Month: October 2021

Officials in some college towns across the country plan to challenge the results of the 2020 census, claiming that vacant campuses emptied because of the COVID-19 pandemic cost them a fair count.

In its review of 75 metro areas that are home to the largest shares of residents ages 20-24, The Associated Press found that in some towns, the census count was significantly below population estimates. In others, the count exceeded estimates.

For example, in Bloomington, Indiana, home of Indiana University, the numbers were off by as much as 7%, according to AP. Indiana University, which has about 48,000 students, vacated its classrooms just as the census began. Bloomington officials believe their city’s census results were too low.

“It’s just not a credible number,” Bloomington Mayor John Hamilton told AP. “The simplest explanation is that the count was done after the university told students, ‘Don’t return to Bloomington and go back to your parents’ homes.’ I’m not blaming anybody. The university did the right thing to protect its students.”

But in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Huntsville, Texas, AP found that results surpassed local estimates by 6%. In Tuscaloosa, home of the University of Alabama, Mayor Walt Maddox told AP that last year’s census put the city just shy of 100,000 residents, an important threshold that decides whether cities receive certain funding streams. Maddox said properly counting off-campus students living in the city will make up the difference.

“In terms of economic development, the perception of being above 100,000 has a greater psychological impact in your recruiting and development,” Maddox told AP.

Funding, representation at stake

Much is on the line. Census data determines how seats in the U.S. House of Representatives are apportioned, as well as billions of dollars in federal funding. Results last until the next census in 10 years.

For cities and towns built around universities, accurate census information often hinges on how well students are counted. School records for students living on campus may have been more easily aggregated than for those students living off campus, which likely contributed to the inaccurate headcount, according to the AP report.

Collecting information on this demographic presented challenges from the start. A U.S. Census Bureau press release in June 2020 said efforts were being made to solicit off-campus student data from college administrators. An earlier release asked college students to report their residency as “where they live and sleep most of the time.”

But this led to some confusion. As schools asked students to shelter in place and wait out the worsening pandemic, communities typically brimming with off-campus student life quieted. Students were back home, many unsure where to count their residency. In State College, Pennsylvania, AP reported that neighborhoods normally dominated by Penn State students had the lowest census response rates in the area.

Challenging the numbers

In a letter sent this month to the Census Bureau, Boston Mayor Kim Janey said she would challenge her city’s census results, attributing low response rates to fewer college students and foreign residents hesitant about citizenship questions, language barriers and the government.

Janey said a city survey earlier in the academic year counted 5,000 local students who were later not among the final tally. Another 500 inmates in Boston’s two correctional facilities were also not counted.

Despite their differences, Janey signaled her gratitude for the bureau’s work.

“The pandemic could not have come at a more inopportune time for the Decennial Census,” she wrote in the letter. “Our desire to have a more accurate population count for Boston does not diminish our appreciation for the valuable resources that the Census Bureau provides.”

The bureau’s Count Question Resolution Operation offers a chance for officials to challenge the census results, but it will only consider geographic issues and coverage concerns, such as a missed apartment building or counts made using incorrect boundaries. Communities can begin filing their cases in January.

Few complaints submitted after the 2010 census — the last time all U.S. residents were counted — led to a correction, according to the bureau’s website.

Some information for this report comes from AP. 
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An advisory panel of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration voted Tuesday to grant emergency authorization to Pfizer’s two-dose COVID-19 vaccine for children between the ages of 5 and 11 years old.

Pfizer and its German-based partner BioNTech are seeking permission to inoculate children in this age group with a lower dose than what is currently given to people ages 12 and older. 

The advisory panel voted 17-to-0, with one person declining to 

vote, that the benefits of the vaccine outweigh any potential risks of any side effects such as myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart. The rare condition has been detected mostly among boys and young men who were immunized with either Pfizer or the two-shot Moderna vaccine.

Pfizer says clinical trials showed its vaccine was nearly 91 percent effective in preventing symptomatic COVID-19 among 5-to-11-year-old children.

