Politics

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two-thirds of the U.S. Senate voted on Wednesday to recommend ratification of the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, a global environmental treaty.

The amendment would phase out use of key greenhouse gasses that contribute to climate change. Voting continues on the measure.

(Reporting by Moira Warburton in Washington, Editing by Franklin Paul)

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By Trevor Hunnicutt and Alexandra Alper

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday made a plea for Congress to pass a bill that would require super PACs and certain other groups to disclose donors who contributed $10,000 or more during an election cycle, a measure doomed to fail due to lack of Republican support.

“There’s much too much money that flows in the shadows to influence our elections,” Biden said at the White House, noting that advocacy groups can run advertisements supporting or attacking a candidate “right up until election day” without disclosing who paid for it.

“I believe sunlight is the best disinfectant,” he added, calling on Republicans to join Democrats in supporting the bill.

The measure is slated for a Senate vote this week, top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said on Monday, as Democrats seek to boost election transparency ahead of the November midterms after failing to pass more ambitious voting rights legislation earlier this year.

The legislation does not have the support of 60 senators necessary to overcome the Senate’s vote threshold for ending debate.

Still, the bill represents one of many fronts on which Democrats are warring with Republicans over laws governing elections following the 2020 presidential race won by Biden but which his predecessor, Donald Trump, disputes with false claims it was stolen.

Election experts worry the next presidential election in 2024, in which Biden may seek re-election and Trump may run again, could be even more bitterly disputed.

Republicans, including Texas Senator Ted Cruz, have argued that companies have the right to express themselves through anonymous donations. Democrats say such ‘dark money’ donations have warped the political system, resulting in laws that do not reflect the majority of Americans’ views.

“There is no justification under heaven for keeping such massive contributions hidden from the public,” Schumer said.

The measure, known as the DISCLOSE Act, was initially included in Democrats’ voting rights bill that sought to counteract voting restrictions in Republican-led states. That package passed the House in January but died in the Senate under Republican opposition.

The DISCLOSE ACT, if approved, would also require groups spending money on judicial nominees to disclose their donors.

After long championing broad political spending reforms, Biden took heat from Democrats and good-governance activists when he dropped his opposition to outside political spending groups during his 2020 presidential campaign.

Biden had initially struggled to match Trump’s fundraising might and that of his Democratic rivals and used the outside funding to support a campaign running on a shoestring budget.

Under federal law, super PACs can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money, unlike candidates, but cannot coordinate their efforts with a candidate’s campaign.

The House of Representatives is separately considering a proposal by Republican Liz Cheney and Democrat Zoe Lofgren clarifying a 135-year-old law to show that the vice president’s role in certifying elections is purely symbolic.

The proposal is a response to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters, who were trying to stop certification of Biden’s victory, and to pressure from Trump himself on his Vice President Mike Pence to overturn Biden’s election win by decertifying certain slates of electors.

House Republican leadership is urging party members to vote against that measure.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt, Alexandra Alper and Moira Warbuton; Editing by Heather Timmons, Edmund Klamann and Bill Berkrot)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Senator Joe Manchin will unveil his full energy permitting bill on Wednesday to speed fossil fuel projects and offer incentives for renewable energy electricity transmission, legislation that faces an uphill battle.

    “The text will be out tomorrow,” Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, told a press conference on Tuesday, noting it will give senators plenty of time to review the legislation he wants to attach to a temporary federal funding bill to prevent government shutdowns before the start of the new fiscal year on Oct. 1.

Manchin, an important swing vote in the 50-50 Senate, reached a side deal with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer during talks for the wider Inflation Reduction Act for his permitting measure to be voted on this fall.

A short version of the measure has been out for months and included speeding the permitting of Equitrans Midstream Corp’s long-delayed $6.6 billion West Virginia-to-Virginia natural gas Mountain Valley Pipeline.

The measure’s support for fossil fuel projects has spurred 77 Democrats in the U.S. House and two in the Senate, including Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, to already oppose the measure. Some Republicans also say they oppose it.

“I’ve never seen stranger bedfellows than Bernie Sanders and the extreme liberal left siding up with Republican leadership” and its rank-and-file senators, Manchin said.  

When asked whether he was willing to shut down the government if he does not win the vote, Manchin said, “I’m not shutting the government down, I’m voting for it.”

