WASHINGTON DC (AP) — Eliminating the Islamic State’s elusive leader gives President Donald Trump a new argument for leaving Syria, but the U.S. military campaign against the extremists is far from finished. The killing of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi by U.S. forces leaves the Islamic State without an obvious leader, a major setback for an organization…
WASHINGTON (AP) — Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the shadowy leader of the Islamic State group who presided over its global jihad and became arguably the world’s most wanted man, is believed dead after being targeted by a U.S. military raid in Syria. A U.S. official told The Associated Press late Saturday that al-Baghdadi was targeted in…
MINNEAPOLIS, MN (AP) — The conflict and Twitter battles arrived in Minnesota well ahead of President Donald Trump’s touchdown in the state. Trump traded Twitter insults with the Minneapolis mayor over who should pay more than $500,000 in security costs for Thursday’s rally at a downtown arena. He denounced Jacob Frey as a “Radical Left”…
NEW YORK (AP) — Federal prosecutors are joining President Donald Trump in asking a federal judge in New York to temporarily block a state court grand jury subpoena seeking his tax returns. They say in papers filed late Tuesday in Manhattan federal court that Trump has raised “weighty constitutional issues” in trying to stop the…
BEIJING (AP) — China’s government has threatened unspecified “necessary countermeasures” if Trump’s planned tariff hike goes ahead. The Commerce Ministry said Trump’s announcement is a violation of his agreement with President Xi Jinping in June to revive negotiations aimed at ending their fight over Beijing’s trade surplus and technology ambitions. The ministry said if the…
WASHINGTON D.C. (AP) — Robert Mueller, the taciturn lawman at the center of a polarizing American drama, bluntly dismissed President Donald Trump’s claims of “total exoneration” in the federal probe of Russia’s 2016 election interference. In a long day of congressional testimony, Mueller warned that Moscow’s actions represented — and still represent — a great…
WASHINGTON D.C. (AP) — It took seven months, but President Donald Trump on Tuesday finally got a Senate-confirmed secretary of defense to succeed Jim Mattis. Mark Esper, an Army veteran and former defense industry lobbyist, won Senate confirmation by a vote of 90-8 and was sworn in at the White House by Supreme Court Justice…
By MATTHEW DALY Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate gave final legislative approval Tuesday to a bill ensuring that a victims’ compensation fund related to the Sept. 11 attacks never runs out of money. The 97-2 vote sends the bill to President Donald Trump, who is expected to sign it. The vote came after…
WASHINGTON D.C. (AP) — In a remarkable political repudiation, the Democratic-led U.S. House voted to condemn President Donald Trump’s “racist comments” against four congresswomen of color, despite protestations by Trump’s Republican congressional allies and his own insistence he hasn’t “a racist bone in my body.” Two days after Trump tweeted that four Democratic freshmen should “go…
WASHINGTON D.C. (AP) — Facebook’s ambitious plan to create a financial eco-system based on a digital currency faces questions from lawmakers, as it’s shadowed by negative comments from President Donald Trump, his treasury secretary and the head of the Federal Reserve. Congress begins two days of hearings Tuesday on the currency planned by Facebook, to…