United News of Bangladesh

President-elect Donald Trump's choice for defense secretary is still up in the air, but it is a sure bet he will look to reshape the Pentagon and pick a loyalist. During his tumultuous first term, five men held the job as Pentagon chief only to resign, be fired or serve briefly as a stopgap. While he has yet to announce a decision, the names of potential Pentagon chiefs stretch from the well known — such as Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee — to an array of former administration loyalists, including retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, who held national security posts during Trump's first term. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had been floated, but Trump said on social media Saturday that Pompeo would not be joining the new administration. Rep. Michael Waltz of Florida had also been mentioned, but he's now been tapped to be Trump's national security adviser. Some decisions may linger for days as candidates jostle for attention and officials wait for the final results from House races, weighing whether Republican lawmakers can be tapped or if others are a safer pick to avoid a new election for an empty congressional seat. “The choice is going to tell us a lot about how he will deal with the Pentagon,” said Mark Cancian, senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a retired Marine colonel. He said someone with a deep military background may not be as dramatic of a change as others who may be viewed as stronger Trump loyalists. With a number of top jobs at the State Department, National Security Council and Defense Department up for grabs, Trump is expected to lean toward those who back his desire to end U.S. involvement in any wars, use the military to control the U.S.-Mexico border and take a hard line on Iran. The key test, however, will be loyalty and a willingness to do whatever Trump wants, as he seeks to avoid the pushback he got from the Pentagon the first time around. Trump's relationship with his civilian and military leaders during those years was fraught with tension, confusion and frustration, as they struggled to temper or even simply interpret presidential tweets and pronouncements that blindsided them with abrupt policy decisions they weren't prepared to explain or defend. Time after time, senior Pentagon officials — both in and out of uniform — worked to dissuade, delay or derail Trump, on issues ranging from his early demand to prohibit transgender troops from serving in the military and his announcements that he was pulling troops out of Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan to his push to use troops to police the border and stem civil unrest on the streets of Washington. In his first administration, Trump hewed toward what he considered strong military men and defense industry executives. Initially enamored with generals, Trump over time found them to be not loyal enough. “He soured on them,” Cancian said. “They were not as pliable as he had thought. ... I’ve heard people speculate that maybe the chairman would be fired. So that’s something to watch.” Air Force Gen. CQ Brown, took over as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in October 2023 for a four-year term, but military leaders serve at the pleasure of the president. Brown, a combat pilot and just the second Black officer to serve as chairman, spoke out after the police killing of George Floyd, describing the bias he faced in his life and career. Trump also is expected to choose someone as defense secretary with disdain for equity and diversity programs and less likely to counter his plans based on limits laid out in the Constitution and rule of law. But he also may well push for increased defense spending, at least initially, including on U.S. missile defense. A key overriding concern is that Trump will select someone who won't push back against potentially unlawful or dangerous orders or protect the military's longstanding apolitical status. On Thursday, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin raised that red flag. In a message to the force, he said the U.S. military stands ready to “obey all lawful orders from its civilian chain of command,” adding that troops swear an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States.” He echoed retired Army Gen. Mark Milley's pronouncement during a speech as he closed out four years as chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “We don’t take an oath to a king or a queen or to a tyrant or a dictator. And we don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator,” Milley said. “We don’t take an oath to an individual. We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we’re willing to die to protect it.” Trump’s first defense chief, retired Marine Gen. Jim Mattis, learned quickly to stay off his boss’ radar by largely eliminating press conferences that Trump could see. Mattis and Milley, along with Trump's chief of staff John Kelly, a retired Marine general, and retired Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford, who also served as Joint Chiefs chairman, all worked quietly behind the scenes to temper some of Trump's decisions. They stalled his demands that troops be quickly and completely withdrawn from Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan and managed to prevent the use of active-duty troops to quell civil unrest in Washington. Two years in, Mattis abruptly resigned in December 2018 in frustration over Trump’s national security policies, including a perceived disdain for allies and his demands to pull all troops out of Syria. Patrick Shanahan, the deputy defense secretary, took over as acting Pentagon chief but withdrew as the nominee six months later due to personal family problems that were made public. Then-Army Secretary Mark Esper took over in an acting role, but he had to step aside briefly when nominated, so Navy Secretary Richard Spencer served as the acting chief until Esper was confirmed. Esper was fired days after Trump lost the 2020 election, largely because the president did not believe him to be loyal enough. Trump was especially angry over Esper’s public opposition to invoking the two-centuries-old Insurrection Act to deploy active-duty troops in the District of Columbia during unrest following the police killing of George Floyd. Trump named Christopher Miller, a retired Army officer who has been director of the National Counterterrorism Center, to serve as acting secretary and surrounded him with staunch loyalists. That is the Pentagon that officials quietly say they expect to see in Trump's new administration.

