Tag Archives: President Trump

Tillerson says he never considered resigning

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson makes a statement to the media that he is not going to resign, at the State Department in Washington, U.S., October 4, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

By Doina Chiacu and Yara Bayoumy

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Wednesday he had never considered resigning and that he was committed to Donald Trump’s agenda but declined to directly address whether he had referred to the president as a “moron” as NBC News has reported.

The top U.S. diplomat, whose tenure has been dogged with rumors about unhappiness with Trump’s policies and rhetoric, said he was committed to Trump’s agenda as much today as he was when he first accepted the offer to serve as secretary of state.

Tillerson spoke after NBC reported that Vice President Mike Pence and other top officials had intervened to persuade him not to resign this summer as tensions rose between Trump and Tillerson.

“The vice president has never had to persuade me to remain as secretary of state because I have never considered leaving this post,” Tillerson said in a hastily prepared news conference at the State Department.

“My commitment to the success of our president and our country is as strong as it was the day I accepted his offer to serve as secretary of state,” Tillerson said.

In a session with Trump’s national security team and Cabinet officials at the Pentagon, Tillerson openly criticized the president and referred to him as a “moron,” NBC reported, citing three officials familiar with the incident.

Tillerson, who said he had not spoken to Trump on Wednesday, sidestepped the issue when taking questions after his statement:

“I’m not going to deal with petty stuff like that,” he said, adding, “I’m not from this place (Washington), but the places I come from we don’t deal with that kind of petty nonsense.”

Tillerson, the former CEO of Exxon and former president of the Boy Scouts, also said of Trump: “He’s smart. He demands results.”

Trump appeared to undercut Tillerson over the weekend when the president tweeted that he told him that he was “wasting his time” trying to negotiate with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un over Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs.

Tillerson offered a vigorous defense of both the U.S. president and his foreign policy even though the White House and State Department have at times appeared to differ on policy.

“President Trump’s foreign policy goals break the mold of what people traditionally think is achievable on behalf of our country,” Tillerson said.

TRUMP CONFIDENT IN TILLERSON

The White House said Trump has confidence in Tillerson.

“As we’ve said many times before, if the president doesn’t have confidence in somebody, that person will not remain in that position,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters on Air Force One.

Pence, in a statement, said he never discussed with Tillerson the prospect of the secretary of state’s resignation.

In a tweet, Trump called on NBC to apologize for its story.

NBC News anchor Hallie Jackson said on air after Trump’s tweets: “NBC will not be issuing an apology to America as the president is calling for because again … the secretary did not refute directly some of the key points” in the story.

Several NBC journalists who reported the story also stood by their piece, saying on MSNBC that their reporting was true.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has played down any tensions between Trump and Tillerson over their apparent split, most recently over North Korea.

Tillerson’s insistence that he completely supports Trump’s agenda runs counter to what some administration officials have privately described as him chafing against some of the president’s pronouncements and off-the-cuff decisions, sometimes contrary to advice from senior advisers.

“… this was a stunning and unprecedented statement by a secretary of state in response to a news report about his comments about the president,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator for both Republican and Democratic administrations and now an analyst at the Wilson Center think tank in Washington.

One U.S. official said the view of many within the administration was that despite Tillerson’s denial of having contemplated resignation, “it’s only a matter of time” before he does consider it.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was no reason to believe that Trump would give up his habit of publicly contradicting Tillerson and that each time speculation on his future would resurface.

Tillerson has often found himself at odds with the president on a range of issues, according to current and former U.S. officials and media reports.

He has taken a more hawkish view on Russia and tried to mediate a dispute among key U.S. Mideast allies after four Arab nations boycotted Qatar over its alleged extremist ties.

Tillerson also appeared to distance himself from Trump’s response to the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia this summer, saying at the time “the president speaks for himself” when asked about Trump’s values.

Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican, said Tillerson was working under very difficult circumstances because there are a number of people in the administration who are undermining his authority by trying to act as secretary of state on a daily basis. He declined to name names.

Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, said he had never heard Tillerson make the kind of comment of calling someone a moron.

Asked whether he supported Tillerson, Corker said:

“As a team, Tillerson, Mattis and (White House Chief of Staff John) Kelly help separate us from chaos, so I absolutely support ‘em. Absolutely.”

Tillerson was confirmed by only 56-43 at his Senate confirmation hearing in January, an unusually low confirmation for a secretary of state.

Many members of Congress, including Republicans, strongly object to Tillerson’s plans to slash the State Department and foreign aid budgets.

