Month: January 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump lashed out at the media Friday as a provocative new book hit the stands portraying the first year of his presidency as one in shambles, and him as childlike and possibly in need of psychiatric help.

In a morning tweet, Trump did not mention author Michael Wolff or his sensational book Fire and Fury by name, but said “the Fake News Media (Mainstream) and this phony new book are hitting out at every new front imaginable.”

Wolff said Friday he stands by “absolutely everything” in the book. “One of the things we have to count on is that Donald Trump will attack. He will send lawyer’s letters. This is a 35-year history of how he approaches everything,” he told NBC’s Today show host Savannah Guthrie. “My credibility is being questioned by a man who has less credibility than perhaps anyone who has ever walked on Earth at this point.

“I will tell you the one description that everyone gave, everyone has in common: They all say he is like a child,” Wolff said on NBC. “And what they mean by that is, he has a need for immediate gratification. It is all about him.”

On Thursday, Trump denied granting Wolff access to the White House, and he planted a new nickname on his former chief strategist Steve Bannon, who is quoted extensively in the book as making disparaging statements about his former boss and members of his family and inner circle.

Trump’s lawyers initially tried to block publication of the book, describing it as defamatory and libelous. That only added to the frenzy at bookstores where it was available early Friday, several days ahead of schedule. Long lines formed outside some Washington stores where the book went on sale at midnight.

Several independent sources have noted that author Wolff is known for publishing provocative material that has turned out to be unsubstantiated or disputed.

Veteran Washington reporter Mike Allen, in his widely-read Axios Newsletter, cautioned Friday “there are definitely parts of Michael Wolff’s “Fire and Fury” that are wrong, sloppy, or betray off-the-record confidence.”

Allen said, however, there are many things Wolff got right, “even in the eyes of White House officials who think some of the book’s scenes are fiction. His spot-on portrait of Trump as an emotionally erratic president, and the low opinion of him among some of those serving him.”

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders accused Wolff on Friday of fabricating quotes for the book.

“This is a guy who made up a lot of stories to try to sell books, and I think more and more people are starting to see that his facts just simply don’t add up,” Sanders told Fox News.

Sanders acknowledged that Trump had spoken with Wolff, but she said it was not for the book. “They spoke once by the phone for a few minutes, but it wasn’t about the book. They had a very short conversation, but he never interviewed the president about the book,” she said.

At Thursday’s White House press briefing, Sanders suggested the book has little interest outside Washington’s beltway, where politics is something of an obsession.

“Most people in the United States could “probably care less about a book full of lies,” she told a reporter, characterizing the book as “trash” and something “a fired employee wanted to peddle.”

Presidential scholar Dan Mahaffee of Washington’s Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress says the book controversy is taking on a cartoon-like character.

“Once the spin starts you get this cloud surrounding everything, and it becomes a media frenzy,” Mahaffee said in a VOA interview. “It reflects the arrival of a reality-TV mindset to American politics.”

Mahaffee said the constant cable TV coverage of the book has diverted attention from almost all other events in Washington, including some favorable to Trump and others the president might want to hide, such as Thursday’s move by the administration to vastly expand offshore drilling from the Atlantic to the Arctic oceans.

“In a normal environment, we’d be talking about how all the waters in the United States are open to oil drilling. Something that would be the top of every headline is overshadowed by this circus,” Mahaffee said.
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Senator Ben Cardin, (D-MD), the highest ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee spoke to VOA contributor Greta Van Susteren about Iran and North Korea. The following is a full transcript of the interview.

Van Susteren: “Senator, thank you very much for joining me.”

Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD): “My pleasure. It’s good to be with you.”

Van Susteren: “Senator, there is a lot going on in Iran. There have been a series of protests sparked, at least at first, according to many as an economic issue, they have now somewhat subsided but what are your thoughts on these protests?”

Cardin: “Well, the Persian people, the Iranians, are great people; they want freedom, they want economic opportunities. They were promised a lot that has not been delivered so there’s a great deal of frustration among the Iranians that why aren’t they doing better why aren’t there better opportunities. They see their leadership, their government, is holding them back so they’re expressing themselves and I think we should all be proud of their courage.”