As money continues to pour into crypto following Donald Trump's victory last week, bitcoin has climbed to yet another record high. The world's largest cryptocurrency topped $87,000 for the first time on Monday. As of around 3:45 p.m. ET, bitcoin's price stood at $87,083, per CoinDesk, up over 28% in the last week alone. That's part of a rally across cryptocurrencies and crypto-related investments since Trump won the U.S. presidential election last week. Analysts credit much of the recent gains to an anticipated “crypto-friendly” nature of the incoming administration, which could translate into more regulatory clarity but also leeway. Still, as with everything in the volatile cryptoverse, the future is hard to predict. And while some are bullish, others continue to warn of investment risks. Here's what you need to know. Back up. What is cryptocurrency again? Cryptocurrency has been around for a while now, but has come under the spotlight in recent years. In basic terms, cryptocurrency is digital money. This kind of currency is designed to work through an online network without a central authority — meaning it's typically not backed by any government or banking institution — and transactions get recorded with technology called a blockchain. Bitcoin is the largest and oldest cryptocurrency, although other assets like Ethereum, Tether and Dogecoin have gained popularity over the years. Some investors see cryptocurrency as a “digital alternative” to traditional money — but it can be very volatile, and reliant on larger market conditions. Why are bitcoin and other crypto assets soaring now? A lot of it has to do with the outcome of last week's election. Trump was previously a crypto skeptic, but changed his mind and embraced cryptocurrencies during this year's presidential race. He has pledged to make the U.S. “the crypto capital of the planet” and create a “strategic reserve” of bitcoin. His campaign accepted donations in cryptocurrency and he courted fans at a bitcoin conference in July. He also launched World Liberty Financial, a new venture with family members to trade cryptocurrencies. Crypto industry players welcomed Trump’s victory, in hopes that he would be able to push through legislative and regulatory changes that they’ve long lobbied for. And Trump had previously promised that, if elected, he would remove the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Gary Gensler, who has been leading the U.S. government’s crackdown on the crypto industry and repeatedly called for more oversight. “Crypto rallied as Election Day progressed into the night and as it became increasingly clear that Trump would emerge victorious,” Citi analysts David Glass and Alex Saunders wrote in a Friday research note, pointing to larger industry sentiment around Trump being “crypto-friendly" and a potential shift in regulatory backing. Even before the post-election rally, assets like bitcoin posted notable gains over the past year or so. Much of the credit goes to early success of a new way to invest in the asset: spot bitcoin ETFs, which were approved by U.S. regulators in January. Inflows into spot ETFs, or exchange-traded funds, "have been the dominant driver of Bitcoin returns from some time, and we expect this relationship to continue in the near-term,” Glass and Saunders noted. They added that spot crypto ETFs saw some of their largest inflows on record in the days following the election. What are the risks? Crypto assets like bitcoin have a history of drastic swings in value — which can come suddenly and happen over the weekend or overnight in trading that continues at all hours, every day. In short, history shows you can lose money as quickly as you've made it. Long-term price behavior relies on larger market conditions. At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, bitcoin stood at just over $5,000. Its price climbed to nearly $69,000 by November 2021, in a time marked by high demand for technology assets, but later crashed during an aggressive series of Federal Reserve rate hikes aimed at curbing inflation. Then came the 2022 collapse of FTX, which significantly undermined confidence in crypto overall. At the start of last year, a single bitcoin could be had for less than $17,000. Investors, however, began returning in large numbers as inflation started to cool — and gains skyrocketed on the anticipation and then early success of spot ETFs. While some crypto supporters see the potential for more record-breaking days, experts still stress caution, especially for small-pocketed investors. “Investors should only dabble in crypto with money that they can be prepared to lose,” Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown, said last week. “Because we’ve seen these wild swings in the past.” What about the climate impact? Assets like bitcoin are produced through a process called “mining," which consumes a lot of energy. And operations relying on pollutive sources have drawn particular concern over the years. Recent research published by the United Nations University and Earth’s Future journal found that the carbon footprint of 2020-2021 bitcoin mining across 76 nations was equivalent to the emissions from burning 84 billion pounds of coal or running 190 natural gas-fired power plants. Coal satisfied the bulk of bitcoin’s electricity demands (45%), followed by natural gas (21%) and hydropower (16%). In the U.S., the Energy Information Administration notes that crypto mining across the country has “grown very rapidly over the last several years," adding that grid planners have begun to express concern over increases in related electricity demand. Preliminary estimates released by the EIA in February suggest that annual electricity use from crypto mining probably represents between 0.6% to 2.3% of U.S. electricity consumption. Environmental impacts of bitcoin mining boil largely down to the energy source used. Industry analysts have maintained that clean energy has increased in use in recent years, coinciding with rising calls for climate protections from regulators around the world.

Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday, discussing the ongoing war in Ukraine, according to a report by the Washington Post on Sunday. The US president-elect reportedly advised Putin to avoid escalating the conflict and reminded him of “Washington’s sizeable military presence in Europe.” Trump also expressed an interest in further discussions aimed at resolving the war, with the Washington Post noting that he pushed for a resolution “soon.” During his campaign, Trump claimed he could end the war “within a day,” though he has yet to detail how he would achieve such a swift resolution. What will Trump do on Day 1 in White House? Mass deportation in the cards? A former US official familiar with the call, speaking to the Washington Post, suggested that Trump may want to avoid beginning his second term with a worsening Ukraine crisis, describing it as an incentive for him to discourage escalation. In a statement to the outlet, Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said: “President Trump won a historic election decisively and leaders from around the world know America will return to prominence on the world stage. That is why leaders have begun the process of developing stronger relationships with the 45th and 47th president because he represents global peace and stability.” Trump reportedly spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier on Wednesday. Meanwhile, President Joe Biden has invited Trump to the Oval Office on Wednesday. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Sunday that Biden’s top priorities for the meeting will include ensuring a peaceful transfer of power and discussing global issues, including developments in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Washington has allocated tens of billions of dollars in military and economic aid to Ukraine. Trump has consistently criticized this funding, aligning with other Republican lawmakers in opposition to the extensive financial support.  

Donald Trump has said he wouldn’t be a dictator — “except for Day 1." According to his own statements, he's got a lot to do on that first day in the White House. His list includes starting up the mass deportation of migrants, rolling back Biden administration policies on education, reshaping the federal government by firing potentially thousands of federal employees he believes are secretly working against him, and pardoning people who were arrested for their role in the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. “I want to close the border, and I want to drill, drill, drill," he said of his Day 1 plans. When he took office in 2017, he had a long list, too, including immediately renegotiating trade deals, deporting migrants and putting in place measures to root out government corruption. Those things didn't happen all at once. How many executive orders in the first week? “There will be tens of them. I can assure you of that," Trump’s national press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, told Fox News on Sunday. Here's a look at what Trump has said he will do in his second term and whether he can do it the moment he steps into the White House: Make most of his criminal cases go away, at least the federal ones Trump has said that “within two seconds" of taking office that he would fire Jack Smith, the special counsel who has been prosecuting two federal cases against him. Smith is already evaluating how to wind down the cases because of long-standing Justice Department policy that says sitting presidents cannot be prosecuted. Smith charged Trump last year with plotting to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Trump cannot pardon himself when it comes to his state conviction in New York in a hush money case, but he could seek to leverage his status as president-elect in an effort to set aside or expunge his felony conviction and stave off a potential prison sentence. A case in Georgia, where Trump was charged with election interference, will likely be the only criminal case left standing. It would probably be put on hold until at least 2029, at the end of his presidential term. The Georgia prosecutor on the case just won reelection. Pardon supporters who attacked the Capitol More than 1,500 people have been charged since a mob of Trump supporters spun up by the outgoing president attacked the Capitol almost nearly four years ago. Trump launched his general election campaign in March by not merely trying to rewrite the history of that riot, but positioning the violent siege and failed attempt to overturn the 2020 election as a cornerstone of his bid to return to the White House. As part of that, he called the rioters “unbelievable patriots” and promised to help them “the first day we get into office.” As president, Trump can pardon anyone convicted in federal court, District of Columbia Superior Court or in a military court-martial. He can stop the continued prosecution of rioters by telling his attorney general to stand down. “I am inclined to pardon many of them," Trump said on his social media platform in March when announcing the promise. “I can’t say for every single one, because a couple of them, probably they got out of control.” Dismantle the ‘deep state’ of government workers Trump could begin the process of stripping tens of thousands of career employees of their civil service protections, so they could be more easily fired. He wants to do two things: drastically reduce the federal workforce, which he has long said is an unnecessary drain, and to “totally obliterate the deep state” — perceived enemies who, he believes, are hiding in government jobs. Within the government, there are hundreds of politically appointed professionals who come and go with administrations. There also are tens of thousands of “career” officials, who work under Democratic and Republican presidents. They are considered apolitical workers whose expertise and experience help keep the government functioning, particularly through transitions. Trump wants the ability to convert some of those career people into political jobs, making them easier to dismiss and replace with loyalists. He would try to accomplish that by reviving a 2020 executive order known as “Schedule F.” The idea behind the order was to strip job protections from federal workers and create a new class of political employees. It could affect roughly 50,000 of 2.2 million civilian federal employees. Democratic President Joe Biden rescinded the order when he took office in January 2021. But Congress failed to pass a bill protecting federal employees. The Office of Personnel Management, the federal government’s chief human resources agency, finalized a rule last spring against reclassifying workers, so Trump might have to spend months — or even years — unwinding it. Trump has said he has a particular focus on “corrupt bureaucrats who have weaponized our justice system” and “corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus.” Beyond the firings, Trump wants to crack down on government officials who leak to reporters. He also wants to require that federal employees pass a new civil service test. Impose tariffs on imported goods, especially those from China Trump promised throughout the campaign to impose tariffs on imported goods, particularly those from China. He argued that such import taxes would keep manufacturing jobs in the United States, shrink the federal deficit and help lower food prices. He also cast them as central to his national security agenda. “Tariffs are the greatest thing ever invented," Trump said during a September rally in Flint, Michigan. The size of his pledged tariffs varied. He proposed at least a 10% across-the-board tariff on imported goods, a 60% import tax on goods from China and a 25% tariff on all goods from Mexico — if not more. Trump would likely not need Congress to impose these tariffs, as was clear in 2018, when he imposed them on steel and aluminum imports without going through lawmakers by citing Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. That law, according to the Congressional Research Service, gives a president the power to adjust tariffs on imports that could affect U.S. national security, an argument Trump has made. “We’re being invaded by Mexico,” Trump said at a rally in North Carolina this month. Speaking about the new president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, Trump said: “I’m going to inform her on Day 1 or sooner that if they don’t stop this onslaught of criminals and drugs coming into our country, I’m going to immediately impose a 25% tariff on everything they send into the United States of America.” Roll back protections for transgender students Trump said during the campaign that he would roll back Biden administration action seeking to protect transgender students from discrimination in schools on the first day of his new administration. Opposition to transgender rights was central to the Trump campaign’s closing argument. His campaign ran an ad in the final days of the race against Vice President Kamala Harris in which a narrator said: “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.” The Biden administration announced new Title IX protections in April that made clear treating transgender students differently from their classmates is discrimination. Trump responded by saying he would roll back those changes, pledging to do some on the first day of his new administration and specifically noting he has the power to act without Congress. “We’re going to end it on Day 1,” Trump said in May. “Don’t forget, that was done as an order from the president. That came down as an executive order. And we’re going to change it — on Day 1 it’s going to be changed.” It is unlikely Trump will stop there. Speaking at a Wisconsin rally in June, Trump said “on Day 1" he would “sign a new executive order” that would cut federal money for any school “pushing critical race theory, transgender insanity and other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content onto the lives of our children.” Trump hasn’t said how he would try to cut schools’ federal money, and any widespread rollback would require action from Congress. Drill, drill, drill Trump is looking to reverse climate policies aimed at reducing planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions. With an executive order on Day 1, he can roll back environmental protections, halt wind projects, scuttle the Biden administration's targets that encourage the switch to electric cars and abolish standards for companies to become more environmentally friendly. He has pledged to increase production of U.S. fossil fuels, promising to “drill, drill, drill," when he gets into office on Day 1 and seeking to open the Arctic wilderness to oil drilling, which he claims would lower energy costs. Settle the war between Russia and Ukraine Trump has repeatedly said he could settle the war between Russia and Ukraine in one day. When asked to respond to the claim, Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, said “the Ukrainian crisis cannot be solved in one day.” Leavitt, the Trump press secretary, told Fox News after Trump on Wednesday was declared the winner of the election that he would now be able to “negotiate a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine.” She later said, “It includes, on Day 1, bringing Ukraine and Russia to the negotiating table to end this war.” Russia invaded Ukraine nearly three years ago. Trump, who makes no secret of his admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin, has criticized the Biden administration for giving money to Ukraine to fight the war. At a CNN town hall in May 2023, Trump said: “They’re dying, Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying. And I’ll have that done — I’ll have that done in 24 hours.” He said that would happen after he met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Putin. Begin mass deportations of migrants in the US Speaking last month at his Madison Square Garden rally in New York, Trump said: “On Day 1, I will launch the largest deportation program in American history to get the criminals out. I will rescue every city and town that has been invaded and conquered, and we will put these vicious and bloodthirsty criminals in jail, then kick them the hell out of our country as fast as possible.” In one of his first personnel announcements, Trump announced via social media late Sunday that he would put Tom Homan, his former acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement director, “in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin,” a central part of his agenda. Trump can direct his administration to begin the effort the minute he arrives in office, but it's much more complicated to actually deport the nearly 11 million people who are believed to be in the United States illegally. That would require a huge, trained law enforcement force, massive detention facilities, airplanes to move people and nations willing to accept them. Trump has said he would invoke the Alien Enemies Act. That rarely used 1798 law allows the president to deport anyone who is not an American citizen and is from a country with which there is a “declared war” or a threatened or attempted “invasion or predatory incursion.” He has spoken about deploying the National Guard, which can be activated on orders from a governor. Stephen Miller, a top Trump adviser, said sympathetic Republican governors could send troops to nearby states that refuse to participate. Asked about the cost of his plan, he told NBC News: “It’s not a question of a price tag. It’s not — really, we have no choice. When people have killed and murdered, when drug lords have destroyed countries, and now they’re going to go back to those countries because they’re not staying here. There is no price tag.”