(Additional reporting by Susan Heavey, Matt Spetalnick, Mohammad Zargham, Patricia Zengerle, Tim Ahmann, Steve Holland, Jeff Mason and Susan Cornwell in Washington; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and James Dalgleish)

Trump praises response to Puerto Rico, says crisis straining budget

U.S. President Donald Trump receives a briefing on hurricane relief efforts in a hangar at Muniz Air National Guard Base in Carolina, Puerto Rico, U.S. October 3, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Roberta Rampton and Gabriel Stargardter

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump expressed satisfaction on Tuesday with the federal response to Hurricane Maria’s devastation of Puerto Rico, despite criticism that the government was slow to address the crisis.

Trump, who has grappled with hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria in the past six weeks, said at a briefing that the disasters were straining the U.S. budget.

“I hate to tell you, Puerto Rico, but you’ve thrown our budget a little out of whack because we’ve spent a lot of money on Puerto Rico,” he said. “And that’s fine. We’ve saved a lot of lives.”

Two weeks after it was hit by the worst hurricane in 90 years, many of Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million residents are still struggling without basic necessities. Shortly after Trump left Puerto Rico, Governor Ricardo Rosello said the death toll had risen from 16 to 34.

The U.S. territory’s economy already was in recession before Hurricane Maria and its government had filed for bankruptcy in the face of a $72 billion debt load. In an interview with Fox News, Trump said the island’s debt would have to be erased.

“They owe a lot of money to your friends on Wall Street and we’re going to have to wipe that out. You’re going to say goodbye to that, I don’t know if it’s Goldman Sachs but whoever it is you can wave goodbye to that,” Trump said in the interview, conducted while he visited the island.

Moody’s on Tuesday estimated Maria’s total cost to Puerto Rico, including lost output, at $45 billion to $95 billion and significant relief from the federal government would be required.

Trump said the federal response to Maria compared favorably with a “real catastrophe like Katrina,” the 2005 storm that swamped Louisiana and Mississippi and killed more than 1,800.

“What’s happened in terms of recovery, in terms of saving lives – 16 lives that’s a lot – but if you compare that to the thousands of people who died in other hurricanes that frankly were not nearly as severe,” he said.

The hurricane wiped out the island’s power grid, and fewer than half of residents have running water. It is still difficult for residents to get a cell phone signal or find fuel for their generators or cars. About 88 percent of cellphone sites are still out of service.

On Air Force One on his return flight to Washington, Trump said it had been a “great day” and he had heard no criticism during his day in Puerto Rico.

“We’ve only heard ‘thank yous’ from the people of Puerto Rico,” he said. “It is something I enjoyed very much today.”

He said local truck drivers are still needed to help distribute supplies.

‘STOP BLAMING’ PUERTO RICO

In Washington, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Republican President Trump should “stop blaming Puerto Rico for the storm that devastated their shores” and should start trying to make the situation better.

The White House is preparing to ask Congress for a $29 billion aid package for Puerto Rico and other areas hit by natural disasters, a White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Additional requests from the administration are expected for longer-term assistance to Puerto Rico, as well as Texas and Florida, which also were hit by powerful storms in recent weeks.

During his 4-1/2 hour visit to Puerto Rico, Trump’s motorcade sped past trees stripped of their leaves and the occasional home without a roof.

He and his wife, Melania, met survivors of the disaster in the town of Guaynabo, walking down a street and talking to several families whose homes were damaged. Sidewalks were piled with debris.

“You know who helped them? God helped them. Right?” Trump said.

San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz, who has criticized the administration’s response to Puerto Rico, was among those Trump met with during his visit to the territory.

Days before, Trump lashed out at Cruz on Twitter, accusing her of “poor leadership” and saying that some people on the island “want everything to be done for them.”

Trump shook hands with Cruz but he saved his warm words of praise for other local and federal authorities.

“Right from the beginning, this governor did not play politics,” he said of Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello.

On CNN, Cruz said she told Trump, “This is about saving lives; it’s not about politics.”

Trump took a helicopter tour of the destruction, seeing hills that are normally lush and green, brown and bare after Maria’s winds stripped the branches. He also saw from the air the USNS Comfort, the just-arrived hospital ship.

Valentine Navarro, 26, a salesman in San Juan, shrugged off Trump’s trip as a public relations exercise.

“I think he’s coming here because of pressure, as a photo-op, but I don’t think he’s going to help more than he has already done – and that’s not much,” Navarro said.