Van Susteren: “What about the response by the Trump administration to these protests? I know that there was criticisms—President Trump and, even Vice President Pence, has been critical of the Obama administration and President Obama waited a number of days before making a statement. Maybe President Trump made a statement earlier on Twitter; but, nonetheless they are just statements. Is there anything more that we should be doing in Iran about these protests?”

Cardin: “The question is what can you do? I mean these are obviously internal issues and it’s hard for us to get directly involved. But to the extent that the Iranian officials violate established international human rights standards we should take action. We have tools that we can use to take action against violations of human rights. People have a right to peacefully protest about their government, they should have the right to be able to speak out without intimation or fear. In Iran that’s not true. So, it is right for us and we do impose sanctions against Iran for human rights violations. We’ve recently passed a new law, known as the Global Magnitsky, we can sanction individuals and in regards to our banking system or visas. So, there are steps that we can take against those who are perpetrating violations of human rights and we should working with the international community.”

Van Susteren: “How fast can we do those sanctions? I mean if sanctions are the proper response, how fast can we do that?”

Cardin: “Well, they can be done quickly. I mean obviously there’s some—when you are dealing with banking issues there’s due process that has to follow and the Treasury Department follows that pretty closely; but we can impose sanctions pretty quickly we have against Iran. We do have sanctions imposed against Iran for human rights we can strengthen those.”

Van Susteren: “Going back about the 2015, you were opposed to the original Iran Deal, the Nuclear Deal. Why were you opposed to it?”

Cardin: “Well, for several reasons. First, it started with the allowing Iran to enrich uranium which I thought they did not need to do. So, it started with a premise that allowed them to have enriched uranium which one day could be used for a nuclear weapon. Secondly, it took away, I thought, a lot of the leverage we had the deal with the non-nuclear violations concerning their ballistic missiles, our sponsoring of terrorism, the human rights violations, even though we can still do that by releasing some of our sanction relief it makes them more challenging to deal with these other issues.”

Van Susteren: “All right, so fast forward to now President Trump in, I think, October said that he was not going to recertify the deal, so where does that lead us now and what is your position on that?”

Cardin: “Well, I think it would be wrong for the United States to walk away from an agreement. We would be isolated, we would be the bad guys when Iran is the bad actor their government is the one violating international laws. We should spotlight on Iran’s compliance with the agreement and the agreement is lifetime. They’re not allowed to have a nuclear weapon or develop nuclear weapons. We need now to make sure that in fact is enforced and Iran never becomes a nuclear weapons state.”

Van Susteren: “I thought there was a period of time as a ten-year deal?”

Cardin: “There’s different limits as to what certain standards have to be complied with. But it’s lifetime that they are not allowed to have a nuclear weapon. So, we can hold them to that and we need to enforce that.”

Van Susteren: “Are you satisfied with the level of inspection that we’re getting. Are we getting the—is the IAEA getting the access it needs to make sure they aren’t violating agreement?”

Cardin: “We’ve had the secretary general of the IAEA in Congress, we’ve asked him specifically whether there’s any additional needs for inspections. He believes he’s had all the access he needs, everywhere he needs to be so there’s been no complaint to date about the denial of access.”

Van Susteren: “So are you confident today, as much as one can be, confident today that Iran met its side of the deal as to where it should be on this agreement?”

Cardin: “As it relates to its nuclear commitments, the individuals who are responsible for the enforcement of this agreement believe that Iran has complied with the agreement. Had there been minor violations at times, yes and they’ve been corrected. But as far as any material breach, there has not been a material breach by Iran.”

Van Susteren: “So Iran doesn’t keep you up at night as it relates to nuclear weapons? Doesn’t keep you up at night?”

Cardin: “Today it does not. I do worry long term about their ability to be nuclear weapons state because of how do we enforce it beyond the sunset dates? That is a concern.

Van Susteren: “What’s a long term for you? What’s the…”

Cardin: “Well there’s 8 years more of the specific limits on what they can do in centrifuges and research and issues like that. After that period of time, although they’ll prevent it from being a nuclear weapons state, those limits no longer apply. So the question is how do you enforce beyond the 8 years?”

Van Susteren: “In terms of what has just transpired, now the protests seem to at least the reports as much we can tell seem the protests have died down a little bit. Do you think by not doing more than sort of just issuing a statement that we’re with you to the Iranian people we have now so taken the wind out of their sales and they’re going to feel very discouraged and there’s going to be no sort of pressure on their government to meet human rights requirements and a greater opportunity for the people?”

