US senators to receive classified Iran briefing, aide to Senator Schumer says
WASHINGTON, June 18 (Reuters) - U.S. senators will receive a classified briefing on Iran early next week, an aide to Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said on Wednesday, as Iran and Israel in recent days have ratcheted up their military attacks on each other.
Earlier, Schumer told reporters that he had requested such a briefing from the Trump administration.
This comes as President Donald Trump on Wednesday declined to say if he had made any decision on whether to join Israel's bombing campaign against Iran.
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The Guardian
29 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Vance attacks Newsom and LA mayor and misnames senator arrested by Ice
JD Vance, the vice-president, on Friday accused California governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass of encouraging violent immigration protests as he used his appearance in Los Angeles to rebut criticism from state and local officials that the Trump administration fueled the unrest by sending in federal officers. Vance also referred to US senator Alex Padilla, the state's first Latino senator, as 'Jose Padilla', a week after the Democrat was forcibly taken to the ground by officers and handcuffed after speaking out during a Los Angeles news conference by homeland security secretary Kristi Noem on immigration raids. 'I was hoping Jose Padilla would be here to ask a question,' Vance said, in an apparent reference to the altercation at Noem's event. 'I guess he decided not to show up because there wasn't a theater. And that's all it is.' He added: 'They want to be able to go back to their far-left groups and to say, 'Look, me, I stood up against border enforcement. I stood up against Donald Trump.'' A spokesperson for Padilla, Tess Oswald, noted in a social media post that Padilla and Vance were formerly colleagues in the Senate and said that Vance should know better. 'He should be more focused on demilitarizing our city than taking cheap shots,' Oswald said. Vance's visit to Los Angeles to tour a multi-agency federal joint operations center and a mobile command center came as demonstrations calmed down in the city and a curfew was lifted this week. That followed over a week of clashes between protesters and police and outbreaks of vandalism and looting that followed immigration raids across southern California. Trump's dispatching of his top emissary to Los Angeles at a time of turmoil surrounding the Israel-Iran war and the US's future role in it signals the political importance Trump places on his hard-line immigration policies. Vance echoed the president's harsh rhetoric toward California Democrats as he sought to blame them for the protests in the city. 'Gavin Newsom and Karen Bass, by treating the city as a sanctuary city, have basically said that this is open season on federal law enforcement,' Vance said after he toured federal immigration enforcement offices. 'What happened here was a tragedy,' Vance added. 'You had people who were doing the simple job of enforcing the law and they had rioters egged on by the governor and the mayor, making it harder for them to do their job. That is disgraceful. And it is why the president has responded so forcefully.' Newsom's spokesperson Izzy Gardon said in a statement: 'The vice-president's claim is categorically false. The governor has consistently condemned violence and has made his stance clear.' In a statement on X, Newsom responded to Vance's reference to 'Jose Padilla', saying the comment was no accident. Jose Padilla also is the name of a convicted al-Qaida terrorism plotter during George W Bush's administration, who was sentenced to two decades in prison. Padilla was arrested in 2002 at Chicago O'Hare airport during the tense months after the 9/11 attacks and accused of a 'dirty bomb' mission. It later emerged through US interrogation of other al-Qaida suspects that the 'mission' was only a sketchy idea, and those claims never surfaced in the terrorism case. Responding to the outrage, Taylor Van Kirk, a spokesperson for Vance, said of the vice-president: 'He must have mixed up two people who have broken the law.' Federal immigration authorities have been ramping up arrests across the country to fulfill Trump's promise of mass deportations. Todd Lyons, the head of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, has defended his tactics against criticism that authorities are being too heavy-handed. The friction in Los Angeles began on 6 June, when federal agents conducted a series of immigration sweeps in the region that have continued since. Amid the protests and over the objections of state and local officials, Trump ordered the deployment of roughly 4,000 national guard troops and 700 marines to the second-largest US city, home to 3.8 million people. Trump has said that without the military's involvement, Los Angeles 'would be a crime scene like we haven't seen in years'. Newsom has depicted the military intervention as the onset of a much broader effort by Trump to overturn political and cultural norms at the heart of the nation's democracy. Earlier Friday, Newsom urged Vance to visit victims of the deadly January wildfires while in southern California and talk with Trump, who earlier this week suggested his feud with the governor might influence his consideration of $40bn in federal wildfire aid for California. 'I hope we get that back on track,' Newsom wrote on X. 'We are counting on you, Mr Vice President.' Vance did not mention either request during his appearance on Friday.
