Politics

Top U.S. Intelligence Official Taps New Counterterrorism Chief

WASHINGTON — Lora Shiao, a career American intelligence officer, will be the next acting director of the National Counterterrorism Center, the government’s central clearinghouse for intelligence on terrorist threats, Trump administration officials said on Saturday. Ms. Shiao, who is currently the center’s third-ranking official, replaces Russell Travers, who was abruptly replaced last week amid planned […]

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Push for Cash in Rescue Package Came From Unlikely Source: Conservatives

But as it became clear there was bipartisan opposition to President Trump’s push for a payroll tax holiday, Mr. Mnuchin got onboard and the cash idea quickly transformed from pipe dream to reality, to the centerpiece of Senate Republicans’ roughly $1 trillion rescue plan. The optics were jarring, since it is Republicans who usually accuse

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Used to Meeting Challenges With Bluster and Force, Trump Confronts a Crisis Unlike Any Before

But even as he has seemed to take the crisis more seriously, Mr. Trump has continued to make statements that conflicted with the government’s own public health experts and focused energy on blaming China, quarreling with reporters, claiming he knew that the coronavirus would be a pandemic even when he was minimizing its threat only

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Al Qaeda Branch in Somalia Threatens Americans in East Africa — and Even the U.S.

The Shabab formally pledged allegiance to Al Qaeda in 2012. But long before that, its members fought Western-backed governments in Mogadishu as the group sought to impose its extremist interpretation of Islam across Somalia. In defending the fragile government, the United States has largely relied on proxy forces, including about 20,000 African Union peacekeepers from

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Biden Takes Charge as Coronavirus Spreads: This Week in the 2020 Race

The lecterns were separated by an epidemiologist-approved six feet. The candidates greeted each other with an elbow bump instead of a handshake. The first topic was, of course, the coronavirus, and the candidates’ arguments reflected their starkly different worldviews. Mr. Biden cast the fight against the virus as something like a war, requiring a well-tested

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Trump Aides Clash Over Response to Iranian-Backed Attacks in Iraq

Defending American troops from accurate, short-range and easily concealed rockets would require an influx of troops to either defend the perimeter of bases like Taji, or to crew air defense weapons capable of intercepting the rockets. Iraqi officials already have pushed back on the placement of Patriot missile batteries, installed to help intercept Iranian ballistic

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Swabs for Coronavirus? White House Enlists Military to Import

WASHINGTON — Faced with steep shortages of medical supplies to combat the coronavirus pandemic, the White House is scrambling to coordinate with the private sector to import and manufacture testing swabs, face masks and hand sanitizer. A lack of nasal swabs has been a pressing obstacle as the United States tries to accelerate testing for

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Trump Administration Delays Tax Filing Deadline Until July 15

WASHINGTON — American taxpayers will have until July 15 to file their tax returns, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Friday, a move intended to offer additional reprieve to individuals and companies in the middle of the coronavirus. The move follows an earlier decision by the Treasury Department, at the direction of President Trump, to

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