WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump frankly acknowledged Thursday that he’s starving the US Postal Service of money in order to make it harder to process an expected surge of mail-in ballots, which he worries could cost him the election.
In an interview on Fox Business Network, Trump explicitly noted two funding provisions that Democrats are seeking in a relief package that has stalled on Capitol Hill. Without the additional money, he said, the Postal Service won’t have the resources to handle a flood of ballots from voters who are seeking to avoid polling places during the coronavirus pandemic.
“If we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money,” Trump told host Maria Bartiromo. “That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting; they just can’t have it.”
Trump’s statements, including the false claim that Democrats are seeking universal mail-in voting, come as he is searching for a strategy to gain an advantage in his November matchup against Joe Biden. He’s pairing the tough Postal Service stance in congressional negotiations with an increasingly robust mail-in -voting legal fight in states that could decide the election.
In Iowa, which Trump won handily in 2016 but is more competitive this year, his campaign joined a lawsuit Wednesday against two Democratic-leaning counties in an effort to invalidate tens of thousands of voters’ absentee ballot applications. That followed legal maneuvers in battleground Pennsylvania, where the campaign hopes to force changes to how the state collects and counts mail-in ballots. And in Nevada, Trump is challenging a law sending ballots to all active voters.
His efforts could face limits. The US Supreme Court on Thursday rebuffed Republicans who challenged an agreement in Rhode Island allowing residents to vote by mail through November’s general election without getting signatures from two witnesses or a notary.
For Democrats, Trump’s new remarks were a clear admission that the president is attempting to restrict voting rights.
Biden said it was “Pure Trump. He doesn’t want an election.”
Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said it was “voter suppression to undermine the safest method to vote during a pandemic, and force Americans to risk their lives to vote.”
Negotiations over a big new virus relief package have all but ended, with the White House and congressional leaders far apart on the size, scope and approach for shoring up households, reopening schools and launching a national strategy to contain the coronavirus.
While there is some common ground over $100 billion for schools and new funds for virus testing, Democrats also want other emergency funds that Trump rejects.
“They want $3.5 billion for something that will turn out to be fraudulent. That’s election money, basically,” Trump said during Thursday’s call-in interview.
Democrats have pushed for a total of $10 billion for the Postal Service in talks with Republicans on the COVID-19 response bill. That figure, which would include money to help with election mail, is down from a $25 billion plan in a House-passed coronavirus measure.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has said that the agency is in a financially untenable position, but he maintains it can handle this year’s election mail. A major donor to Trump and other Republicans, DeJoy is the first postmaster general in nearly two decades who is not a career postal employee.
“Although there will likely be an unprecedented increase in election mail volume due to the pandemic, the Postal Service has ample capacity to deliver all election mail securely and on-time in accordance with our delivery standards, and we will do so,” he told the Postal Service’s governing board last week.
Memos obtained by The Associated Press show that Postal Service leadership has pushed to eliminate overtime and halt late delivery trips that are sometimes needed to ensure mail arrives on time, measures that postal workers and union officials say are delaying service. Additional records detail cuts to hours at post offices, including reductions on Saturdays and during lunch hours.
Democrats, and a handful of Republicans, have sent DeJoy several letters asking him to reverse his changes and criticizing what they say is a lack of openness by he agency. Late Wednesday, Senate Democrats again wrote DeJoy, this time saying postal leadership is pushing state election officials to opt for pricier first-class postage for mail-in ballots to be prioritized.
“Instead of taking steps to increase your agency’s ability to deliver for the American people, you are implementing policy changes that make matters worse, and the Postal Service is reportedly considering changes that would increase costs for states at a time when millions of Americans are relying on voting by mail to exercise their right to vote,” the Democrats wrote.
Separately, in a letter last month, the Postal Service warned Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson that the agency might not be able to deliver ballots in time to be counted under the state’s deadlines for casting mail-in votes.
A spokesman for the Postal Service, David Partenheimer, said in a statement that “certain deadlines concerning mail-in ballots, may be incompatible with the Postal Service’s delivery standards,” especially if election officials don’t pay more for first-class postage.
“To the extent that states choose to use the mail as part of their elections, they should do so in a manner that realistically reflects how the mail works,” he said.
