United News of Bangladesh

For 40 years, former President Donald Trump has navigated countless legal investigations without ever facing criminal charges. That record may soon come to an end. Trump could be indicted by a Manhattan grand jury as soon as this week, potentially charged with falsifying business records connected to hush money payments during his 2016 campaign to women who accused him of sexual encounters. It's one of several investigations that have intensified as Trump mounts his third presidential run. He has denied any allegations of wrongdoing and accuses prosecutors of engaging in a politically motivated "witch hunt" to damage his campaign. An indictment in New York would mark an extraordinary turn in American history, making Trump the first former president to face a criminal charge. And it would carry tremendous weight for Trump himself, threatening his long-established ability to avoid consequences despite entanglement in a dizzying number of cases. Indictment, says biographer Michael D'Antonio, would be a "shocking event, both because of the fact that a former president is being indicted for the first time, but also because one of the slipperiest people at the highest level of business, whose devotion to abusing the system is so well established, is being caught." "Throughout his life, he has done things for which he could have been investigated and potentially prosecuted and learned from those experiences that he could act with impunity," he said. Trump first faced legal scrutiny in the 1970s when the Department of Justice brought a racial discrimination case against his family's real estate business. Trump and his father fiercely fought the suit, which accused them of refusing to rent apartments to Black tenants in predominantly white buildings. Testimony showed that applications filed by prospective Black tenants were marked with a "C" for "colored." Trump counter-sued for $100 million, accusing the government of defamation. The case ended with a settlement that opened the way for some Black tenants but did not force the Trumps to explicitly acknowledge they had "failed and neglected" to comply with the Fair Housing Act. Since then, Trump and his businesses have been the subject of thousands of civil lawsuits and numerous investigations. There have been probes into his casino and real estate dealings, allegations of bribery and improper lobbying, fraud allegations against the now-defunct Trump University and charitable Trump Foundation and a probe by the Manhattan district attorney into sales at the Trump SoHo hotel-condominium in Lower Manhattan. Indeed, according Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a government watchdog group abbreviated CREW, as of November 2022, Trump had been accused of committing at least 56 criminal offenses since he launched his campaign in 2015, not including allegations of fraudulent business dealings. But he has never been formally indicted. Trump is a master of delay tactics, "finding ways to endlessly delay in the hopes that the investigation and litigation will go away. And he's had remarkable success," says CREW president Noah Bookbinder, a former federal corruption prosecutor. "It makes accountability absolutely essential because we can't have people in a functioning democracy operating in positions of power with total impunity where they can commit crimes and never have to face any consequences," he said. Trump's retort to such strong talk: He commits no crimes, so consequences would themselves be unjust. As president, Trump continued to face legal scrutiny. For two years, the Justice Department investigated his 2016 campaign's ties to Russia. While special counsel Robert Mueller never found direct evidence of collusion, his final report did lay out evidence for obstruction. He noted that, because of a department opinion that bars indicting a sitting president, he couldn't recommend Trump be criminally charged, even in secret. Since Trump left office, the investigations have circled ever closer. In January, his namesake company was fined $1.6 million for tax crimes, including conspiracy and falsifying business records. The company's longtime executive, Allen Weisselberg, is currently serving jail time as punishment for dodging taxes on job perks. Additional cases are still being pursued. In Georgia, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has been investigating whether Trump and his allies illegally meddled in the 2020 election. The foreperson of a special grand jury, which heard from dozens of witnesses. said last month that the panel had recommended that numerous people be indicted, and hinted Trump could be among them. It is ultimately up to Willis to decide whether to move forward. In Washington, Trump is under scrutiny from special counsel Jack Smith for his handling — allegations say mishandling — of classified documents after leaving office, as well as for his much-publicized efforts to stay in power, despite his 2020 election loss. Justice Department lawyers in the documents probe have said they have amassed evidence of potential crimes involving Trump's retention of national defense information as well as potential efforts to obstruct their work. Some legal experts have questioned the wisdom of having the Manhattan case be the first brought against Trump, when more serious charges could be looming. Trump is expected to be charged with falsifying business records, a misdemeanor unless prosecutors can prove it was done to conceal another crime. And the case dates back years. "Clearly it's not the cleanest criminal case that could be brought of all of them that are existing right now," said Michael Weinstein, an attorney and former Justice Department prosecutor, who said Trump would likely use its potential weaknesses to his political advantage. "By this case coming first, it gives him a opening to go on offense and attack, which for him is the only way he knows," Weinstein said. Still, he said the possible charges felt like a natural culmination of the "unbelievable array of investigations" the former president "has lived through and battled for the last 40 years." "There's a history and pattern of him saying and doing things without resulting in any consequences," Weinstein said. "After 40 years, do the criminal chickens come home to roost? He's been fighting a long time, and it could be in the next 12 months he's facing two or three criminal cases that carry serious criminal liability for him." The New York case involves payments made by Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, who served prison time after pleading guilty in 2018 to federal charges, to porn actor Stormy Daniels and model Karen McDougal. Cohen was reimbursed by Trump, whose company logged the reimbursements as "legal expenses." Politically, Trump allies believe the case actually will benefit the former president in the short term by energizing his base in a competitive Republican primary, and would provide another boost later on if it ultimately fails to yield a conviction. "The prosecutor in New York has done more to help Donald Trump get elected," says Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., echoing other GOP officials, who have also argued the probe will likely help Trump in the short term, even if it could prove damaging in a general election. An indictment wouldn't stop Trump from continuing his campaign. There is no prohibition against running while facing criminal charges — or even following conviction. Indeed, convicted felons have run for president before, including from behind bars. "It boggles the mind to think that we have an ex-president on the eve of being indicted still the frontrunner for the Republican Party in 2024," says presidential historian Douglas Brinkley. "You would have thought (potentially) being arrested would have been a disqualifying factor in presidential politics. But Trump constantly surprises people by his devious and inappropriate behavior that he transcends by turning it into being a victim of a witch hunt."  