(Additional reporting by Jeff Mason in Washington; Writing by Steve Holland and John Whitesides; Editing by Lisa Shumaker, Andrew Hay and Michael Perry)

More groups challenge Trump’s latest travel ban in court

FILE PHOTO - Protesters hold signs against U.S. President Donald Trump's limited travel ban, approved by the U.S. Supreme Court, in New York City, U.S. on June 29, 2017. REUTERS/Joe Penney/File Photo

By Mica Rosenberg

NEW York (Reuters) – Muslim immigrants and an advocacy group filed a fresh lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s latest version of a travel ban that placed indefinite restrictions on the entry of citizens from eight countries to the United States.

The suit filed late Monday in federal court in Maryland challenges a Sep. 24 Presidential proclamation limiting travel from Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Chad and North Korea. Certain government officials from Venezuela were also barred.

Six individual plaintiffs who are U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents with Iranian relatives who could be blocked from coming to the United States, along with the group Iranian Alliances Across Borders, claim the ban violates an immigration law that prevents discrimination based on nationality.

The complaint says that the majority of the people affected by the ban are Muslim and point to Trump’s campaign promises for “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” The suit says North Korea and Venezuela were added so Trump could “cloak this latest iteration of his Muslim ban in religiously neutral garb by invoking a national security review.”

The latest ban goes fully into effect on Oct. 18 and could affect tens of thousands of potential immigrants and visitors. Trump has argued that the restrictions are necessary to tighten security and prevent terrorist attacks.

Department of Justice spokesman Ian Prior said the agency “will continue to vigorously defend the President’s inherent authority to keep this country safe.”

Trump’s proclamation followed on two earlier temporary travel bans against some of the same countries, after the government did a global review of information sharing and security screening protocols.

The first ban issued soon after Trump took office in January targeted seven countries but was blocked by courts following a hasty implementation and chaotic scenes at airports.

The second ban signed in March targeted six countries and was also blocked by lower courts. It was then partially revived by the Supreme Court in June. The third ban, with no clear end date, came out when the temporary measures expired.

On Friday the American Civil Liberties Union said it was seeking to amend an existing lawsuit in Maryland federal court filed against the previous March 6 ban to include the latest proclamation.

Legal experts say the new restrictions are likely on more solid footing, in part because they followed a detailed review by federal agencies.

(Reporting by Mica Rosenberg; editing by Susan Thomas)

Trump meets victims, responders in hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico

U.S. President Donald Trump salutes as he and first lady Melania Trump arrive to board Air Force One for travel to Puerto Rico, from Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, U.S., October 3, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Roberta Rampton and Gabriel Stargardter

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) – President Donald Trump visited Puerto Rico on Tuesday on a mission to reassure the island’s struggling residents that he is committed to their recovery from a devastating hurricane that has tested his ability to manage natural disasters.

One of the first people Trump met when he and his wife, Melania, touched down in San Juan, Puerto Rico, was the city’s mayor, Carmen Yulin Cruz, who has repeatedly blasted Trump as showing insufficient concern about the U.S. territory’s plight.

Trump, who has grappled with hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria in the past six weeks, praised the federal assistance so far in Puerto Rico but said at a briefing that the disasters are straining the boundaries of the U.S. budget.

“I hate to tell you, Puerto Rico, but you’ve thrown our budget a little out of whack because we’ve spent a lot of money on Puerto Rico,” he said. “And that’s fine, we’ve saved a lot of lives.”

The trip offered Trump the chance to show solidarity with survivors, who are still struggling to get basic necessities, and demonstrate how his government intends to help them recover after they were hit by Maria, the worst hurricane in 90 years.

A few days earlier Trump had lashed out at Cruz on Twitter for “poor leadership” on the weekend after she criticized his government’s response. He cited “politically motivated ingrates” and said some people on the island “want everything to be done for them.”

Trump shook hands with Cruz after his arrival but he saved his warm words of praise for other local and federal authorities.

“Right from the beginning, this governor did not play politics,” he said of Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello.

Trump’s motorcade sped past trees stripped of their leaves, billboards stripped of their advertising, and the occasional home without a roof.

Not all were happy to see him.

“You are a bad hombre,” said hand-lettered sign in pink marker held by a woman along the route.

Trump and his wife, Melania, met survivors of the disaster in the nearby town Guaynabo, walking down a street and talking to several families whose homes were damaged. The sidewalks were piled with debris.

