Politics

By Sarah N. Lynch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The FBI did not send undercover agents to participate in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and did not authorize its informants to enter the building or engage in violence, the U.S. Justice Department’s internal watchdog said on Thursday.

The findings by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz run counter to far-right conspiracy theories by supporters of President-elect Donald Trump who have repeatedly made baseless claims suggesting that FBI operatives were secretly involved in the Capitol riot.

One such false claim pertained to James Ray Epps, an Arizona man who entered the Capitol that day. Epps, who was charged last year with a misdemeanor for entering a restricted building or grounds, was falsely accused by Trump’s supporters and by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson of being an undercover government informant.

Horowitz’s report comes a little more than a month before Trump will be sworn in for his second term as president. He has pledged to grant clemency to many of the people who stormed the Capitol as soon as his first day in office.

The report found that the FBI could have done more ahead of the Jan. 6 attack by canvassing its field offices for intelligence from informants to prepare for what was to come.

Twenty-six FBI confidential informants were in Washington, D.C., on the day of the attack, the report said.

Three of them were tasked with reporting on domestic terrorism case subjects. One of those three entered the Capitol that day, while two others entered a restricted area around the Capitol.

The other 23 informants who were in Washington to attend protests did so on their own initiative and were not asked by the bureau to attend the events, the report said.

(Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis)

source

By Nate Raymond

(Reuters) -The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday passed a bill to add 66 new judges to understaffed federal courts nationally, a bill that outgoing Democratic President Joe Biden has threatened to veto after lawmakers only took up the measure after Republican President-elect Donald Trump won the election.

The Republican-led House voted 236-173 in favor of legislation the Democratic-led Senate passed earlier this year that would result in the first major expansion of the federal judiciary since 1990.

The bipartisan bill, once widely supported, would increase the number of trial court judges in 25 federal district courts in 13 states including California, Florida and Texas in six waves ever two years through 2035.

Hundreds of judges have taken the rare step of publicly advocating for the JUDGES Act, saying federal caseloads have increased more than 30% since Congress last passed legislation to comprehensively expand the judiciary. And the bill received a unanimous vote in the Senate in August.

But that was before the results of the Nov. 5 presidential election were known. Democratic lawmakers have accused House Republicans of holding up on a vote on the bill until they knew Trump would emerge the victor and get the chance to name the first 25 judges.

The White House on Tuesday noted the delay as one of the reasons Biden planned to veto the bill if the House passed it. A White House spokesperson reaffirmed Biden’s plans to veto the bill following the vote, which garnered support from only 29 House Democrats.

“This should not be a political issue–it should be about prioritizing the needs of the American people and ensuring the courts are able to deliver fair, impartial, and timely justice,” Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement.

But U.S. Representative Jerrold Nadler, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said that by not taking up the measure pre-election, House Republican leaders had broken a central promise to have lawmakers approve the measure when no one knew who would get to appoint the initial wave of judges.

He accused Republicans of playing “political games” with what should have been a bipartisan bill and said he could not endorse allowing Trump to appoint more “ultra-conservative ideologues” to the bench.

Trump is already expected to be able to appoint 100-plus judges over his four-year term. He made 234 appointments to the federal judiciary in his first term, including three members of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority.

Biden is nearing Trump’s total, with 233 so far including one Supreme Court justice, and the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday advanced the nominations of two final nominees out of California for the full Senate’s consideration.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by David Gregorio and Alexia Garamfalvi)

source

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump was on the verge of backing a 16-week federal abortion ban earlier this year when aides staged an intervention.

According to Time magazine’s cover story on his selection as its 2024 Person of the Year, Trump’s aides first raised concerns in mid-March that the abortion cutoff being pushed by some allies would be stricter than existing law in numerous states. It was seen as a potential political liability amid ongoing fallout over the overturning of Roe v. Wade by a conservative majority on the Supreme Court that includes three justices nominated by Trump in his first term.

Trump political director James Blair went to work assembling a slide deck — eventually titled “How a national abortion ban will cost Trump the election” — that argued a 16-week ban would hurt the Republican candidate in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, the magazine reported.