Senator Brian Schatz, a Democrat from Hawaii, said at a Washington Post event on Tuesday he did not know whether the measure will pass this month given the opposition from some Republicans who hope their party can retake the Senate in the Nov. 8 midterm elections.

But Schatz said the bill has a chance if it offers incentives for renewable energy including transmission lines. “Democrats in the Senate by and large are for this because they understand the need to make it easier to build these projects,” said Schatz.

(Reporting by Richard Cowan and Timothy Gardner; Editing by Josie Kao)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House on Tuesday said it was aware of a reported flight of migrants to an area near President Joe Biden’s vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, and was working with state and local officials to help the migrants.

White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre called recent flights of migrants to Delaware, Martha’s Vineyard and outside Vice President Kamala Harris’s residence in Washington a “political stunt” by Republican governors.

“We’ve been in close contact with Delaware officials” about providing shelter and aid to the migrants, she added.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Andrea Shalal)

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By Ted Hesson and Trevor Hunnicutt

GEORGETOWN, Del. (Reuters) -The White House on Tuesday said it was aware of reports of a flight carrying migrants to an area near President Joe Biden’s vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, and would work with state and local officials to help the migrants if they arrived, while condemning it as a “political stunt.”

Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis did not confirm reports of the flight on Tuesday nor did he indicate if he was behind the action. Last week, he took credit for a pair of planes that dropped off nearly 50 migrants, mostly from Venezuela, on the wealthy vacation island of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, with no warning.

Asked at the White House about his reaction to the possibility of DeSantis sending migrants near his Delaware beach house, Biden told reporters, “He should come visit. We have a beautiful shoreline.”

The White House said it was coordinating closely with local officials and had received no heads up from DeSantis, with spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre saying “his only goal is to create chaos.” She called the moves “political theater” and a “cruel, premeditated political stunt”

DeSantis, who is up for re-election in November and seen as a possible presidential contender in 2024, joins Republican governors from Texas and Arizona in sending migrants to Democratic-controlled cities, in an effort to criticize the Biden administration’s handling of the U.S.-Mexico border where there have been a record number of crossings.

“I think it’s opening people’s eyes to the solution, which is let’s have a secure border,” DeSantis said in a press conference Tuesday.

Texas, which has sent more than 11,000 migrants to Washington D.C. and New York City since April, stepped up its campaign in recent days, dropping migrants off near the official residence of Vice President Kamala Harris in Washington.

A spokesperson for Delaware Governor John Carney said in a statement that the state was coordinating with federal officials and other groups and “are prepared to welcome these families in an orderly manner.”

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Andrea Shalal in Washington and Ted Hesson in Georgetown; Additional reporting by Jason Buch in Madison, Kristina Cooke in San Francisco, and Susan Heavey in Washington; Editing by Mica Rosenberg and Aurora Ellis)

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By Mica Rosenberg

(Reuters) -A Texas county sheriff is opening a criminal investigation into flights that carried dozens of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, from Texas last week, an act that Florida’s Republican governor took credit for and which the White House dubbed a political stunt.

Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar said at a news conference on Monday that around 50 migrants were “lured under false pretences” on the streets of San Antonio, put up in a hotel, bused to planes and “stranded unceremoniously in Martha’s Vineyard,” a wealthy vacation island, “for nothing other than a photo op.”

San Antonio is the biggest city in Bexar County.

“What infuriates me most about this case is that we have 48 people who are already on hard times,” Salazar said. “I believe they were preyed upon.”

Salazar, a Democrat, said his move was not related to his party affiliation. “It’s wrong from a human rights perspective. What was done to these folks was wrong.”

A spokesperson for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said immigrants have been “more than willing to leave Bexar County after being abandoned”.

“Florida gave them an opportunity to seek greener pastures in a sanctuary jurisdiction that offered greater resources for them, as we expected,” DeSantis’ communications director, Taryn Fenske, said in an emailed statement.

“POLITICAL PAWNS”

Salazar said his office was working with advocacy organizations and private attorneys representing the victims and could coordinate with federal authorities as needed.

DeSantis, who is up for re-election in November and seen as a possible presidential contender in 2024, claimed credit for the two flights from San Antonio, while criticizing Democratic President Joe Biden’s handling of a record number of crossings along the U.S.-Mexico border.

