Murder
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FILE PHOTO – Vietnamese Doan Thi Huong, who was a suspect in the murder case of North Korean leader’s half brother Kim Jong Nam, leaves the Shah Alam High Court on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia March 14, 2019. REUTERS/Lai Seng Sin
April 1, 2019
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysia has offered an alternative charge against a Vietnamese woman accused of killing the brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, prosecutors said on Monday.
Doan Thi Huong, 30, is facing a murder charge after smearing Kim Jong Nam’s face with VX poison, a lethal chemical weapon, at Kuala Lumpur airport in February 2017.
Prosecutors offered an alternative charge of voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means, Huong’s lawyer Salim Bashir told reporters.
Prosecutors told the court they made the offer after receiving representations from the Vietnamese embassy and Huong’s lawyers.
(Reporting by Rozanna Latiff, Writing by A. Ananthalakshmi; editing by Darren Schuettler)
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FILE PHOTO: A police officer stands guard outside Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Jorge Silva/File Photo
March 30, 2019
By Charlotte Greenfield and Praveen Menon
CHRISTCHURCH/WELLINGTON (Reuters) – Weeks before a gunman killed 50 Muslims in Christchurch, a man had threatened to burn copies of the Koran outside New Zealand mosques, in what community leaders said was the latest in a long list of threatening behavior against religious minorities.
Police said they warned a 38-year-old man over the incident, which was unrelated to the Christchurch attack, but could not say if it was part of a pattern.
That’s because, unlike many Western countries including the United Kingdom and the United States, New Zealand’s government keeps no comprehensive record of hate crimes, failing to act on requests to do so from local and international agencies spanning more than a decade.
“For many years our view has consistently been that this needs to be prioritized and implemented urgently,” said Janet Anderson-Bidois, Chief Legal Adviser at the Human Rights Commission, the independent government agency tasked with protecting human rights.
“It is imperative that we have good data.”
A suspected white supremacist has been charged with murder over the Christchurch shootings and will appear in court again on April 5.
In the wake of New Zealand’s worst mass shooting, questions are being asked about what signs agencies missed and where resources should have been allocated to protect vulnerable communities.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has ordered a Royal Commission, a powerful form of inquiry, into the attack.
Anwar Ghani from the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand, said anecdotal evidence suggested there had been a rise in anti-Muslim behavior in recent years.
“When there is a hot spot in global events and when Muslims are involved…we do see the pulse of hate crime coming from certain members of the community,” he said.
“NOT A PRIORITY”
Joris De Bres, New Zealand’s Race Relations Commissioner between 2002 and 2013, said he was alarmed at signs of an uptick in threats against Muslims when he took up the role soon after the 9/11 attacks in the United States.
De Bres said he repeatedly asked the government and police to create a central system for recording details about crimes motivated by hatred and racism.
He raised the issue with the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, which in its 2007 review of New Zealand said the lack of records was a concern, and asked the government to collect data on complaints of racially motivated crimes.
“I listed it every year…I wrote at various points to government about it and it was simply said that it wasn’t necessary and it wasn’t a priority,” De Bres said.
In its latest report on New Zealand in 2017, the UN committee repeated its concerns and requests and asked the government to provide the data for its next report as a priority.
When current Justice and Intelligence Services Minister Andrew Little took office in late 2017, the Human Rights Commission said in their incoming briefing the country needed a central system for recording details about crimes motivated by hatred and racism and steps currently taken by police were insufficient.
“Understanding the scale, extent, and location of hate crimes is essential and is a prerequisite to ensuring adequate resources are available to address the issue,” the briefing said.
Little did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment but told local media on Saturday that current hate speech laws were inadequate and he would work with officials to review the legislation, including considering whether a separate hate crime offense should be created.
Police said they took hate crimes seriously and were continually looking to improve the way they worked.
“We are engaged in ongoing conversations with community leaders and representatives about a range of issues, including how police record allegations of hate crime and crimes of prejudice,” said a police spokesperson via email.
The National Party, in power from 2008 to 2017, said while in government, it introduced legislation to protect people from harmful communication online.
“There are hate speech laws in the Human Rights Act, but whether data should be collected is an operational matter for Police,” a spokeswoman said by email.
NO ONE WAS LISTENING
New Zealand has had no previous extremist mass attacks, unlike neighboring Australia, but civil society members say an underbelly of racism has always existed and may have been escalating.
