Category Archives: US News

US treasury secretary denies Trump tariffs are tax on Americans

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Billionaire Scott Bessent dismisses concerns about president’s levies and predicts ‘acceleration’ in US economy

US treasury secretary Scott Bessent has refused to acknowledge that the sweeping trade tariffs imposed by Donald Trump around the world are taxes on Americans.

In a new interview on Sunday with NBC host Kristen Welker, Bessent, a former billionaire hedge fund manager, dismissed concerns from major American companies including John Deere, Nike and Black and Decker who have all said that Trump’s tariffs policy will cost them billions of dollars annually.

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Chicago churches urge calm resistance as Trump threatens intervention

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Residents told to stay connected to family and tell people their whereabouts as city readies for expected crackdown

The Rev Marshall Hatch urged congregants of a prominent Black church on Chicago’s West Side to carry identification, stay connected to family and protest as the city readied for an expected federal intervention.

“You need to start telling people about your whereabouts, so you don’t disappear,” Hatch said during services at New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist church. “We’re not going to despair. We’re not going to feel threatened. We’re not going to give up and give in to fascism and authoritarianism.”

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300 South Koreans detained at Hyundai plant in US to be released, says Seoul

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Footage of raid by US immigration officials showed detained workers in handcuffs and with chains around their ankles

South Korea announced on Sunday that the roughly 300 of its nationals detained during an immigration raid in Georgia would be released and flown home, as the sudden detention of workers appeared to strain the longstanding diplomatic and economic relationship between the two nations.

Nearly 500 workers, among them at least 300 South Koreans and at least 23 Mexicans, were arrested at the Hyundai-LG battery plant in the city of Ellabell on Thursday.

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Republican condemns Vance for ‘despicable’ comments on Venezuelan boat strike

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Rand Paul decries ‘thoughtless’ comment after vice-president defends strike against alleged drug traffickers

The Republican senator who heads the homeland security committee has criticized JD Vance for “despicable” comments apparently in support of extrajudicial military killings.

“Killing cartel members who poison our fellow citizens is the highest and best use of our military,” the vice-president said in an X post on Saturday, in defense of Tuesday’s US military strike against a Venezuelan boat in the Caribbean Sea, which killed 11 people the administration alleged were drug traffickers.

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Blackwater founder and Maga disciple Erik Prince pitching services in Ukraine

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Sources say Prince, whose firm’s contractors committed 2007 Iraq massacre, eager to get into valuable drone sector

Amid reports that Donald Trump’s administration is considering using US private military contractors in a postwar Ukraine, multiple sources tell the Guardian one high-profile and controversial American from the “war on terror” era is already circling for business.

In the streets of Kyiv, military hawks and defense privateers have described how Erik Prince, Maga disciple and founder of the now-defunct mercenary company Blackwater, has been aggressively pitching his services and looking to buy.

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‘We have the people’: Bernie Sanders campaigns with Zohran Mamdani as New York mayoral race enters final stretch

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Pair met with thunderous applause at town hall in Brooklyn as part of senator’s Fighting Oligarchy tour

Zohran Mamdani, the New York City mayoral frontrunner and Democratic nominee, joined the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders in a rousing town hall in Brooklyn on Saturday evening where the two addressed the growing threat of oligarchic control across the US and how to fight it.

The event, held at Sanders’ alma mater Brooklyn College, drew an audience of about 1,700 people. Mamdani and Sanders co-hosted the town hall as part of Sanders’ Fighting Oligarchy tour, which has included rallies in 20 states. Throughout the tour, the senator has been actively supporting and recruiting progressive candidates to run for office.

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Trump administration begins new Ice operation in Massachusetts

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A Department of Homeland Security official confirmed the action in a statement, blaming mayor’s sanctuary policies

The Trump administration has targeted Massachusetts as its next location to begin arresting and deporting immigrants, a Department of Homeland Security official confirmed to NBC News on Saturday.

DHS and its US Immigration and Customs Enforcement arm are calling the operation Patriot 2.0, modifying the name of a May deportation surge that led to the arrest of 1,500 people in the state, according to the reports.

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Postal traffic into US plunges by more than 80% after Trump ends exemption

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Dozens of operators have suspended service to the US until a solution is implemented on parcels worth $800 or less

Postal traffic into the United States plunged by more than 80% after the Trump administration ended a tariff exemption for low-cost imports, the United Nations postal agency said Saturday.

The Universal Postal Union says it has started rolling out new measures that can help postal operators around the world calculate and collect duties, or taxes, after the US eliminated the so-called “de minimis exemption” for lower-value parcels.

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West Point cancels ceremony to honor Tom Hanks as ‘outstanding US citizen’

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Little known about decision, although Hanks, who has advocated for military memorials, also voted for Biden

In Forrest Gump, the title character, played by Tom Hanks, receives the Congressional Medal of Honor from President Lyndon B Johnson.

In real life, it appears Hanks will no longer receive another military honor.

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Trump’s former surgeon general urges president to fire RFK Jr

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Jerome Adams cites vaccine policy and chaos at CDC and joins other officials in saying Kennedy is risking US health

The surgeon general from the first Trump administration on Saturday said that the US president should “absolutely” fire health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr over his “dangerous” policies on vaccines and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Jerome Adams, who has become a pointed critic of the controversial public health decisions being swiftly rolled out in the second Trump administration, made his most fierce attack yet on what has been unfolding.