DeSantis joins Republican governors from Texas and Arizona in sending migrants to Democratic-controlled cities, including buses of migrants from Texas dropped off near the residence of Vice President Kamala Harris in Washington.

DeSantis said last week that Florida paid to fly the migrants to Martha’s Vineyard because many migrants who arrive in Florida come from Texas.

Republicans have been trying to shift responsibility for border crossers to Democratic leaders. The Biden administration said the Republicans are using migrants as “political pawns.”

While details of how the flights were arranged and paid for remain unclear, one migrant told Reuters he and his family were recruited outside of a migrant resource center in San Antonio and promised housing, support for 90 days, help with work permits and English lessons. He said they were surprised when their flight landed on an island best known as a summer retreat populated mostly by affluent, liberal Americans.

U.S. border agents made nearly 2 million migrant arrests through August at the U.S.-Mexico border this fiscal year, which began last October, according to government data released Monday. They include a growing number of Cubans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans and others who cannot be expelled to Mexico under a public health order in place since the beginning of the COVID pandemic. Many seek to pursue asylum claims.

(Reporting by Mica Rosenberg in New York, Jason Buch in Madison and Kristina Cooke in San Francisco; Additional reporting by Ted Hesson in Washington; Writing by Mica Rosenberg; Editing by Leslie Adler)

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By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democratic and Republican senators urged U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration on Tuesday to impose secondary sanctions on international banks to strengthen a price cap G7 countries plan to impose on Russian oil over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen and Republican Senator Pat Toomey introduced legislation imposing the secondary sanctions, which would target financial institutions involved in trade finance, insurance, reinsurance and brokerage of Russia oil and petroleum products sold at prices exceeding the cap.

The two senators are both members of the Senate Banking Committee, which oversees sanctions policy.

They said the ability to target banks would make it harder for Russia to evade the price cap by making deals with countries not formally participating in the G7 scheme.

“I do think there’s a great benefit to having a worldwide backup so that Russia does not try – as it’s bound to do – to play countries against each other,” van Hollen said during a committee hearing.

“I promise to work with Senator Van Hollen to get this bill enacted as soon as possible so that Russia can no longer profit from the oil sales funding its war in Ukraine,” Toomey, the top Republican on the banking panel, said.

The Biden administration has been reluctant to impose secondary sanctions over concerns that they could complicate relations with importers of Russia oil like China and India.

Elizabeth Rosenberg, Treasury Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes, told the hearing that the price cap was a powerful tool to hit Russia and stabilize energy prices.

The U.S. Treasury has said that anyone who falsifies documentation or otherwise hides the true origin or price of Russian oil would face consequences under the domestic law of jurisdictions implementing the price cap.

The Group of Seven announced the price cap plan this month to limit Russia’s lucrative oil export revenue in the wake of the invasion. Several countries have banned imports of Russian crude and fuel, but Moscow has managed to maintain its revenues through increased crude sales to Asia.

“The price cap we believe will have a powerful effect in doing several things, certainly in the first instance denying Russia’s revenue to fund its war,” Rosenberg said. “And secondly, by keeping Russian oil in the market at lower prices, it will reduce the potential for price spikes in the market.”

Also at the hearing, Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema asked Rosenberg what Washington can do to address the blending of Russian oil by the country’s producers with crude from other nations to circumvent sanctions.

Rosenberg indicated that Treasury will in coming weeks release guidelines to address the issue.

“We have an opportunity to offer further clarity and guidance on this important point in the forthcoming guidance and frequently asked questions that the U.S. government will put out in the coming weeks,” she said.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle, additional reporting by Doina Chiacu and Timothy Gardner; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

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By Luc Cohen

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A federal judge on Monday began questioning potential jurors in Brooklyn for the trial of Tom Barrack, the private equity executive and onetime fundraiser for former President Donald Trump charged with acting as a foreign agent without notifying the U.S. government as required.

Barrack, the 75-year-old former chairman of the firm now called DigitalBridge Group Inc, worked for the United Arab Emirates to influence Trump’s campaign and administration between 2016 and 2018 and advance the Middle Eastern country’s interests, according to federal prosecutors.