Anjum Rahman from the Islamic Women’s Council of New Zealand said the group had repeatedly alerted the government over the past five years about the rise of the extreme right and the growing threat Muslim women felt in New Zealand.
“Without the data, without the measurement it’s really hard to push for change…I feel like it wasn’t taken seriously because it wasn’t hard data because we didn’t have it,” she said, adding she felt “a resistance to creating that data.”
One in 10 New Zealand adults have experienced hate speech online according to a 2018 study by internet safety organization Netsafe, with people of Asian descent or who identified as ‘other’ ethnicity most affected.
Since 2002, a law has specified judges should take hostility toward a group of people with a “common characteristic”, such as race or religion, into account when sentencing.
A Reuters review of sentencing records found 22 such cases since 2002, most with a racial motive.
Those included the murder of a Korean student, the hurling of a pipe bomb at a Sikh Temple, and threats to politicians by a non-Muslim posing as an Islamic extremist, which the judge described as a “deliberate attempt to tap into public fear about radicalized Muslims”.
The likely number is far higher, say human rights experts, because accessible records encompass only cases that are appealed or the most severe charges that reach New Zealand’s highest courts, not the tens of thousands of cases dealt with in lower District Courts each year.
One of those was a 2016 case, first reported by the New Zealand Herald, in which a Christchurch man delivered a bloodied pig’s head to Al Noor mosque, which was attacked this month.
He was charged with “offensive behavior” and fined NZ$800 ($543), court records show.
In 2017, lawmakers asked police whether hate crime was increasing but were told it could not be measured because it was not recorded as a specific category, according to Parliamentary records.
The Human Rights Commission said it received 417 complaints relating to race in 2018, up from 350 in 2014. Those included 63 complaints of “racial disharmony”, which includes hate speech, a 26 percent jump from four years earlier.
Lawmaker Golriz Ghahraman, a former human rights lawyer who was born in Iran and came to New Zealand as a child refugee, said she had received death threats and xenophobia including being called a “terrorist” and “Jihadist” online.
Before the Christchurch attacks, most of the public had felt safe, she said.
“Minorities didn’t, but no one was listening to them.”
(Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield and Praveen Menon.; Editing by Lincoln Feast)
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FILE PHOTO: The Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison attends a news conference in Canberra, Australia August 24, 2018. REUTERS/David Gray
March 30, 2019
MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Australia’s budget for the 2019/20 fiscal year will include an additional A$570 million ($404.36 million) for national security to boost counter-terrorism and anti-espionage operations, The Weekend Australian newspaper reported on Saturday.
The extra spending package for domestic spy agency the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and the Australian Federal Police (AFP) will fund programs such as anti-drone technology for the police and intelligence gathering in offshore conflict zones.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison will unveil a budget on Tuesday that is expected to feature an avalanche of spending in an effort to arrest his conservative government’s slide in popularity.
The delivery of the budget for the year beginning July 1 will be a launching pad for a general election due in May.
The killing of 50 people in two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 15 has sparked debate about Australia’s readiness to fight extremism.
An Australian man, a suspected white supremacist, has been charged with one count of murder and is expected to face more charges at his next court appearance on Friday.
Morrison said the extra money for security was not a response to concerns Australia had let extremists slip through its net.
“No, no. What this is is a recognition of the growing threat of extremist terrorism in so many different terms,” he said in televised remarks.
The Weekend Australian reported that the majority of the new spending would go to the AFP. The agency was expected to receive a A$512 million increase over the next five years to cope with a seven-fold increase in counter-terrorism operations and an eight-fold increase in the number of people being monitored under a security watch list, it said.
(Reporting by Lidia Kelly; Editing by Paul Tait)
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FILE PHOTO: Demonstrators light up their mobile phones as they take part in a protest rally marking the first anniversary of the murder of the investigative reporter Jan Kuciak and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova in Bratislava, Slovakia, February 21, 2019. REUTERS/David W. Cerny/File Photo
March 29, 2019
BRATISLAVA (Reuters) – A Slovak deputy general prosecutor resigned under pressure on Friday over his contacts with the main suspect in the murder of investigative journalist Jan Kuciak, the second such departure in the high-profile case.
