politics

ABC went to court Tuesday in an attempt to halt the Federal Communications Commission’s early review of its TV licenses, claiming the move is an attack on the broadcast outlet’s right to free speech.

The Disney-owned network asked a U.S. District Court to issue a temporary restraining order to stop the FCC’s action. The agency says it is investigating ABC stations over whether the company’s diversity and inclusion policies are in violation of federal anti-discrimination laws.

But the suit alleges that the FCC is retaliating against ABC due to President Trump’s dissatisfaction with the network’s coverage of his administration. Trump has frequently threatened to have TV station licenses pulled when he believes he is treated unfairly on news and talk programs.

In late December, Trump posted on X that “If Network NEWSCASTS, and their Late Night Shows are almost 100% negative to President Donald J. Trump, MAGA, and the Republican Party, shouldn’t their very valuable Broadcast Licenses be terminated? I say YES!”

The suit claims the FCC “has not been shy about openly coercing ABC into changing its programming,” citing comments made last fall by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr about late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s remarks about the president.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr said. “These companies can find ways….to take action…on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC.”

Shortly after Carr made those remarks, two large TV station ownership groups had their ABC affiliates pull Kimmel off the air for a week after conservative blowback over the host’s comments regarding the shooting death of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.

The licenses for eight ABC-owned TV stations, including KABC in Los Angeles, were originally scheduled for renewal between 2028 and 2031. The suit said the current review is “extraordinarily early” and “that timing underscores the Commission’s true purpose: coercing and retaliating against a network that refuses to bow to the Administration’s demands.”

Trump recently called for ABC’s TV licenses to be revoked after the network did not carry his July 16 prime-time Oval Office address on election fraud. Carr said the network’s decision would be taken under consideration in the license review process.

Broadcast outlets have long had the option to determine whether to carry a presidential address. ABC presented Trump’s speech on its news streaming platform, as did NBC.

Carr has also questioned whether “The View” should be classified as a news program, which is exempt from the equal-time rule for political candidates who appear as guests.

ABC has asked the FCC to rule on the status of “The View,” which received an exemption from the rarely enforced equal time provision in 2002.

ABC has maintained that “The View” books politicians based on newsworthiness and not partisanship.

United States President Donald Trump has threatened to bomb Oman if it “gets in the way” of a peace deal between the US and Iran.

Oman is currently negotiating with Iran over the reopening of the critical Strait of Hormuz, while Iran has repeatedly stated that it will not speak directly to the US.

On Monday, as Iranian officials said they were close to announcing an agreement with Oman, a 60-day Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Washington and Tehran – which had provided for a period of peace talks but largely fell apart early on – expired with little hope for renewal.

This is not the first time Trump has threatened Oman, a US ally which has never entered into any direct conflict with the US. Oman, through whose territorial waters the contested Strait of Hormuz also flows, has positioned itself as a neutral party in the US-Iran war. Despite that, it has suffered a number of strikes by Iran, which has targeted US military assets and infrastructure around the region in retaliation for US-Israeli attacks.

Now, Trump is threatening to strike it as well.

Here is more about what Trump has threatened, and why.

What did Trump threaten Oman with?

Trump told US broadcaster Fox News on Monday that Iran should surrender, and claimed that his administration had opened a direct backchannel for talks with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

During the interview, he threatened to bomb US ally Oman if it “gets in the way” of US talks with Iran.

“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the s*** out of them,” he said.

An IRGC spokesman denied Trump’s claim of direct talks, telling Iran’s semi-official Tasnim News: “There are no talks taking place between IRGC officials and the Americans, and this lie by Trump is merely fantasies caused by the delusions and nightmares he has suffered as a result of defeat and desperation in the war.”

Has he threatened Oman before?

Monday was not the first time Trump threatened Oman over the course of the five-month war between the US and Iran. In May, he made a similar threat.

At a cabinet meeting on May 27, a reporter asked Trump what he thought about the idea of Oman and Iran jointly overseeing shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

“ Would you accept a short-term deal that allows Iran and Oman to control the strait?” the reporter asked.

Trump replied with a seemingly offhand threat. “Nobody is going to control it. It’s international waters, and Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we will have to blow them up.”

While there was initial speculation that Trump might have misspoken and said “Oman” instead of “Iran”, the US State Department later shared the comment on social media, with a transcript of the quote that referred to the Arab country.

What is the context for all this?

For the past few weeks, Iran and Oman have been engaged in direct talks, facilitated by mediators in Qatar, to reach an agreement over how to manage maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz in the future.

While Iran had agreed to keep the strait open to shipping without charge for 60 days following the signing of the MoU with the US on June 17, this quickly fell apart as the two sides disagreed over who had ultimate control over the strait – in particular which routes ships should take. Towards the end of June, Iran launched strikes on a number of ships which had followed an Oman-issued route, approved by the US, rather than its own route, and the US restarted strikes on Iran for nearly two weeks.

Following that, Iran refused to talk directly to the US, saying it had violated the terms of the MoU which included a cessation of hostilities on all fronts, and began talks with Oman over the future of the strait instead. Iran also issued a list of new demands relating to the lifting of sanctions and a permanent end to US strikes before it would resume talks, it said.

On Monday, Tehran said the two countries have reached an agreement on a new shipping route in the strait and are now preparing a joint declaration.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said the proposed mechanism for control of the strait seeks to protect the interests of both Iran and Oman while allowing commercial shipping to pass through.

“This is the first time that a mechanism is being developed to simultaneously safeguard the sovereign rights of the two littoral states and ensure the safe passage of commercial vessels,” said Baghaei.

The Strait of Hormuz is a critical waterway through which one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies were shipped before the US-Israel war on Iran began on February 28. Roughly 130 ships sailed through the strait each day.

Iran closed the strait in early March, allowing only a few ships it deemed “friendly” to pass through the strait until it signed the MoU with the US on June 17. Since then, it has become the key issue holding up talks for a lasting peace plan to end the war on Iran.

The US, meanwhile, has established its own blockade on Iranian ports in and around the strait. Last week, it fired on a Panama-flagged cargo vessel it accused of attempting to reach Iranian ports and which, it said, had failed to follow orders to change course.

The crisis has triggered global energy shortages and the price of oil has soared. The price of Brent crude, the global benchmark, was about $66 a barrel just before the Middle East conflict began. Over the course of the war, the price has surged past $100 on several occasions, most recently on July 23. In March, the price rose as high as $119.

Global benchmark Brent crude futures rose to $91.22 a barrel on Tuesday, inching close to a three-week high.

What is Oman’s position on the Iran war?

Oman, which is known for its neutrality, has not publicly stated that it intends to join Iran in controlling the Strait of Hormuz. The US and Oman are close partners with a relationship stretching back nearly 200 years.

The two countries have multiple cooperation treaties, including security partnerships, a free trade agreement and a science and technology deal.

During the war, Iran launched multiple strikes on US military assets and energy infrastructure in neighbouring countries, including Oman.

Oman previously acted as a key mediator between Washington and Tehran as they sought a resolution to the war that began on February 28, when the US and Israel attacked Iran.

So, why is Trump threatening Oman now?

A potential Iran-Oman understanding covering the Strait of Hormuz could cut against one of Washington’s core demands: that Iran relinquish control of the strait as a condition of ending the war. Rather than curbing that control, such a deal would lend it greater legitimacy by formalising Iran’s position.

But experts say Trump is also likely angry that the US has seemingly been cut out of the deal relating to the strait.

“In part, a solution mediated without US intervention and which in fact allows Oman and Iran to manage passage through Hormuz, which lies entirely within the two countries’ territorial waters, would show how impotent the United States is and has been,” Laleh Khalili, a professor of Gulf studies at the University of Exeter, told Al Jazeera.

The US and Iran have also strongly disagreed about whether Iran should be allowed to charge fees to shipping companies using the strait. Under international law, tolls for passing through natural waterways such as Hormuz are forbidden, even when they are not technically in international waters. However, fees for services such as insurance, environmental protection and docking can be charged. It has yet to be seen whether this issue will be addressed in an Iran-Oman agreement.

In late July, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned that Iran should not be allowed to charge tolls on vessels traversing Hormuz. Days earlier, Trump himself pledged there would be no tolls for passage through the strait, unless they are collected by his own country.

On August 14, Trump went a step further, telling his supporters in New York that he had plans to declare the Strait of Hormuz a “territory” of the US. “After we finish defeating Iran, which is being very badly defeated, pretty soon I’ll be declaring the Hormuz Strait a territory of the United States,” Trump said.

Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, responded to that threat on social media with defiance.