A gut punch for most defendants, Donald Trump turned his criminal conviction into a rallying cry. His supporters put “I’m Voting for the Felon” on T-shirts, hats and lawn signs. “The real verdict is going to be Nov. 5 by the people,” Trump proclaimed after his conviction in New York last spring on 34 counts of falsifying business records. Now, just a week after Trump's resounding election victory, a Manhattan judge is poised to decide whether to uphold the hush money verdict or dismiss it because of a U.S. Supreme Court decision in July that gave presidents broad immunity from criminal prosecution. Judge Juan M. Merchan has said he will issue a written opinion Tuesday on Trump's request to toss his conviction and either order a new trial or dismiss the indictment entirely. Merchan had been expected to rule in September, but put it off “to avoid any appearance” he was trying to sway the election. His decision could be on ice again if Trump takes other steps to delay or end the case. If the judge upholds the verdict, the case would be on track for sentencing Nov. 26 — though that could shift or vanish depending on appeals or other legal maneuvers. Trump's lawyers have been fighting for months to reverse his conviction, which involved efforts to conceal a $130,000 payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels, whose affair allegations threatened to disrupt his 2016 campaign. Trump denies her claim, maintains he did nothing wrong and has decried the verdict as a “rigged, disgraceful” result of a politically motivated “witch hunt” meant to harm his campaign. The Supreme Court’s ruling gives former presidents immunity from prosecution for official acts — things they do as part of their job as president — and bars prosecutors from using evidence of official acts in trying to prove that purely personal conduct violated the law. Trump was a private citizen — campaigning for president, but neither elected nor sworn in — when his then-lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels in October 2016. But Trump was president when Cohen was reimbursed, and Cohen testified that they discussed the repayment arrangement in the Oval Office. Those reimbursements, jurors found, were falsely logged in Trump’s records as legal expenses. Trump’s lawyers contend the Manhattan district attorney's office “tainted” the case with evidence — including testimony about Trump’s first term as president — that shouldn’t have been allowed. Prosecutors maintain that the high court's ruling provides “no basis for disturbing the jury’s verdict.” Trump's conviction, they said, involved unofficial acts — personal conduct for which he is not immune. The Supreme Court didn't define an official act, leaving that to lower courts. Nor did it make clear how its ruling — which arose from one of Trump's two federal criminal cases — pertains to state-level cases like Trump's hush money prosecution. “There are several murky aspects of the court’s ruling, but one that is particularly relevant to this case is the issue of what counts as an official act," said George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin. “And I think it’s extremely difficult to argue that this payoff to this woman does qualify as an official act, for a number of fairly obvious reasons.” Trump’s efforts to erase the verdict have taken on new urgency since his election, with a sentencing date looming at the end of the month and possible punishments ranging from a fine or probation to up to four years in prison. Presidents-elect don't typically enjoy the same legal protections as presidents, but Trump and his lawyers could try to leverage his unique status as a former and future commander-in-chief into something of a “Get Out of Jail Free” card. One likely argument: Trump wouldn't just be saving himself from a potential prison sentence, he'd be sparing the nation from the calamity of its leader behind bars — however remote that possibility is. “He’ll ask every court in the world to intervene if he can, including the Supreme Court, so that could drag things out a bit,” said Syracuse University law professor David Driesen, author of the book, “The Specter of Dictatorship: Judicial Enabling of Presidential Power.” At the same time, Trump has been attempting to again move the case from state court to federal court, where he could also assert immunity. His lawyers have asked the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse a judge’s September ruling denying the transfer. If Merchan orders a new trial, it seems unlikely that could happen while Trump is in office. Trump’s lawyers argued in court papers that, given the Supreme Court ruling, jurors shouldn’t have been allowed to hear about matters including his conversations with then-White House communications director Hope Hicks, nor another aide's testimony about his work practices. Also verboten, they said, was prosecutors’ use of Trump’s 2018 financial disclosure report, which he was required as president to file. A footnote mentioned that Trump reimbursed Cohen in 2017 for unspecified expenses the year before. Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove argued that prosecutors were trying “to assign a criminal motive” to some of Trump’s actions in office to “unfairly prejudice” him. For example, they wrote, prosecutors pushed the “dubious theory" that some of Trump's 2018 tweets were part of a “pressure campaign” to keep Cohen from turning on him. The immunity decision “forecloses inquiry into those motives,” Blanche and Bove wrote. Prosecutors countered that the ruling doesn’t apply to the evidence in question, and that regardless, it’s “only a sliver of the mountains of testimony and documentary proof” the jury considered.    