The murder of Kuciak, who wrote about political corruption and fraud cases and was found shot dead at home along with his fiancee in February 2018, prompted the largest protests in Slovakia since the end of Communist rule in 1989 and led to the resignation of its prime minister, Robert Fico.
General prosecutor Jaroslav Ciznar said his deputy, Peter Sufliarsky, had agreed to resign, effective Monday, after admitting to exchanging hundreds of text messages with the man charged with ordering Kuciak’s murder, prior to his arrest.
Some of the messages with the accused – politically connected businessman Marian Kocner – in which Sufliarsky discusses politics, were leaked by the media on Wednesday.
Kocner, who was the subject of some of Kuciak’s reporting, was charged earlier this month with ordering the journalist’s murder. He denies any wrongdoing.
Sufliarsky said on Thursday the communication was a mistake but denied cooperating with the suspect in any way.
Another deputy general prosecutor was fired in January for having had online contacts with a second suspect in the murder.
Public distrust in political leaders has kept attention on any signs that the murder was linked to ruling circles.
The killing has also been a major factor in a presidential election in which opinion polls show liberal political novice, Zuzana Caputova, favoured to defeat the ruling party’s candidate in a run-off vote on Saturday.
(Reporting by Tatiana Jancarikova; Editing by Frances Kerry)
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Radical Democrats are “running scared of the facts” and still trying to “chase down witch hunts” even after special counsel Robert Mueller’s report has been concluded, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise said Friday.
“If that’s what they want to be the party of constant harassment of the president, of his family. Of allowing babies who are born to be killed when they are outside of the womb, that’s what they have become,” the Louisiana Republican told Fox News’ “Fox and Friends,” while responding to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s comments that party members are acting like “scaredy cats” over Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff.
Scalise also said that Republicans on Schiff’s committee who called for his resignation Thursday used “powerful words” and that Schiff and other Democrats “still won’t get over” the fact that there will be no new indictments and there was no proof of collusion between Russia and President Donald Trump’s campaign.
“There was no collusion,” Scalise said. ‘Get over that fact. Nobody should have wanted it to happen anyway. But it didn’t happen, and yet for two years they have been peddling this lie.”
Meanwhile, Scalise will introduce the “Born Alive” act next week, which he said will give full legal protections to newborn babies.
“When I talk to people all around the country, the first thing they say is why do you need to do that it already exists, right? It doesn’t. Look at New York,” said Scalise. ” This is murder. We need to protect innocent life. When the baby is born alive outside the womb, it should be fully protected.”
Source: NewsMax Politics
A building is seen where a fire broke out in Dhaka, Bangladesh, March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain
March 29, 2019
By Ruma Paul
DHAKA (Reuters) – A high-rise commercial building in the Bangladeshi capital where a blaze this week killed at least 25 people lacked proper fire exits, government officials said, prompting a senior minister to describe the incident as “murder”.
Lax regulations and poor enforcement have often been blamed for several large fires in the south Asian nation that have led to hundreds of deaths in recent years, at least 96 since last month.
Authorities have launched an investigation into the cause of Thursday’s fire, in which at least seven people, including a Sri Lankan, died after jumping off the 22-storey structure in one of the world’s most densely congested cities.
“There were no proper fire exits in the building that houses many offices and several restaurants,” Julfikar Rahman, director of the Fire Service and Civil Defence, told Reuters.
“It the building had proper fire exits, people would have been able to come out. There was little fire-fighting equipment in the building and it was not in working condition.”
At just two feet (0.6 m) and four feet (1.2 m) wide, the building’s two exits were too narrow for people inside to leave smoothly, and were blocked by obstructions that made the task harder, he added.
Reuters could not ascertain who owns the building, and a telephone number for the purported owner was switched off.
The Dhaka development authority said it was investigating how the owner, who had permission only to build 18 stories, managed to extend them to 22.
“It’s not an accident, it’s murder,” Public Works and Housing Minister Rezaul Karim told reporters after visiting the site, where firefighters combed through the ashes.
“Legal action will be taken against those responsible for violating the building code, no matter how powerful they are.”
Helicopters had joined 22 firefighting units in battling the fire, along with police and armed forces, as some of those trapped in the building waved desperately for help from its windows and roof.