“Trump said that, after Iran’s defeat, he will soon declare the Strait of Hormuz as American territory,” Gharibabadi wrote.

“The Strait of Hormuz cannot be taken over by a tweet, nor by an aircraft carrier, nor by issuing a decree, nor by an election speech. Iran is neither afraid of threats nor intimidated by a show of force.”

The Rohingya of Myanmar have faced decades of discrimination and forced displacement, and a case alleging genocide now sits before the International Court of Justice.

This film describes how military regimes rewrote citizenship laws to exclude Rohingya from registers and used identity documents, checkpoints and travel permits to control movement. It also highlights how segregation, incitement and continuing waves of violence normalised their erasure from the community.

Focusing on the 2016-2017 “clearance operations”, the film documents village burnings, mass killings and the flight of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya to Bangladesh. Through survivor testimony and interviews with officials and legal experts, Myanmar: The Architecture of Statelessness examines whether these crimes meet the legal threshold for genocide, how Myanmar defends itself against the allegation and what is ultimately at stake when the court delivers its verdict.

Aug. 18 (UPI) — Two counties and two cities are suing the Trump administration over conditioning national security funding on local governments adopting sweeping election procedures, calling the requirement illegal federal overreach.

The Brennan Center for Justice filed the lawsuit Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on behalf of Nashville and Davidson County, Tenn., Harris and El Paso counties, Texas, and Columbus, asking it to declare the decision to impose election administration conditions on grants unlawful and enjoin its enforcement.

“This is the kind of federal overreach we’ve come to expect from the Trump administration,” Harris County Attorney Abbie Kamin said in a statement emailed to UPI. “To threaten law enforcement and public safety funding our agencies rely on, to withhold dollars that protect our communities for a partisan power grab is not only improper, it’s dangerous.”

Since returning to office, President Donald Trump has taken a series of actions he says are to improve election integrity and security but that Democrats and civil rights advocates have described as efforts to interfere with and undermine U.S. elections.

In June, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, under the Department of Homeland Security, updated compliance requirements for Homeland Security Grant Program funds, which are to help local governments prevent terrorism. Conditions added include creating a plan for transitioning to hand-marked paper ballots, conducting a 5% post-election manual audit and citizenship verification for all poll workers and registered voters, among others.

FEMA said it will withhold 20% of the recipient’s total HSGP funding until receipt of proof of compliance with the new requirements.

The jurisdictions suing the administration described the withholding of funds as FEMA holding their money “hostage” and its new election-related conditions “arbitrary and capricious.”

“Never before has FEMA purported to regulate how states and counties run elections,” they said in the lawsuit, stating that such a change would require congressional authorization, which FEMA does not have.

“The power to administer elections belongs to the states, subject only to conditions imposed by Congress — not the president, not the secretary of Homeland Security and not FEMA.”

The plaintiffs state that FEMA has not provided a “reasoned explanation” for the change in funding administration while ignoring the legal, financial and logistical “chaos” the new conditions will cause with midterm elections less than two months away and the potential harm withholding anti-terrorism funds could cause.

“Holding cities hostage by threatening anti-terrorism funding if they don’t go along with the president’s absurd election manipulation is as dangerous as it is illegal,” Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein said in a statement.

“We’re fighting back to protect public safety and election integrity. We will not be bullied by this president and his administration.”

New Delhi, India — On August 13, Abdul Hafeez returned to the primary school he once went to, in Karisunda, a village in Bankura district in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal.

The 26-year-old was visiting his alma mater as part of a campaign by the Cockroach Janata Party, a popular Indian pressure group, to audit conditions of the country’s under-funded, often dilapidated government-run schools.

The CJP had just succeeded in forcing the resignation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s education minister, Dharmendra Pradhan, in July, after a 37-day sit-in in the national capital that prompted antigovernment Gen Z protests across the country.

But in Bankura, things would turn deadly. Hours after Hafeez’s visit to his school, he alleged that local workers of Modi’s Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) arrived at his home and assaulted him and his father, Mohammad Mafik. Two days later, Hafeez’s 51-year-old father died from his injuries.

On Sunday, Suvendu Adhikari, the chief minister of BJP-ruled West Bengal, said the attackers were “criminals with no BJP connection” and assured action.

But a day after burying his father, Hafeez told Al Jazeera that he stands firm in calling for accountability and reforms in government-run schools. “We will fight for justice for my father, but these attacks will not stop us from demanding better education,” he said.

That demand marks a new line in the sand for the CJP. Fresh from successfully forcing Modi and his government onto the defensive — the Indian PM has only rarely sacked ministers even in the face of credible accusations of wrongdoing or public pressure — the group has now announced its next battleground: India’s public-funded schools.

CJP leaders have asked their supporters, who thronged the protests in New Delhi from different parts of the country, to visit their nearby schools and audit their conditions.

They are working around a basic four-point checklist for what the CJP is calling its Fix the Schools campaign: drinking water and functional toilets; electricity and usable classrooms; boundary walls and campus safety; and midday meals and teacher attendance.

And the murder of Hafeez’s father has raised the already high stakes in a battle between the well-oiled machinery of Modi’s BJP and the fledgling, thin-on-organisation CJP.

“Abdul went to inspect the [government] school in Bengal where he once studied,” said Abhijeet Dipke, founder of the CJP. “It makes my blood boil that people are being murdered simply for demanding better schools.”

‘A disruptive change’

Ashutosh Ranka, a co-convenor of the Cockroach group, appeared emotional after meeting Hafeez’s family on Monday. He told reporters that the group proposed to press the government for compensation; however, Hafeez requested that a school be named after his father.

In Rajasthan, Ranka’s home state in western India, the group has faced other challenges.

Ranka joined a sit-in with primary school students in Alwar district on August 14 to demand additional rooms, clean toilets and drinking water. Local publications reported that the officials accepted the demands.

On Sunday, the Rajasthan government, also led by Modi’s BJP, imposed restrictions on so-called outsiders entering government schools and on taking photos and videos, citing students’ privacy.

The government notice, which ordered the school management to pursue criminal action against such surveys, came after Ranka had announced visits by CJP volunteers across the state.

Samina Bano, an education-policy expert who has advised several Indian states on reforms, told Al Jazeera that “it is essentially the system itself that is not working anymore for the people”.

In the last 10 years, Bano said, she had found “drunk teachers on duty during spot checks”, fake appointments in rural areas that many teachers do not want to go to, and other systemic failures that she insisted are common in the Indian public school system.

“Education in government-run schools a sorry state of affairs.
 It requires a disruptive change,” Bano said.

“The real problem is the quality of teaching, learning outcomes and the food,” Bano added, crediting the Cockroach pressure group for bringing the demands for reform into mainstream politics.

“They are bringing it into the discourse, but once people start demanding, there needs to be actual institution building, and that’s different work altogether,” Bano said. “There has to be an appetite to reimagine public education in India.”

‘Playing to strength’

After Gen Z protesters returned from the streets in New Delhi, the internet was instead flooded with videos of school-going children asking for better facilities across several states. They were blocking roads, circling local administration offices and fighting with bureaucrats.

The Cockroach party tapped into the momentum and announced its next phase in a smart mobilisation strategy, said Asim Ali, a political analyst in New Delhi.

“It plays to their strength of leveraging social media. Without many volunteers [like a traditional political party], they can outsource the grassroots work to followers on social media itself,” he said.

“By leveraging the power of social media, which is now felt in the remotest of corners in India, the Cockroach party has dramatically driven down organisational resource costs of a movement,” Ali added.

But Ali cautioned that this approach of relying on volunteers without political or organisational skills, protest experience or institutional support also exposes them to violence, as happened with the Hafeez family in West Bengal.

Yet the blood spilled in the eastern state hasn’t dimmed the drive from the CJP to demand accountability from authorities.

On Tuesday, Ranka announced on X that multiple venues in West Bengal’s capital Kolkata had cancelled or refused permission to the CJP to hold meet-ups with students.

“This only reinforces the fact that the BJP is scared from the cockroaches,” he wrote. “Cockroaches of Bengal will continue to visit govt schools and push the Bengal govt to get them fixed.

“The more you stop us, the bigger we become.”

The youth movement among our political leaders, especially among Democrats, is in full cry. On the whole, this looks to be a positive inflection point in our political leadership, empowering a new generation of leaders advocating needed changes in the government’s relationship with its constituents.

But in some particulars it’s misplaced. As the smoke from the recent party primaries clears, it’s proper to take stock in what we’ve lost, alongside what we may gain from a changing of the guard.