Cardin: “This is a delicate line we have to walk. This is the Iranian people speaking out against their government. It’s not the United States encouraging people to do things they don’t want to do. To the extent that we get actively engaged, it will be used by the Iranian officials to say this is the United States not the Iranian people.”

Van Susteren: “Well they’ve already said that. They say their enemies have done it which means Israel and the United States. That’s what the hard lines clerics are saying that we’re responsible for this.”

Cardin: “And we don’t want to give them any ammunition for what they’re saying. We know that the Iranian’s don’t tell the truth about what is happening. Their people know that. They’ve figured this out. You see the protests that are taking place. I think it’s important for us to keep a spotlight on the protestors and do everything we can to keep them safe and to take action against Iran if they violate basic human rights. I think the seeds for protest will remain unless the Iranian leaders change their course and allow the people basic human rights and basic economic freedoms.”

Van Susteren: “Do you have a dialogue at all with the White House on the recertification issue and the deal and even the protests?”

Cardin: “Yes, I’ve talk to Vice President Pence about the protests and we have a resolution that we hope to file – Senator Corker and I, with others that will pass in regards to showing that the United States Senate is behind the rights of the people of Iran to express their views against their government and I’ve been meeting with the representatives of the Trump administration in regards to the certification and waiver issues as to how Congress can be helpful provided that we don’t do anything that will violate the nuclear agreement and that we work closely with our European partners.”

Van Susteren: “Well President Trump seems to take much harder line on this than you do, right? Is that a fair description?”

Cardin: “Well I think President Trump has expressed himself that he believes the agreement should be stronger. And we had pointed out that a lot of his concerns which deal with beyond the requirements of the remaining 8 years that that’s an issue we can work together on. So we are working with the administration to see whether we can clarify some of the provisions as long as it doesn’t violate the JCPOA.”

Van Susteren: “And do you think you’ve convinced the administration or convinced President Trump because he seems to have drawn the line in the sand on this.”

Cardin: “I think the National Security Advisor to the president believes in our National Security interest to remain at the table and not violate the agreement ourselves. What the president will do, that’s hard to tell. The way he makes decisions is not a traditional method used by the presidency of the United States.

Van Susteren: “Are you worried about North Korea with its nuclear weapon?”

Cardin: “Certainly. I think North Korea with Kim Jong Un is doing, that regime, is extremely dangerous. They are clearly developed a nuclear weapon. They are trying to develop a way to deliver that nuclear weapon that could threaten the security of the United States. They have violated the United Nations Resolutions on this. There’s been international sanctions imposed on North Korea as a result of it. We need to further isolate North Korea but then have a surge in diplomacy because there’s not a good military solution here. What we want to do is put the sufficient pressure on North Korea to change course and that means the United States working with China and Japan and South Korea to get a realistic offering to how we can get this crisis over with and put the pressure on North Korea to change directions.”

Van Susteren: “Do you see the routine from North Korea to South Korea, the recent, the reopening of negotiations across that border. Is that a good thing or is that just folly?”

Cardin: “I think it’s a good thing. I think it’s always good to see conversations taking place. It was part of the commitment made by the new regime in South Korea – that they were going to open up more discussion with North Korea. We have the Winter Olympics which gives us an opening for the North and South to talk. I think it’s a good sign that they’re talking.”

Van Susteren: “Senator thank you very much for talking with me.”

Cardin: “It’s always good to be with you.”

 
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VOA contributor Greta Van Susteren spoke Friday to Senator Ben Cardin, the highest ranked Democrat on the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.  Below are some excerpts.

Van Susteren: “Senator, there is a lot going on in Iran. There have been a series of protests sparked, at least at first, according to many as an economic issue, they have now somewhat subsided but what are your thoughts on these protests?”

Cardin: “Well, the Persian people, the Iranians, are great people; they want freedom, they want economic opportunities. They were promised a lot that has not been delivered so there’s a great deal of frustration among the Iranians that why aren’t they doing better why aren’t there better opportunities. They see their leadership, their government, is holding them back so they’re expressing themselves and I think we should all be proud of their courage.”  