The blaze comes a month after an inferno killed 71 people in an old neighborhood of the city. [nL3N20F745]
(Reporting by Ruma Paul; Editing by Krishna N. Das and Clarence Fernandez)
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When I was told over a year ago that I would be attending CNN’s “townhall” on the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, I knew it would neither be a journalistic endeavor nor a genuine townhall meeting where anyone would be permitted to speak. CNN’s own title said it all: “Stand Up: The Students of Stoneman Douglas Demand Action.” So this was an advocacy event, not a journalistic undertaking, which makes the Walter Cronkite Award the news channel received last week for the program utterly undeserved.
Yet millions of everyday Americans, many of them parents of school-age children themselves, were concerned how gun owners would be portrayed. Many of them burned up the phone lines at the National Rifle Association headquarters, and requested that their viewpoint be represented at CNN’s event.
This is how I was sent to Parkland. I knew what I was walking into: An emotional assembly held days after an insurmountable loss of innocent life, many of them children the same ages as my own. CNN’s event was held on a Wednesday; I was informed that I would be attending on Tuesday. I learned only upon arriving in Florida that I would be on stage with Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel.
The producers, a couple of whom I’ve known from other networks, seemed nervous. So did Jake Tapper, who approached me in the greenroom to thank me for participating – but who also seemed sheepish about the format, which unfolded with Scott Israel speaking onstage for about a half-hour before the televised event began.
Before the sheriff spoke, I had introduced myself to him and said I was fervently praying for his community.
“Oh, very nice to meet you, yeah,” he responded. “I appreciate that. No hard feelings or anything.”
This warning gave me a sinking feeling that CNN was pitting us against each other for a spectacular show and he was perfectly willing to play along. As he warmed up the crowd, the sheriff referred to me as “the NRA lady” while deflecting as much blame onto innocent NRA members as he could to hide his own cowardice and incompetence.
While he was on stage blaming and electioneering, several of his own deputies, whom I have promised I would not name, quietly stole into the greenroom where I was held to say hello and get a couple of photos.
“We agree with you, by the way,” one confided, giving me a small glimpse into the turmoil roiling the department and the lack of trust the deputies had for their leader. Months later, 85 percent of their deputies’ union voted “no confidence” in Israel’s leadership.
Yet as the event unfolded, those responsible for Marjory Stoneman Douglas’ fateful security deficiencies were celebrated while people like Sen. Marco Rubio were scapegoated for the school officials’ failures. When it was my turn to go onstage, I was cued to walk into the center of the arena to the Black Eyed Peas’ “Let’s Get It Started,” an odd choice, considering the somber tone and grieving family members present.
The arena was packed: 7,000 people, some from the community (including grieving families and students), some from outside it. People booed me immediately. The last friendly face I saw was that of student Jalen Martin, who ran up the aisle. Bracing myself for the worse, Jalen instead implored me to say something to stem the tide. He smiled encouragingly; in the middle of the overwhelming boos and epithets yelled I noticed he was wearing an USAF shirt. I asked him if someone in his family was serving.
“Yes, ma’am — my brother,” he replied above the boos and shouts of “Murderer!” I grasped his hand and said thank you.
During the broadcast Scott Israel tried to play the hero and CNN encouraged it, even though the network’s own reporting revealed that his department had received 39 calls about the 19-year-old murderer – and did nothing to stop him. Prior to his Feb. 14, 2018 rampage, Nikolas Cruz had beaten his adoptive mother so badly she lost several of her teeth, had taken knives and bullets to school, and had threatened to kill his fellow students (they reported him to school officials on numerous occasions). School counselors wanted him forcibly committed, and he had even called the police on himself (in addition to his own family calling them, begging for his weapons to be removed). Although Sheriff Israel knew all these things prior to the CNN event, it was made clear that the carnage at that school was my responsibility.
If CNN was practicing journalism instead of advocacy that day, the sheriff would have been held to account. We’ve learned more since the shooting as well. In the weeks following, I spoke with one MSD teacher on NRATV who informed me that the school had no security plan in place for what had happened. I discussed on my radio program that a Secret Service agent had performed a risk assessment months before the massacre and none of his recommendations were put into effect.
If I could discover this kind of information, CNN, with its vast editorial resources, easily could have as well. There was no discussion about mental health awareness. No discussion about school security procedures. Instead, the discussion focused entirely on blaming Republican lawmakers, the Second Amendment, the NRA, and law-abiding gun owners. I watched from the stage as one camera focused on the pained face of a mother in agony, a mother mourning the loss of her child. She read a statement, pausing to compose herself as best she could, tears streaming down her face, while the camera zoomed in to capture her suffering. I don’t think some of those who attended realized that the network intended for this to be a spectacle.