For example, take Rep. John B. Larson (D-Conn.), 78, who was turfed out of his seat in his state’s Aug. 11 primary by his Democratic challenger, former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin, 47.

Given that Larson is in his 28th year as a member of congress, it sounds reasonable to suggest that it’s his time to go. But that means overlooking Larson’s most important role in the House, as a member of both the majority and (currently) the minority. And that’s his persistent campaign to preserve Social Security — indeed, to enhance it so it serves today’s workers as well or better than it has served Americans since its enactment in 1935.

There doesn’t seem to be much risk that Bronin’s election, which looks likely, will undermine the progressive faction in the House.

Connecticut’s 1st Congressional District, which Larson represents, is perhaps the bluest district in a blue state, and Bronin’s policy positions tick all the appropriate progressive boxes. But it will probably take years for Bronin to acquire the credibility on Social Security that Larson possessed, even assuming that he wishes to do so.

Larson’s instrument has been the Social Security 2100 Act, which he first introduced in 2017. The act has never passed, but in its draft versions it has embodied several principles that remain fundamental to the Democratic approach to Social Security.

Among them: augmenting benefits to the lowest-wage workers; providing coverage to those whose work has been outside the system, such as family caregivers; and raising Social Security taxes on the rich, who have increasingly avoided paying their fair share of the costs of this all-important antipoverty program. More on that in a moment.

Larson’s loss didn’t result from his championing Social Security. The thrust of Bronin’s campaign was almost entirely that Larson had grown too old in the job, and the path should be cleared for new blood (i.e., himself).

Nothing is new about the drive to bring fresh faces and fresh ideas into the political mainstream. Youth movements arise regularly in politics, especially in times of partisan discontent.

George Orwell, whose observations about the politics and mores of his time remain relevant to the present, wrote (in 1932) of the youth movement that erupted in Britain in 1918.

“At that time,” he wrote in “The Road to Wigan Pier,” his classic about class and economics, “there was, among the young, a curious cult of hatred of ‘old men.’ The dominance of ‘old men’ was held to be responsible for every evil known to humanity, and every accepted institution from [Sir Walter] Scott’s novels to the House of Lords was derided merely because ‘old men’ were in favor of it.”

Orwell traced the phenomenon to Britain’s experience in World War I, which he wrote “had been conducted mainly by old men and had been conducted with supreme incompetence. By 1918 everyone under forty was in a bad temper with his elders, and the mood of anti-militarism which followed naturally upon the fighting was extended into a general revolt against orthodoxy and authority.”

Today’s youth movement, which is concentrated among Democrats, has an analogous origin. It’s rooted in distaste for a politics that has impoverished a generation while filling the pockets of the wealthy.

In some cases, the need to usher superannuated politicians out the door is indisputable. A prime specimen was Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Cal.), whose mental and physical incapacities became manifest as she neared the end of her life; in 2023 she died in office at 90.

On the other hand, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), led her Democratic caucus with a firm hand as Speaker until she yielded the gavel in 2023 at age 82, having notched one of the most successful speakerships in history. (She’s not running for reelection this year.)

Joe Biden, whose apparently faltering faculties became a political talking point during his 2024 presidential reelection campaign, when he was 82 and was in the process of returning the U.S. economy to its pre-pandemic strength when he lost to Donald Trump — who at the age of 80 has been systematically dismantling Biden’s economic policies to the disadvantage of middle-class and working Americans.

Meanwhile, has anybody heard recently from Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), age 84? He hasn’t been seen in public since mid-June. At the moment, he’s regarded as one of those politicians determined to hold on to their seats with what Orwell (him again) described as their “prehensile bottoms.”

As I wrote in 2023, when the age issue was all the rage, “concern-trolling about the advanced age of government leaders hasn’t always been a path to political success.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt cited a “hardening of the judicial arteries” in announcing his 1937 scheme to pack the Supreme Court, which involved shifting the politics of the court to the left by trying to force justices to retire when they reached the age of 70, or adding a justice to the court for every sitting justice who refused. FDR’s plan collapsed after it provoked widespread opposition, the most significant political failure of the New Deal.

That brings us back to the Social Security 2100 Act. The measure, which was introduced in the Senate by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), isn’t perfect. In fact it has been revised at least three times, typically to address political wavelets that come and go.

In all versions, over time it would eliminate the cap on payroll taxes, which are currently limited to 12.4% on wage income up to a maximum of $184,500. That’s a maximum tax of $22,878, divided 50/50 between workers and their employers.

Because of the cap, the effective payroll tax rate on someone with income of $1 million falls to about 2.3%; in reality it’s even lower, because unearned income such as capital gains, interest and dividends, which constitute half or more of the income of wealthy households, isn’t taxed at all.

Originally, the bill called for raising the payroll tax rate by one-tenth of a percentage point a year, to an employer/employee combined 14.8% by the 2040. On the other hand, Larson would reduce the income tax on Social Security earnings, returning a bit to middle- and lower-income workers. Social Security’s actuaries calculated that Larson’s bill would ensure the program’s solvency for at least 75 years, but in practical terms into the almost limitless future.

The rate increase was dropped in subsequent versions, but it was supplanted by a 12.4% tax on net investment income for taxpayers with income over $400,000. That would guarantee the system’s solvency into the 2060s, the actuaries calculated.

Social Security’s advocates plainly could see Larson’s defeat coming. The day before the Connecticut primary, three of them published an op-ed calling Larson an “irreplaceable” asset to their cause. “When it comes to fighting for Social Security,” they wrote, “no one has worked harder than Rep. Larson.” They pointed out that the “Social Security 2100 Act earned in the last Congress support from over 90% of House Democrats, representing all corners of the Democratic coalition.”

Bronin hasn’t said anything specific about Social Security, beyond a campaign pledge that he’ll work for “strengthening” the program. I asked his campaign whether he had any details to offer, but didn’t get a reply. Larson, for his part, has reacted to his defeat with a gentlemanly call for all Democrats to come together to defeat Trump.

Unlike Republicans, who have spent decades slandering Social Security as an undeserved “entitlement” and suggesting that it’s responsible for federal budget deficits (impossible, as a matter of law) and sluggish economic growth (untrue, as a matter of fact), Democrats have worked to preserve it, if not always effectively.

In coming Congresses, Republicans will be offering all sorts of nostrums to “save” Social Security. History says that these will aim to impose benefit cuts on workers to protect the rich from higher taxes.

Will the Democrats stand fast against this long GOP campaign? With Larson’s defeat, they’ll be short one leader. Let’s hope the rest of the party keeps the faith.

Supreme Court grants jailed ex-PM Imran Khan transfer to hospital for nearly a month after concerns were raised over his blood pressure.

Islamabad, Pakistan — Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the transfer of Imran Khan, former prime minister and founder of the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, from Rawalpindi’s Adiala prison to Islamabad’s Shifa International Hospital within two days, accepting a demand his party had been making for months.

Uzair Bhandari, one of Khan’s lawyers, told Al Jazeera the three-member bench also ordered a medical board be formed to oversee Khan’s treatment, including the ex-prime minister’s sister, Dr Uzma Khan, and his personal physician, Dr Faisal Sultan.

“The court also directed that Khan’s family be allowed to meet him at the hospital and that he be permitted to speak with his sons, who live abroad,” Bhandari said.

The next hearing has been fixed for September 16, and Khan should remain hospitalised until at least then as per the order, according to the lawyer. This will be the longest period that Khan will be physically outside jail premises since he was imprisoned in August 2023, convicted in several corruption-related cases that he and his party insist are politically motivated.

The order followed a report Adiala jail’s superintendent submitted to the court on Monday, detailing a cardiac board’s August 10 review of Khan, 73, which recorded fluctuating blood pressure and anxiety linked to restricted contact with his family.

During Tuesday’s hearing, the court pressed Pakistan’s advocate general over gaps in the report, saying Khan’s “pulse and heart condition were not normal” and that his vital organs “had started being affected”.

Courts had twice declined similar transfer requests since February, including an Islamabad High Court ruling that ordered a medical board’s assessment instead.

Zulfi Bukhari, a senior PTI leader, told Al Jazeera the ruling reinforced the party’s longstanding position that Khan needed independent, specialised treatment outside Adiala jail.

“Medical care provided within the prison system is no substitute for a thorough evaluation by independent specialists of his choosing,” he said, adding that PTI had consistently called for Khan’s transfer to Shifa International and access to his own doctors.

Government officials have insisted any transfer required judicial authorisation rather than executive discretion.

Rana Sanaullah, adviser to the prime minister, told the Senate on Monday that Khan was receiving “the best available medical treatment” and that his condition did not support PTI’s concerns.