Two decades after the United States invaded Iraq, 61 percent of Americans do not believe the country made the right decision by invading Iraq, according to a new Axios/Ipsos poll. "The chaos and destruction that followed the invasion have made a generation of Americans and their leaders more skeptical of the use of military force overseas, in particular in the Middle East," said an Axios report of the poll published last week. The invasion toppled a "brutal dictator" but "sparked 20 years of instability in Iraq, and damaged America's standing in the world," it noted. On March 17, 2003, then U.S. President George W. Bush issued an ultimatum that the United States would take military action if Iraqi President Saddam Hussein did not leave Iraq within 48 hours. On March 19, bombs began to fall on Baghdad. On March 20, the ground invasion commenced. The invasion was extremely controversial overseas, but highly popular then in the United States. A Pew poll in February 2003 found that 66 percent of Americans approved of the military action and only 26 percent disapproved. However, the Bush administration had justified the invasion on the grounds that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, which were never found. Fifty seven percent of Americans at the time also believed, falsely, that Saddam Hussein had played a role in the 9/11 attacks, According to Pew.  

President Joe Biden issued the first veto of his presidency Monday in an early sign of shifting White House relations with the new Congress since Republicans took control of the House in January — a move that serves as a prelude to bigger battles with GOP lawmakers on government spending and the nation’s debt limit. Biden sought to kill a Republican-authored measure that would ban the government from considering environmental impacts or potential lawsuits when making investment decisions for people’s retirement plans. In a video released by the White House, Biden said he vetoed the measure because it “put at risk the retirement savings of individuals across the country.” His first veto represents a more confrontational approach at the midway of Biden’s term in office, as he faces a GOP-controlled House that is eager to undo parts of his policy legacy and investigate his administration and his family. Complicating matters for Biden, several Democratic senators are up for re-election next year in conservative states, giving them political incentive to put some distance between them and the White House. The measure vetoed by Biden would have effectively reinstated a Trump-era ban on federal managers of retirement plans considering factors such as climate change, social impacts or pending lawsuits when making investment choices. Read: Trump says he expects to be arrested, calls for protest The veto could also help calm some anger from environmentalists who have been upset with the Biden administration for its recent decision to greenlight the Willow oil project, a massive and contentious drilling project in Alaska. “The president vetoed the bill because it jeopardizes the hard-earned life savings of cops, firefighters, teachers, and other workers,” White House spokesperson Robyn Patterson said. But critics say so-called environmental, social and governance investments allocate money based on political agendas, such as a drive against climate change, rather than on earning the best returns for savers. Republicans in Congress who pushed the measure said environmental or social considerations in investments by the government are just another example of being “woke.” “In his first veto, Biden just sided with woke Wall Street over workers,” House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., tweeted on Monday. “Tells you exactly where his priorities lie.” He said “it’s clear Biden wants Wall Street to use your retirement savings to fund his far-left political causes.” Biden’s veto is likely to prevail. Just three Democrats in Congress — one in the House, and two in the Senate — supported Republicans in the matter, making it unlikely a two-thirds majority in both chambers could be assembled to overcome Biden’s veto. Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, was the sole Democrat to back the resolution in the House, while Sens. Jon Tester, D-Mont., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., supported it in the Senate. Golden is a perennial target of Republicans seeking to oust him from his conservative district, while Tester and Manchin are both up for re-election next year. “This administration continues to prioritize their radical policy agenda over the economic, energy and national security needs of our country, and it is absolutely infuriating,” Manchin said in a statement. Though Biden swiftly vetoed the investment resolution, other measures coming from Capitol Hill in the weeks and months ahead could be a tougher call for the White House. Read: How Washington came to rescue US banks The administration initially signaled that Biden would reject a Republican-authored measure that would override a crime measure passed by the District of Columbia Council, but the president later said he would sign it and did so Monday. He also signed a bill directing the federal government to declassify intelligence related to the origins of COVID-19. Biden’s immediate predecessor, Donald Trump, vetoed 10 bills during his term in office, while Barack Obama vetoed 12, according to the the American Presidency Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Both had one of their vetoes overridden by Congress. The president with the most vetoes was Franklin Delano Roosevelt — who was elected to four terms before a constitutional amendment limited all presidents to two — with 635 vetoes. Six U.S. presidents never vetoed any legislation in office.    