“After flipping through Blair’s presentation” on a flight to a rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in April, Trump dropped the idea, according to the report. “So we leave it to the states, right?” Trump was quoted as saying. He soon released a video articulating that position.

At the time, Trump’s campaign denied that he was considering supporting the 16-week ban, calling it “fake news” and saying Trump planned to “negotiate a deal” on abortion if elected to the White House.

Here are other highlights from the story and the president-elect’s 65-minute interview with the magazine:

Trump reaffirmed his plans to pardon most of those convicted for their actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. “It’s going to start in the first hour,” he said of the pardons. “Maybe the first nine minutes.”

Trump said he would look at individuals on a “case-by-case” basis, but that “a vast majority of them should not be in jail.”

More than 1,500 people have been charged with federal crimes stemming from the riot that left more than 100 police officers injured and sent lawmakers running into hiding as they met to certify Democrat Joe Biden’s 2020 victory. More than 1,000 defendants have pleaded guilty or been convicted at trial of charges, including misdemeanor trespassing offenses, assaulting police officers and seditious conspiracy.

Trump insisted he has the authority to use the military to assist with his promised mass deportations, even though, as his interviewers noted, the Posse Comitatus Act prohibits the use of the military in domestic law enforcement.

“It doesn’t stop the military if it’s an invasion of our country, and I consider it an invasion of our country,” he said. “I’ll only do what the law allows, but I will go up to the maximum level of what the law allows. And I think in many cases, the sheriffs and law enforcement is going to need help.”

Trump did not deny that camps would be needed to hold detained migrants as they are processed for deportation.

“Whatever it takes to get them out. I don’t care,” he said. “I hope we’re not going to need too many because I want to get them out and I don’t want them sitting in camp for the next 20 years.”

Trump told Time he does not plan to restore the policy of separating children from their families to deter border crossings, but he did not rule it out. The practice led to thousands of children being separated from their parents and was condemned around the globe as inhumane.

“I don’t believe we’ll have to because we will send the whole family back,” he said. “I would much rather deport them together, yes, than separate.”

Trump dismissed the idea that Elon Musk will face conflicts of interest as he takes the helm of the Department of Government Efficiency, an advisory group that Trump has selected him to lead. The panel is supposed to find waste and cut regulations, including many that could affect Musk’s wide-ranging interests, which include electric cars, rockets and telecommunications.

“I don’t think so,” Trump said. “I think that Elon puts the country long before his company. … He considers this to be his most important project.”

Trump lowered expectations about his ability to drive down grocery prices.

“I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard. But I think that they will,” he said.

Trump said he is planning “a virtual closure” of the “Department of Education in Washington.”

“You’re going to need some people just to make sure they’re teaching English in the schools,” he said. “But we want to move education back to the states.”

Yet Trump has proposed exerting enormous influence over schools. He has threatened to cut funding for schools with vaccine mandates while forcing them to “teach students to love their country” and promote “the nuclear family,” including “the roles of mothers and fathers” and the “things that make men and women different and unique.”

Asked to clarify whether he was committed to preventing the Food and Drug Administration from stripping access to abortion pills, Trump replied, “It’s always been my commitment.”

But Trump has offered numerous conflicting stances on the issue, including to Time.

Earlier in the interview, he was asked whether he would promise that his FDA would not do anything to limit access to medication abortion or abortion pills. “We’re going to take a look at all of that,” he said, before calling the prospect “very unlikely.”

“Look, I’ve stated it very clearly and I just stated it again very clearly. I think it would be highly unlikely. I can’t imagine, but with, you know, we’re looking at everything, but highly unlikely. I guess I could say probably as close to ruling it out as possible, but I don’t want to. I don’t want to do anything now.”

Pressed on whether he would abandon Ukraine in its efforts to stave off Russia’s invasion, Trump said he would use U.S. support for Kyiv as leverage against Moscow in negotiating an end to the war.

“I want to reach an agreement,” he said, “and the only way you’re going to reach an agreement is not to abandon.”

Trump would not commit to supporting a two-state solution, with a Palestinian state alongside Israel, as he had previously.

“I support whatever solution we can do to get peace,” he said. “There are other ideas other than two state, but I support whatever, whatever is necessary to get not just peace, a lasting peace. It can’t go on where every five years you end up in tragedy. There are other alternatives.”