The order lands amid a wider standoff over access to Khan, which PTI has increasingly framed as the precondition for reviving talks with the government. The government, for its part, has renewed efforts to engage in dialogue but to no avail as yet, while PTI leadership has announced a countrywide protest on September 27.

Aug. 17 (UPI) — The U.S. House Ethics Committee announced Monday that it is investigating Rep. Jimmy Gomez over allegations of sexual misconduct, the latest House member to come under an ethics probe.

The release from the bipartisan committee did not detail the allegations, only stating it was investigating the California Democrat for possibly having “engaged in sexual misconduct in violation of the Code of Official Conduct or any other applicable standard of conduct, including engaging in inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”

The committee noted that while it has made its investigation public that does not mean an ethics violation has been committed.

The announcement comes months after the New York Post reported in April that Gomez kissed a congressional aide to another House Democrat at a backyard party hosted by former Rep. Eric Swalwell in the summer of 2023. The report stated the aide was two decades younger than Gomez, who is now 51, but was 48 the summer of the alleged kiss.

The Monday announcement confirms an early June CNN report that the ethics committee was investigating Gomez over allegations of sexual misconduct.

Gomez is married to Mary Hodge and together they have one son. In January 2023, Gomez and his son made headlines as the new father brought his infant son to the House, wearing him on the chamber floor in a baby carrier.

Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-CA, carries his infant son Hodge on the chamber floor of the House at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, January 5, 2023. File Photo by Pat Benic/UPI

Following the June CNN report, Gomez released a statement acknowledging that he made mistakes in his marriage but that he violated no House ethics rules, while stating he would cooperate with its investigation.

Gomez on Monday issued a very similar statement to Courthouse News in response to the committee’s announcement, stating, “Although my actions were consensual in nature and haven’t violated the law or House Ethics rules, that doesn’t diminish the impact that these mistakes have made on those I care about most.”

“I have and continue to sincerely apologize to my family, friends and the people that II have the privilege to serve,” he said.

“I am deeply sorry to my wife for the pain and embarrassment that I have brought into our lives.”

The investigation into Gomez is the latest probe involving House members of both parties that the ethics panel has launched this summer.

Earlier this month, the panel made public an investigation into allegations of domestic violence and illegal drug use by Rep. Max Miller, R-Ohio. It also completed its investigation of Rep. Chuck Edwards, R-N.C., finding substantial reason to believe he violated House rules concerning sexual harassment and creating a hostile workplace and recommended that he be censured. Edwards has since announced he is dropping his re-election campaign.

In April, both Swalwell, D-Calif., and Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, resigned amid House Ethics investigations into alleged sexual misconduct. The Swalwell probe included allegations involving an employee, while the Gonzales probe was looking into allegations involving a congressional employee and alleged special favors.

SACRAMENTO — A billionaire-funded political group gave a $5-million donation to the campaign opposing California’s proposed wealth tax, the first of many expected in the expensive fight over a ballot question dividing the state.

If approved by voters, Proposition 40 would impose a one-time 5% tax on the assets of billionaires who were residing in the state at the start of this year to pay primarily for healthcare.

The ballot measure has splintered California Democrats and their allies, who are at odds over which public services would receive a portion of the revenue and Proposition 40’s long-term impact on the state budget.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra and groups including Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California and the California Teachers Assn. oppose the tax, arguing it could push many of the state’s biggest taxpayers to relocate and in effect destabilize the state’s finances.

On Monday, nine Democratic state lawmakers announced their opposition to Proposition 40, writing in an open letter to voters that “while well-intentioned, this measure will blow a massive hole in our state budget in the years ahead and undermine our ability to sustain investments in the very priorities Prop 40 claims to support.” Its signers included Assemblymembers Jacqui Irwin (D-Thousand Oaks), Lisa Calderon (D-Whittier) and John Harabedian (D-Pasadena).

The California Democratic Party, the California Federation of Labor Unions and progressive officials including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) support the tax, which is intended to raise roughly $100 billion over five years to backfill federal cuts to healthcare and other social safety net programs by President Trump and the Republican-led Congress.

To this point, Building a Better California — a group funded by Google co-founder Sergey Brin and other members of the Silicon Valley elite — has focused on qualifying two ballot measures meant to defang the billionaire tax while maintaining a neutral position on Proposition 40 itself.

That changed over the weekend when the group of billionaires officially came out against the measure and reported the $5-million donation to the anti-Proposition 40 campaign backed by teachers and firefighters unions.

A handful of billionaires have pumped more than $156 million into Building a Better California, mostly from Brin, who has given more than $100 million to the group. It has also received more than $17 million from venture capitalist L. John Doerr, $12 million from Ripple Labs founder Chris Larsen and $3 million from philanthropist and former Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt.

In addition to opposing the wealth tax, Building a Better California announced support for Proposition 3, which would permanently extend an existing tax on certain high earners, along with two housing bonds.

The group has already spent more than $127 million on two competing ballot measures written to weaken or nullify the billionaire tax: Proposition 41 would require audits for new state special taxes and prohibit new taxes from being excluded from the state spending limit. Proposition 42 would ban new taxes on assets such as as personal property, intellectual property and retirement accounts.

If Proposition 40 passes but either Proposition 41 or Proposition 42 receive more votes, the billionaire tax would be voided.

“A few controversial billionaires like Sergey Brin would rather spend millions to fund shady opposition campaigns than simply pay their fair share in taxes so millions of their fellow Californians don’t lose their healthcare. That’s shameful,” said Debru Carthan, executive vice president of Service Employees International United-Healthcare Workers West, the union that collected the signatures to put the measure on the ballot.

Abby Lunardini, a spokesperson for Building a Better California, said the state “is at an inflection point” due to its high cost of living and taxes.

“California’s future rests on both maintaining our economic competitiveness and making smart, accountable public investments that improve affordability and quality of life for all,” Lunardini wrote in a statement. “It’s rare for such a broad coalition to unite around any single cause in California, but it reflects the potentially devastating impact of this measure on healthcare, education, and our state’s economy.”

The $5-million donation is the largest reported by the Proposition 40 opposition campaign, which wrote in a statement that it “welcomes support from everyone — teachers, doctors, hospitals, community clinics, firefighters, housing advocates, blue-collar unions, entrepreneurs, small businesses, Democrats, and Republicans.”

The donation indicates that members of the opposition coalition — and not billionaires — will play a more visible role in campaign ads.

“Two groups in California that have the most credibility with voters are the teachers and the firefighters,” said Garry South, a Democratic strategist who has worked on past ballot measure campaigns. Making them visible messengers against Proposition 40 “is a very important credibility aspect for the No campaign.”

“Nobody likes political consultants or lawyers. They like firefighters and nurses and teachers,” Republican strategist Matt Rexroad agreed.

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department finalized a rule Monday that will pave the way for people who have been barred from owning firearms because of criminal convictions to apply to have their gun rights reinstated.

The process launched by newly confirmed Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche is a victory for 2nd Amendment advocates who have long pushed for nonviolent people with felony convictions to be given a pathway to regain their legal right to own firearms.

“The Second Amendment is not a second-class right, and the federal government should not permanently deprive Americans of a constitutional right without regard to whether they pose a danger to public safety,” Blanche said in a statement. The attorney general said the new process will protect “public safety while giving deserving Americans a real path to restoration.”

It’s the latest move by President Trump’s administration to ease firearms restrictions. The Justice Department moved earlier this year to roll back and modify a slate of gun regulations. Separately, the department recently decided against challenging a court ruling that struck down regulations on firearm suppressors and certain guns.

Federal law has long allowed people who have had their gun rights stripped because of felony convictions to petition the government for the ability to own firearms again, but Congress since 1992 has effectively barred the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from processing applications.

The Trump administration’s rule aims to circumvent that by establishing a new application system using an online portal.

The Justice Department says restoration will be granted on a case-by-case basis, weighing a person’s record and reputation to determine whether they pose a likely threat to public safety. Officials say people who have been convicted of violent crimes, registered sex offenders, people living in the country illegally and others whom officials believe pose a danger to society will be denied “absent extraordinary circumstances.”

Richer writes for the Associated Press.

The House Ethics Committee announced Monday that it is investigating Democratic Rep. Jimmy Gomez of Los Angeles for alleged sexual misconduct.

The committee said it is investigating allegations that Gomez, 51, engaged in “inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer,” according to a statement released by the committee’s chair, Rep. Michael Guest (R-Miss.), and ranking member Mark DeSaulnier (D-Concord).

