held by Hamas in Gaza have died, bringing the number still alive to 21.

At a White House swearing-in ceremony for his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Trump revealed that three more Israeli hostages have died in Gaza, meaning that just 21 of the hostages taken from Israel during the 7 October attacks remain alive.

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US agrees ceasefire with Houthis in Yemen after dozens killed in airstrikes

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The Houthis have agreed to stop targeting commercial shipping in the Red Sea, but said attacks against Israel will continue

The US will halt its bombing campaign against Yemen’s Houthis after the Iran-aligned group agreed to stop targeting shipping in the Red Sea.

The halt – announced by the US president, Donald Trump, during an Oval Office meeting with Mark Carney, Canada’s prime minister, came on a day in which Israel claimed its jets had fully disabled Yemen’s main airport, including three civilian aircraft on the ground, in retaliation for a missile strike on Sunday that hit within the perimeter of Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport.

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Identity of second man illegally deported to El Salvador prison revealed

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Daniel Lozano-Camargo, 20, was deported in March in violation of a legal settlement over his asylum application

The identity of a second man illegally deported from the US by the Trump administration in defiance of a court order and now in detention in El Salvador has been revealed.

Daniel Lozano-Camargo, a 20-year-old Venezuelan, was deported to El Salvador’s notorious Cecot terrorism confinement facility in March under the White House’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, Politico reported.

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How Trump’s walkaway diplomacy enabled Israel’s worst impulses

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The common perception is that Trump has largely moved on, leaving an emboldened Netanyahu to his own devices

The Israeli plan to occupy and depopulate Gaza may not be identical to Donald Trump’s vision of a new riviera, but his inspiration and the US’s walkaway diplomacy have ushered Benjamin Netanyahu to the precipice of a dire new chapter in the Israel-Gaza war.

The common perception in both Washington and Israel is that Trump has largely moved on, leaving an emboldened Netanyahu to his own devices, while his offhand proposals for turning Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” have provided cover for rightwing Israeli politicians to enthusiastically support the forced resettlement of the Palestinian population.

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Trump says ‘we just want to be friends’ as Canada PM torpedoes 51st state idea

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Mark Carney said country was ‘not for sale’ in much anticipated summit between leaders at White House

Donald Trump has said he “just want[s] to be friends with Canada” after his first post-election meeting with the country’s prime minister, Mark Carney – who used the gathering to shoot down any prospect of his country becoming the 51st state.

Speaking in the Oval Office, Trump praised Carney – whose Liberal party won the federal election last week – for one of the “greatest political comebacks of all time”, and described the prime minister’s visit as “an honour” for the White House.

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Pentagon stopped Ukraine military aid shipments in February without Trump’s approval

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Order to cancel 11 military aid flights – which were quickly reinstated – originated in defense head Pete Hegseth’s office

Roughly a week after Donald Trump started his second term as president, the US military issued an order to three freight airlines operating out of Dover air force base in Delaware and a US base in Qatar: stop 11 flights loaded with artillery shells and other weaponry that were bound for Ukraine.

In a matter of hours, frantic questions reached Washington from Ukrainians in Kyiv and from officials in Poland, where the shipments were coordinated. Who had ordered the US Transportation Command, known as TransCom, to halt the flights? Was it a permanent pause on all aid? Or just some?

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Iran calls for US to withdraw support for Israeli strikes on Yemen

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Iran claims attacks in Yemen are attempt to disrupt negotiations with US over Tehran’s nuclear programme

Iran has urged the US to end its support for Israel’s continuing strikes on Yemen, claiming Israel is trying to use its conflict with the Houthi-led government to drive a wedge between Iran and the US in the negotiations over the future of Tehran’s civil nuclear programme.

The strikes have been criticised by the UN-recognised Yemen government based in Aden , which said it had not been consulted and airstrikes alone were not an integrated plan to remove the Houthis from power. Yemen has been divided between the Houthis and the official government since the Houthis captured the capital, Sana’a, in 2015.

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Trump and Carney to meet at White House in closely watched encounter

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Vibe at meeting could hint at future relationship between the two countries and their two leaders

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, was due to meet with the US president, Donald Trump, on Tuesday in a closely watched encounter at the White House that could hint at the future relationship between the two countries and their two leaders.

Over the weekend, Trump said it was “highly unlikely” he would use military force to annex Canada, a key trading partner and political ally. In recent months, the president has repeatedly threatened to use economic coercion to weaken Canada to the point that it accedes to Trump’s wish to make it the 51st state.