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Trump whines he won't get a Nobel Peace Prize while weighing US strike on Iran
President Donald Trump has again complained he can't win a Nobel Peace Prize, this time, as he weighs whether to attack Iran. Trump took to Truth Social on Friday evening to highlight the peace deal he said his administration brokered between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda while lamenting he'll be denied the Nobel Peace Prize 'no matter what.' 'This is a Great Day for Africa and, quite frankly, a Great Day for the World,' Trump wrote. 'I won't get a Nobel Peace Prize for this,' Trump added, before listing other negotiations he says his administration led, including 'stopping the War between Serbia and Kosovo' and 'keeping Peace between Egypt and Ethiopia.' 'No, I won't get a Nobel Peace Prize no matter what I do, including Russia/Ukraine, and Israel/Iran, whatever those outcomes may be, but the people know, and that's all that matters to me,' the president wrote. The post comes a day after Trump said he'd decide whether to strike Iran within the next two weeks. Earlier Friday, the Pakistani government said it plans to nominate Trump for the prize, citing his 'decisive diplomatic intervention and pivotal leadership during the recent India-Pakistan crisis.' Last month, India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire, a deal in which Trump claims he played a significant role. But Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi disagrees. Modi 'clearly conveyed' to Trump that he did not play a role in the ceasefire during a recent phone call, Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said on Tuesday. Instead, Modi says the ceasefire was achieved through direct talks with Pakistan. This isn't the first time Trump has pined over the Nobel Peace Prize, which is awarded to a 'person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.' Trump has appeared frustrated that his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, received the award in 2009, less than a year into his first term. Obama received the award for his 'extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples,' and particularly his 'vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.' Last year, Trump claimed that if he 'were named Obama,' he would've 'had the Nobel Prize given to me in 10 seconds.' John Bolton, Trump's former national security adviser who has since become a vocal opponent of the Republican, once told The New York Times that the 'center of his public life is the greater glory of Donald Trump, and the Nobel Peace Prize would be a nice thing to hang on the wall.'
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
US evacuates 79 staff and family from embassy in Israel as more Americans ask how to leave
The U.S. evacuated 79 staff and families from the U.S. Embassy in Israel on Friday as the conflict between Israel and Iran intensifies and growing numbers of private American citizens seek information on how to leave Israel and Iran. An internal State Department memo says the military flight, the second known to have occurred this week, left Tel Aviv for Sofia, Bulgaria, where some or all of the passengers were to get a connecting charter flight to Washington. The document, which was obtained by The Associated Press, also said that more than 6,400 U.S. citizens in Israel had filled out an online form on Friday alone asking for information about when and if the U.S. government would organize evacuation flights. An additional 3,265 people, some of whom may also have competed the form, called an emergency number seeking assistance. The document estimated that between 300 and 500 people per day could need evacuation assistance should the U.S. decide to offer flights or ships to get Americans out, as the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has said is being considered. There are some 700,000 Americans in Israel, many of them dual nationals, according to estimates, although the exact number at any given time is unclear because U.S. citizens are not required to notify the embassy if they are there or when they might leave. Earlier Friday, before the memo was distributed, State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters that more than 25,000 Americans had reached out for information on leaving Israel, the West Bank and Iran. She told reporters that those people had sought 'information and support' and were 'seeking guidance' on departing. She would not give a breakdown of where the queries had come from and would not comment on embassy evacuations. In Iran, the document said that at least 84 U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, or Green Card holders, had crossed into neighboring Azerbaijan by land since the conflict began and that an additional 774 had been granted permission to enter as of Friday. Nearly 200 American citizens and Green Card holders are awaiting permission to travel overland from Iran to neighboring Turkmenistan, it said.