“You know who helped them? God helped them. Right?” Trump said. Later, he was to take a helicopter tour to look at the destruction. He is expected to fly over the USNS Comfort, the just-arrived hospital ship.

Before leaving Washington on Tuesday morning, Trump told reporters that roads were cleared and communication capabilities were coming back on the island. He said the mayor had “come back a long way” since her criticism.

Trump had criticism of his own about the local response.

“Their drivers have to start driving trucks,” he said at the White House. “So on a local level, they have to give us more help. But I will tell you, the first responders, the military, FEMA, they have done an incredible job in Puerto Rico.”

PROBLEMS PERSIST

The economy of the U.S. territory, home to 3.4 million people, already was in recession and its government filed for bankruptcy in May. The storm wiped out the island’s power grid, and less than half of residents have running water.

Two weeks after Maria, it is still difficult for residents to get a cell phone signal or find fuel for their generators or cars. About 88 percent of the cellphone sites are still out of service.

Valentine Navarro, 26, a salesman in San Juan, shrugged off Trump’s trip as a public relations exercise.

“I think he’s coming here because of pressure, as a photo-op, but I don’t think he’s going to help more than he has already done – and that’s not much,” Navarro said.

Puerto Rican Governor Ricardo Rossello said that as Trump flies over the island he would see “the magnitude of the devastation.” He said there were 320 functioning cash machines across the island and that waiting times for gasoline had dropped significantly.

Trump got high marks for his handling of Hurricane Harvey in Texas and Hurricane Irma in Florida and the Caribbean.

Caught off guard by the severity of Hurricane Maria’s damage to Puerto Rico, Trump did not focus on the storm for days, instead launching a barrage of tweets over his view that National Football League players should be required to stand during the U.S. national anthem.

A previous Republican president, George W. Bush, faced widespread criticism for his administration’s initial handling of Hurricane Katrina, which killed some 1,800 people in and around New Orleans in 2005.

Images of Trump standing together with mayors, the governor and federal officials would go a long way toward showing Americans the White House is addressing the hurricane damage, said retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen.

Allen, who led the federal response to Hurricane Katrina and the Gulf oil spill, said the presidential visit will provide a chance to communicate that Americans care about the disaster on the isolated island territory.

Trump’s administration has transferred more than $20.5 million in federal funds to Puerto Rico to defray disaster expenses, FEMA said on its website.

The administration is preparing to ask Congress for $13 billion in aid for Puerto Rico and other areas hit by natural disasters, according to congressional sources said.

But that money will only go so far. The island’s recovery will likely cost more than $30 billion.

(Reporting by Roberta Rampton in WASHINGTON and Gabriel Stargardter in SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico; Additional reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Catherine Evans and Bill Trott)

As Trump set to visit Puerto Rico, 95 percent lack power

As Trump set to visit Puerto Rico, 95 percent lack power

By Robin Respaut and Gabriel Stargardter

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) – President Donald Trump is set to make his first visit to Puerto Rico on Tuesday, two weeks after Hurricane Maria devastated the U.S. territory, and is likely to face more criticism of his handling of the disaster as the vast majority of inhabitants lack power and phone service and are scrambling for food, clean water and fuel.

San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz led the attack on the administration’s response on Friday, criticizing an official’s description of relief efforts as a “good news story” and urging Trump to act more decisively. Trump fired back at Cruz on Twitter, accusing her of “poor leadership.”

It is not clear if the two will meet during Trump’s visit.

“She (Cruz) has been invited to participate in the events tomorrow, and we hope those conversations will happen and that we can all work together to move forward,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters on Monday.

Trump will spend “significant time” on the island. He is due in Las Vegas on Wednesday to meet with people affected by Sunday’s mass shooting.

For 72-year-old Angel Negroni of Juana Matos, the situation has begun to improve as flood waters receded from his neighborhood, located 20 minutes from San Juan.

Locals could occasionally get spotty cellular service, an improvement from the communication vacuum of days earlier. And he can trade his neighborhood’s restored municipal water for ice made by a friend’s generator-powered freezer.

“It’s better now,” said Negroni, while standing on his covered porch on Monday, cooking fish on a propane-powered camping stove. “We’re OK.”

At least 5.4 percent of customers in Puerto Rico had their power restored by mid-morning on Monday, according to the U.S. Energy Department, with San Juan’s airport and marine terminal and several hospitals back on the power grid. It said the head of Puerto Rico’s power utility expects 15 percent of electricity customers to have power restored within the next two weeks.