Three people are dead in what authorities said was a shooting in an Atlanta-area home early Monday, according to a news report. The Rockdale County Sheriff’s Office received a report of gunshots at 12:10 a.m. in the Honey Creek Country Club neighborhood of Conyers, Georgia, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) east of Atlanta, WSB-TV reported. Deputies arrived and found three people who had been shot. The victims, who were not immediately identified, were pronounced dead at the scene. A suspect who was not immediately identified was in custody and an investigation was ongoing early Monday, WSB-TV reported.  

In the hours after some of Silicon Valley Bank’s biggest customers started pulling out their money, a WhatsApp group of startup founders who are immigrants of color ballooned to more than 1,000 members. Questions flowed as the bank’s financial status worsened. Some desperately sought advice: Could they open an account at a larger bank without a Social Security Number? Others questioned whether they had to physically be at a bank to open an account, because they're visiting parents overseas. One clear theme emerged: a deep concern about the broader impact on startups led by people of color. While Wall Street struggles to contain the banking crisis after the swift demise of SVB — the nation's 16th largest bank and the biggest to fail since the 2008 financial meltdown — industry experts predict it could become even harder for people of color to secure funding or a financial home supporting their startups. SVB had opened its doors to such entrepreneurs, offering opportunities to form crucial relationships in the technology and financial communities that had been out of reach within larger financial institutions. But smaller players have fewer means of surviving a collapse, reflecting the perilous journey minority entrepreneurs face while attempting to navigate industries historically rife with racism. “All these folks that have very special circumstances based on their identity, it’s not something that they can just change about themselves and that makes them unbankable by the top four (large banks),” said Asya Bradley, a board member of numerous startups who has watched the WhatsApp group grapple with SVB's demise. Bradley said some investors have implored startups to switch to larger financial institutions to stymie future financial risks, but that's not an easy transition. “The reason why we’re going to regional and community banks is because these (large) banks don’t want our business,” Bradley said. Banking expert Aaron Klein, a senior fellow in Economic Studies at the Brookings Institution, said SVB’s collapse could exacerbate racial disparities. “That’s going to be more challenging for people who don’t fit the traditional credit box, including minorities,” Klein said. "A financial system that prefers the existing holders of wealth will perpetuate the legacy of past discrimination.” Tiffany Dufu was gutted when she couldn’t access her SVB account and, in turn, could not pay her employees. Read more: One of Silicon Valley's top banks fails; assets are seized Dufu raised $5 million as CEO of The Cru, a New York-based career coaching platform and community for women. It was a rare feat for businesses founded by Black women, which get less than 1% of the billions of dollars in venture capital funding doled out yearly to startups. She banked with SVB because it was known for its close ties to the tech community and investors. “In order to have raised that money, I pitched nearly 200 investors over the past few years,” said Dufu, who has since regained access to her funds and moved to Bank of America. “It’s very hard to put yourself out there and time after time — you get told this isn’t a good fit. So, the money in the bank account was very precious.” A February Crunchbase News analysis determined funding for Black-founded startups slowed by more than 50% last year after they received a record $5.1 billion in venture capital in 2021. Overall venture funding dropped from about $337 billion to roughly $214 billion, while Black founders were hit disproportionately hard, dropping to just $2.3 billion, or 1.1% of the total. Entrepreneur Amy Hilliard, a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, knows how difficult it is to secure financing. It took three years to secure a loan for her cake manufacturing company, and she had to sell her home to get it started. Banking is based on relationships and when a bank like SVB goes under, “those relationships go away, too,” said Hilliard, who is African American. Some conservative critics asserted SVB's commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion were to blame, but banking experts say those claims were false. The bank slid into insolvency because its larger customers pulled deposits rather than borrow at higher interest rates and the bank's balance sheets were overexposed, forcing it to sell bonds at a loss to cover the withdrawals. “If we’re focused on climate or communities of color or racial equity, that has nothing to do with what happened with Silicon Valley Bank,” said Valerie Red-Horse Mohl, co-founder of Known Holdings, a Black, Indigenous, Asian American-founded investment banking platform focused on the sustainable growth of minority-managed funds. Red-Horse Mohl — who has raised, structured and managed over $3 billion in capital for tribal nations — said most larger banks are led by white men and majority-white boards, and “even when they do DEI programs, it’s not a really deep sort of shifting of capital.” Smaller financial institutions, however, have worked to build relationships with people of color. “We cannot lose our regional and community banks," she said. "It would be a travesty.” Historically, smaller and minority-owned banks have addressed funding gaps that larger banks ignored or even created, following exclusionary laws and policies as they turned away customers because of the color of their skin. But the ripple effects from SVB's collapse are being felt among these banks as well, said Nicole Elam, president and CEO of the National Bankers Association, a 96-year-old trade association representing more than 175 minority-owned banks. Some have seen customers