The New York Post reported in April that Gomez, a married five-term congressman, was spotted in 2023 kissing a much younger staffer from another office. CNN reported that the House Ethics Committee later discovered other allegations of sexual misconduct by Gomez.

Gomez acknowledged in a statement Monday that he made “personal mistakes outside my marriage,” but said that his “actions were consensual in nature and haven’t violated the law or House Ethics rules.”

Guest and DeSaulnier said in their statement that the panel’s public acknowledgment of the investigation “does not itself indicate that any violation has occurred.”

Gomez said he is “confident that a full and impartial review of the facts will bear that out” and that he is “ready to cooperate with the Ethics Committee inquiry and provide it with whatever information it might need.”

The committee can take a wide range of actions if it substantiates the allegations in an investigation, including recommending that a member be reprimanded, censured or removed, or referring the conduct to the U.S. Department of Justice for criminal investigation.

Gomez represents California’s 34th Congressional District, stretching from Koreatown to Eagle Rock. He faces an election challenge in November from Democrat Angela Gonzales-Torres, who has the backing of the progressive Justice Democrats.

Gomez received 46% of the vote in the June primary, while Gonzales-Torres got 30%.

Gonzales-Torres has been particularly critical of Gomez because of his past support from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC.

Gonzales-Torres blasted Gomez in a statement to The Times after news of the investigation.

“At a time when working families are struggling the most, we need to get creeps out of office,” she said. “We need representatives who will actually focus on fighting for policies like Medicare for All — not people like Rep. Jimmy Gomez and Donald Trump, who are mired in scandal and investigation.”

Gomez was friends with former California Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin), who resigned from Congress earlier this year and suspended his campaign for California gubernatorial campaign after being accused of sexual assault by multiple women. Gomez had been a co-chair of Swalwell’s campaign.

The 2023 incident reportedly occurred at a party hosted by Swalwell.

Gomez is married to Mary Hodge, a onetime top aide to former Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti. The couple have a son whom Gomez wore in a baby carrier during the lengthy House speaker election in 2023. That same year, Gomez founded the Congressional Dads Caucus, which has advocated for expanded child tax credits and other parent-friendly legislation.

Gomez apologized to Hodge in his statement.

“I am deeply sorry to my wife for the pain and embarrassment that I have brought into our lives,” he said. “Her sacrifices and support are central to my ability to serve, and I can only feel gratitude for her grace and strength.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump says vandals are to blame for large swaths of dead grass on the National Mall near the World War II Memorial — in the spot where he had a stage built and hosted crowds for his July 4 celebration.

Trump made the accusation in a social media post on Sunday without saying why he believes it’s the work of vandals instead of trampled turf from the Independence Day festivities. The Republican president posted a photo showing a once-grassy area by the World War II Memorial, now patchy and brown across much of the sprawling turf.

“Look what VANDALS did to the grass connecting the vandalized World War II Monument and the vandalized Reflecting Pool, which will be opened again, and better than ever, shortly,” Trump said on his social media website.

“Anybody who thinks the Reflecting Pool wasn’t vandalized should go back to Law School!” he added.

Trump has repeatedly blamed vandals for damage to his renovation projects in the nation’s capital, often without evidence and sometimes despite opposing accounts from his officials. He lashed out at U.S. Atty. Jeanine Pirro this month after her office concluded that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was the result of poor construction and not the work of vandals, as Trump claimed.

Authorities on Friday announced an arrest in connection with vandalism at the World War II Memorial, after the words “Clean hands dirty $” were found painted on the monument and bubbles filled a fountain. Pirro said felony charges were being brought against Melissa L. Farris, who was in custody and couldn’t be reached for comment.

A woman identified on her Facebook page as Melissa Lovewell on Thursday posted a video in which she is seen taking cans of spray paint from her bag and then painting the monument. “I will wait here to be arrested for spraying our veterans’ fountain,” she says. “It was me. I’m doing it. It’s on camera.”

The woman was identified by her Kentucky driver’s license as Melissa L. Farris of Elizabethtown, an arrest warrant says.

Charging documents in that case make no mention of the grassy area Trump is highlighting in his new claims. Authorities said Farris had been arrested previously for camping on federal property a few blocks from the World War II Memorial, but not the area cited by Trump.

That stretch of lawn is instead where a large stage was built and crowds gathered to hear from Trump and watch fireworks at a July 4 event celebrating the nation’s 250th anniversary. Trump claimed without providing evidence that more than 400,000 people attended the event before a storm hit the area and delayed his remarks.

Photos from the time, taken by a streaming webcam atop the Washington Monument, show a large bandstand and seating areas covering nearly the entire lawn that Trump now says has been vandalized. Associated Press photos from the days that followed showed workers removing the structures, revealing brown, damaged grass underneath.

On Aug. 1, Trump posted a different photo of the same area that appears to show the numbers “86 47” — which federal officials have said constitutes a threat against Trump, the 47th president — emblazoned into the grass. He cited it as evidence refuting Pirro’s conclusion, calling it “a pure case of VANDALISM, that included the grass.”

“There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!” he wrote.

Those numbers are not visible in the photo Trump posted to social media on Sunday.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration says it is temporarily pausing construction of a controversial border construction project in the Big Bend National Park while the head of the agency tasked with building the wall visits Texas to do an “on-the-ground evaluation.”

The project through the national park in southern Texas has faced fierce bipartisan opposition by critics who say that it is marring a pristine environmental area and that the region’s rugged and remote terrain already serves as a deterrent to migrants and smugglers.

Rodney Scott, who heads Customs and Border Protection, which is tasked with building the wall, announced on X that he was visiting Texas to do an evaluation.

“CBP is pausing all construction activity in Big Bend National Park while I visit and conduct a personal, on-the-ground evaluation,” Scott said.

Congress gave the Trump administration $46 billion last summer to build a wall from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, and the administration has been racing ahead and waiving numerous regulations in an effort to swiftly build the wall.

Scott has said that he expects that they will build the first layer of the wall by the end of next year.

But they have run into fierce opposition in Texas especially when it comes to construction in and near Big Bend National Park and a state park to the west.

Santana writes for the Associated Press.

LINCOLN, Calif. — One thing Anne Smull, a retired feedstore owner, was looking forward to on election day was voting for the man who currently represents her in Congress, conservative Rep. Kevin Kiley. Now she can’t.

That’s because California Democrats sliced Kiley’s district six ways as payback for Republican redistricting in Texas and elsewhere. The chunk of the district that Smull, who identifies as a conservative, lives in is now grafted onto an overwhelmingly Democratic seat based in the state’s wine country.

During a recent lunch at a cafe in Lincoln, a onetime agricultural town that has morphed into a bedroom community on the edge of Sacramento’s exurban sprawl, Smull was heartbroken to hear she can no longer vote for Kiley.

“He believes in the same things I do,” Smull said. “It feels sneaky and underhanded.”

Republicans started the redistricting competition. Democrats might finish it

Democratic voters in several other states know how Smull feels.

President Trump last year told GOP-controlled states to redraw their maps before this year’s midterm elections to increase the number of winnable seats for Republicans in order to help the party hold on to the U.S. House. The effort was turbocharged by a U.S. Supreme Court decision in the spring of this year that neutralized a key provision of the Voting Rights Act and cleared the way for Republicans to redraw more seats across the South that had elected Black Democrats.

Democratic-leaning and heavily minority communities from Texas to Tennessee have been split into multiple congressional districts that dilute the Democratic vote by stretching deep into conservative areas.

In the future, it is likely that more Republican voters in other states will go through what Smull and other conservatives in Northern California are facing. Democrats in Maryland, New York, Illinois and other strongholds have pledged to retaliate in time for the 2028 elections and split Republican-leaning districts the way their California counterparts did Kiley’s.

Democrats have been hindered nationally by stricter rules against partisan line-drawing in their states, but California showed a way around that. California Democrats won voter approval last year to redraw the state’s congressional map, originally made by an independent commission, and formed five new Democratic-leaning seats.

‘We have zero voice,’ says voter angry at the Democratic drive for a new political map

Kiley’s is one of them. The reworked political lines led the two-term congressman to leave the Republican Party and run as an independent in the slightly Democratic-leaning district that now includes his home.

He spoke out against partisan gerrymandering, even unsuccessfully trying to force the Republican-led House to allow a vote on a bill to ban mid-decade redistricting.

“We’ve seen partisan divisions really spin out of control in really harmful ways, and I think Exhibit No. 1 is the redistricting wars,” Kiley recently told a group of voters in the suburb of Citrus Heights.