Mobile phone service is still elusive. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Monday 88.3 percent of cellphone sites – which transmit signals to create a cellular network – were out of service, virtually unchanged from 88.8 percent on Sunday.

FEMA Administrator Brock Long on a trip to the island on Monday said things were improving with traffic moving and businesses reopening.

“I didn’t see anybody in a life-threatening situation at all,” he told reporters. “We have a long way to go in recovery,” adding that rebuilding Puerto Rico is “going to be a Herculean effort.”

GAS FLOWING

Nearly two weeks after the fiercest hurricane to hit the island in 90 years, everyday life was still severely curtailed by the destruction. The ramping up of fuel supplies should allow more Puerto Ricans to operate generators and travel more freely.

“We’ve been increasing the number of gas stations that are open,” Governor Ricardo Rossello said at a news briefing, with more than 720 of the island’s 1,100 gas stations now up and running.

Puerto Rico relies on fuel supplies shipped from the mainland United States and distribution has been disrupted by the bad state of roads.

Within the next couple of days, Rossello expects 500,000 barrels of diesel and close to 1 million barrels of gasoline to arrive on the island. All of Puerto Rico’s primary ports have reopened but many still have restrictions, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

At least four tankers carrying fuel are waiting to unload with two more on the way, according to Thomson Reuters shipping data.

“The flow is coming, gasoline is getting here,” Rossello said. “We have been able to reduce the time that it takes to get gasoline and diesel at different stations.”

Federal and local authorities were working together to keep 50 hospitals operational and Rossello said the U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort would arrive in Puerto Rico between Tuesday and Wednesday.

RUNNING OUT OF CASH

As it tries to get back on its feet, Puerto Rico is in danger of running out of cash in a matter of weeks because the economy has come to a halt in the hurricane’s aftermath, Rossello told the local El Nuevo Dia newspaper in an interview published on Monday.

After filing for the largest U.S. local government bankruptcy on record in May, Puerto Rico owes about $72 billion to creditors and another $45 billion or so in pension benefits to retired workers.

What little cash it has is now being diverted to emergency response while it works to secure aid from the federal government. The grinding halt to the economy will delay a fiscal recovery plan and negotiations with creditors.

“There is no cash on hand. We have made a huge effort to get $2 billion in cash,” Rossello said in the interview. “But let me tell you what $2 billion means when you have zero collection: it’s basically a month government’s payroll, a little bit more.”

Trump’s administration is preparing to ask Congress for $13 billion in aid for Puerto Rico and other areas hit by natural disasters, congressional sources said. The island’s recovery will likely cost more than $30 billion.

(Reporting by Robin Respaut, Gabriel Stargardter; additional reporting by Nicholas Brown and Carlos Barria in SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico; Doina Chiacu, Roberta Rampton, Tim Ahmann and Makini Brice in WASHINGTON; Marianna Parraga in HOUSTON; Rodrigo Campos and Herb Lash in NEW YORK and Esha Vaish in BENGALURU; Writing by Bill Rigby and Lisa Shumaker; Editing by Bill Trott and Mary Milliken)

Trump to visit Asia in November, North Korea in spotlight

U.S. President Donald Trump departs aboard Air Force One to return to Washington from Indianapolis International Airport in Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S. September 27, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Donald Trump will travel to Asia in November for the first time since becoming president, stopping in Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines on a trip expected to be dominated by the North Korea nuclear threat.

Joined by his wife Melania, Trump will travel Nov. 3-14. His visit will include attending two major summits, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Vietnam and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations conclave in the Philippines.

Trump’s attendance at the Manila summit had been in doubt until recent days, with officials saying he was reluctant to show support for Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who has been responsible for a number of anti-American outbursts.

A U.S. official said Asian leaders who met Trump at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week helped persuade him to attend in unity with key Asian allies.

An Asian diplomat welcomed Trump’s decision to visit Manila “because that reassures the region that Asia policy is not just about North Korea, it’s about Southeast Asia as well.”

The diplomat said Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal early this year had raised questions about the administration’s commitment to the region. But visits by senior officials, including the secretaries of state, defense and commerce, and Trump’s planned trip, showed Washington intended to remain engaged.

Philippine Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said Duterte was looking forward to meeting Trump, adding that the relationship between the two countries was so resilient that ties would always recover, regardless of disagreements.

Trump, who has been locked in an increasingly bitter war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, will have the opportunity to bolster allied resolve for what he calls the “complete denuclearization” of Pyongyang.