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Trump called for 100% tariff on foreign films a day after Jon Voight proposed ‘limited’ tariffs

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Actor was assigned by Trump to come up with a plan to save Hollywood, but his proposal only included tariffs ‘in certain limited circumstances’

US president Donald Trump announced his 100% tariff on films “coming into our country produced in foreign lands” one day after meeting with actor Jon Voight to discuss his proposals to bring film production back to the US – which only suggested that tariffs could be used “in certain limited circumstances”.

The Midnight Cowboy and Heat actor, who was appointed a “special ambassador” to Hollywood by Trump, has been meeting with studios, streamers, unions and guilds for months to develop a plan to lure film and television productions back to the US. Production companies often seek more cost-effective locations or tax incentives in other countries such as Canada, Australia, the UK, New Zealand, Hungary, Italy and Spain.

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Mexico’s president tries to defuse fears of US military intervention

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Sheinbaum emphasises communication with Trump ‘very good’ after rejecting offer to send US troops into Mexico

A sharp exchange of statements over the weekend has heightened concerns in Mexico that Donald Trump may push for a US military presence in its territory to fight drug trafficking.

The Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, sought to defuse the situation in her daily press conference on Monday, emphasising that communication between the two leaders had been “very good” so far.

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US media stocks slide on Wall Street after Trump threatens movie tariffs

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Netflix, Amazon, Warner Bros Discovery and Paramount shares fall as studios reel from announcement

Shares in US streamers and production companies fell on Monday, after Donald Trump said he would introduce 100% tariffs on films made abroad, a move that couldsharply raise costs for Hollywood studios.

Trump’s announcement on his Truth Social platform, revived worries about the US president’s trade policy and its impact on the world economy.

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Trump orders reopening of Alcatraz prison for ‘most ruthless offenders’

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Plan to expand and reuse long-shuttered penitentiary off San Francisco described as ‘not serious’ by Nancy Pelosi

Donald Trump has said he is directing the administration to reopen and expand Alcatraz, the notorious former prison on an island off San Francisco that has been closed for more than 60 years.

California lawmakers called the idea “absurd on its face” and part of the US president’s strategy of political distraction. Other officials pointed to the closure of the prison complex in 1963, known for its brutal conditions, due to operational expense and the high number of (unsuccessful) escape attempts.

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Trump announces 100% tariffs on movies ‘produced in foreign lands’

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President calls films ‘national security threat’ and claims he called on commerce department to immediately enact tariff

Donald Trump on Sunday announced on his Truth Social platform a 100% tariff on all movies “produced in Foreign Lands”, saying the US film industry was dying a “very fast death” due to the incentives that other countries were offering to draw American film-makers.

In his post, he claimed to have authorised the commerce department and the US trade representative to immediately begin instituting such a tariff.

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NPR and PBS push back against Trump’s order to cut funding: ‘This could be devastating’

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PBS’s Paula Kerger and NPR’s Katherine Maher say they’re looking at legal options to defend against White House

The heads of embattled US public broadcasters, National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), defended themselves against efforts by the Trump administration to cut off taxpayer funding, with both telling a Sunday political talk show they were looking at legal options.

PBS’s chief executive, Paula Kerger, told CBS News’s Face the Nation that Republican-led threats to withdraw federal funding from public broadcasters had been around for decades but are “different this time”.

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Trump says he ‘doesn’t rule out’ using military force to control Greenland

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President has repeatedly expressed idea of expansion into autonomous territory within fellow Nato member Denmark

Donald Trump would not rule out using military force to gain control of Greenland, the world’s largest island and an autonomous territory within Denmark, a fellow Nato member with the US.

Since taking office, the US president has repeatedly expressed the idea of US expansion into Greenland, triggering widespread condemnation and unease both on the island itself and in the global diplomatic community. Greenland is seen as strategically important both for defense and as a future source of mineral wealth.

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Trump says he doesn’t know if he needs to uphold constitutional due process

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President also says he sees himself as leaving office at the end of his current term and not seeking a third one

Donald Trump said “I don’t know” when asked if he needed to uphold the US constitution when it comes to giving immigrants the right of due process as he gave a wide-ranging TV interview broadcast on Sunday.

At the same time the US president also said he saw himself as leaving office at the end of his current term and not seeking a third one – something he has not previously always been consistent on even though a third term is widely seen as unconstitutional.

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