Asked whether he trusted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he told Time: “I don’t trust anybody.”

Trump would not rule out the possibility of war with Iran during his second term. “Anything can happen. It’s a very volatile situation,” he said.

Asked if he has spoken to Russian President Vladimir Putin since the Nov. 5 election, Trump continued to play coy: “I can’t tell you. It’s just inappropriate.”

Trump insisted that his bid to install Matt Gaetz as attorney general ”wasn’t blocked. I had the votes (in the Senate) if I needed them, but I had to work very hard.”

When the scope of resistance to the former Republican congressman from Florida became clear, Trump said, “I talked to him, and I said, ‘You know, Matt, I don’t think this is worth the fight.’”

Gaetz pulled out amid scrutiny over sex trafficking allegations, and Trump tapped former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi for the Cabinet post.

Trump, who has named anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, did not rule out the possibility of eliminating some childhood vaccinations even though they have been proved safe in extensive studies and real world use in hundreds of millions of people over decades and are considered among the most effective public health measures in modern history.

Pressed on whether “getting rid of some vaccinations” — neither Trump nor the interviewers specified which ones — might be part of the plan to improve the health of the country, Trump responded: “It could if I think it’s dangerous, if I think they are not beneficial, but I don’t think it’s going to be very controversial in the end.”

“I think there could be, yeah,” Trump said of the prospect of others in his family continuing in his footsteps.

He pointed to daughter-in-law Lara Trump, who served as co-chair of the Republican National Committee and is now being talked about as a potential replacement for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, whom Trump has chosen for secretary of state.

Trump said the former and soon-to-be first lady Melania Trump will be joining him at the White House during second term and will “be active, when she needs to be.”

“Oh yes,” he said. “She’s very beloved by the people, Melania. And they like the fact that she’s not out there in your face all the time for many reasons.”

source

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump’s former Wisconsin attorney lashed out Thursday at the state’s Democratic attorney general for filing felony charges against him and two others related to the 2020 fake electors scheme, saying after their initial court appearance that he was the victim of “lawfare” that wreaked havoc on his life.

Jim Troupis, a former Wisconsin judge who represented Trump in 2020, was the only one of the three defendants to appear in person at the hearing. Kenneth Chesebro, an attorney who advised Trump’s 2020 campaign, and Mike Roman, Trump’s director of Election Day operations in 2020, appeared by phone.

All three are charged with 11 felony forgery counts. Each charge carries a maximum penalty of six years in prison and a $10,000 fine. A court commissioner set a preliminary hearing for all three for Jan. 28. They will enter their pleas at their arraignment, which is not yet scheduled.

Troupis, in comments after the brief hearing, said Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul has “doubled down on a vicious strategy to destroy our very faith in the system of justice by using the courts for his own personal political game.”

“My family and I have endured nonstop vicious and unrelenting savage attacks on my reputation, on my livelihood,” Troupis said outside of the courtroom surrounded by supporters, including Republican former Gov. Scott McCallum. “My children have been interrogated. My long-held friendships and professional life have been destroyed.”

Kaul did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

Troupis defended the strategy of having the GOP electors meet, saying it was necessary in case a court ruled that Trump won Wisconsin.

“We had thought that this would end,” Troupis said. “The country asked for it to end in November, but lawfare in all its despicable forms will not end in Wisconsin.”

Troupis and the other two defendants were ordered not to have contact with the 10 electors or three others not identified by name in the criminal complaint. They did not object to those conditions and were allowed to leave without posting any money for bail.

The state charges against the Trump attorneys and aide are the only ones in Wisconsin. None of the electors have been charged. The 10 Wisconsin electors, Chesebro and Troupis all settled a lawsuit that was brought against them in 2023.

There are pending charges related to the fake electors scheme in state and federal courts in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada and Georgia. Federal prosecutors investigating Trump’s conduct related to the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot said the fake electors scheme originated in Wisconsin.

Electors are people appointed to represent voters in presidential elections. The winner of the popular vote in each state determines which party’s electors are sent to the Electoral College, which meets in December after a presidential election to certify the outcome.