Democrats contend Kiley’s party switch is purely a political trick to survive in a more liberal district. They note that he still caucuses with House Republicans and has voted for many of the GOP’s priorities, including Trump’s sweeping budget and tax cut bill last year, and that political organizations run by House Republicans are spending money to back his reelection.

Even some of Kiley’s supporters think the election was a factor in the congressman’s decision to become an independent.

“My original thinking was he did it because of redistricting — maybe it’d help him get reelected,” said John Coburn, a 68-year-old retired business owner, at the Citrus Heights event.

Coburn is furious at the Democrats’ redistricting and hopes Kiley wins. Coburn does not care that they did it in retaliation for Texas, where Republicans at Trump’s directive revised that state’s map to carve out up to five new winnable conservative seats.

“I don’t care about Texas, I live in California,” Coburn said, adding that “40% of the state is Republican, and we have zero voice. Zero. It’s not how our Founding Fathers intended.”

For Democrats in the district, a rare political opportunity

In an interview, Kiley said his switch to independent was no political gambit. If he wanted to stay in the House, he argued, he could have had an easier time staying in the GOP, moving to a more conservative district that included parts of his old one and running in a Republican primary there.

“I could have gone there and run and played the same game these other politicians are playing,” he said.

Kiley said that he is caucusing with Republicans to avoid losing his seats on committees and that in the next Congress he will try to change rules so independent members do not lose committee seats because they do not caucus with one of the two major parties.

Among his backers, he noted, is onetime Democratic presidential hopeful Andrew Yang, a former technology entrepreneur who co-founded a centrist party for independents.

The Democrat running against Kiley, former state Sen. Richard Pan, scoffs at his rival’s newfound independent status.

“He was a MAGA champion when he first ran for Congress, and now he’s trying to say ‘I’m not,’” Pan told a crowd at a senior community in Roseville, referring to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” movement.

Earlier that day, Pan swung by the Placer County Democratic Party office, tucked away on the second story of a brick shopping arcade in Lincoln’s compact downtown.

Placer is a Republican county that stretches from the Sacramento suburbs to the northwestern shores of Lake Tahoe. The entire county is in Kiley’s current district, but it will be divided among three districts in the new map.

Kathleen Crawford, chair of the county Democratic Party, was enthusiastic about the county getting carved up.

“It’s worth it, because we have an opportunity to get Democratic representation, which has been missing from our county,” Crawford said. “I’ve been here 15 years, and this is my first real opportunity to elect a Democrat.”

A never-ending cycle that cuts out ‘the little people’

Lincoln’s downtown is flanked by fruit, vegetable and flower farms, as well as new subdivisions. The community and its neighboring suburbs have become a destination for people fleeing the San Francisco Bay Area’s housing prices. That has helped change the once solidly conservative area into a political battleground where skilled mapmakers can draw winnable seats for Democrats.

Ed Church, a 61-year-old risk manager, was eating lunch at Simple Pleasures cafe in Lincoln when he contemplated Kiley’s shift. A Democrat, Church has not been a Kiley fan and he was bemused by the congressman’s move.

“If that’s how he’d been initially and not so MAGA, I probably could have supported him,” Church said of Kiley’s independent status. Now Church, as a Lincoln resident, is in a purely Democratic district and will not have a say in Kiley’s fate in November. His main criteria in the election will be “who’s going to stand up to Trump?”

Across the street at a gun store, Wesley Johnson, 43, who considers himself a conservative independent, said he was dispirited by the state’s redistricting.

“I feel Northern California is not represented fairly,” Johnson said. “San Francisco, Sacramento and Los Angeles control everything.”

He acknowledged Republicans were doing the same thing in states they controlled and said he did not know how it could stop.

“You’re just cutting out the little people,” Johnson said.

Riccardi writes for the Associated Press.

LONDON — British Prime Minister Andy Burnham exchanged messages with an impostor posing as President Trump’s chief of staff, according to reports published Monday.

A spokesperson for Burnham declined to comment, saying it was policy not to discuss “national security matters.”

Politico cited four unnamed officials in first reporting that Burnham thought he was messaging with Susie Wiles before he became suspicious and cut off communications.

Last year, the U.S. government investigated a series of messages that elected officials, business executives and other prominent figures in the U.S. received messages from someone posing as Wiles.

Soon after those incidents, the State Department warned U.S. diplomats of attempts to impersonate Secretary of State Marco Rubio and possibly other officials using artificial intelligence. The warning followed the discovery that an impostor posing as Rubio had attempted to reach out to at least three foreign ministers, a U.S. senator and a governor.

The FBI had also warned of “malicious actors” misusing AI to impersonate senior U.S. government officials.

Burnham, who became prime minister less than a month ago, has tried to forge good ties with the White House. Trump initially warmed to Burnham’s predecessor, Keir Starmer, before souring on him.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday again rebuffed President Trump’s push to throw out a jury’s $5 million finding that he sexually abused the writer E. Jean Carroll at a New York City department store in the mid-1990s and later defamed her.

The Republican president’s lawyers had asked the justices to reconsider their refusal to hear his appeal. The court denied Trump’s petition along with several others.

It’s unusual — although not unheard of — for the court to grant such requests. Trump paid the judgment shortly after the court declined to take up his appeal in June.

Trump and the Justice Department are also asking the high court to toss out a second Carroll verdict totaling $83 million. They argue he’s immune from being sued over comments he made about her in 2019, when he was president. The court has not yet acted on that appeal.

Carroll is a longtime advice columnist and former TV talk show host. She testified at a 2023 trial that Trump turned a friendly 1990s encounter into a violent attack in the dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury retailer across the street from Trump Tower in Manhattan. The jury found Trump liable for defaming Carroll when he denied her allegation in 2022.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing.

The Associated Press does not identify people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they come forward publicly, as Carroll has done.

Whitehurst writes for the Associated Press.

Wealth, perhaps second only to loyalty, has been a prized attribute for Donald Trump during his second presidency.

The number of people worth at least $100 million whom the Republican president has appointed to his administration is more than four times the combined total under the three previous presidents, according to a report from the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen.

It’s the numbers for the Trump administration, in the context of previous administrations, that stand out in Public Citizen’s report, published on Monday. In all, 57 Trump officials are worth at least $100 million, including 17 ambassadors and the remaining 40 in senior posts across the executive branch.

Look no further than Trump’s Cabinet. Eight of its 23 members fit the category, notably Treasury Secretary Howard Lutnick and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, both billionaires.

The president, himself a billionaire, has described his inclination toward appointing the ultrawealthy as deference to financial success. And yet, Trump, who owes his White House comeback to support from middle-income, working Americans drawn to his pledge to lower everyday costs, now faces a midterm election electorate decidedly less keen on his handling of the economy.

Presidents have long sought counsel from the nation’s wealthiest people and tapped some for high-profile administrative leadership roles. Likewise, presidents routinely reward wealthy and influential supporters with ambassadorships.

Among the most notable examples is Andrew Mellon, the aluminum, oil and banking tycoon who was among the handful of the nation’s wealthiest people in the 1920s and served as treasury secretary for three presidents.

The Trump officials worth at least $100 million include Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg and Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler, who are also billionaires, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and special envoy Steve Witkoff, both worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

By comparison, Republican George W. Bush’s administration and Democrat Joe Biden’s each included five members worth $100 million or more. Democrat Barack Obama’s included three, the report states.

A government populated by so many of the economic elite presents potential problems, the report’s authors said.

“When the people holding the reins of government are drawn overwhelmingly from the ranks of the ultra-rich, it leads to misplaced incentives and corruption, and begs the question, ‘Whose interests they are truly serving?” said Lisa Gilbert, Public Citizen’s co-president.

The list does not include Trump, whose net worth Forbes estimates at more than $6 billion. Nor does it include space and social media giant Elon Musk, who advised Trump last year on an effort to reduce the federal government’s size, scope and workforce and is the world’s wealthiest person, with a net worth Forbes estimates at about $860 billion.

Trump’s views are well established: Financial success is evidence of executive mastery and negotiating strength.

“They have great competence, those people. Incredible competence. Some of the smartest business leaders,” Trump said last year in explaining why he put considerable weight on advice from business executives.

He has also pointed to investments by wealthy people as a signal of future economic growth. To encourage billionaires to deliver, Trump, in his first year back in the White House, pursued policies on artificial intelligence and financial regulation that could benefit wealthy people, along with tax cuts and reduced regulatory burdens for large-scale investments.

Still, last month, only 32% of U.S. adults approved of Trump’s handling of the economy, down from 40% at the beginning of his second term and as his Republican Party faces headwinds in its attempt to hold both majorities in Congress in November.