When the event ended, I stood to leave and a woman in front of the stage attempted to rush forward and jump on the stage, presumably to attack me. She was physically stopped by a member of my three-person detail. I’d be interested to know if CNN has footage of this. The other two, stationed on the left side of the stage, had to lift me off the stairs as another woman had angrily grabbed my arm and would not let go, making it awkward for me to step down from the last step onto the floor to exit.
Meanwhile, many of the thousands in the arena hugged, shook hands, and took photos with Scott Israel and Robert Runcie, the local school superintendent whose policies of not arresting students who committed crimes made it possible for Cruz to legally purchase firearms.
I hadn’t gone to argue with anyone, I was simply there to be a voice for millions of people who choose to associate as NRA members, many of whom were watching the CNN event with their own children at home. We are just as concerned with school security, which is why we support NRA’s School Shield program to improve security and training within schools across the country, free of charge. Our support for Second Amendment rights doesn’t make us complicit in crimes we didn’t commit nor responsible for failing to prevent these crimes — not any more than Scott Israel and Robert Runcie, who had years’ worth of advance knowledge and tips that we did not.
In the days following the event, CNN allowed to air unchallenged accusation that I owned Congress, that gun owners are monsters, that any lawmaker who supports the Second Amendment is complicit in mass murder.
That CNN celebrates winning an award for this event demonstrates that the network cannot distinguish between political activism and reporting. At best, its event was network-organized tragedy voyeurism, a selfish intrusion into a community’s fresh, days-old pain, with the purpose of settling political scores and dividing the country instead of fostering genuine discussion on solutions and practical means of school security. If anyone should have won an award, it should be the local media in Florida, particularly the reporters at the Sun-Sentinel, the Fort Lauderdale daily newspaper whose original, dedicated focus on the truth exposed much of what we now know about the missed warnings leading up to the massacre and the corruption of the school board. (The board even threatened legal action against reporters for accurate reporting.)
CNN should give its award to the Sun-Sentinel — and to everyone else, an apology.
People attend the national remembrance service for victims of the mosque attacks, at Hagley Park in Christchurch, New Zealand March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Jorge Silva
March 28, 2019
By Charlotte Greenfield
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (Reuters) – Thousands stood in silence in a Christchurch park on Friday as the names of 50 people shot dead in two mosques were read out at a national memorial service, with speakers calling for the legacy of the tragedy to be a kinder, more tolerant New Zealand.
Dozens of representatives of governments from around the world joined New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern at the remembrance service in Hagley Park, near the Al Noor mosque where more than 40 of the victims were killed by a suspected white supremacist during Friday prayers on March 15.
“Our challenge now is to make the very best of us a daily reality. Because we are not immune to the viruses of hate, of
fear, of other. We never have been,” said Ardern, whose handling of the tragedy has won global praise.
“But we can be the nation that discovers the cure. And so to each of us as we go from here, we have work to do,” she said.
Ardern, who wore a Maori cloak known as a kakahu during the service, said the world had to end the vicious cycle of extremism and that it needed a global effort.
“The answer to them lies in a simple concept that is not bound by domestic borders, that isn’t based on ethnicity, power-base or even forms of governance. The answer lies in our humanity,” she said.
Security was tight around the service and New Zealand remains on high security alert. Police Commissioner Mike Bush said it was one of the largest security events ever conducted by the police.
‘A BEAUTIFUL GARDEN’
Farid Ahmed, whose wife Husna was one of the 50 killed, told the crowd that, as a man of faith, he had forgiven his wife’s killer because he did not want to have “a heart that is boiling like a volcano”.
“I want a heart that will be full of love and care and full of mercy and will forgive easily, because this heart doesn’t want any more lives to be lost,” he said to applause.
He called for people to work together for peace and to change attitudes to see everyone as part of one family, using Christchurch’s nickname of the Garden City to make his point.
“I may be from one culture, you may come from another culture, I may have one faith, you may have one faith, but together we are a beautiful garden,” Ahmed said.
Performers during the ceremony included Yusuf Islam, also known as Cat Stevens, who performed his song “Peace Train”.