The Wisconsin complaint details how Troupis, Chesebro and Roman created a document that falsely said Trump had won the state’s 10 Electoral College votes and attempted to deliver it to then-Vice President Mike Pence for congressional certification.

Prosecutors said in the complaint that most of the 10 electors told investigators they needed to sign the elector certificate indicating that Trump had won only to preserve his legal options if a court changed the outcome of the election in Wisconsin. Most of the electors also said that they did not consent to having their signatures presented as if Trump had won without such a court ruling, the complaint said.

Troupis and Roman filed four motions to dismiss the charge before Thursday’s hearing. The court commissioner did not consider those.

The fake elector efforts were central to a 2023 federal racketeering indictment filed against Trump alleging he tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Special counsel Jack Smith moved to abandon that case last month, acknowledging that Trump’s return to the White House in January will preclude attempts to federally prosecute him.

Trump was also indicted in Georgia along with 18 others accused of participating in a sprawling scheme to illegally overturn the 2020 presidential election there. Trump is trying to get that case dismissed, arguing that state courts won’t have jurisdiction over him when he returns to the White House next month.

Chesebro and Roman were among those indicted with Trump in Georgia.

Roman has pleaded not guilty to racketeering and conspiracy charges there, as well as to nine felony charges in Arizona related to the fake electors scheme in that state.

Chesebro pleaded guilty to one felony charge of conspiracy to commit filing false documents in a deal with Georgia prosecutors. He is trying to invalidate the plea after the judge in September tossed out the charge against Trump and others.

___

Associated Press writer Todd Richmond contributed to this story.

source

NEW YORK (AP) — A nonprofit law group dedicated to protecting the rights of Southern voters of color had more on its plate this year than just the 2024 presidential election.

The Southern Coalition for Social Justice supports voter registration drives and monitors election certification. Staff attorneys help run a legal hotline for voting irregularities. Teams challenge electoral maps and restrictive laws deemed unfair. It’s costly, year-round work that senior counsel Mitchell Brown considers vital to participatory democracy — but also work that gets less attention outside of high-profile campaign cycles.

“A lot of people exert a lot of energy during the presidential year and it falls off for the next three to four years,” Brown said. “That can’t happen. Because there’s a lot of changes that are occurring in between those four years between presidential elections.”

“There are no more off years anymore,” he added.

The coalition benefited this spring from a progressive philanthropic network organized around the belief that democracy is an exercise — not a given — in need of constant support. Led by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar’s Democracy Fund, petitioners pledged to reverse existing boom-and-bust dynamics where money floods politically engaged nonprofits late into election years only to dry up afterward. Beginning with the “All by April” campaign to move money early, the effort is continuing with the “Election Day to Every Day” push to shore up next year’s funding.

However, according to interviews with other nonprofit leaders in the left-leaning civic space, the philanthropic sector at large has not heeded the call. For the nonprofit leaders experiencing budgets as usual, the anticipated pattern of funding drop-offs is raising stakes many leaders felt were already heightened by the fraught political climate.

With reported security threats and staff burnout, Democracy Fund President Joe Goldman said it’s especially inefficient to spend millions training people, developing skills and creating a knowledge base only to cut nonprofit budgets and “throw it away.” Despite what Democracy Fund said was widespread agreement that democracy is under threat, the organization found that many funders had no plans before September to help grantees prepare for the post-election environment.

“We need to show them that we’ve got their backs,” Goldman said.

Grassroots nonprofits — both “501(c)3″ groups, named after the tax code section they were organized under, which are restricted from party politics altogether, and “501(c)4″ organizations, which are allowed limited partisan activity — believe their bottom-up approach positions them well to engage their communities in local politics.

That might take the form of deep canvassing. Unlike political canvassers who knock on doors and call numbers to sway votes, deep canvassers have longer conversations with strangers about their concerns and desires. The idea is to form connections that eventually change hearts and minds on divisive topics. Or, it might look like mobilizing residents around single issues in their backyards.

Groups that spent 2020 doing such work felt drained afterward, according to Women Donors Network President Leena Barakat, whose group signed the Election Day to Every Day petition. The election had high turnout. But money and energy were depleted, she said, and there was scant capacity for sustaining political engagement with democratic processes. By the time 2024 rolled around, many civically-minded nonprofits were still playing catch up with their staffing levels. Any financial windfall this year wouldn’t have been enough to effectively organize in just six months.