Barrack, who headed Trump’s inauguration committee and was a frequent White House guest, has pleaded not guilty, as has his former assistant and co-defendant Matthew Grimes. The two defendants intend to argue that their interactions with UAE officials were part of their work for DigitalBridge, then known as Colony Capital.

Another co-defendant, Emirati businessman Rashid Al Malik, is at large.

The trial is expected to focus on allegations that UAE officials gave Barrack input about what to say in television interviews, what then-candidate Trump should say in a 2016 energy policy speech, and who should be appointed ambassador to Abu Dhabi.

U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan told potential jurors not to “exaggerate potential unavailability” to try to get out of service.

“You’re going to find this trial, if you’re chosen as a juror, to be particularly interesting,” Cogan told them.

Cogan, prosecutors and defense lawyers are interviewing prospective jurors one-by-one about whether their views on topics ranging from Trump to Middle East politics would affect their ability to be fair. A pool of 39 prospective jurors deemed qualified is to due to be selected before a jury of 12, with four alternatives, is picked.

Prosecutors have said Barrack, Grimes and Al Malik never told the U.S. attorney general they were acting as UAE agents as required under federal law. Barrack’s lawyers have said the U.S. State Department, and Trump himself, knew of his contacts with Middle East officials, showing that Barrack did not intend to be a foreign agent. Barrack was arrested in Los Angeles but has remained free on bond pending trial.

Barrack was charged https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-advisor-presidential-candidate-among-three-defendants-charged-acting-agents-foreign last year with acting as a foreign agent and conspiracy – counts that could bring 10 and five years in prison, respectively, though the sentence would be determined by the judge based on a range of factors. Barrack also was charged with obstruction of justice and making false statements in an FBI interview.

(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Will Dunham and Jonathan Oatis)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said on Monday that the chamber would vote this week on the DISCLOSE Act, which he said would require super PACs and certain other groups to disclose donors who contributed $10,000 or more to them during an election.

(Reporting by Makini Brice and Katharine Jackson; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

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By Luc Cohen

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A federal judge on Monday began questioning potential jurors in Brooklyn for the trial of Tom Barrack, the private equity executive and onetime fundraiser for former President Donald Trump charged with acting as a foreign agent without notifying the U.S. government as required.

Barrack, the 75-year-old former chairman of the firm now called DigitalBridge Group Inc, worked for the United Arab Emirates to influence Trump’s campaign and administration between 2016 and 2018 and advance the Middle Eastern country’s interests, according to federal prosecutors.

Barrack, who headed Trump’s inauguration committee and was a frequent White House guest, has pleaded not guilty, as has his former assistant and co-defendant Matthew Grimes. The two defendants intend to argue that their interactions with UAE officials were part of their work for DigitalBridge, then known as Colony Capital.

Another co-defendant, Emirati businessman Rashid Al Malik, is at large.

The trial is expected to focus on allegations that UAE officials gave Barrack input about what to say in television interviews, what then-candidate Trump should say in a 2016 energy policy speech, and who should be appointed ambassador to Abu Dhabi.

U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan told potential jurors not to “exaggerate potential unavailability” to try to get out of service.

“You’re going to find this trial, if you’re chosen as a juror, to be particularly interesting,” Cogan told them.

Cogan, prosecutors and defense lawyers are interviewing prospective jurors one-by-one about whether their views on topics ranging from Trump to Middle East politics would affect their ability to be fair. A pool of 39 prospective jurors deemed qualified is to due to be selected before a jury of 12, with four alternatives, is picked.

Prosecutors have said Barrack, Grimes and Al Malik never told the U.S. attorney general they were acting as UAE agents as required under federal law. Barrack’s lawyers have said the U.S. State Department, and Trump himself, knew of his contacts with Middle East officials, showing that Barrack did not intend to be a foreign agent. Barrack was arrested in Los Angeles but has remained free on bond pending trial.

Barrack was charged https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-advisor-presidential-candidate-among-three-defendants-charged-acting-agents-foreign last year with acting as a foreign agent and conspiracy – counts that could bring 10 and five years in prison, respectively, though the sentence would be determined by the judge based on a range of factors. Barrack also was charged with obstruction of justice and making false statements in an FBI interview.

(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Will Dunham and Jonathan Oatis)

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