“We will get through this time and emerge a kinder, more compassionate place,” Christchurch mayor Lianne Dalziel said.
People needed to ask hard questions about what they may have done to harbor racism “because we now know where this ends”, she said.
The massacre in Christchurch was carried out by a lone gunman at two mosques. Australian Brenton Tarrant, 28, a suspected white supremacist, has been charged with one count of murder and is likely to face more charges when he reappears in court next Friday.
(Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield; Writing by John Mair; Editing by Paul Tait)
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FILE PHOTO: U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry attends a news conference after meeting with Iraqi President Barham Salih in Baghdad, Iraq December 11, 2018. REUTERS/Thaier al-Sudani/File Photo
March 28, 2019
By Timothy Gardner
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry told lawmakers on Thursday he did not know whether any of the approvals he authorized for U.S. companies to sell nuclear power technology to Saudi Arabia were made after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in October last year.
Perry told a Senate hearing he has approved six authorizations by U.S. companies to sell preliminary nuclear power technology and assistance to Saudi Arabia since November 2017, confirming media reports by the Daily Beast and Reuters on Wednesday.
U.S. companies commonly win such approvals, known as Part 810 authorizations, for selling nuclear power technology abroad and the documents are often kept for the public to access in a room at Energy Department headquarters.
But the six that Perry approved for Saudi Arabia, which has been in quiet talks with the Trump administration on a wider nuclear power deal, were not made public. Perry said the six contained proprietary information for the companies, the names of which have not been released.
A House of Representatives aide said that previous Part 810 approvals for Saudi Arabia made during the administration of President Barack Obama are available for public perusal.
Lawmakers from both parties have slammed the Trump administration for negotiating a deal while keeping Congress in the dark. They worry that a program without non-proliferation safeguards could eventually lead to a nuclear arms race in the Middle East.
Saudi Arabia, which wants to build two reactors initially, has pushed back against U.S. limits on enriching uranium and reprocessing spent fuel, both of which are potential paths to a nuclear weapons program.
Concern grew after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said last year said the kingdom would pursue nuclear weapons if its rival Iran developed them.
Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat, asked Perry if any of his approvals were made before or after Oct. 2, 2018, the day that Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Khashoggi was a resident of Virginia, Kaine’s state.
“I don’t,” Perry told Kaine. “I don’t want to give you a date specific,” Perry said before Kaine resumed questioning. Perry told Kaine he would get back to him on the specific timing of the approvals.
Kaine has accused the Trump administration of complicity in covering up Khashoggi’s murder. A number of lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, have been at odds with the Trump administration over its response to Khashoggi’s killing, and a bipartisan group of senators had introduced a bill to impose sanctions on those responsible for his death.
Perry, responding to another question by Kaine at the hearing, said that since 2017, the Department of Energy has received 65 applications for Part 810 authorizations and approved 37. Perry said nine were for work in the Middle East, six for Saudi Arabia, and two for Jordan. It was not clear where the last one was for.
Perry said late last year that he had emphasized to Saudi Arabian officials it was important for them to be seen as strong on non-proliferation, but that part of the talks have centered on making sure any nuclear inspections would not be intrusive to sensitive areas in the kingdom.
Senator Ed Markey, a Democrat, said on Thursday he will introduce a bill to stop the Trump administration from what he called “bypassing Congress” on nuclear technology transfer to Saudi Arabia. The legislation, which would mandate that any 810 authorizations are made available to Congress, would face an uphill battle in the Republican-led chamber.
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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FILE PHOTO: U.S. former Vice President Joe Biden delivers remarks at the First State Democratic Dinner in Dover, Delaware, U.S. March 16, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
March 28, 2019
By Arlene Washington
(Reuters) – A crowded field of fresh faces and veteran U.S. lawmakers has lined up to seek the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential nomination.
The diverse group vying to challenge President Donald Trump, the likely Republican nominee, includes six U.S. senators. A record six women are running, as well as black, Hispanic and openly gay candidates who would make history if one of them became the party’s nominee.
Here are the Democrats who have launched campaigns or are expected to pursue a presidential bid, listed in order of their RealClearPolitics national polling average.