Judy Beard, legislative and political director for the American Postal Workers Union, said postal workers are up to the task of delivering mail-in ballots this year.
“We definitely know that the president is absolutely wrong concerning vote-by-mail,” she said.
Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Virginia, chair of the House subcommittee on government operations, said Trump is acknowledging that he wants to hold up funding for the US Postal Service to hinder Americans from voting.
“The president admits his motive for holding USPS funding hostage is that he doesn’t want Americans to vote by mail,” Connolly said in a statement Thursday. “Why? It hurts his electoral chances. He’s putting self-preservation ahead of public safety, for an election he deserves to lose.”
Trump has requested a mail-in ballot for Florida’s primary election Tuesday. Ballots were mailed Wednesday to both the president and first lady Melania Trump at the Mar-a-Lago resort, which Trump lists as his legal address, according to online Palm Beach County elections records. Both voted by mail in the presidential preference primary in March, according to records.
Trump admits he’s blocking postal cash to stop mail-in votes
https://arab.news/y5jw9
Trump admits he’s blocking postal cash to stop mail-in votes
- Trump’s statements come as he is searching for a strategy to gain an advantage in his November matchup against Joe Biden
North Korea’s Kim oversees test of latest anti-aircraft missile system: state media
SEOUL: North Korea on Thursday conducted a test fire of its latest anti-aircraft missile system in a drill watched by leader Kim Jong Un, Pyongyang’s state media reported.
The launch proved the system’s “combat fast response,” the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said, and came just over a week after South Korea began a major annual joint military drill with the United States.
M23 group seizes key town in eastern DR Congo
- Capture of Walikale leaves rebels in control of road linking 4 provinces
GOMA: Rwanda-backed M23 rebels have entered the center of the eastern Congo town of Walikale, a local activist and an M23 source said on Thursday, expanding the insurgents’ presence deep into the Congolese interior despite renewed calls for a ceasefire.
Their entry into Walikale, an area rich in minerals including tin, followed fighting on Wednesday with the Democratic Republic of Congo’s army and allied militias on the outskirts of the town.
The town’s capture would leave the rebels, who took eastern Congo’s two largest cities earlier this year, in control of a road linking four eastern Congo provinces and within 400 km of Kisangani, the country’s fourth-biggest city.
“The rebels are now visible in the city’s center,” said Fiston Misona, a civil society activist in Walikale.
“There are at least seven people wounded who are at the general hospital.”
An M23 source said the rebels were in complete control of the town.
A spokesperson for Congo’s army did not respond to requests for comment about the situation in Walikale.
The rebels’ move on Walikale, a town of about 15,000 people, came despite calls on Tuesday by Congo President Felix Tshisekedi and his Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame for an immediate ceasefire after their first direct talks since M23 stepped up its offensive in January.
The conflict, rooted in the fallout from Rwanda’s 1994 genocide and competition for mineral riches, has quickly become eastern Congo’s worst conflict since a 1998-2003 war that drew in multiple neighboring countries.
Rwanda has been supporting the ethnic Tutsi-led rebels by providing arms and sending troops, according to the UN, Western governments, and independent experts.
Rwanda has denied backing M23 and says its military has been acting in self-defense against Congo’s army and a militia founded by some of the perpetrators of the genocide.
Trump administration to open more Alaska acres for oil, gas drilling
- US to lift restrictions on building an LNG pipeline and mining road in Alaska
WASHINGTON: US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum on Thursday announced steps to open up more acreage for oil and gas leasing and lift restrictions on building an LNG pipeline and mining road in Alaska, carrying out President Donald Trump’s executive order to remove barriers to energy development in the state.
Burgum said the agency plans to reopen the 82 percent of Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve that is available for leasing for development and reopen the 1.56-million-acre Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas leasing.
He also said the administration would revoke restrictions on land along the Trans-Alaska Pipeline Corridor and Dalton Highway north of the Yukon River and convey the land to the State of Alaska, which would pave the way forward for the proposed Ambler Road and the Alaska Liquified Natural Gas Pipeline project.
“It’s time for the US to embrace Alaska’s abundant and largely untapped resources as a pathway to prosperity for the Nation, including Alaskans,” said Burgum.