He has denounced Kim as a “rocket man” on a suicide mission for test launches of ballistic missiles and for nuclear weapon tests. He has warned North Korea would face total devastation if it threatens the United States. Kim has blasted Trump as “mentally deranged.”

“The president’s engagements will strengthen the international resolve to confront the North Korean threat and ensure the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” the White House said in announcing the trip.

Trump’s visit to China will reciprocate a trip to the United States made in April by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Trump has applied heavy pressure on China to rein in North Korea. While his efforts have had limited success thus far, he went out of his way to thank Xi on Tuesday for his efforts.

“I applaud China for breaking off all banking relationships with North Korea – something that people would have thought unthinkable even two months ago. I want to thank President Xi,” Trump said at a news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.

Speaking in Beijing, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told China’s top diplomat State Councilor Yang Jiechi that the two presidents had established a “very regular and close working relationship”.

Yang described Trump’s visit as of great importance to the bilateral relationship. “Let us concentrate on cooperation and properly manage our differences in a spirit of mutual respect and mutual benefit,” he said to Tillerson.

At the same time, Trump’s national security team is conducting a broad review of U.S. strategy toward China in search of ways to counter Chinese trade practices and open up market access, a senior administration official said.

The United States also considers Chinese entities behind the theft of intellectual property and cyber attacks and wants to find ways to address these concerns, the official said.

There was no definite timetable for concluding the review.

“We’re looking at all of it,” the official said.

(Reporting by Steve Holland, additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in WASHINGTON, Phil Stewart in BEIJING and Martin Petty in MANILA; Editing by Andrew Hay and Richard Pullin)

Under pressure from Trump, Price resigns as health secretary over private plane uproar

HHS Secretary Tom Price speaks at a news conference on annual influenza prevention at the Press Club in Washington, U.S., September 28, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned under pressure from President Donald Trump on Friday in an uproar over Price’s use of costly private charter planes for government business.

His abrupt departure was announced an hour after Trump told reporters he was disappointed in Price’s use of private aircraft and did not like the way it reflected on his administration.

“Secretary of Health and Human Services Thomas Price offered his resignation earlier today and the president accepted,” the White House said in a statement.

Trump named Don Wright to serve as acting secretary. Wright is currently the deputy assistant secretary for health and director of the office of disease prevention and health promotion.

“I’m not happy. OK? I’m not happy,” Trump told reporters on the White House South Lawn.

Candidates to succeed Price included Seema Verma, who is administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and who is close to Vice President Mike Pence, and Scott Gottlieb, a physician who serves as commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, according to industry analysts.

Several sources saw Gottlieb as a clear front runner. They said he got along well with the White House and is viewed favorably there.

Price’s resignation leaves Trump with a second Cabinet position to fill. He has yet to pick a secretary for homeland security after hiring former Secretary John Kelly as his White House chief of staff.

It was the latest blow to the Trump White House, which has struggled to get major legislative achievements passed by Congress and has been embroiled in one controversy after another since Trump took office in January.

Price, a former congressman, was instrumental in the Trump administration’s policies aimed at undercutting Obamacare, as well as working with governors across the country to slowly begin unraveling parts of the law.

In a resignation letter, Price offered little in the way of contrition. He said he had been working to reform the U.S. healthcare system and reduce regulatory burdens, among other goals.

“I have spent forty years both as a doctor and public servant putting people first. I regret that the recent events have created a distraction from these important objectives,” he said.

Trump, currently trying to sell his tax cut plan and oversee the federal response to devastation wreaked by three hurricanes, saw the Price drama as an unnecessary distraction and behind the scenes was telling aides “what was he thinking?,” a source close to the president said.

Price promised on Thursday to repay the nearly $52,000 cost of his seats on private charter flights. “The taxpayers won’t pay a dime for my seat on those planes,” Price said.

But that was not enough to satisfy Trump.

Trump told reporters that the “optics” of Price’s travel were not good, since, as president he was trying to renegotiate U.S. contracts to get a better deal for taxpayers.

“Look, I think he’s a very fine person. I certainly don’t like the optics,” Trump said.

Price had also been seen in the White House as having been ineffective in getting Congress to pass healthcare reform legislation, an effort that has fizzled on Capitol Hill.

Price was one of a handful of senior officials in Trump’s administration put on the defensive over reports about their use of charter flights and government aircraft, sometimes for personal travel, when they could have flown commercial for less money.

The White House issued an order late on Friday saying use of private planes required approval from White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and that the commercial air system was appropriate even for very senior officials with few exceptions.