Van Susteren: “What about the response by the Trump administration to these protests? I know that there was criticisms—President Trump and, even Vice President Pence, has been critical of the Obama administration and President Obama waited a number of days before making a statement. Maybe President Trump made a statement earlier on Twitter; but, nonetheless they are just statements. Is there anything more that we should be doing in Iran about these protests?”

Cardin: “The question is what can you do? I mean these are obviously internal issues and it’s hard for us to get directly involved. But to the extent that the Iranian officials violate established international human rights standards we should take action. We have tools that we can use to take action against violations of human rights. People have a right to peacefully protest about their government, they should have the right to be able to speak out without intimidation or fear. In Iran that’s not true. So, it is right for us and we do impose sanctions against Iran for human rights violations. We’ve recently passed a new law, known as the Global Magnitsky, we can sanction individuals and in regards to our banking system or visas. So, there are steps that we can take against those who are perpetrating violations of human rights and we should working with the international community.”

Van Susteren: “How fast can we do those sanctions? I mean if sanctions are the proper response, how fast can we do that?”

Cardin: “Well, they can be done quickly. I mean obviously there’s some—when you are dealing with banking issues there’s due process that has to follow and the Treasury Department follows that pretty closely; but we can impose sanctions pretty quickly we have against Iran. We do have sanctions imposed against Iran for human rights we can strengthen those.”
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So much for a new year, new start.

For Donald Trump, that energy-sapping 2017 cocktail of blistering presidential tweets, salacious White House infighting and jaw-dropping feuds with foreign adversaries has given way to, well, more of the same.

“We are off and running,” said Josh Holmes, a longtime adviser to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “It’s amazing that the pace that we set in 2017 has continued with equal vigor.”

Indeed, the first three days of 2018 – yes, just three days – brought a new array of targets for the president and the return of some familiar foes. As part of a 17-tweet barrage on Tuesday, Trump picked a fight with the “deep state” within his own government that he believes is trying to undermine his presidency, and he raised the specter of war with North Korea by asserting that his “Nuclear Button” was bigger than that of Pyongyang’s leader Kim Jong Un.

By Wednesday, Trump had turned on his former top adviser Steve Bannon, accusing him of having “lost his mind.” The scathing attack, issued with the formality of an official White House statement, followed the publication of excerpts from an unflattering book in which Bannon accuses the president’s namesake son of holding a “treasonous” meeting with a Russian lawyer during the campaign.

Across Washington, holiday cheer was suddenly a distant memory.

“I feel exhausted,” said Rick Tyler, a Republican strategist who advised Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in his campaign against Trump in the 2016 GOP presidential primary. “I feel like the year has got to be over by now.”

Trump rattled Washington in his first year in office by blowing past the guardrails that have traditionally governed what a president does and doesn’t say and by frequently picking fights that seem far less consequential than the weighty issues that land on a commander in chief’s desk. He needled friendly foreign leaders like Britain’s Theresa May, accused former President Barack Obama of wiretapping his New York skyscraper and spread rumors about media personalities he deemed overly critical.

To be sure, no one in Washington expected Trump to be a different man when he returned from Christmas vacation at his estate in Palm Beach, Florida. By now, Washington has largely come to grips with the reality of a president who often starts and ends his day with tweets on topics that are a mystery to even his closest aides until they pop up on their smartphones. And while some Trump advisers have grown beleaguered by the president’s seemingly insatiable appetite for a feud, few expect that to change or put much effort into trying to hold him back.

Yet there was still a hope, both in the White House and on Capitol Hill, that the president might return to Washington eager to build on the passage of a sweeping Republican overhaul of the tax code in the waning days of December. The bill passed with only Republican votes, and polling shows the complicated legislation is deeply unpopular with Americans, leaving the president and his party with a tall task if they hope to ride the tax overhaul to electoral victories in the midterm elections.

Trump has tweeted a handful of messages in 2018 about the tax bill. But he generated far more attention with his missives taking aim at the media and his unfounded claim of credit for the fact that no commercial airlines crashed in 2017.

Some Republicans cringed. Tyler said that in the early days of 2018, the White House had already “lost the communications war over what tax policy is designed to do.” And he put the blame squarely on Trump, saying the president “cannot be trusted with his own message.”

On Capitol Hill, where the Senate returned to work, most GOP lawmakers girded themselves for another year of what has become their familiar ritual: carefully critiquing Trump’s most sensational comments without criticizing the president himself. Asked about Trump’s North Korea button bluster, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican, said simply: “It’s probably better not to tweet about such things.”