“They don’t show up for just an election day. They are there to really understand and meet the needs of their community year-round,” said Women Donors Network President Leena Barakat, whose group signed the Election Day to Every Day petition. “To just fund them around elections is incredibly transactional and less effective in the work that we are trying to do. Change moves at the speed of trust.”

The effort’s proponents suggest financial backing to form those ties is limited in part because the work goes unseen to funders. Philanthropists tend to prefer projects that can be measured easily and quickly, the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy Senior Research Manager Katherine Ponce noted. But Ponce said the work of relationship development and trust building is difficult to quantify and happens slowly.

Explicitly electoral work understandably gets a lot of resources during election years, according to Alice Evans of the Southeast Immigrant Rights Network. It makes sense to focus on efforts like get-out-the-vote events, she said, but it also makes it harder for SIRN to support what she called “very democracy-related work.” The nonprofit coalition of more than 50 immigrant- and refugee-led groups provides leadership trainings for the heads of immigration-focused organizations and “Know Your Rights” toolkits for their communities.

Evans, who oversees fundraising, said she is bracing for organizing conditions to grow “more hostile” under the incoming Trump administration; SIRN is preparing a “rapid response fund” in anticipation of immigration crackdowns.

“In order for a democracy to function and be healthy, we need people understanding their rights,” Evans said. “Understanding and taking up their part in co-creating democracy. And instead, I think often these days, it feels like we often understand democracy as this transactional thing that we sort of receive.”

DoSomething is a nonprofit that encourages youth participation by providing opportunities to volunteer and organize. But DoSomething CEO DeNora Getachew said funders told her that youth are not a strategic investment despite 41 million Gen Z members being eligible to vote this year.

Money flowed across the philanthropic sector during the first half of the year, DoSomething Vice President of Development Katie Tynes said, but the overall spigot seemed to tighten in the second half. Tynes said she also saw funding shift from 501(c)3s to 501(c)4s. While there’s room for both types of tax-exempt organizations, she said, it was troubling because the former tend to do more people-centered work on the ground whereas the latter have more political agendas.

Speaking anecdotally, Getachew said she saw a decline this year in funding for nonprofit groups like hers focused on evergreen civic engagement.

“This very cyclical, very transactional rush to register young people to vote, get them to turn out to vote and then bid them adieu in those in-between years — if we don’t develop the civic muscle of young people early and then ensure that they practice that muscle consistently, I think we’re going to have a big challenge with the viability of our democracy long-term,” she said.

Still, the “All by April” campaign claimed some success. Democracy Fund reported sparking $79 million in new 501(c)3 grants for election-related work and $61 million in money disbursed sooner than planned. Brown said the Southern Coalition for Social Justice was able to hire three new attorneys with the influx of donations spurred by the springtime push to provide funding earlier into the election cycle.

But two of them are fellows, he said, and SCSJ has an expanded docket of redistricting cases to maintain.

___

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

source

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic senators are urging President Joe Biden to extend temporary protections for migrants in the U.S. before he leaves office, warning that millions of people could be forced to return to unsafe countries once President-elect Donald Trump retakes the White House.

The senators have been quietly urging the White House to take executive actions that would attempt to extend legal protections for migrants into Trump’s administration, and the White House has been discussing what steps to take.

But any actions from the outgoing president would happen in the wake of an election that Trump won on promises of hardline immigration enforcement. The Democratic Party is also debating internally how it should approach immigration and border security after its election losses.

The Biden administration earlier this week made permanent a rule that extends work authorizations for asylum seekers, but has not made commitments on other priorities for immigration advocates and Democrats. With just weeks remaining before Biden leaves office, several Democratic senators took their pleas public Wednesday.

“The urgency of the next 40 days will remain,” Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., said at a news conference. “So we’re going to keep pressing.”

The senators from the Congressional Hispanic Conference urged the White House to re-designate or renew Temporary Protected Status for migrants from Nicaragua, Ecuador and El Salvador, as well as issue an order to expedite renewals for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Over 1 million migrants in the U.S. rely on TPS, which allows people already in the country to stay and work legally if their homelands are deemed unsafe. Trump has suggested he would scale back the program as he looks to implement the largest deportation operation in U.S. history.