Days before Senate Republicans pick their new leader, President-elect Donald Trump is pressuring the candidates to change the rules and empower him to appoint some nominees without a Senate vote. Republican Sens. John Thune of South Dakota, John Cornyn of Texas and Rick Scott of Florida are running in a secret ballot election Wednesday to lead the GOP conference and replace longtime GOP leader Mitch McConnell, who is stepping aside from the job after almost two decades. All three have courted Trump's support in the race, vying to show who is the closest to the president-elect as they campaign to become majority leader. Trump has not endorsed in the race, but on Sunday he made clear that he expects the new leader to go around regular Senate order, if necessary, to allow him to fill his Cabinet quickly. In a statement on X and Truth Social, Trump said that the next leader “must agree” to allow him to make appointments when the chamber is on recess, bypassing a confirmation vote. “Any Republican Senator seeking the coveted LEADERSHIP position in the United States Senate must agree to Recess Appointments (in the Senate!), without which we will not be able to get people confirmed in a timely manner,” Trump posted, adding that positions should be filled “IMMEDIATELY!” The Senate has not allowed presidents to make so-called recess appointments since a 2014 Supreme Court ruling limited the president’s power to do so. Since then, the Senate has held brief “pro-forma” sessions when it is out of town for more than 10 days so that a president cannot take advantage of the absence and start filling posts that have not been confirmed. But with Trump’s approval paramount in the race, all three candidates quickly suggested that they might be willing to reconsider the practice. Scott replied to Trump, “100% agree. I will do whatever it takes to get your nominations through as quickly as possible.” And Thune said in a statement that they must “quickly and decisively” act to get nominees in place and that “all options are on the table to make that happen, including recess appointments.” Cornyn said that “It is unacceptable for Senate Ds to blockade President @realDonaldTrump ’s cabinet appointments. If they do, we will stay in session, including weekends, until they relent.” He noted that recess appointments are allowed under the Constitution. The social media exchange on Sunday became a first test for the three candidates since Trump was decisively elected last week to a second term. Trump’s relationship with Congress — especially the advice and consent role afforded to the Senate when it comes to nominations — was tumultuous in his first term as he chafed at resistance to his selections and sought ways to work around lawmakers. With Trump now entering a second term emboldened by his sweeping election victory, he is already signaling that he expects Senate Republicans, and by extension, their new leader, to fall in line behind his Cabinet selections. Trump also posted on Sunday that the Senate should not approve any judges in the weeks before Republicans take power next year — a more difficult demand to fulfill as Democrats will control the floor, and hold the majority of votes, until the new Congress is sworn in on Jan. 3. Trump posted that “Democrats are looking to ram through their Judges as the Republicans fight over Leadership. THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.” With days to go, the race for Senate Republican leader is deeply in flux. Thune and Cornyn are both well-liked, longtime senators who have served as deputies to McConnell and have been seen as the front-runners, despite past statements criticizing Trump. Scott — a longtime friend of Trump’s and fierce ally — has been seen as more of a longshot, but he has mounted an aggressive campaign in recent days on social media and elsewhere with the aim of getting Trump’s endorsement. Senators who are close to Trump, such as Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida, have endorsed Scott, as have tech mogul Elon Musk and other people who have Trump’s ear. “We have to be the change,” Scott said on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures." “That’s what Donald Trump got elected to do, to be the change.” All three candidates are promising that they will be more open and transparent than McConnell was and that they would give senators more power to get their priorities to the floor. They have also tried to make clear that they would have a much different relationship with Trump than McConnell, who once called the former president a “despicable human being” behind closed doors. As the Senate haggles over how to fill Trump’s Cabinet, many of his allies are campaigning for the nominations. Former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said on ABC’s “This Week” that there are “a couple of great options on the table.” Sen. Bill Hagerty, a Republican from Tennessee who served as U.S. ambassador to Japan between 2017 and 2019, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” that one of his greatest honors was to represent the Trump administration overseas. He said he would advance “the positions that President Trump has articulated.” “I’ll do that in whatever role necessary,” said Hagerty, who has endorsed Scott in the leadership race. While Trump has made only one personnel move public so far, naming Susie Wiles his chief of staff, he has already ruled out two names for top positions. Trump said Saturday that he would not be inviting Mike Pompeo, his former U.S. Secretary of State and CIA chief, and Nikki Haley, a former South Carolina governor who served as his U.N. ambassador and challenged him for the GOP nomination. Pompeo rallied with Trump on the night before Election Day. “I very much enjoyed and appreciated working with them previously, and would like to thank them for their service to our Country,” Trump posted on his network Truth Social. Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., reposted on X a message by podcaster Dave Smith suggesting to put pressure to “keep all neocons and war hawks out of the Trump administration.” “The ‘stop Pompeo’ movement is great, but it’s not enough,” Smith posted on X. “America First: screw the war machine!”

President Joe Biden will host President-elect Donald Trump for a traditional postelection meeting in the Oval Office on Wednesday, the White House said Saturday. Such a meeting is customary between the outgoing president and the incoming president, and is meant partly to mark the start of a peaceful transfer of power under America's democracy. But then-President Trump, a Republican, did not host Biden, a Democrat, for a sit-down after the 2020 election, when Trump lost his reelection bid. Trump sought the presidency again four years later, and on Tuesday he defeated Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee. Trump is the first former president to return to power since Grover Cleveland regained the White House in the 1892 election. The White House said Biden called Trump this past Wednesday to congratulate him and invite him to meet in the Oval Office. Their meeting is scheduled for 11 a.m. In a speech Thursday, Biden said he had assured Trump “that I would direct my entire administration to work with his team to ensure a peaceful and orderly transition. That’s what the American people deserve.” Asked about Trump as he left church Saturday in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, where he was spending the weekend, Biden said, “I'm going to see him on Wednesday.”