Beaumont writes for the Associated Press.

The next Los Angeles City Councilmember to represent the West San Fernando Valley will either be a former small business owner backed by the Police Protective League or a career public-sector staffer who has racked up a long list of endorsements from unions and Democratic lawmakers.

Tim Gaspar, 44, founded an eponymous insurance agency in the Valley, which he sold in 2021and is now campaigning full time to win the Third District council seat, according to campaign spokesperson Haley Townes. He was the top vote-getter in the June 2 primary, garnering 46.1% of the vote.

Barri Worth Girvan, 43, was a close second with 42.5% of the vote. She is the director of community affairs for Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsay Horvath and previously held staff positions with former L.A. mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former Democratic state senator Bob Hertzberg.

The winner of the Nov. 3 runoff will replace termed-out council member Bob Blumenfield, who recently endorsed Gaspar, as did Christopher Celona, the third-place finisher in the primary.

“We feel like those are the endorsements that resonate with voters here,” Gaspar told a group of voters at a recent campaign event.

L.A. City Council Candidate Tim Gaspar speaks with Dr. Lawrence Kaplan during a Kids on the Spectrum Bowling League event at Lucky Strike Bowling Alley this month.

(Arwen Clemans/Los Angeles Times)

In an interview, Gaspar said the City Council could benefit from his business experience to counter members whose backgrounds are mostly in public policy or community organizing.

“They’re missing the business perspective,” he said. “Sometimes you need to do things that might be unpopular if it’s going to be something that benefits the greater good. A healthy economy is the tide that raises all ships.”

L.A. City Council Barri Worth Girvan chats wth LAPD Capt. Rudy Lopez while greeting voters during a recent neighborhood National Night Out event in Canoga Park’s Lanark Park.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Worth Girvan, by contrast, says her years of experience in the public sector will ensure that she can best navigate City Hall to advocate for the district’s interests.

“Delivering core city services is my bread and butter,” she said in an interview. “If your trash isn’t picked up, if your trees aren’t trimmed, if your street lights aren’t working, if you pick up the phone to call 911 and nobody responds, then not only is your neighborhood not safe, but your city is not working for you.”

Gaspar has a huge lead in fund-raising, reporting more than $180,000 in donations to his runoff campaign through June 30, compared with about $31,000 for Worth Girvan.

In addition, companies and special interests including Airbnb, Uber, the California Apartment Association, the L.A. Police Protective League and IBEW Local 18 spent $1.39 million through independent expenditure committees in the primary race.

Airbnb spokeswoman Nicolette Velasquez said the candidates it backs, including Gaspar, are in favor of expanding short-term rental policies to allow homeowners to supplement their income by renting out their homes. Hotel companies and the unions representing hotel workers oppose such expanding the short-term rental market out of existing housing stock.

Worth Girvan asserts that her second-place finish in June was effectively “a virtual tie” given all the money companies and others spent to back Gaspar.

“We were massively outspent with that kind of money, but the voters clearly spoke, and we’re expecting an even broader electorate in the general,” she said.

Tim Gaspar outside the Lucky Strike Bowling Alley.

(Arwen Clemans/Los Angeles Times)

Gaspar’s contributors in the runoff include billionaire developer Rick Caruso and the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce.

Worth Girvan has picked up donations from state Assemblyman Mark Gonzalez (D-Boyle Heights), former Democratic state Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and former Los Angeles City Council member David Ryu, according to her filing.

She also touts endorsements from a long list of Democratic lawmakers, including state Sen. Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica) and Rep. Luz Rivas (D-North Hollywood)., and has strong backing from labor including the local chapters of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and the Service Employees International Union and the including the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor.

“Barri was a clear choice for us,” said Devin Osiri, Chief of Staff at the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor. “Our unions have actually worked with her at all three levels of government. Her reputation, her professional resume from the Valley and her personal story are just more reflective of the LA Federation of Labor.”

The two candidates differ on housing policy.

Barri Worth Girvan meets voters at the National Night Out event in Canoga Park’s Lanark Park.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Worth Girvan said she supports more housing development, particularly near transit lines, saying the West Valley “needs to do our part” to scale up construction and bring housing prices down.

Gaspar said District 3 is already doing its part to bring in new housing development in areas like Warner Center, and remains skeptical of increasing density in single-family home neighborhoods.

He opposes rent control and some of the city’s current tenant protections, and said at the campaign event that he has a “zero tolerance policy” for homeless encampments.

Both candidates say public safety is their top priority, and they support expanding the Los Angeles Police Department.

SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea on Monday expressed hopes for resumption of diplomacy between the U.S. and North Korea to ease animosities on the Korean Peninsula, as President Trump’s order to cut military exercises with South Korea caused concerns it might hurt the allies’ readiness against North Korean threats.

Trump cited his good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for the decision, a likely bid to reengage with Kim, who views U.S.-South Korean military exercises as invasion rehearsals. But experts say the North Korean leader, now emboldened by his advancing nuclear arsenal and expanding military cooperation with Russia, won’t likely return to talks unless he is assured of serious U.S. concessions.

The 11-day, summertime Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises began Monday morning as scheduled and it wasn’t known which parts of the training were being downsized. Trump’s announcement baffled many in South Korea, a key U.S. ally in Asia where national security is a top priority due to threats from nuclear-armed North Korea.

Trump orders military to ‘substantially reduce’ drills

Trump said in a social media post that the exercises are not only costly but “send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile” to North Korea, which he said “has been unthreatening and respectful” during his time in the White House.

Trump instructed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to “substantially reduce” the exercises. He added that he recently asked President Lee Jae Myung if South Korea would join the U.S. in the “denuclearization” of Iran, “and they said, ‘No thanks!’”

Trump’s move is the latest example of the American president appearing to turn against an ally in favor of a leader cast by previous administrations as an adversary. Trump and others in his administration also have railed against NATO allies over a perceived lack of support for his war against Iran, even as they seek to confront an increasingly aggressive Russia in the Baltic region.

The trust many South Koreans have in the U.S. has eroded following a tariff war instigated by Trump’s administration and his transactional approach to security.

South Korea hopes for talks between U.S. and North Korea

The office of South Korea’s president said later Monday that the government hopes “friendly relationship” between Trump and Kim would lead to “meaningful dialogue” between the U.S. and North Korea and start discussions on promoting peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula. It said that South Korea will make necessary diplomatic efforts for that.

South Korea and the U.S. are closely discussing practical and military contributions that can be made to restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, according to South Korea’s presidential office.

Lee is a liberal who espouses improved ties with North Korea. Since taking office last year, his government has taken proactive steps to improve ties with North Korea, including turning off front line loudspeakers that blared K-pop music and world news. On Saturday, Lee offered to hold talks to formally end the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

The conservative People Power Party, the main opposition party, lambasted Lee for allegedly “turning a blind eye on the public’s security concerns” caused by Trump’s announcement and prioritizing hopes for U.S.-North Korea diplomacy.

North Korea has shunned any talks with South Korea and the U.S. and accelerated weapons testing activities since Kim’s high-stakes nuclear diplomacy with Trump broke down in 2019. Kim also has bolstered his diplomatic credentials by aligning with Russia over its war against Ukraine and taking steps to deepen cooperation with China.

In September 2025, Kim suggested he could resume talks with the American president if the U.S. drops “its delusional obsession with denuclearization” of North Korea. Experts say Kim likely aims to use his enlarged nuclear arsenal to win major concessions like extensive sanctions relief.

“Trump’s recent social media posts about Kim Jong Un suggest a willingness to reengage, but North Korea is busy profiting from Russia’s war against Ukraine while modernizing its own military,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

Downsizing the U.S. and South Korean drills “can damage alliance coordination, slow the process of South Korea taking on greater responsibility for its own defense, and weaken deterrence against possible conflicts in Asia,” Easley said.

Duyeon Kim, a senior analyst at Washington’s Center for a New American Security, said “reducing joint drills weakens military readiness over time against another potential North Korean attack.”

Military drills test tactics and anger North Korea

South Korea’s military earlier said the Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises this year would be similar to previous years in scale, with about 18,000 South Korean soldiers taking part.

The U.S. military said the drills would incorporate lessens from recent conflicts such as North Korea’s battlefield experiences in the Russia-Ukraine front, while including a live-fire exercise to test joint precision targeting and maneuver, a wet gap crossing and distribution of prepositioned military equipment.