withdraw funds and move to larger banks out of fear, even though most minority-owned banks have a more traditional customer base, with secured loans and minimal risky investments, she said. “You’re seeing customer flight of folks that we’ve been serving for a long time,” Elam said. “How many people may not come to us for a mortgage or small business loan or to do their banking business because they now have in their mind that they need to bank with a bank that is too big to fail? That's the first impact of eroding public trust.” Black-owned banks have been hit the hardest as the industry consolidates. Most don't have as much capital to withstand economic downturns. At its peak, there were 134. Today, there are only 21. But change is on the way. Within the last three years, the federal government, private sector and philanthropic community have invested heavily in minority-run depository institutions. “In response to this national conversation around racial equity, people are really seeing minority banks are key to wealth creation and key to helping to close the wealth gap," Elam said. Bradley also is an angel investor, providing seed money for a number of entrepreneurs, and is seeing new opportunities as people network in the WhatsApp group to help each other remain afloat and grow. “I'm really so hopeful,” Bradley said. “Even in the downfall of SVB, it has managed to form this incredible community of folks that are trying to help each other to succeed. They're saying, 'SVB was here for us, now we're going to be here for each other.'”

Donald Trump claimed on Saturday that his arrest is imminent and issued an extraordinary call for his supporters to protest as a New York grand jury investigates hush money payments to women who alleged sexual encounters with the former president. Even as a Trump lawyer and spokesperson said there had been no communication from prosecutors, Trump declared in a post on his social media platform that he expects to be taken into custody on Tuesday. His message seemed designed to preempt a formal announcement from prosecutors and to galvanize outrage from his base of supporters in advance of widely anticipated charges. Within hours, he sent a fundraising email to supporters while influential Republicans in Congress issued statements in his defense. In a later post that went beyond simply exhorting loyalists to protest about his legal peril, the 2024 presidential candidate directed his overarching ire in all capital letters at the Biden administration and raised the prospect of civil unrest: “IT’S TIME!!!” he wrote. “WE JUST CAN’T ALLOW THIS ANYMORE. THEY’RE KILLING OUR NATION AS WE SIT BACK & WATCH. WE MUST SAVE AMERICA!PROTEST, PROTEST, PROTEST!!!” It all evoked, in foreboding ways, the rhetoric he used shortly before the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. After hearing from the then-president at a Washington rally that morning, his supporters marched to the Capitol and tried to stop the congressional certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s White House victory, breaking through doors and windows of the building and leaving officers beaten and bloodied. District Attorney Alvin Bragg is thought to be eyeing charges in the hush money investigation, and recently offered Trump a chance to testify before the grand jury. Local law enforcement officials are bracing for the public safety ramifications of an unprecedented prosecution of a former American president. But there has been no public announcement of any time frame for the grand jury’s secret work in the case. At least one additional witness is expected to testify, further indicating that no vote to indict has yet been taken, according to a person familiar with the investigation who was not authorized to publicly discuss the case and spoke on condition of anonymity. That did not stop Trump from taking to his social media platform to say “illegal leaks” from Bragg’s office indicate that “THE FAR & AWAY LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE & FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK.” A Trump lawyer, Susan Necheles, said Trump’s post was “based on the media reports,” though the origin of Trump’s Tuesday reference was unclear. The district attorney’s office declined comment. Trump’s aides and legal team have been preparing the possibility of an indictment. Should that happen, he would be arrested only if he refused to surrender. Trump’s lawyers have previously said he would follow normal procedure, meaning he would likely agree to surrender at a New York Police Department precinct or directly to Bragg’s office. It is unclear whether Trump’s supporters would heed his protest call or if he retains the same persuasive power he held as president. Trump’s posts on Truth Social generally receive far less attention than he used to get on Twitter, but he maintains a deeply loyal base. The aftermath of the Jan. 6 riot, in which hundreds of Trump loyalists were arrested and prosecuted in federal court, may also have dampened the passion among supporters for confrontation. The indictment of Trump, 76, would be an extraordinary development after years of investigations into his business, political and personal dealings. Even as Trump pursues his latest White House campaign — his first rally is set for Waco, Texas, later this month and he was scheduled to make a public appearance Saturday evening at the NCAA Division I wrestling championships in Tulsa, Oklahoma — there is no question an indictment would be a distraction and give fodder to opponents and critics tired of the legal scandals that have long enveloped him. In addition to the hush money inquiry in New York, Trump faces separate criminal investigations in Atlanta and Washington over his efforts to undo the results of the 2020 election. A Justice Department special counsel has also been presenting evidence before a grand jury investigating Trump’s possession of hundreds of classified documents at his Florida estate. It is not clear when those investigations will end or whether they might result in criminal charges, but they will continue regardless of what happens in New York, underscoring the ongoing gravity – and broad geographic scope – of the legal challenges facing the