“We know the incoming administration is going to try to implement chaotic immigration policies that tear our families apart,” said Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., adding, “But we have a chance to do something about that right now and give these families as much legal protection and reassurance as possible.”

While Trump could attempt to undo some of the actions, they would set up a legal impediment and give migrants stronger legal standing to challenge Trump’s orders.

In 2017, the Trump administration announced the end of TPS for Nicaraguans, saying that it was no longer needed. But TPS holders challenged the legality of that decision in a lawsuit in court. Since then, the duration of TPS for Nicaragua depends on a court order from a federal judge.

The White House is considering taking action to extend temporary protections for some nations, but nothing has yet been decided, according to two people with knowledge of the discussions who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss negotiations.

Redesignating protected status for some nations would involve a more serious undertaking because it would grant people the right to stay in the U.S. from the date it was designated and a determination on the safety and security of the nation must be done. The renewal procedure only involves those already in the U.S. who would be allowed to stay longer.

In the last months, advocates have ramped up pressure on the Biden administration re-designate Nicaraguan migrants for TPS, which would protect thousands of people from deportation. Hundreds of religious, immigration and human rights organizations argue that the combination of political and environmental circumstances make it unsafe for Nicaraguans to return to their country.

“We don’t know how politics can change with Trump and TPS gives us peace of mind,” said Grethel Gomez, a 60-year-old Nicaraguan activist and asylum petitioner who could benefit from TPS. “There is horror of deportation, and this would give us security.”

Gomez’s son was a human rights activist in Nicaragua and was detained for 45 days. She took to the streets to protest and ask for his release and was also persecuted, she said.

Gomez left Nicaragua clandestinely and arrived in the United States with a tourist visa in 2021. Less than a year later she requested asylum, but she has not yet had any interviews and fears that her process will be hindered during the Trump administration.

TPS could also benefit those Nicaraguans who came under a separate Biden program called humanitarian parole and have temporary legal status that expires after two years. Trump has said that he will end the parole program.

Other immigrants, such as Jose Cabrera, a TPS holder from El Salvador, have lived in the U.S. for decades. But the TPS designation for El Salvador ends in March.

Cabrera, who took time off from his landscaping job to speak alongside the senators at the Capitol Wednesday, said in comments translated from Spanish, “I’m proud to be part of this community. But right now, there’s so much fear among immigrants like me, especially with the new administration coming in.”

source

By Isla Binnie and Laura Matthews

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Kristin Johnson, a top Democratic official at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, signalled on Wednesday she would be willing to stay on at the agency under new Republican leadership, serving as a “gadfly” on key issues like crypto and artificial intelligence.

President-elect Donald Trump is expected to replace the current Democratic CFTC chair Rostin Behnam with a Republican pick, eventually giving the governing party control of the five-member commission.

While the CFTC, which oversees commodity derivatives markets, has traditionally been a junior player in financial policy, it is likely to play a more prominent role as Trump’s administration starts to overhaul cryptocurrency regulations.

Johnson’s term is due to expire in April, but speaking at the Reuters NEXT conference in New York on Wednesday, she said she was confident she could carry on doing constructive work in the CFTC’s minority, assuming the White House agrees with Democrats to re-nominate her for a second term.

The Biden administration earlier this year nominated Johnson for a top Treasury Department role, but that move and other Democratic nominations have stalled with so little time left on the congressional calendar.

“A lot of what happens in the minority is … raising really critical points that the majority might be willing to forego or compromise on … so kind of being a gadfly,” Johnson said.

She added: “As a former academic I think I have this in spades.”

During her time at the CFTC, Johnson has advocated for stronger rules to protect consumers from fraud in digital currency markets after the collapse of crypto exchange FTX, and is focusing on the ways artificial intelligence could be used both to commit financial crimes and to police them.

“What happens next in the journey of integrating AI into financial markets is a really big and important question,” she said. “I think it’s a non-partisan question that really will be at the fore for the incoming administration.”