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Joe Biden to begin fundraising to build presidential library in Delaware

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Effort could be a tough task in current political climate, with Trump maligning ex-president and left-leaning groups daily

Former US president Joe Biden has decided to build his presidential library in Delaware and has tapped a group of former aides, friends and political allies to begin the heavy lift of fundraising and finding a site for the museum and archive.

The Joe and Jill Biden Foundation this past week approved a 13-person governance board that is charged with steering the project. The board includes former secretary of state Antony Blinken, longtime adviser Steve Ricchetti, prolific Democratic fundraiser Rufus Gifford and others with deep ties to the one-term president and his wife.

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Joe Biden to begin fundraising to build presidential library in Delaware

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Effort could be a tough task in current political climate, with Trump maligning ex-president and left-leaning groups daily

Former US president Joe Biden has decided to build his presidential library in Delaware and has tapped a group of former aides, friends and political allies to begin the heavy lift of fundraising and finding a site for the museum and archive.

The Joe and Jill Biden Foundation this past week approved a 13-person governance board that is charged with steering the project. The board includes former secretary of state Antony Blinken, longtime adviser Steve Ricchetti, prolific Democratic fundraiser Rufus Gifford and others with deep ties to the one-term president and his wife.

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What lies beneath: Lake Tahoe dive offers rare view of the deep

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Livestream of voyage to bottom of one of country’s deepest lakes draws thousands – but no sign of Tahoe Tessie yet

The cobalt waters of Lake Tahoe have long captivated the public, helping drive the area’s massive tourism industry and even attracting urban legends about what lies in the cold, shadowy depths.

Theories have ranged from an aquatic creature named Tessie to perfectly preserved bodies dumped by the mafia decades ago.

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Amy Coney Barrett says supreme court rulings are ‘not opinion polls’

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Justice believes court should not ‘impose’ own values as it weighs request to overturn same-sex marriage decision

US supreme court rulings are “not just an opinion poll” of its nine judges’ beliefs, conservative Amy Coney Barrett says, as she and her colleagues weigh a request to overturn the legalization of same-sex marriage.

“The court should not be imposing its own values on the American people,” Barrett remarked in a preview of an interview airing on the latest episode of CBS News Sunday Morning. “That’s for the democratic process.”

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Amy Coney Barrett says supreme court rulings are ‘not opinion polls’

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Justice believes court should not ‘impose’ own values as it weighs request to overturn same-sex marriage decision

US supreme court rulings are “not just an opinion poll” of its nine judges’ beliefs, conservative Amy Coney Barrett says, as she and her colleagues weigh a request to overturn the legalization of same-sex marriage.

“The court should not be imposing its own values on the American people,” Barrett remarked in a preview of an interview airing on the latest episode of CBS News Sunday Morning. “That’s for the democratic process.”

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Ex-pilot who tried to cut engines on flight after taking mushrooms pleads guilty

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Joseph Emerson, formerly of Alaska Airlines, must do 664 hours of community service and pay $60,569

A former Alaska Airlines pilot accused of trying to cut the engines of a passenger flight in 2023 while riding off-duty in the cockpit pleaded guilty or no contest to all charges against him Friday, saying in court that he regretted endangering those on board as well as the damage he caused to his former profession.

Joseph Emerson reached the plea agreements because he wants to take responsibility for his actions and hopes to avoid further time behind bars, said his attorney, Noah Horst.

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Judge blocks ending of legal protections for 1m Venezuelans and Haitians in US

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Homeland security had tried to end temporary protected status granted by the Biden administration

A federal judge on Friday ruled against the Trump administration from ending temporary legal protections that have granted more than 1 million people from Haiti and Venezuela the right to live and work in the United States.

The ruling by US district judge Edward Chen of San Francisco for the plaintiffs means that 600,000 Venezuelans whose temporary protections expired in April or whose protections were about to expire on 10 September have status to stay and work in the United States.

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At least 475 workers detained in major Ice raid at US Hyundai factory

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South Korea concerned after hundreds were arrested at Georgia work site making batteries for Hyundai and Kia cars

Hundreds of workers at a factory being built in Georgia to make car batteries for Hyundai and Kia electric vehicles were detained in a huge raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) on Thursday that stopped construction.

The facility is part of what would be the biggest industrial investment in the state’s history and had been hailed as a huge boost for the economy by Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp.

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EU fines Google nearly €3bn for ‘abusing’ dominant position in ad tech

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Regulators ordered the tech giant to end ‘self-preferencing practices’ in advertising services but declined to force sale

European Union regulators on Friday hit Google with a €2.95bn ($3.5bn) fine for breaching the bloc’s competition rules by favoring its own digital advertising services, marking the fourth such antitrust penalty for the company as well as a retreat from previous threats to break up the tech giant.

The European Commission, the 27-nation bloc’s executive branch and top antitrust enforcer, also ordered the US company to end its “self-preferencing practices” and take steps to stop “conflicts of interest” along the advertising technology supply chain.

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Trump sends 10 stealth fighter planes to Puerto Rico amid war on Caribbean drug cartels

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Move comes after accusing Venezuela of buzzing US warship and a deadly US missile strike in Caribbean Sea

Donald Trump is sending 10 F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico to bolster US military operations against drug cartels in the Caribbean region, it was reported on Friday.

If follows a deadly US missile strike on Tuesday on a boat in the Caribbean Sea that the Trump administration insisted was carrying 11 Venezuelan drug traffickers, and comments by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, on Wednesday that such attacks “will happen again”.

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