The Washington Post on Friday reported that Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin attended a Wimbledon tennis match, toured Westminster Abbey and took a cruise on the Thames this summer during a 10-day trip to discuss veterans’ health issues in Britain and Denmark.

Shulkin, who traveled on a commercial airline, was accompanied on the trip by his wife, whose airfare was paid for by the government and who received a per diem for meals, the Post said, noting that the Department of Veterans Affairs said she was traveling on “approved invitational orders.”

His six-person traveling party included an acting undersecretary of health and her husband as well as two aides. They were accompanied by a security detail of as many as six people, the Post said.

Washington news media outlet Politico has reported that Price had taken at least two dozen private charter flights since May at a cost to U.S. taxpayers of more than $400,000. Politico also reported he took approved military flights to Africa and Europe costing $500,000.

Senior U.S. government officials travel frequently, but are generally expected to keep costs down by taking commercial flights or the train when possible.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin have also been in the spotlight for their travel habits.

(Additional reporting by David Alexander, James Oliphant, Yasmeen Abutaleb and Toni Clarke; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Andrew Hay)

Iran will drop nuclear deal if U.S. withdraws, foreign minister tells al Jazeera

A staff member removes the Iranian flag from the stage after a group picture with foreign ministers and representatives of the U.S., Iran, China, Russia, Britain, Germany, France and the European Union during the Iran nuclear talks at the Vienna International Center in Vienna, Austria July 14, 2015. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo

ANKARA (Reuters) – Iran will abandon the nuclear deal it reached with six major powers if the United States decides to withdraw from it, its foreign minister told Qatar’s al Jazeera TV in New York.

U.S. President Donald Trump has called the 2015 deal an “embarrassment”. The deal is supported by the other major powers that negotiated it with Iran and its collapse could trigger a regional arms race and worsen tensions in the Middle East.

“If Washington decides to pull out of the nuclear deal, Iran will withdraw too,” Al Jazeera TV wrote on its Twitter feed, quoting the minister.

“Washington will be in a better position if it remains committed to the deal,” the network wrote.

Trump is considering whether the accord serves U.S. security interests. He faces a mid-October deadline for certifying that Iran is complying with the pact.

A State Department official said Washington would not comment on every statement by an Iranian official.

“We are fully committed to addressing the totality of Iranian threats and malign activities,” the official said.

Iranian authorities had repeatedly said Tehran would not be the first to violate the agreement, under which Tehran agreed to restrict its nuclear program in return for lifting most international sanctions that had crippled its economy.

The prospect that Washington could renege on the deal has worried some of the U.S. allies that helped negotiate it. French President Emmanuel Macron said last week that there was no alternative to the nuclear accord.

If Trump, who has called the accord “the worst deal ever negotiated”, does not recertify it by Oct. 16, Congress has 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions suspended under the accord.

(Writing by Parisa Hafezim; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)

Trump expected to set U.S. refugee cap at 45,000: sources

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks as he holds a joint news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, U.S., September 26, 2017. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

By Yeganeh Torbati and Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Trump administration plans to cap the number of refugees admitted to the United States in the coming year at 45,000, two people with knowledge of the decision said on Tuesday, and advocates said this historically low level is insufficient in the face of growing humanitarian crises worldwide.

That figure would be the lowest ceiling for refugee admissions since the U.S. Refugee Act was signed in 1980. Since then, the ceiling has never been set below 67,000 and in recent years has been around 70,000 to 80,000.

The secretaries of State and Homeland Security are consulting with members of Congress on Wednesday, according to one White House official. The president’s decision on the refugee limit will be announced following that consultation, two officials said. The Wall Street Journal first reported the 45,000 figure on Tuesday.

By law, the president is required to consult with members of Congress about the number of refugee admissions before the start of each fiscal year, on Oct. 1.

The number of refugees actually admitted to the country, which can fall below the cap, dropped to its lowest in the fiscal year after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks with only around 27,000 admitted.

For fiscal year 2017, which ends Sept. 30, former President Barack Obama established a cap of 110,000 refugees for permanent resettlement in the United States.

After taking office in January, President Donald Trump issued an executive order lowering the maximum number to 50,000 for 2017, saying that more would be “detrimental to the interests of the United States.”

Critics said if the 2018 level is set even lower, it could damage the international reputation of the United States.

“It’s tragic,” said Robert Carey, former director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement under Obama. “It’s really moving away from the commitments the government has had for protections of refugees from both Republican and Democratic administrations,” he said. “Some people will die.”