Just 361 days to go until the calendar flips again.
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Immigration is the focus for President Donald Trump’s meeting with some Republican senators as he pushes his overhaul plan.

Trump wants to shift from a family-based immigration system to one based on merit, as part of any deal to extend legal status for young immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children.

Trump ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program last year. He set a March deadline for Congress to act.

A White House spokesman, Hogan Gidley, says an updated approach to immigration should “serve the needs of American workers, families and taxpayers.”

The senators expected at Thursday’s meeting are John Cornyn of Texas, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, James Lankford of Oklahoma and Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

 
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The U.S. State Department re-designated 10 countries, including Myanmar, China, Iran and North Korea, as “countries of particular concern” under the International Religious Freedom Act for having engaged in or tolerated violations of religious freedom.

Eritrea, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan also were added to the list, the State Department said.

It said Pakistan was added to a “Special Watch List” for severe violations of religious freedom.

“The protection of religious freedom is vital to peace, stability, and prosperity. These designations are aimed at improving the respect for religious freedom in these countries,” a State Department statement said. “We recognize that several designated countries are working to improve their respect for religious freedom; we welcome these initiatives and look forward to continued dialogue.”

State Department correspondent Nike Ching contributed to this report
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Vice President Mike Pence was interviewed by VOA contributor Greta Van Susteren Wednesday.  

Greta Van Susteren: Mr. Vice President, good to see you sir.

Vice President Mike Pence: Good to see you, Greta. Thank you.

WATCH: Full interview of Vice President Mike Pence

Q: Much is going on in Iran, and I realize it is a very tough situation, situation very fragile over there. What is the United States going to do, if anything? I know that there’s been a tweet and verbal statements in support, but what about doing?

Pence: Well it’s important to remember that first and foremost that Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism in the world. Not only do they oppress their own people, deny human rights to their own, but they also export terrorists across the region, and continue to be an enormously dangerous destabilizing force. And so to see the people of Iran rising up to demand change in their country should hearten every freedom-loving American and people who cherish freedom around the world, and I have to tell you, that the contrast today between the deafening silence from an American president in 2009 during the Green revolution in Iran and the clear. …

Q: He waited, he waited, he waited a few days, but then he spoke up.

Pence: Well, but the clear affirmation and support that President (Donald) Trump has provided to protesters rising up in cities across Iran is dramatic and I think it’s very consistent with America’s role in the world as a leading champion of freedom.

Q: In terms of support though, there’s verbal support and there was admittedly President (Barack) Obama’s few days late back in ’09 …

Pence: It wasn’t just a few days late, because I was there. I was a member of the Congress, you recall I served on the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House of Representatives, and I remember back in 2009, seeing this largely youth-driven movement following a fraudulent election in Iran, people taking to the streets, demonstrating incredible courage that the people of Iran did to claim a democratic and free future. And we looked to the White House in those days in 2009, we looked for American leadership, and there was none. There was deafening silence from the Obama administration. So as a member of Congress, I authored a resolution with a Democratic congressman by the name of Howard Berman who was at the time Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. We introduced the resolution, it passed almost unanimously in the House of Representatives, then Senator (John) McCain and Senator (Joe) Lieberman introduced it in the Senate where it passed unanimously, and then and only then did we hear from President Obama and the Obama administration. The contrast between the silence and the failure to support freedom in the last administration and President Trump’s unapologetic willingness to stand with the courageous people of Iran. I know it is giving hope to the people on the streets of those cities across that country and we’re going to continue to support them in not just verbally, but as they bring about change in their country, I can assure you the United States and the wider world stands with the people of Iran who want a better and more prosperous and freer future.

Q: In 1956-ish, the same thing happened in Hungary where the people rose up, and there was verbal support. We’ve had it with the Kurds with President (George H.W.) Bush ’41,’ we had the Green Movement, which the Congress, as you say, had supported a unanim(ous) … different on how fast President Obama responded, but is when you support them verbally, it has not had necessarily the intended consequences. This is a chance where the United States has supported them verbally, is there something more that the United States intends to actually do to support them as they take to the streets?