 While inflation and immigration emerged as the dominant themes in this year's presidential race, another issue was prominent in the minds of voters for both major candidates: the stakes for democracy. Half of voters identified democracy as the single most important motivating factor for their vote. That was higher than the share of voters who answered the same way about inflation, the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border, abortion policy or free speech, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 120,000 voters nationwide. Notably, backers of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump, the president-elect, saw the issue from different perspectives. About two-thirds of Harris voters said the future of democracy was the most important factor for their votes. No other topic — high prices, abortion policy, free speech or the potential of the first woman to be elected as president — was as big a factor for her supporters. Harris especially leaned into this messaging toward the end of her campaign: She said Trump was a threat to undermine the country's founding ideals and she called him a fascist. The sentiment was supported by former members of the first Trump administration who warned about his fitness for office. Trump refused the peaceful transfer of power while lying about his loss in the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden. And on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump also directed a mob of his supporters to the Capitol after telling them to “fight like hell.” Audrey Wesley, 90, of Minneapolis cited Trump’s legal cases and his disregard for the law as one of the reasons she supported Harris. “Our system is broken,” she said. Wesley said one of the things that troubled her most was Project 2025, a detailed conservative blueprint for the next Republican administration. Trump has said he had not read the report, even though many members of his first administration had a hand in creating it. "That’s very scary as to what he wants to do,” Wesley said. The idea that democracy is under attack also motivated Trump voters, but in starkly different ways. About one-third of his supporters said democracy was the most important factor for their vote. A further breakdown of the survey found that 9 in 10 Harris voters who indicated democracy was the single most important factor in their vote were somewhat or very concerned that electing Trump would bring the country closer to authoritarianism. About 8 in 10 Trump voters felt electing Harris would bring the country closer to authoritarianism. “Democracy voters” who supported Harris and Trump were equally concerned that the opposing candidate's views were too extreme. The findings followed a consistent pattern in recent surveys by AP VoteCast and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. While democracy's future has been one of the few crossover concerns among a fractured electorate, people have differed on why they are worried about it and who is responsible for the threat. Debbie Dooley, 66, and a co-founder of the tea party movement, had several important factors in her voting decision, all leading to concern over what would happen to the country under another Democratic administration. “I think it was Thomas Jefferson who said when people fear their government, there is tyranny,” she said. “We had tyranny under the Biden-Harris machine.” Dooley, a longtime Trump supporter, cited the nation's “open border” and concerns by many conservatives about crimes caused by migrants who had circumvented the law. The resident of Cumming, Georgia, also agreed with Trump's contention that the Biden administration had unleashed the Department of Justice on political adversaries. “That’s something they do in Russia. That’s something they would do in China, not the United States, not here in the beacon of freedom for the world,” Dooley said. Republicans have held congressional hearings for nearly two years but have provided little substance to the claim that Biden has “weaponized” the department. Like many other conservatives, Dooley also felt social media companies had silenced their voices, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. ”Thank God for Elon Musk," she said. "Twitter or X is a totally different place now than it was before he took over, so we have First Amendment rights. It's free speech.” The survey found that nearly all “democracy voters” who supported Trump said freedom of speech was at least a factor in their vote. It was a less prominent issue for Trump voters who said democracy was a minor factor or not at a factor in their choice. Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth College, said the opposing views about which side posed a threat to democracy are understandable because both campaigns had spoken about the other in those terms. And because democracy is an abstract issue, what constitutes a threat can vary. “Harris talked a lot about democracy, and the Democratic coalition talked a lot about the threats to democracy,” he said. “So it's not surprising that many Democrats correctly perceived Trump as a threat and name it as one of the most important issues.” The fact that Republicans echoed the claim against Harris would seem unusual, but one of Trump’s political strategies is to appropriate an attack against him and turn it around against his opponent. Nyhan said Trump did that successfully with the democracy argument. Border protection, for example, could mean one thing to a Harris backer and something quite different to a Trump voter who might support the idea of the great replacement conspiracy theory — the notion that the influence of whites is being diminished through illegal immigration. In her concession speech at her alma mater, Howard University in Washington, Harris alluded to the importance of accepting election results even in a loss and peacefully transferring power, which Trump has conditioned on whether he would view the election outcome as fair. “That principle, as much as any other, distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny,” Harris said. Leah Wright Rigueur, a history professor at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University, said the processes of democracy as expressed through the presidential vote won, for now. “The 2024 presidential election was fundamentally, as far as I understand, an example of democracy in action. Trump won the Electoral College. Trump won the popular votes," she said. The question is whether the country would be as peaceful if the outcome were different and how does the nation close that fissure in the future when a “very vocal cross section” of the American public sees democracy working only “when my side wins, but tyranny when your side wins?”