In a speech to the United Nations last week, Trump said that more could be done to help refugees in their home regions. Offering financial assistance to hosting countries “is the safe, responsible, and humanitarian approach,” Trump said.

But that type of assistance “ignores all the people who have fled to places that are still not safe,” said another former Obama administration official, Anne Richard.

“Those are the people that the U.S. program really rescues,” said Richard, a former assistant secretary for refugees and migration at the State Department.

She said other countries might try to follow suit by closing the door to more refugees.

A September 2016 study by the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute found that of 3.3 million refugees admitted to the United States between 1975 through 2015, 20 were convicted of planning or committing a terrorist attack on U.S. soil.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security declined to comment ahead of Trump’s final decision on the cap. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

David Inserra from the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation said Congress should have more of a say in setting the cap to avoid radical swings in the numbers when there is a change in administrations.

“When president Obama increased the number dramatically Republicans said they didn’t want that but the consultation process didn’t give them any authority to stop it,” he said. “Now the same is going to be true for the other side.”

(Reporting by Yeganeh Torbati and Steve Holland in Washington; Additional reporting by Mica Rosenberg in New York and David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Grant McCool)

Trump’s tax plan to propose deep U.S. rate cuts, lacks revenue details

U.S. President Donald Trump walks to Marine One as he departs for New York from the White House in Washington, U.S., September 26, 2017. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

By David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump will call on Wednesday for slashing tax rates on businesses and the wealthy as part of a new tax plan that is likely to offer few details about how to pay for the cuts without expanding the federal deficit.

Hammered out over months of talks among Trump aides and top Republicans in Congress, the plan to be unveiled at an event in Indianapolis was expected to propose a 20 percent corporate income tax rate, a new 25 percent tax rate for pass-through businesses such as partnerships, and a reduced 35 percent top income tax rate for individual Americans.

While it would lower the top individual rate from 39.6 percent, the plan was also expected to double the standard deduction, a set amount of income exempt from taxation, for all taxpayers.

“You have to look at the plan in its entirety. It doubles the standard deduction, so in the end, even the lowest rates get a tax cut,” said Jim Renacci, a Republican on the tax-writing House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee.

Republicans will say that the tax cuts, widely leaked to the media by a variety of sources in recent days, would be offset by new revenues raised from eliminating tax loopholes, although few if any of those are expected to be named in the plan.

Republicans are also expected to predict that the Trump tax cuts, if approved by Congress, would drive more robust U.S. economic growth, predictions that critics are sure to question.

At a time of slow but steady U.S. economic expansion, the Trump tax-cut package has some support in Congress, even among Republican fiscal hawks who only a short time ago routinely opposed deficit-financed fiscal proposals.

Trump and his Republican allies made completing tax reform in 2017 a top promise of the 2016 election campaign and are under mounting pressure to finish the job since the collapse of the latest Republican effort to overturn the Obamacare healthcare law.

Trump was expected to push lawmakers hard to quickly approve his tax package, despite critics who will say it falls short of the “tax reform” he promised on the campaign trail.

The plan will be the latest in a series of Republican documents outlining tax policy goals, but failing to tackle the tough questions that have defied past administrations’ efforts to fix the tax code. It has not been reformed since 1986.

WARNINGS ON DEFICIT

The Republican president was expected to try to sell his proposals as beneficial to U.S. workers by saying they would drive economic growth, create jobs and raise wages.

Corporations now pay a statutory 35 percent income tax rate. That is high by global standards and corporations have been seeking a tax cut for years, even though many of them pay much less than the headline rate due to loopholes and tax breaks.

Profits of small, pass-through businesses that are passed directly to the owners are now taxed at the individual income tax rates, often at the top level of 39.6 percent.

Analysts have warned that huge tax cuts would balloon the federal deficit and debt if the economic growth projected by Republicans fails to materialize amid rising interest rates.

An early analysis of the Trump plan by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation think tank estimated it would reduce federal revenues by roughly $5 trillion over a decade, excluding offsets.

On Tuesday, Trump told Republicans and Democrats from the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee that he wanted tax reform to be bipartisan.

The plan to be unveiled was developed by a small team of senior Republicans behind closed doors with no input from Democrats. It was not clear how far Republicans in Congress would go to accommodate Democratic demands for revenue neutrality and no tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Trump asked for Democrats to jump on the caboose after the tax train has already left the station. I saw no Democrat ready to jump on board,” Democratic Representative Lloyd Doggett said after the meeting.

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Peter Cooney)