former president. Trump’s post Saturday echoes one made last summer when he broke the news on Truth Social that the FBI was searching his Florida home as part of an investigation into the possible mishandling of classified documents. News of that search sparked a flood of contributions to Trump’s political operation, and on Saturday, Trump sent out a fundraising email to his supporters that said the “MANHATTAN D.A. COULD BE CLOSE TO CHARGING TRUMP.” After his post, Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy decried any plans to prosecute Trump as an “outrageous abuse of power by a radical DA” whom he claimed was pursuing “political vengeance.” Rep. Elise Stefanik, the third-ranking House Republican, issued a statement with a similar sentiment. The grand jury has been hearing from witnesses, including former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, who says he orchestrated payments in 2016 to two women to silence them about sexual encounters they said they had with Trump a decade earlier. Trump denies the encounters occurred, says he did nothing wrong and has cast the investigation as a “witch hunt” by a Democratic prosecutor bent on sabotaging the Republican’s 2024 campaign. Trump also has labeled Bragg, who is Black, a “racist” and has accused the prosecutor of letting crime in the city run amok while he has focused on Trump. New York remains one of the safest cities in the country. Bragg’s office has apparently been examining whether any state laws were broken in connection with the payments or the way Trump’s company compensated Cohen for his work to keep the women’s allegations quiet. Porn actor Stormy Daniels and at least two former Trump aides — onetime political adviser Kellyanne Conway and former spokesperson Hope Hicks — are among witnesses who have met with prosecutors in recent weeks. Cohen has said that at Trump’s direction, he arranged payments totaling $280,000 to Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal. According to Cohen, the payouts were to buy their silence about Trump, who was then in the thick of his first presidential campaign. Cohen and federal prosecutors said Trump’s company paid him $420,000 as reimbursement for the $130,000 payment to Daniels and to cover bonuses and other supposed expenses. The company classified those payments internally as legal expenses. The $150,000 payment to McDougal was made by the then-publisher of the supermarket tabloid National Enquirer, which kept her story from coming to light. Federal prosecutors agreed not to prosecute the Enquirer’s corporate parent in exchange for its cooperation in a campaign finance investigation that led to charges against Cohen in 2018. Prosecutors said the payments to Daniels and McDougal amounted to impermissible, unrecorded gifts to Trump’s election effort. Cohen pleaded guilty, served prison time and was disbarred. Federal prosecutors never charged Trump with any crime. News that law enforcement agencies were preparing for a possible indictment was first reported by NBC News.

Cash-short banks have borrowed about $300 billion from the Federal Reserve in the past week, the central bank announced Thursday. Nearly half the money — $143 billion — went to holding companies for two major banks that failed over the past week, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, triggering widespread alarm in financial markets. The Fed did not identify the banks that received the other half of the funding or say how many of them did so. The holding companies for the two failed banks were set up by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which has taken over both banks. The money they borrowed was used to pay their uninsured depositors, with bonds owned by both banks posted as collateral. The FDIC has guaranteed the repayment of the loans, the Fed said. The figures provide a first glimpse of the scale of the Fed's assistance to the financial sector after the two banks collapsed this past weekend. The rest of the money was borrowed by banks seeking to raise cash — likely, at least in part, to pay off depositors who tried to withdraw their money. Many mega banks, such as Bank of America, have reported receiving inflows of funds from smaller banks since the bank failures last weekend. An additional $153 billion in borrowing from the Fed over the past week came through a longstanding program called the "discount window"; it amounted to a record level for that program. Banks can borrow from the discount window for up to 90 days. Typically in a given week, only about $4 billion to $5 billion is borrowed through this program. The Fed has lent an additional $11.9 billion from a new lending facility it announced on Sunday. The new program enables banks to raise cash and pay any depositors who withdraw money. Michael Feroli, an economist at JPMorgan Chase, said in research note that the Fed's assistance is, so far, about half what it was during the financial crisis 15 years ago. "But it is still a big number," he said. "The glass half-empty view is that banks need a lot of money. The glass half-full take is that the system is working as intended." The past week's emergency lending from the Fed seeks to address a leading cause of the collapse of the two banks: Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank owned billions of dollars of seemingly safe Treasury and other bonds that paid low interest rates. Over the past year, as the Fed steadily raised its benchmark interest rate, yields on longer-term Treasurys and other bonds rose. That, in turn, reduced the value of the lower-yielding Treasurys that the banks held. As a result, the banks couldn't raise enough cash from the sale of their Treasurys to pay the many depositors who were trying to withdraw their money from the banks. It amounted to a classic bank run. The Fed's lending programs, particularly the new facility it unveiled Sunday, enable financial institutions to post bonds as collateral and borrow against them, rather than having to sell them. For its new lending facility, the Fed said it has received $15.9 billion in collateral, more than the $11.9 billion it has lent. Banks sometimes provide the Fed collateral before borrowing. That suggests that additional lending is under way.  