Drilling in Alaska’s pristine Arctic refuge has long been a source of friction between Alaska lawmakers and tribal corporations seeking to open more acres to drilling to spur economic growth, and Democratic presidential administrations that sought to preserve the local ecosystem and wildlife.
A January 8 lease auction that had been mandated by Congress held under the Biden administration’s Interior Department received no bids from energy companies.
The Biden administration last year rejected the Ambler Road Project, a proposed 211-mile road that would connect to a rare earths mining district.
Alaska’s Republican Governor Mike Dunleavy and the state’s congressional delegation have pushed for a reversal of Biden’s Alaska resource development policies.
The oil industry has signalled it would be hesitant to rush into Alaska given its high risk and the possibility of a political pendulum swing in four years that could put Alaska off limits again.
Ceasefire talks put Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia in the spotlight, so what’s next for the nuclear power plant?
- Zelensky said the discussion with Trump had focused specifically on the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant
- It has been under Russian control since the early days of the war, making it unclear what future US involvement could look like
KYIV: During a call between US President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, the US leader apparently suggested Volodymyr Zelensky consider transferring ownership of Ukraine’s power plants to the US for long-term security, according to a US statement.
Briefing the media later, Zelensky said the discussion with Trump had focused specifically on the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, ZNPP, in southern Ukraine.
While the facility remains connected to Ukraine’s energy grid without producing electricity, it has been under Russian control since the early days of the war, making it unclear what future US involvement could look like.
Who controls the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant?
The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant is one of the world’s 10 largest and Europe’s biggest. Located in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region, Russian forces occupied it shortly after Moscow’s February 2022 invasion.
While Russia declared the region annexed in fall 2022, its largest city, Zaporizhzhia, remains under Ukrainian control.
Ukraine has accused Russia of stationing troops and weapons at the plant and using it as a launchpad for attacks across the Dnipro River. Russia denies this, accusing Ukraine of shelling the facility.
How many nuclear power plants does Ukraine have?
Besides Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine operates three active nuclear power plants, which generate the majority of the country’s electricity following sustained Russian attacks on thermal and hydroelectric plants.
These facilities are located in southern, western and northwestern Ukraine, away from frontline areas.
What did Trump and Zelensky discuss and are there negotiations over Zaporizhzhia’s fate?
During their call on Wednesday, Trump suggested that Zelensky should consider giving the US ownership of Ukraine’s power plants to ensure their long-term security, according to a White House statement from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz.
“American ownership of those plants could be the best protection for that infrastructure,” Trump suggested, according to the statement.
Zelensky later told journalists their conversation focused on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, and the following day, made it clear that “the issue of ownership” of the other three plants was never discussed.
“All nuclear power plants belong to the people of Ukraine,” he said.
Zelensky said that when they discussed Zaporizhzhia, the US leader had inquired about the facility’s future. “Trump asked my thoughts on the plant,” Zelensky said. “I told him that if it is not Ukrainian, it will not operate. It is illegal.”
Even though ZNPP is a state-owned plant, Zelensky acknowledged that if the US were to claim it from Russian control, invest in it and modernize it, Ukraine might consider it. “That is a separate question, an open one,” he said.
What is the current state of Zaporizhzhia’s nuclear plant?
Since falling under Russian control, the plant’s conditions have deteriorated. While its six reactors have been shut down for years, they still require power and qualified staff to maintain cooling systems and safety features.
Energoatom, Ukraine’s state nuclear operator, said that after Russian forces took over, Ukrainian personnel were forced to sign contracts with Russian authorities and take Russian citizenship. Those who refused faced abduction or threats, forcing thousands to flee, leaving the facility understaffed and harder to manage.
The collapse of a dam in June 2023 further jeopardized the plant’s cooling systems, which relied on water from the reservoir. In response, plant administrators dug wells, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Zelensky said extensive repairs would be needed before the plant could operate again, estimating the process could take at least two years.
The IAEA has repeatedly warned the war could cause a radiation leak. While the plant no longer produces electricity, it still holds large amounts of nuclear fuel, requiring constant cooling.
Regular blackouts caused by the fighting have disrupted the facility, though power has been quickly restored each time.