Donald Trump's biggest European fan, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, predicted on Friday that a new U.S. administration under Trump will cease providing support to Ukraine in its fight against Russia's full-scale invasion. Orbán's comments were a signal that Trump's recent election could drive a wedge among European Union leaders on the question of the war. Hungary's leader hosted the second of two days of summits on Friday in the capital, Budapest, just days after Trump's election victory. The war in Ukraine was high on the agenda for the gathering of the EU's 27 leaders, most of whom believe continuing to supply Kyiv with weapons and financial assistance are key elements for the continent's security. The nationalist Hungarian leader has long sought to undermine EU support for Ukraine, and routinely blocked, delayed or watered down the bloc’s efforts to provide weapons and funding and to sanction Moscow for its invasion. He has sought to use the summits to make his case to other leaders that they should rethink their commitments to the war-ravaged country. In comments to state radio before Friday's summit, Orbán, who is considered close to both Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, reiterated his long-held position that an immediate cease-fire should be declared, and suggested that Ukraine has already lost its fight. “The situation on the front is obvious, there’s been a military defeat. The Americans are going to pull out of this war,” Orbán said. The Hungarian leader has cast himself as the exemplar of some in the EU who are skeptical of providing indefinite support to Ukraine, especially in light of uncertainty over whether U.S. assistance could evaporate under Trump. He said Friday that Trump's reelection had created a “new situation” for Europe, and that the continent "cannot finance this war alone.” But numerous EU leaders made a point to downplay the risk of a shift in U.S. policies drifting across the Atlantic into European capitals. Arriving at the summit, the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said a new U.S. administration wouldn't lead Europe to change course. “We cannot outsource our capacity of action. Whatever happens in the U.S., we have our interests, we have our values,” Borrell said. Italy’s hard-right leader, Premier Giorgia Meloni, who is aligned with Orbán on many issues but breaks with him sharply on Russia’s war, said: “As long is there is a war, Italy is on the side of Ukraine.” Western support is crucial for Kyiv to sustain the costly war of attrition, but Trump's repeated statements criticizing U.S. aid, and his claims that he could bring the conflict to a rapid end, have led to uncertainty over how long the help will continue. At a gathering on Thursday of European leaders in Budapest, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy objected to Trump’s claim that Russia’s war with Ukraine could be ended in a day, something he and his European backers fear would mean peace on terms favorable to Putin and involving the surrender of territory. “If it is going to be very fast, it will be a loss for Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said. Despite Orbán's attempts to throttle aid packages, EU leaders have largely found workaround solutions to any obstruction to providing Zelenskyy with assistance, and have been able to signal their commitment to supporting Ukraine in its fight, regardless of who occupies the White House. Closing out the summit on Friday, European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen said the EU would “discuss with our American friends also the fact that Russia is not only a threat to Europe, but a threat to the global security as a whole” in an effort to dissuade a new Trump administration from abandoning aid to Ukraine. “We see that technology from China and Iran is used by Russia on the battlefield,” she continued. "It shows that the security of the Indo-Pacific and Europe are interconnected, and so are the European and the United States interests in this course.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory in his first public comment on the U.S. vote, and he praised the president-elect's courage during the July assassination attempt. “His behavior at the moment of an attempt on his life left an impression on me. He turned out to be a brave man," Putin said at an international forum following a speech in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. "He manifested himself in the very correct way, bravely as a man,” he added. Putin also said that what Trump has said “about the desire to restore relations with Russia, to help end the Ukrainian crisis, in my opinion, deserves attention at least.” The Kremlin earlier welcomed Trump’s claim that he could negotiate an end to the conflict in Ukraine “in 24 hours” but emphasized that it will wait for concrete policy steps. ″I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate him on his election as president of the United States of America,” Putin said in a question-and-answer session at the conference. As to what he expects from a second Trump administration, Putin said, “I don’t know what will happen now. I have no idea.” "For him, this is still his last presidential term. What he will do is his matter,” added Putin, who this year began a fifth term that will keep him in power until 2030 and could seek six more years in office after that. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday the Kremlin is not ruling out the possibility of contact between Putin and Trump before the inauguration, given that Trump “said he would call Putin before the inauguration.” Peskov has emphasized that Moscow views the U.S. as an “unfriendly” country that is directly involved in the Ukrainian conflict. He dismissed arguments that Putin’s failure to reach out quickly to Trump could hurt future ties, saying that Moscow's relations with Washington already are at the “lowest point in history” and arguing that it will be up to the new U.S. leadership to change the situation. The Kremlin’s cautious stand reflected its view of the U.S. vote as a choice between two unappealing possibilities. While Trump is known for his admiration of Putin, the Russian leader has repeatedly noted that during Trump’s first term, there were “so many restrictions and sanctions against Russia like no other president has ever introduced before him.”