(Reporting by Isla Binnie and Laura Matthews in New York; Editing by Michelle Price and Matthew Lewis)

source

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina lawmakers on Wednesday enacted a law over the governor’s veto that would diminish the powers afforded to his successor and other other Democratic statewide winners in the Nov. 5 elections.

In a 72-46 vote, the Republican-dominated House overrode Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto a week after the GOP-controlled Senate voted to do the same.

Like during the Senate vote, opponents to the power-shifting bill sat in the gallery and disrupted the chambers’ floor proceedings. More than 150 people gathered on the third floor — more than the House gallery could seat. They chanted “shame” as the override vote completed and continued to yell as they were escorted out.

After warning disruptors they would face arrest if they didn’t quiet down and leave the building, General Assembly police arrested one woman who refused to leave, said police Chief Martin Brock, adding that she would face charges of trespassing, resisting arrest and violating building rules.

Many provisions within the 132-page law seek to diminish powers afforded to Gov.-elect Josh Stein, incoming attorney general Jeff Jackson, the next Democratic lieutenant governor and the schools superintendent. They all take office early next month. One of the most significant changes shifts the power to appoint State Board of Elections members from the governor to the state auditor, who will be a Republican next year.

For decades, the governor has selected its five members, with the governor’s party usually taking three seats. The enacted law transfers that power to the state auditor starting in spring. This, in turn, means Republicans will likely hold majorities on the state board and the county election boards.

The legislation also weakens the governor’s authority to fill vacancies on the state Court of Appeals and Supreme Court and prevents the attorney general from taking legal positions contrary to the General Assembly in litigation challenging a law’s validity. Several post-election deadlines will move up under the law after Republican complaints that counties took too long to count provisional and absentee ballots, especially in light of an extremely close Supreme Court race.

The veto override took place in the final days of a lame-duck General Assembly session where Republicans hold exactly the number of seats necessary to override vetoes without help from Democrats.

That won’t be the case much longer — barring a successful election protest that would flip a race’s result — after Democrats picked up one more House seat in the general elections.

Despite ultimately succeeding in their override, House Republicans had some difficulty staying unified. Some GOP lawmakers from western North Carolina — where Hurricane Helene caused historic flooding — initially voted against the measure last month. But all three — Reps. Mike Clampitt, Karl Gillespie and Mark Pless — ended up voting to override the veto.

Part of the criticism levied against the bill centered on the $252 million of Helene recovery funds attached to it, most of which can’t be spent until the General Assembly acts again.

In his veto message, Cooper called the bill a sham in which Republicans used Helene and “disaster relief” in its title to mask unconstitutional political power grabs — a message repeated by House Democrats and Stein.

“It is despicable for the Republicans in the General Assembly to use folks’ incredible need for aid to cloak their political pettiness,” Stein said in a statement after Wednesday’s vote.

Other opponents to the bill said at a Wednesday news conference that GOP lawmakers weren’t serving western North Carolinians and instead were undermining democracy.

“Western North Carolina is not a toy to be played with. It is not an opportunity to exploit. It is not a place to be so violently disrespected,” said Sam Stites, a Transylvania County staff member from advocacy group Just Economics of Western North Carolina.

Republicans point out they had already allocated more than $900 million to Helene relief since October, with plans for more funding next session. Caldwell County Republican Rep. Destin Hall, who is expected to be the House speaker next year, further defended the bill’s executive power shifts as the legislature’s constitutional right.

“This body is entirely committed to helping folks in this state with storm relief,” Hall said. “So, in my opinion, what’s happened is political football has been made out of this bill.”

It’s likely the new law will soon be mired in litigation — just like eight years ago, after Republicans passed laws weakening Cooper’s powers just before he took office.

“Of course it’s going to go to court,” outgoing House Speaker Tim Moore, a congressman-elect, told reporters after the vote. “That’s just the way it is.”

The House also secured for the November 2026 statewide ballot a proposed constitutional amendment to require all North Carolina voters show photo identification before voting. The constitution currently only specifies that it’s required for in-person voting. ID exceptions are afforded now and would continue with the amendment, and laws separate from the state constitution already direct voters to provide a photo ID copy when voting by mail.

source

By Trevor Hunnicutt and Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump is now considering tapping Richard Grenell, his former intelligence chief, to be a special envoy for Iran, according to two people familiar with the transition plans.