North Korea’s Foreign Ministry on Friday accused the U.S. and South Korea of plotting more provocative drills this year and vowed to respond with “a new level of a deterrent.” Earlier this month, North Korea fired two ballistic missiles into the sea in a likely protest of the drills.

Duyeon Kim, the analyst, said North Korea uses U.S.-South Korean drills “for domestic propaganda purposes to create a false narrative of a hostile America and justify its nuclear weapons program.”

This is not the first time Trump has sought to suspend the drills. After his first summit with Kim in 2018, Trump unilaterally announced the suspension of the U.S.-South Korean summertime exercises, calling them “very provocative” and “tremendously expensive.”

Kim Dong-yub, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, said North Korea feels less urgency to return to talks with the U.S. and South Korea now than when it entered talks with its rivals in 2018, but is unlikely to completely ignore Trump’s overture.

He predicted North Korea will likely say it has noted Trump’s post but will wait for further action showing the U.S. intends to drop hostilities against North Korea.

Kim writes for the Associated Press.

SACRAMENTO — California’s next governor, Xavier Becerra, is a “small ball” player, to borrow a baseball term. He probably won’t be swinging for the fences like Govs. Gavin Newsom and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

But he also won’t be striking out a lot trying to hit home runs, like Newsom and Schwarzenegger.

Democrat Newsom has rapped some doubles, most notably streamlining the long-abused California Environmental Quality Act that has slowed housing development for decades and increased the cost of homeownership.

Republican Schwarzenegger slammed a home run when he signed Democratic legislation (AB 32) kicking off California’s nation-leading fight against climate change.

But stars Newsom and Schwarzenegger frequently fanned at the plate while overreaching.

Gov. Jerry Brown? He had the “good eye,” another baseball term referring to a batter adept at spotting a good pitch to swing at and knowing when to lay off. Brown was very choosy and strategic — a solid player in his second tenure as governor.

We don’t know for sure what type of governor Becerra, 68, will be. More like the low-profile but feisty Pete Wilson? Or the dull, but dedicated and determined George Deukmejian? Certainly not an all-star complete player like Gov. Ronald Reagan.

We can only surmise based on Becerra’s long record of public service — legislator, congressman, state attorney general and U.S. Health secretary in the Biden administration.

That, and how he’s approaching his election campaign — basically the same way he has performed throughout his career: slow, steady, cautious. A gradual, careful climb to the top in California.

A workhorse, not a show horse, using a tired cliche that’s applicable to Becerra.

Framed by the background of struggling, working class Mexican immigrant parents — roots the candidate never forgets and frequently mentions.

We do know one thing for sure: He’ll be elected governor in November — California’s first elected Latino governor in history.

We’ll go through the motions of watching two candidates “compete.” But there’s no way that a moderate, essentially clean Democrat can lose in California to a Republican former Fox News host whose only previous political gig was as strategist for a British prime minister and — most damning — who is endorsed by the detested, despicable President Trump.

GOP candidate Steve Hilton contends that Trump’s unpopularity in California “doesn’t matter because we’re not talking about national policies here. This is about what we can do in our state to make life better for Californians.”

One thing we can do is continue to fight back against Trump. Becerra vehemently pledges to do that and points to his successful record as attorney general blocking the president’s policies in court.

Trump’s national policies don’t matter in California? Wrong. He shrinks federal healthcare funds, attempts to drill for oil off the pristine coast, invades our cities with the National Guard and poisons protection for salmon and other endangered species.

Californians will be voting against Trump up and down the ballot in November.

Back to Becerra.

Small ball is basically about playing methodically, scoring one run at a time rather than relying on home runs and extra-base hits, moving runners with walks, bunts, stolen bases and bloop singles. Patience and careful incrementalism. That’s Becerra.

“I would prefer not to run on inflated promises that then I can’t deliver on,” Becerra told Politico reporter Melanie Mason last week at a public forum in Sacramento. “I’m not going to promise you 3 million [new housing] units because that’s where I can’t go. That’s an inflated promise. But I will tell you we will build. There will be more Californians who own a home.”

Newsom promised to build 3.5 million new housing units when he ran for election in 2018 — and dramatically struck out.

Becerra told reporters that “realistically” he could double the roughly 100,000 new units annually being built today. A bloop single.

The Democrat made a small ball proposal last week. He pledged two free hours of electricity daily for low-income households. Details will be negotiated with the state Public Utilities Commission and presumably private utilities like Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric.

Becerra envisions, for example, that a family of four earning less than $82,500 annually would get two hours of free electricity mid-day when regional demand is low and solar is generating lots of unused energy.

So, if it’s unused electricity why not make it free for practically everyone regardless of their income? Maybe that could be considered. Probably not.

One thing we can look forward to: A full-time governor who won’t be dividing his time running for president. He’ll be solely focused on the job of governing.

He’ll also fully understand and respect the process of legislating — as a former member of the U.S. House Democratic leadership — and presumably feel comfortable dealing with legislative honchos.

Becerra already has one devoted fan in the Legislature: Powerful Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D-Hollister).

“This is a person who is always just incredibly focused, someone who is very engaged,” Rivas told Politico’s Jeremy White last week.

“One quality about Xavier is he doesn’t wake up every morning thinking how he can make headlines or be on the front page of our newspapers.

“He’s someone [who] doesn’t ever have to speak the loudest but you can’t mistake that for being passive. … He’s intensely competitive. He’s extremely persistent. … He’s going to have an ambitious plan and an agenda.”

OK, we’re all ears. We’d like to hear about it before election day. But don’t count on it. Small ballers tend to be agonizingly cautious, even when they end up winning.

What else you should be reading

The must-read: Californians split on proposed tax on billionaires, sour on voter ID requirement, poll shows
What the … : California’s bid to outlaw ‘glow-in-the-dark rabbits’ and ‘unicorn horses’ fails
The L.A. Times Special: What’s at stake — legally and politically — in Paramount merger

Until next week,
George Skelton

—
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Aug. 17 (UPI) — Britain’s Reform U.K. party said Monday that it would slash almost $68B from welfare, were it to win power at the next election.

The largest single ticket-items, saving $58.3 billion, would come from halting welfare payments to non-citizens and a shake up of disability and ill-health benefits.

Cutting off nationals of other countries, including those with settled status and resident EU nationals would save $28.5 billion by year five, according to Reform, but would breach the country’s 2019 Brexit deal with Brussels and would therefore require it to be renegotiated.

Foreign nationals would become ineligible for six main benefits from the state including “universal credit,” housing payments, free childcare and unemployment, child and disability checks.

All families whose children were born in Britain would continue to receive payments for each child under 16 [under 20 if in non-higher education or training] and free school meals for those with after-tax household incomes of $10,000 or less.

Danny Kruger, Reform’s work and pensions spokesman, told BBC’s Breakfast program it was fair that people requiring welfare should have it paid by the country of which they are a citizen.

“I’d understand if the Europeans decided to apply the same principle that we are and to deny our nationals access to their welfare system and we will pay for that ourselves.”

Kruger acknowledged that many settled overseas nationals living in Britain would simply apply for — and would likely be granted — British citizenship, insisting that the savings calculated took account of that scenario.

He said the plan had also taken into account that the EU would likely take reciprocal action, halting welfare payments to Britons who had not become citizens of the EU country where they were living.

The other biggest area of savings — $29.8 billion — would come from reforming disability benefits, including scrapping so-called personal independence payments for disabled people and replacing them with another cash benefit available only to those deemed “gravely ill and severely challenged.”

Kruger stressed that Reform accepted some people were unable to ever work, saying that those people would continue to be properly supported and would no longer be required to repeatedly be assessed to see if they were still eligible.

The pro-EU Best For Britain group criticized Reform’s plan, in particular the potential negative impact on relations with the EU.

“Our polling shows that people do want to renegotiate our relationship with Europe, but by moving closer, not by damaging ties with vital allies and punishing our neighbours, colleagues and friends who have settled status here,” said policy executive director Tom Brufatto.

Labour MP Rachael Maskell was critical of the targeting of disability benefits.

“When Pip helps people go to work, play a role in our society and simply live, threatening to remove Pip demonstrates that Reform do not want disabled people to play a full role in our society,” said Maskell who previously led a rebellion by Labour backbenchers against efforts by former Prime Minister Keir Starmer to cut welfare.

In April, the Office for Budget Responsibility said it expected Britain’s welfare bill for 2025-2026 to hit $452.4 billion, equivalent to 10.6% of GDP, and accounting around 24% of all government spending.

However, more than half of all welfare spending goes on pensioners, nearly all of it on the State Pension, an inflation-protected pension which people pay into until they retire and is topped up by the government.