Author: Press Room

President Donald Trump called on Congress Wednesday to quickly extend a key surveillance program amid a Republican rebellion that is threatening to tank the effort ahead of an April 20 deadline. “When used properly, [the program] is an effective tool to keep Americans safe,” Trump said in a Truth Social post Wednesday. “For these reasons, I have called for a clean 18-month extension.” He emphasized that restrictions included in the last reauthorization of the Section 702 spy program should remain in place. Trump also argued that the ongoing war against Iran should lead Congress to act quickly given the program,…

Indian refiners have reportedly payed above benchmark prices for about 60 million barrels for April delivery Indian refiners have sharply increased purchases of Russian oil for delivery next month, paying above global benchmark prices, Bloomberg reports.The US-Israeli war against Iran has virtually halted shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which carries around a fifth of the world’s daily oil supply, triggering a surge in oil and gas prices and increasing demand for Russian oil.Companies in the world’s third-largest oil-importing nation have struck deals for around 60 million barrels of Russian crude for April, people familiar with the matter told…

First Lady Melania Trump made history on Wednesday as she strutted through the halls of the East Room of the White House alongside a robot. During the second day of her Fostering the Future Together Global Coalition Summit, which saw the likes of France’s First Lady Brigitte Macron and Princess Lalla Hasna of Morocco in attendance, among others, Melania Trump entered the East Room with a robot. For the occasion, Mrs. Trump chose an ivory single-breasted suit from Dolce & Gabbana. The silhouette that has become synonymous with Mrs. Trump’s second tenure at the White House. Mrs. Trump paired the suit…

Radical left-wing actress Jane Fonda teamed with extremist Democrat Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren for a badly staged video to lambast the proposed merger between media giants Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery. Paramount Skydance came out as the top bidder after streaming giant Netflix bowed out of its multibillion-dollar failed effort to buy the Warners studios. So, Hollywood’s focus is now landing on this deal. And they are worried. The Paramount deal is just entering into its phase of jumping through the regulatory hoops it will need to get approval, but at least one of those hoops was successfully jumped…

Senate Majority Leader John Thune defended on Wednesday a Department of Homeland Security funding framework as it comes under heavy criticism from Democrats and some conservatives. “I think it’s going to be … still the best landing spot, but we haven’t heard anything back from the Dems yet,” Thune said when asked if the framework was still viable. He added that the best way for the shutdown to end would be for Democrats to “take a deal” but added that he doubted they “have a clear idea about what they want to do or how they see us concluding.” “But…

Germany’s troubled industrial base is increasingly pivoting toward defense production German auto giant Volkswagen could repurpose one of its struggling plants to produce components for an Israeli arms company, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.Volkswagen’s factory in Osnabruck, Lower Saxony is expected to halt vehicle production later this year as part of a sweeping cost-cutting and restructuring plan adopted in 2024. The FT reports that the company is now in talks with Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems about converting the site to manufacture elements of the Iron Dome air defense system.Sources cited by the newspaper said that, if approved, the…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned in a war update on Monday that the government of Russia was allegedly offering Iran intelligence to help it more accurately target sites, presumably American or Israeli targets, in the ongoing war in the region. Zelensky accused Russia, which has been engaging in a full-scale invasion of Ukraine since 2022, of “prolonging” the war between Iran and America and Israel by helping Iran use lethal force. In addition to strikes on Israel, Iran has targeted about a dozen neighboring countries since the United States announced Operation Epic Fury to erode the ability of the Iranian…

The Economy That Never Came in from the Cold Four score years ago, the United States brought forth a new economic system, dedicated to the proposition that we would rebuild the world from the wreckage of the Second World War and stand athwart communism. For 40 years, that system worked. Germany and Japan, economically devastated, got rebuilt. In return, the United States accepted persistent trade deficits and the gradual hollowing out of our manufacturing base. The logic was coherent: we needed these allies secure and prosperous. Then the logic expired in 1989, but we never stopped. For the past 30…

A Guatemalan jurist is suing Socialist Spain’s Equality Ministry for over 375,000 euros on allegations it illegally appropriated her work for the nation’s abortion law reforms, the newspaper El País reported on Wednesday. El País explained that in 2021, the Equality Ministry reached out to jurist Adilia de las Mercedes to commission a “blueprint” for the abortion law reforms that were ultimately passed by the Spanish socialists in 2023. De las Mercedes reportedly specializes in “human rights, sexual and reproductive health, and international law,” and has served as an expert for organizations such as the United Nations and governments in Asia, Europe, and…

President Donald Trump maintained government documents relevant to his business interests after he left office, according to an internal memo from former special counsel Jack Smith’s office. The memo, viewed by POLITICO, was transmitted by the Justice Department to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees earlier this month. It was turned over in response to Republican-led probes into the investigations Smith led during the Biden administration surrounding Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents after leaving office, as well as his efforts to subvert the results of the 2020 election. “Process is very much ongoing but the FBI has already since…