IAEA experts permanently stationed there still face restricted access, with Russian authorities blocking some inspection requests, according to IAEA head Rafael Grossi.
Is any kind of deal imminent?
Zelensky said the discussions with Trump on restoring Zaporizhzhia were a positive step, but cautioned that no one would work at the plant if Russian forces remained stationed nearby.
Control over the plant is likely to remain a legal and logistical challenge, intertwined with a highly divisive issue for both warring sides: control over the land itself. Russian troops hold the area, while Ukrainian forces are separated from it by the Dnipro River and more than 100 kilometers (62 miles) of terrain.
“Simply handing over the plant while everything within a meter of it remains occupied or armed by Russia — no one will work under such conditions,” Zelensky said after the call with Trump. “It’s impossible.”
He said there would be no way to operate securely in such a scenario. “That would mean that the plant could start operating tomorrow, only to be blown up by the Russians the following day.”
UK police chiefs warn of increased Islamophobia as British government defunds Tell Mama service
- Tell Mama, the UK’s leading anti-Muslim hate-monitoring service, faces imminent closure unless the decision is reversed
LONDON: Senior police officials have issued a warning that the British government’s plans to cut funding for Tell Mama, the UK’s leading anti-Muslim hate-monitoring service, could severely impact efforts to tackle Islamophobia.
The charity, which has been entirely funded by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government since its establishment in 2015, faces imminent closure unless the decision is reversed, The Times reported on Thursday.
Earlier this year, Tell Mama recorded the highest number of anti-Muslim hate incidents in its history.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council has urged the government to reconsider, stressing the charity’s “invaluable” role in providing police forces with critical data.
The NPCC, which has a data-sharing agreement with Tell Mama, says the organization’s work has been instrumental in preventing hate-fueled social disorder.
“This research lays bare the hostility and abuse faced by many in our Muslim communities,” said Mark Hobrough, NPCC lead for hate crime and chief constable of Gwent police.
“Our longstanding and trusted relationships with key partners like Tell Mama have been invaluable amidst these events, and I am confident that the strength of our partnerships will continue to help us reassure communities and bring hate crime offenders to justice.
“We all have a right to live our lives free from targeted abuse, and I would urge anyone who suffers anti-Muslim hate crime to report it to the police or to Tell Mama.”
Experts in policing and hate crime have echoed concerns about the consequences of defunding Tell Mama. Mike Ainsworth, chair of the National Independent Advisory Group on Hate Crime for Policing and Criminal Justice, warned against downplaying the seriousness of Islamophobia in Britain.
“Tell Mama have provided the clearest picture we have of the extent of anti-Muslim hate crime and prejudice in the country,” he said. “It’s an uncomfortable picture to look at, but it is essential that we do not look away.
“The figures are stark, but they help us understand the scale of the problem and what we must do to move forward. Tell Mama have provided the foundations that government departments and the legal justice system must build on to restore trust and confidence.”
Tell Mama’s founder, Fiyaz Mughal, expressed frustration over what he saw as a failure by British ministers to appreciate the organization’s vital role in tackling hate crime.
“Tell Mama has worked tirelessly with many police forces in the United Kingdom,” he said. “We have met with officers from every corner of the country and met committed, dedicated, and true professionals who have tried to get victims of anti-Muslim hate access to justice.
“They are the unsung heroes with the victims themselves, and some people, including a handful of politicians, reduce our work to numbers and figures and disrespect the whole picture of the range of activities, statutory agencies, and the good men and women in law enforcement in our country that we work with on a daily basis.”
Tell Mama has yet to receive £500,000 from last year’s government grant. While discussions about a potential six-month extension to its funding are ongoing, there is no guarantee the charity will be able to continue its operations.
Despite the widespread criticism, the government has maintained that it remains committed to tackling religious hatred.
An Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said: “Religious and racial hatred has absolutely no place in our society, and we will not tolerate Islamophobia in any form.
“That’s why we will tackle religiously motivated hate crime and provide a comprehensive service to monitor Anti-Muslim Hatred, so we can deliver on the government’s Plan for Change mission for safer streets.
“We will soon be opening a call for grant applications to ensure we can meet the challenges communities face today and continue to provide support for victims, with further detail to be set out in due course.”