After the sudden collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters started furiously working the phones to find out what was going on with the failed lender — and what would happen to its panicked depositors. Waters, former chair of the House Financial Services Committee, had her doubts that another bank would step up as a savior and buy the defunct institution. “Banks don’t just wake up and say: ‘Oh, there’s a problem with another significant bank and they’ve collapsed. Let’s just take it over,”’ she said. So began a frenetic weekend of nonstop briefings with regulators, lawmakers, administration officials and President Joe Biden himself about how to handle the demise of the nation’s 16th-biggest bank and a go-to financial institution for tech entrepreneurs. At the core of the problem was tens of billions of dollars — including money companies needed to meet payrolls — sitting in Silicon Valley Bank accounts that were not protected by federal deposit insurance that only goes up to $250,000.Something needed to be done, federal officials agreed, before Asian stock markets opened Sunday evening and other banks faced the potential for waves of panicked withdrawals Monday morning. “We were racing against the clock,” said Bharat Ramamurti, deputy director of the National Economic Council. Waters was right to be skeptical about a sale being closed on the fly. The bank’s size — $210 billion in assets — and complexity made it difficult to quickly wrap up a deal. Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. officials told Republican senators Monday that they received offers for the bank over the weekend but didn’t have time to close; they said they could put Silicon Valley Bank up for auction again, according to a person familiar with the conversation who requested anonymity to discuss a private call. But another plan was coming together. On Sunday, Waters was on the phone with Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who briefed her on how it would work. The Fed was creating a new emergency program that allowed it to lend directly to banks so they could cover withdrawals without having to sell off assets to raise cash. The idea was to reassure depositors and prevent bank runs at other institutions. By Sunday night, the Treasury Department, the Fed and the FDIC said the federal government would protect all deposits — even those that exceeded the FDIC’s $250,000 limit. “It’s miraculous, really,” Waters said, calling it “an example of what working together and what government can do with the right people in charge.’’ The praise was not unanimous. In the call Monday with officials from the FDIC and the Treasury Department, Republican senators expressed concern that millionaire Silicon Valley depositors were being rescued — and the cost might be passed onto community banks in their home states in the form of higher assessments for federal deposit insurance, according to the person familiar with the discussion. The trouble started last Wednesday when Silicon Valley Bank said it needed to raise $2.25 billion to shore up its finances after suffering big losses on its bond portfolio, which had plunged in value as the Federal Reserve raised interest rates. On Thursday, depositors rushed to pull their money out. An old-fashioned bank run was underway.At a House Ways and Means committee hearing on Friday morning, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said her agency was “monitoring very carefully” developments related to the bank. “When banks experience financial losses, it is and should be a matter of concern,” she told lawmakers. Biden was briefed about the situation on Friday morning, according to a White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. Then he celebrated an unexpectedly strong February jobs report, met with the leader of the European Union and jetted off to Wilmington, Delaware, to mark his grandson’s 17th birthday. His weekend would soon be consumed with phone and video calls focused on preventing a nationwide banking crisis. Regulators were so concerned, they didn’t even wait until the close of business on Friday — the usual practice — to shut the bank down; they closed the doors during working hours. It was the second-biggest bank failure in U.S. history and trickier than most: An astonishing 94% of Silicon Valley Bank’s deposits — including large cash holdings by tech startups — were uninsured by the FDIC. As administration officials and regulators worked through the weekend, Biden expressed concern about small businesses and their employees who relied on accounts that were now in jeopardy, the White House official said. There were also fears, the official said, that if Silicon Valley Bank depositors lost money, others would lose faith in the banking system and rush to withdraw money on Monday, causing a cascading crisis. Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Jake Auchincloss’ phone had started lighting up even before the weekend. Silicon Valley Bank had eight branches and offices in his home state, and word of its failure was traveling fast on social media.“The panic within Massachusetts industry and nonprofit sectors became acute within a matter of hours,” Auchincloss said. “My phone started just exploding.’’ Silicon Valley Bank wouldn’t be the only bank to collapse. By Sunday evening, federal officials announced that New York-based Signature Bank, a major lender to New York landlords, had also failed and was being seized. The government’s plan to cover deposits over $250,000 ended up applying to Signature’s customers as well. In a statement Sunday, Biden said, “The American people and American businesses can have confidence that their bank deposits will be there when they need them.″ On Monday, Powell announced that the Fed would review its supervision of Silicon Valley Bank to understand what went wrong. The review will be conducted by Michael Barr, the Fed vice chair who oversees bank oversight, and be released May 1. Now Biden and lawmakers are calling for legislative changes to tighten financial rules on regional banks, perhaps restoring parts of the Dodd-Frank law that tightened bank regulation after the 2008-2009 financial crisis but were rolled back five years ago. Waters said it might be time to raise deposit insurance thresholds. “We can’t just say this is an emergency and forget about it,″ she said.