“He’s definitely in the running,” said a person familiar with transition deliberations, who asked not to be identified.

No final decisions on either personnel or strategy on Iran have been made official yet by Trump, including whether to slap fresh sanctions on the country, pursue diplomacy or both in order to halt their nuclear program.

Neither Trump’s team nor Grenell responded to requests for comment. Trump’s plans for the role have not previously been reported.

But his consideration of a key ally for such a posting sends a signal to the region that the new U.S. president may be open to talks with a country he has previously threatened and whose elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have sought to assassinate him, according to the U.S. government. Iran has denied the claim.

In the role, Grenell is expected to be tasked with speaking with countries in and beyond the region about the Iran issue as well as taking Tehran’s temperature on possible negotiations, said one of the people.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian, who is viewed as relatively moderate, said following Trump’s election that Tehran must “deal with the U.S.” and “manage” relations with its arch-foe.

Iran has suffered a series of strategic setbacks, including Israel’s assault on Tehran’s proxy militias Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon and the ouster of Iranian ally Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

But tensions remain high more than a year after Hamas attacked southern Israel, launching the Gaza war. Meanwhile, other Iranian proxies have attacked U.S., Israeli and other Western targets, and Tehran has accelerated its nuclear program while limiting the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s ability to monitor it.

It’s not the first job Trump has considered for Grenell, who served as Trump’s ambassador to Germany, a special presidential envoy for Serbia and Kosovo peace negotiations, and as acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s 2017-2021 term.

After campaigning for Trump in the lead up to the Nov. 5 election, he was a top contender to be secretary of state and for special envoy for the Ukraine war. Those jobs went to U.S. Senator Marco Rubio and retired lieutenant general Keith Kellogg, respectively. Trump takes office next month.

During his first term in office, in 2020, Trump ordered a U.S. air strike that killed Iran’s top military commander, Qassem Soleimani.

Trump in 2018 also reneged on a nuclear deal struck by his predecessor Barack Obama in 2015 and re-imposed U.S. economic sanctions on Iran that had been relaxed. The deal had limited Iran’s ability to enrich uranium, a process that can yield fissile material for nuclear weapons.

Iran now is “dramatically” accelerating enrichment of uranium to up to 60% purity, close to the roughly 90% level that is weapons grade, the U.N. nuclear watchdog chief told Reuters last week. Iran says its nuclear program only serves peaceful purposes.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Steve Holland in Washington; Additional reporting by Alexandra Ulmer in San Francisco; Editing by Mary Milliken and Diane Craft)

source

By Mike Scarcella

(Reuters) -U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit accusing him of making defamatory statements during his campaign about five Black and Hispanic men who were wrongly convicted and imprisoned for the 1989 rape of a white jogger in New York’s Central Park.

Trump’s lawyers said in a court filing that his statements about the men, known widely as the Central Park Five, were legally protected expressions of opinion.

The Central Park Five were cleared in 2002 based on new DNA evidence and another person’s confession. Trump falsely said at a Sept. 10 presidential debate with Democrat Kamala Harris that they had killed a person and pleaded guilty.

Attorneys for Trump said the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment “protects the President-elect’s speech about matters of public concern.”

A lawyer for Trump at Dhillon Law Group declined to comment, and a spokesperson for his transition team did not immediately respond to a request for one. Trump on Monday said he would nominate Dhillon Law Group’s founder Harmeet Dhillon to lead the Justice Department’s civil rights division.

Shanin Specter, an attorney for the Central Park Five — Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, Antron Brown and Korey Wise — said they expected Trump’s arguments to fail.

“We look forward to taking discovery and proceeding to trial,” Specter said.

The lawsuit said Trump’s “demonstrably false” statements cast the plaintiffs in “a harmful false light and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on them.”

Attorneys for the men said they gave false confessions that they later recanted. They never pleaded guilty.

Trump has drawn criticism before over his statements about the Central Park Five. After the jogger’s assault, he spoke out about the case and took out a full-page ad in several New York newspapers calling for the reinstatement of the death penalty.

(Reporting by Mike Scarcella; Editing by David Bario and David Gregorio)

source