JOE BIDEN
The leader in polls of Democratic presidential contenders is not even a candidate yet. But Biden, who served eight years as vice president under former President Barack Obama and 36 years in the U.S. Senate, looks poised to join the 2020 race. At 76, he will be the second oldest candidate in the Democratic primary, after Senator Bernie Sanders. Biden will be a key figure in the Democratic debate over whether a liberal political newcomer or a centrist veteran is needed to win back the White House. Liberal activists criticize his Senate record, including his authorship of the 1994 crime act that led to increased incarceration rates, and his ties to the financial industry, which is prominent in his home state of Delaware. Biden, who relishes his “Middle-Class Joe” nickname and touts his working-class roots, made unsuccessful bids for the nomination in 1988 and 2008.
BERNIE SANDERS
The senator from Vermont lost the Democratic nomination in 2016 to Hillary Clinton but has jumped in for a second try. In the 2020 race, Sanders, 77, will have to fight to stand out in a packed field of progressives touting issues he brought into the Democratic Party mainstream four years ago. His proposals include free tuition at public colleges, a $15 minimum wage and universal healthcare. He benefits from strong name recognition and a robust network of small-dollar donors, helping him to raise $5.9 million during his first day in the contest. Sanders, whose father was a Jewish immigrant from Poland, has shown a more personal side in this campaign, highlighting his struggles while growing up in a working-class family. He also has tried to reach out to black and Hispanic leaders after having trouble winning over minority voters in 2016.
KAMALA HARRIS
The first-term senator from California would make history as the first black woman to gain the nomination. Harris, 54, the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India, announced her candidacy on the holiday honoring slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. She has made a quick impact in a Democratic race that will be heavily influenced by women and minority voters. She raised $1.5 million in the first 24 hours of her campaign and drew record ratings on a CNN televised town hall. She supports a middle-class tax credit, Medicare for All healthcare funding reform, the Green New Deal and the legalization of marijuana. Her track record as San Francisco’s district attorney and California’s attorney general has drawn scrutiny in a Democratic Party that has shifted in recent years on criminal justice issues.
BETO O’ROURKE
The former three-term Texas congressman jumped into the race on March 14 – and has been jumping on to store countertops ever since to deliver his optimistic message to voters in early primary states. O’Rourke, 46, gained fame last year for his record fundraising and ability to draw crowds ahead of his unexpectedly narrow loss in the U.S. Senate race against Republican incumbent Ted Cruz. O’Rourke announced a $6.1 million fundraising haul for the first 24 hours of his campaign, besting his Democratic opponents. But with progressive policies and diversity at the forefront of the party’s nominating battle, O’Rourke will face a challenge as a wealthy white man who is more moderate on several key issues than many of his competitors.
ELIZABETH WARREN
The 69-year-old senator from Massachusetts is a leader of the party’s liberals and a fierce Wall Street critic who was instrumental in creating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She has focused her presidential campaign on her populist economic message, promising to fight what she calls a rigged economic system that favors the wealthy. She also has proposed eliminating the Electoral College, vowed to break up Amazon, Google and Facebook if elected, and sworn off political fundraising events to collect cash for her bid. Warren apologized earlier this year to the Cherokee Nation for taking a DNA test to prove her claims to Native American ancestry, an assertion that has prompted Trump to mockingly refer to her as “Pocahontas.”
CORY BOOKER
Booker, 49, a black senator from New Jersey and former mayor of Newark, gained national prominence in the fight over Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination. He has made U.S. race relations and racial disparities a focus of his campaign, noting the impact of discrimination on his family. He embraces progressive positions on Medicare coverage for every American, the Green New Deal and other key issues, and touts his style of positivity over attacks. Booker eats a vegan diet and recently confirmed rumors he is dating actress Rosario Dawson.
AMY KLOBUCHAR
The third-term senator from Minnesota was the first moderate in the Democratic field vying to challenge Trump. Klobuchar, 58, gained national attention in 2018 when she sparred with Brett Kavanaugh during Senate hearings for his Supreme Court nomination. On the campaign trail, the former prosecutor and corporate attorney supports an alternative to traditional Medicare healthcare funding and is taking a hard stance against rising prescription drug prices. Klobuchar’s campaign reported raising more than $1 million in its first 48 hours. Her campaign announcement came amid news reports that staff in her Senate office were asked to do menial tasks, making it difficult to hire high-level campaign strategists.