A winter storm dumped heavy, wet snow in parts of the Northeast on Tuesday, causing tens of thousands of power outages, widespread school closings, dangerous driving conditions and a plane to slide off a taxiway. The storm's path included parts of New England, upstate New York, northeastern Pennsylvania and northern New Jersey. Snow totals by the time it ends Wednesday were expected to range from a few inches to a few feet, depending on the area. About two feet of snow fell in parts of northern New York and the Catskill Mountains, with Indian Lake in New York’s Adirondack Mountains recording 31 inches (79 centimeters) of snow. Gov. Kathy Hochul said some areas could get an additional foot by Wednesday morning. “Heavy snow has impacted much of the state today — and it’s not over yet,” Hochul said late Tuesday on Twitter. She said more than 74,700 households had lost power and that a windy night was anticipated. More than two feet of snow fell on some parts of New Hampshire Tuesday including the town of Bennington, which recorded 30 inches (76 centimeters), according to the National Weather Service. Also Read: Storms roll eastward after slamming South; 8 deaths reported In Derry, New Hampshire, firefighters and police officers used chain saws, shovels and their bare hands to rescue a girl trapped under a fallen tree. Authorities said the girl had been playing outside near a parent who was clearing snow when the tree fell on her. The girl was taken to a hospital with minor injuries. All northbound lanes of Interstate 95 on the Piscataqua River Bridge between Maine and New Hampshire were shut down for about an hour after tractor trailer trucks became stuck on the bridge due to icy conditions. New Hampshire State Police said troopers across the state on Tuesday responded to more than 200 crashes and vehicles that slid off the road. In the Berkshires in western Massachusetts, heavy, wet snow made driving treacherous, weighed down tree limbs and caused spinouts. Further east in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, where as much as 18 inches (45 centimeters) of snow was reported to have fallen, Jean Guerrer said the conditions were too dangerous for him to drive to work as a Boston-based taxi driver. Also Read: Winter storms sow more chaos, shut down much of Portland The storm in the Northeast came as California faced warnings of more flooding, potentially damaging winds and difficult travel conditions on mountain highways as a new atmospheric river pushed into the swamped state early Tuesday. So far this winter, California has been battered by 10 previous atmospheric rivers, long plumes of moisture from the Pacific Ocean, as well as powerful storms fueled by arctic air that produced blizzard conditions. A Delta Air Lines plane veered off a paved surface as it taxied for takeoff from a Syracuse, New York, airport Tuesday morning. Flight 1718, which was bound for New York City’s LaGuardia Airport, slid into a grassy area, forcing passengers off the plane and onto buses back to the terminal, according to airport officials. No one was injured and the airport remained open. About 2,100 flights traveling to, from or within the U.S. were canceled Tuesday, with Boston and New York City area airports seeing the highest number of scrubbed flights, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. The storm shut down state and local government offices in Maine, where snow arrived later in the day and power outages climbed Tuesday with more than 80,000 customers affected Tuesday night. About 70,000 customers were without power in New Hampshire. In Massachusetts, more than 57,000 customers without power Tuesday evening. More than 30,000 electricity customers were affected in Vermont. The National Weather Service said that in New York, 2 inches (5 centimeters) of snow per hour or more fell in higher elevations in the eastern Catskills through the mid-Hudson Valley, central Taconics and Berkshires. Dustin Reidy, a county legislator who lives in Albany, said he stocked up on groceries and had prepared an emergency bin of candles, flashlights, and extra batteries. “I don’t think the storm is as bad in my neck of the woods, but I give a lot of credit to the snow plows,” said Reidy, who was working from home. The snowfall totals will be among the highest of the season, said meteorologist Andrew Orrison of the weather service office in College Park, Maryland. “It has been below average for snowfall across the Northeast this year, and so this nor'easter will be very impactful," he said. While higher elevations got snow, authorities warned residents in coastal areas to watch for possible flooding because of heavy rains. The National Weather Service in New York said wind gusts could reach 50 mph (80 kph) across Long Island and lower Connecticut. It was Election Day in New Hampshire for town officeholders, but more than 70 communities postponed voting because of the storm. In Kingston, New Hampshire, police offered voters rides to the polls. In Weare, power was knocked out at the polling place, forcing officials to set up battery-powered lights until a generator arrived. Interstate 93, the state’s main north-south route, was shut down in Londonderry in both directions after electrical wires came down. In Connecticut, state government offices and courts were closed Tuesday. State offices were also closed in New York. The weather service said expected snow totals from the storm, which is forecast to wind up Wednesday, ranged from more than 2 feet (1 meter) in higher elevations in New York, New Hampshire and western Massachusetts, to 4 to 6 inches (10 to 15 centimeters) in Boston.

