All posts tagged: Guarded

Police Officers Who Guarded Capitol Sue to Block Trump’s .8 Billion ‘Slush Fund’

Police Officers Who Guarded Capitol Sue to Block Trump’s $1.8 Billion ‘Slush Fund’

Published by Sam Flores

May 20 (Reuters) – Two police officers ⁠who ⁠defended the U.S. Capitol from ⁠rioters on January 6, 2021, filed a lawsuit on ​Wednesday seeking to halt President Donald Trump’s nearly $1.8 billion fund to compensate victims of ‌political “weaponization.” In a complaint filed in ‌federal court in Washington, former Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn and Metropolitan ⁠Police Department ⁠officer Daniel Hodges alleged Trump has “created a $1.776 billion taxpayer-funded slush ​fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name.” The lawsuit seeks a court order blocking payments from the fund, calling it “the most brazen act ​of presidential corruption this century.” Trump settled on Monday with the Internal Revenue ⁠Service, ⁠agreeing to drop his $10 ⁠billion lawsuit ​over the leak of his tax returns during his first term. As part ​of the settlement, the ⁠Justice Department created the fund to compensate victims of political “weaponization.” U.S. acting Attorney General Todd Blanche faced repeated questions over that fund during congressional testimony on Tuesday. Blanche said the money could be given to …

Stocks up, oil down over week on guarded optimism for Iran

Stocks up, oil down over week on guarded optimism for Iran

Published by Sam Flores

NEW YORK: Wall Street stocks rose sharply over the week and oil prices fell as a fragile truce was struck between the United States and Iran, with ceasefire talks due to start in Islamabad on Saturday (Apr 11). For the week, all three major US indices advanced by more than three per cent. Oil prices retreated once again on Friday. For the week, they tumbled by approximately 13 per cent. The New York Stock Exchange closed mixed for the day Friday – the Dow Jones shed 0.6 per cent, the Nasdaq gained 0.4 per cent, and the broader S&P 500 index was flat, slipping 0.1 per cent. “Markets are trading on a cautious tone ahead of the US-Iran ceasefire talks,” Elias Haddad of Brown Brothers Harriman (BBH) said in a note. “For financial markets, the key issue is whether peak shipping security fear is now behind us.” Official sources say the talks in Islamabad will cover Iran’s nuclear enrichment and the free flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. Since the ceasefire took effect, …

After Putin’s Guarded Iran War Comments, Medvedev Enters The Chat

After Putin’s Guarded Iran War Comments, Medvedev Enters The Chat

Published by Jenni Sidey

Earlier this week President Putin weighed in on America’s Iran operations, and as we detailed his comments were predictably a bit guarded. He had compared the war and the Hormuz Strait closure – and subsequent impact on global energy – to the massive widescale impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. But fundamentally he highlighted the “unpredictable” nature of the conflict in terms of where it’s headed, as Washington appears to be searching for an offramp on its terms. On Friday Dmitry Medvedev weighed in, and as expected the former Russian president and current Deputy Chairman of the Security Council was much less guarded in his assessment. He warned at a moment thousands of US Marines and Airborne troop are en route to the Middle East that if the US enters a ground war in Iran it will be another “Vietnam”. American boots on the ground so far from US shores “threatens roughly the same consequences as what happened in Vietnam,” Medvedev said as quotes in NBC and others. “When Washington intervened in a foreign country, located a thousand …