PETE BUTTIGIEG
The 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana, is emerging from underdog status as he begins to build momentum with young voters. A Harvard University graduate and Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford, he speaks seven languages and served in Afghanistan with the U.S. Navy Reserve. He touts himself as representing a new generation of leadership needed to combat Trump. Buttigieg would be the first openly gay presidential nominee of a major American political party.
JULIAN CASTRO
The secretary of housing and urban development under President Barack Obama would be the first Hispanic to win a major U.S. party’s presidential nomination. Castro, 44, whose grandmother was a Mexican immigrant who immigrated to Texas, has used his family’s personal story to criticize Trump’s border policies. Castro advocates for a universal pre-kindergarten program, supports Medicare for All and cites his experience to push for affordable housing. He announced his bid in his hometown of San Antonio, where he once served as mayor and a city councilman. His twin brother, Joaquin Castro, is a Democratic congressman from Texas.
KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND
Gillibrand, known as a moderate when she served as a congresswoman from upstate New York, has refashioned herself into a staunch progressive, calling for strict gun laws and supporting the Green New Deal. The senator for New York, who is 52, has led efforts to address sexual assault in the military and on college campuses, and she pushed for Congress to improve its own handling of sexual misconduct allegations. On the campaign trail, she has made fiery denunciations of Trump. She released her tax returns for the years 2007 through 2018, offering the most comprehensive look to date at the finances of a 2020 White House candidate, and has called on her rivals to do the same.
JAY INSLEE
The Washington state governor has made fighting climate change the central issue of his campaign. As governor, Inslee, 68, has moved to put a moratorium on capital punishment and fully implement the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, and accompanying expansion of Medicaid health coverage for the poor. He has not settled on a position on Medicare for All but does support the Green New Deal backed by progressives. Inslee spent 15 years in Congress before being elected governor in 2012.
JOHN HICKENLOOPER
The 67-year-old former Colorado governor has positioned himself as a centrist and an experienced officeholder with business experience. He is the only Democratic presidential candidate so far to oppose the Green New Deal plan to tackle climate change, saying it would give the government too much power in investment decisions. During his two terms in office, Colorado’s economy soared and the Western state expanded healthcare, passed a gun control law and legalized marijuana. The former geologist and brew pub owner is among the many candidates who have refused to take corporate money. He previously served as mayor of Denver.
JOHN DELANEY
The former U.S. representative from Maryland became the first Democrat to enter the 2020 race, declaring his candidacy in July 2017. Delaney, 55, plans to focus on advancing only bipartisan bills during the first 100 days of his presidency if elected. He’s also pushing for a universal healthcare system, raising the federal minimum wage and passing gun safety legislation.
TULSI GABBARD
The Samoan-American congresswoman from Hawaii and Iraq war veteran is the first Hindu to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. After working for her father’s anti-gay advocacy group and drafting relevant legislation, she was forced to apologize for her past views on same-sex marriage. Gabbard, 37, has been against U.S. intervention in Syria and slammed Trump for standing by Saudi Arabia after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. She endorsed Bernie Sanders during his 2016 presidential campaign.
ANDREW YANG
The entrepreneur and former tech executive is focusing his campaign on an ambitious universal income plan. Yang, 44, wants to guarantee all American citizens between the ages of 18 and 64 a $1,000 check every month. The son of immigrants from Taiwan, Yang also is pushing for Medicare for All and proposing a new form of capitalism that is “human-centered.” He lives in New York.
MARIANNE WILLIAMSON The 66-year-old New York Times best-selling author, motivational speaker and Texas native believes her spirituality-focused campaign can heal America. A 1992 interview on Oprah Winfrey’s show propelled her to make a name for herself as a “spiritual guide” for Hollywood and a self-help expert. She is calling for $100 billion in reparations for slavery over 10 years, gun control, education reform and equal rights for lesbian and gay communities. In 2014, she made an unsuccessful bid for a House seat in California as an independent.
WAYNE MESSAM
Messam, 44, defeated a 16-year incumbent in 2015 to become the first black mayor of in the Miami suburb of Miramar. He was re-elected in March. The son of Jamaican immigrants, he played on Florida State University’s 1993 national championship team, and then started a construction business with his wife. He has pledged to focus on reducing gun violence, mitigating climate change and reducing student loan debt and the cost of healthcare.
(Additional reporting by John Whitesides; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Jonathan Oatis)
Source: OANN
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