The latest powerful atmospheric river to drench California put nearly 27,000 people under evacuation orders Tuesday due to flooding and landslide risks. On the central coast, workers hauled truckloads of rocks to plug a broken river levee amid steady rain and wind. Damaging winds with gusts topping 70 mph (113 kph) blew out windows, and there were numerous reports of falling trees. Power outages hit more than 330,000 utility customers in northern and central areas, according to poweroutage.us, which tracks outages nationwide. Crews raced to stabilize the Pajaro River's ruptured levee Tuesday, placing rocks and boulders to finish filling the gap that opened late Friday, about 70 miles (110 kilometers) south of San Francisco. Workers will then raise that portion's elevation to match the rest of the levee over the next few weeks to make it impermeable, officials said. Tuesday's storm initially spread light to moderate rain over the state's north and center. But the National Weather Service said the storm was moving faster than expected and that most of the precipitation would shift southward. Also Read: Snow, rain slam California as Michigan suffers without power “Even a small amount of rain could potentially have larger impacts,” Shaunna Murray of the Monterey County Water Resources Agency said Tuesday during a news conference. Powerful winds damaged windows in a San Francisco high-rise, causing glass to rain down and forcing evacuations from the building in the financial district. No injuries were immediately reported. A gust of 74 mph (119 kph) was recorded at the city's airport, the weather service said. So far this winter, California has been battered by 10 previous atmospheric rivers — long plumes of moisture from the Pacific Ocean — as well as powerful storms fueled by arctic air that produced blizzard conditions. On the East Coast, the start of a winter storm with heavy, wet snow caused a plane to slide off a runway and led to hundreds of school closings, canceled flights and thousands of power outages Tuesday. Along the Southern California coast, evacuation orders began at 8 a.m. in Santa Barbara County for several areas burned by wildfires in recent years, creating increased risk of flash floods and debris flows. The storm caused emergency declarations for 40 counties. Also Read: Police say 3 dead, 4 hurt in latest California shooting In addition to evacuation orders, more than 71,600 people were under evacuation warnings and 546 people were in shelters by Tuesday morning, said Brian Ferguson, spokesperson for the California Office of Emergency Services. Updated figures were not immediately available. More flooding was expected on the central coast, where the Pajaro River swelled with runoff from last week's atmospheric river. Authorities had not received reports of any deaths or missing persons related to the storm as of Monday. The levee breach grew to at least 400 feet (120 meters) since the failure late Friday, officials said. A roughly 20-foot (6.10-meter) gap remained Tuesday afternoon. Pajaro, an unincorporated community known for its strawberry crops, was largely flooded. More than 8,500 people were told to evacuate, and nearly 250 people have been rescued by first responders since Friday. Some residents of the largely Latino farmworker community stayed. One shelter was already full by midday Tuesday, and officials were forced to open two more to accommodate the evacuees. “We live seven houses away from the river and the water level was six feet high, seven probably,” said evacuee Andres Garcia. “So we probably lost everything.” A second 100-foot (30-meter) breach in the levee opened closer to the Pacific coast, providing a “relief valve” for floodwaters to recede near the mouth of the river, officials said at a news conference Monday. Built in the late 1940s to provide flood protection, the levee was a known risk for decades and had several breaches in the 1990s. Emergency repairs to a section of the berm were undertaken in January. A $400 million rebuild is set to begin in the next few years. “We had so many years of drought and they could’ve fixed the levee way back and they didn’t," said Garcia, the Pajaro evacuee. "This is the second time it happened. Back in 1995, same thing. We lost everything.” The river separates Santa Cruz and Monterey counties. Highway 1, a main link between the two counties, was closed along with several other roads.