Pence: There is an extraordinary amount that the United States and countries around the world can do for the people of Iran if they will continue to stand up for their own freedom and to stand up for change and to reject the radical ideology that overtook their country decades ago and continues to beset the wider world through the export of terrorism from Iran. Look, the last administration not only was silent when the good and courageous people of Iran were rising up for democracy but they also pushed forward and embraced the disastrous Iran Nuclear Deal that President Trump refused to recertify and we’re continuing to provide leadership on. You know the hope of the Iran nuclear deal is that it would encourage a more moderate Iran, but we’ve seen nothing of the kind. But to see people taking to the streets again in Iran and to now have an American president who’s willing in that great American tradition to affirm and to say to the people, we’re with you, we support you, we’re prepared to help you achieve that freer, more prosperous future. I think it represents a genuine opportunity and if I had one hope today it’s that just as the dissidence in the old Soviet Union heard of (President) Ronald Reagan’s evil empire speech and were encouraged to know they were not alone. My hope is that the people who are taking in the streets in Iran know that under President Donald Trump they are not alone, that the American people stand with them and if they will just continue to show the courage of their convictions and reach out and embrace a free and democratic future that America and the world will be with them.

Q: The way the president has done it so far is by Twitter and the Iranian authorities … the government has shut down Twitter, Telegram, Facebook and Instagram so social media into Iran is not reaching everyone. I realize that this interview will reach into Iran because Voice of America does reach there and so the president may not be reaching them, the second thing is I suspect that many people in Iran are a little bit distressed with the president’s immigration and terms of banning people from Iran from coming here, the United States so I don’t know how receptive the people are in Iran unless he reaches out more to them.

Pence: Well, the repression by the regime, by the ayatollahs in Iran is not surprising. They continue to be a nation that denies basic human rights to their people and to be shutting down communication means and social media is no real surprise.

Q: If it’s done by Twitter, is there another vehicle that the president has other than I mean you’re speaking here today, is there another vehicle that the president intends to use. Senator Lindsey Graham suggested he address the nation for instance on this issue, our nation on it.

Pence: I think the president again spoke out on social media this morning, directly to the people of Iran.

Q: But they don’t have social media, that’s the problem.

Pence: I can assure you that whether it’s the president, whether it is myself, whether it’s our secretary of state or (United Nations) Ambassador Nikki Haley, we’re going to continue to send, different from nine years ago, we’re going to continue to send from the very outset of this effort on the streets of Iran an unambiguous message that the American people stand with freedom loving people in Iran and around the world and I think this is a very hopeful moment and my goal … really my prayer is that the people of Iran a youthful population, a well-educated population, understand that the United States of America, the people of this country, are their natural ally. We want to see them achieve a free and democratic future. We want to see them step away from a regime that continues to menace the world to threaten the world and threaten to develop nuclear weapons.

Q: What can the people expect in this if the president doesn’t recertify the deal? Now, the people of Iran thought with the deal, that all the money that was going to be unfrozen would go toward … would go with them and would revitalize their economy. That hasn’t happened, what has provoked, in part, these protests. What happens without the deal being recertified? What do you see happening to the people in Iran?

Pence: Well, the president made it clear that we are not recertifying.

Q: So, what happens to the people in Iran?

Pence: But there are other decisions that have to be made, to your point, Greta. Whether or not we’ll continue to waive sanctions and the president is actively considering that decision that needs to be made by the middle of this month.

Q: Do you think that will help? The sanctions? Because sometimes it works. I’m not opposed to sanctions. I want sanctions in Myanmar, you know? So, I mean I’m not opposed to sanctions. But will sanctions, upping the sanctions in Iran will that harm the people who are protesting on the streets or is it helpful?

Pence: We believe that the sanctions (are) working. They are not just working in Iran, we believe they are working in North Korea and this president and this administration are absolutely committed to continue to bring the full economic weight of the United States and these economic sanctions to bear on Iran. Now, we’re also working with the Congress to arrive at a new agreement, a new set of conditions for sanctions going forward. The reality is the Iran nuclear deal was so ill-founded because in part it not only did it not deny that Iran could develop a nuclear weapon. By it only being a 10-year agreement, it virtually guaranteed that they would develop a nuclear weapon after that 10-year period in time. What we want is to have a long-term agreement in place, a long-term legislation in place that it says that if at any time Iran attempts to obtain a usable nuclear weapon and the ballistic missiles to be able to deliver it, that all sanctions would be re-imposed immediately. But all of those decisions going forward, but I think, as you see what’s happening on the streets of Iran, you have to believe that the sanctions are in place today and additional pressure we can bring to bear is having an effect on the nations, its having an effect on the economy, its emboldening the people of Iran to be able to have the courage to step forward.

Q: You brought up North Korea in my last question, is the president – the president has tweeted that he has a bigger button than Kim Jong Un. Is he playing with fire with Kim Jong Un in tweeting him this way – in a Twitter war back and forth?

Pence: President Trump has provided the kind of clear leadership on the world’s stage that’s made measurable progress particularly with regard to North Korea. And the message the president sends, in the wake of (North Korean leader) Kim Jong Un’s New Year’s message where, while on the one hand, he talked about wanting to reach out to his neighbors to the south, at the same moment he spoke of having missiles that could reach the United States, having a button on his desk. President Trump made it clear, America will not be bullied, America will not be threatened, and that the United States of America has, and by being clear, managed to marshal an unprecedented amount of economic and diplomatic pressure on North Korea. And after decades of North Korea stalling and ignoring the world community, and continuing to develop nuclear and ballistic missiles, we’re now literally beginning to see some movement among nations in the region, China is… .

Q: You’re not worried?

Pence: China is doing more than ever before, China needs to do more, but they’re doing more than ever before to isolate North Korea economically and diplomatically and I truly do believe that making it clear that all options are on the table, that the president has done, making it clear that the United States of America has the capacity to defend our people far beyond anything North Korea could imagine, but also making it clear that if North Korea will abandon their nuclear and ballistic and missile ambitions, if they dismantle those programs, there’s an opportunity for a peaceable solution.

Q: Mr. Vice President, nice to see you. Thank you, sir.

Pence: Great to see you, Greta. Thank you.
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U.S. President Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon says he thinks it was “treasonous” and “unpatriotic” for Trump’s eldest son, son-in-law and campaign manager to meet in the midst of the 2016 election campaign with Russians promising incriminating information about Democrat Hillary Clinton, according to a new book about the Trump White House.

Bannon assailed Donald Trump Jr., Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, now a key White House adviser, and then-campaign manager Paul Manafort, according to the book, for attending the June 2016 meeting at campaign headquarters inside Trump Tower in New York. It was set up by the younger Trump after he was told by a European intermediary that the information was part of “Russia and its government’s support” for his father’s election campaign against Clinton.

The younger Trump said he would “love it” to get the damaging material, although he subsequently has said that the Russian lawyer at the meeting had no such incriminating evidence.

“The three senior guys in the campaign thought it was a good idea to meet with a foreign government inside Trump Tower in the conference room on the 25th floor – with no lawyers,” Bannon is quoted as saying in author Michael Wolff’s book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House. “They didn’t have any lawyers.”

“Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad s—, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately,” Bannon said, referring to the top U.S. criminal investigative agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Britain’s Guardian newspaper on Wednesday extensively quoted Bannon’s views from the soon-to-be-published book, which the newspaper said it had seen. Bannon was chief executive of Trump’s campaign in the last three months before the November 2016 election, then chief White House strategist for seven months before returning to head the right-wing Breitbart News website. Bannon remains a staunch Trump supporter, but has failed so far in his political efforts to help insurgent Republican candidates win seats in Congress to support Trump’s populist agenda.

Bannon, according to the book, says that special counsel Robert Mueller and his team of investigators, now in the midst of a months-long criminal investigation of alleged Trump campaign collusion with Russia during the election, are focusing on money laundering.

“They’re going to crack Don Junior like an egg on national TV,” Bannon said of the investigators.

“You realize where this is going,” Bannon is quoted as saying. “This is all about money laundering. Mueller chose [senior prosecutor Andrew] Weissmann first and he is a money-laundering guy. Their path to f—— Trump goes right through Paul Manafort, Don Jr and Jared Kushner …It’s as plain as a hair on your face.”

Bannon said the White House has been too dismissive of the coming storm from the Mueller investigation, comparing it to facing down the strongest hurricane.

“They’re sitting on a beach trying to stop a Category Five,” Bannon said.

Mueller has already indicted Manafort and another Trump campaign aide, Rick Gates, on money laundering charges linked to their lobbying efforts for Ukraine prior to the 2016 election, and secured guilty pleas from former national security adviser Michael Flynn and former foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos for lying to federal agents about their Russia contacts. Aside from probing Trump campaign links with Russia, Mueller is also investigating whether Trump obstructed justice by firing former FBI director James Comey, who was heading the agency’s Russia investigation before Mueller was appointed to take over the probe.

Trump has often denied there was any collusion between his campaign and Russia, contending that Mueller’s probe and congressional investigations of Russian meddling in the U.S. election were excuses by Democrats to explain his upset victory over Clinton.

Trump last week told The New York Times that he thinks Mueller is “going to be fair” in his investigation, but also that his probe “makes the country look very bad.”
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In 2009, the world watched as Iranians marching in the streets turned to social media sites like Twitter and Facebook to organize and share information.

The technology-assisted protests were dubbed the first “Twitter revolution.”

Flash forward to 2018 and technology again is playing a role in demonstrations sweeping cities across Iran.

But much has changed in the intervening years when it comes to the communication tools used by Iranian citizens for organizing and publicizing protests.

Here are some of the main changes:

1. The rise of smartphones has brought more Iranians on to the internet

In 2009, fewer than 15 percent of Iranians had internet access, according to the World Bank.

While Twitter was used to get news of the protests out to the world, it is unclear how much of a role it or any service played to help organize political actions. Word of mouth, in some accounts, as well as SMS messaging over cellphones (and just 30 percent of Iranians owned a cell phone) played a larger role than internet services.

Now, with the advent of smartphones in Iran – about half of Iranians, or 48 million people, have smartphones. More than 50 percent of Iranians are online.

2. An explosion in messaging options

In 2009, Facebook and Twitter were relatively new with Iranians accessing the services mostly on their desktop computers.

As the 2009 protests unfolded, the Obama administration asked Twitter to delay an update that would have taken the service offline to allow Iranians to continue to use it.

Now, Iranian citizens have a number of ways of receiving and sending messages – straight from the device they carry in their pockets.

Of these newer services, the most popular in Iran is Telegram, an instant messaging service that offers encrypted secret chats and channels, where people discuss news and current events. By one count, more than 100,000 Iranian channels are on Telegram. Facebook’s Instagram is the second most popular service.

“Telegram channels are frequently used for organizing protests and for sharing political opinion,” said Eva Galperin, director of cybersecurity for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

As the protests continued, the Iranian government shut down Telegram and Instagram. But other messaging apps give users options.

“Regime in Iran can shut down signal, telegram, etc., but differently from 2009, the whole country is connected and they have a long list of other messaging apps to use,” tweeted Jared Cohen, founder and chief executive of Jigsaw, an Alphabet company, and a senior fellow on the Council of Foreign Relations. “This time around, it’s much harder to win a game of technology wack-a-mole.”

And indeed, the head of Telegram took to Twitter on Tuesday to suggest users go to Whatsapp, which “remains fully accessible in Iran.”

3. Wider adoption of anti-filtering tools

Since the 2009 Green Movement, more Iranians have access to anti-censorship technology, such as VPNs and proxies, servers that transmit content that can evade government controls.

“Iranian internet users are making use of a wider variety of circumvention tools that allow for selective access to blocked resources,” said Alp Toker, founder of NetBlocks.org, a digital rights group.

“This could be down to a more mature understanding of internet filtering that has developed since the Green Movement protests after 2009, supported by domestic technical expertise and earlier initiatives to develop tools for Iran,” Toker said. “This suggests that workarounds for Iran’s internet filters have become a way of life for many mobile and desktop internet users.”

4. Dangers exist for Iranians using mobile technology

With more communication technologies available to Iranians, they are more regulated and less open than they were in 2009, says Toker. Mobile devices are more restricted than computers, making it more difficult to circumvent Iran’s internet filters, he added.

In addition, many Iranians are using outdated iPhone devices and skipping software security updates, which means they may be more vulnerable to state-sponsored hacking and surveillance, Toker said.

Since 2009, the Iranian government has worked to create its own internet service and restricted content it considers objectionable on commercial services.

“Iran’s own strict regime of internet filters, but also U.S. sanctions limiting the transfer and sale of technology and security products, are likely contributing factors that mean the choke points are still an effective mechanism for mass control,” Toker said.
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