The FDA is expected to accept the panel’s recommendation as soon as this week. The issue will then be taken up next week by an advisory panel of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which will decide whether or not to recommend the vaccine and how it should be administered.

If both agencies grant final approval, as many as 28 million young Americans will be eligible to receive the Pfizer vaccine. The White House says it has established a network of pediatricians, pharmacies and other health care providers to quickly distribute the shots. 

Moderna said earlier this week that a low dose of its COVID-19 vaccine is safe for children between 6 and 11 years of age in clinical trials. The company says preliminary results show the antibody levels in the children were at the same level as those seen in young adults who received a full dose. 

In a related development, new guidelines issued Tuesday by the CDC say people 18 or older who are moderately or severely immunocompromised may need to get a fourth jab of a Pfizer or Moderna vaccine. People in these categories include those who are being treated for cancers of the blood, certain organ transplant and stem cell recipients, have advanced or untreated HIV, or are taking high-dose drugs that may suppress their immune systems. 

The CDC has already approved a third shot of either vaccine for those 65 or older six months or more after completing the original two-shot regimen. 

An apparent standoff is developing in Australia over whether unvaccinated tennis players will be able to enter the country to participate in next year’s Australian Open. Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Wednesday that unvaccinated players will be granted exemptions as long as they spend two weeks in quarantine after their arrival. 

But Victoria state Premier Daniel Andrews said hours later that his government would not apply for such exemptions. The Grand Slam tournament is staged annually in Melbourne, Australia’s second-largest city and the capital of Victoria state. 

Melbourne and its 5 million residents just recently emerged from its latest lockdown period after Victoria state reached its goal of fully vaccinating 70 percent of its citizens 16 and older.

Australia has been largely successful in containing the spread of COVID-19 through aggressive lockdown efforts at the start of the pandemic, but a rapid outbreak of new infections in Sydney triggered by the delta outbreak back in June spread across Australia and forced authorities in several cities to impose strict lockdown orders. 

Meanwhile, Greg Hunt, Australia’s health minister, announced Wednesday that beginning November 1, all fully-vaccinated residents will be able to travel overseas without needing a special exemption. Hunt said fully vaccinated residents also will be able to return without restrictions, meaning thousands of Australians who have been stranded overseas since the country closed its borders to all international travel in March 2020 in the early days of the pandemic.

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse. 

  
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The past several weeks have been difficult for the social media behemoth Facebook, with a series of whistleblower revelations demonstrating that the company knew its signature platform was exacerbating all manner of social ills around the globe, from human trafficking to sectarian violence.   

The tide shows no sign of receding. New revelations this week have demonstrated that the company’s supposed commitment to freedom of expression takes a back seat to its bottom line when repressive governments, like Vietnam’s, demand that dissent be silenced. They showed that Facebook knew its algorithms were steering users toward extreme content, such as QAnon conspiracy theories and phony anti-vaccine claims, but took few steps to remedy the problem.

In statements to various media outlets, the company has defended itself, saying it dedicates enormous resources to assuring safety on its platform and asserting that much of the information provided to journalists and government officials has been taken out of context.   

In a conference call to discuss the company’s quarterly earnings on Monday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed that recent media coverage is painting a misleading picture of his company.   

“Good faith criticism helps us get better,” Zuckerberg said. “But my view is that what we are seeing is a coordinated effort to selectively use leaked documents to paint a false picture of our company. The reality is that we have an open culture, where we encourage discussion and research about our work so we can make progress on many complex issues that are not specific to just us.”   

The revelations, as well as unrelated business challenges, mean that Facebook, which also owns Instagram and the messaging service WhatsApp, has a lot of things to worry about in the coming weeks and months. Here are five of the biggest. 

A potential SEC investigation 

Whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former product manager with the company, delivered thousands of pages of documents to lawmakers and journalists last month, prompting the wave of stories about the company’s practices. But the documents also went to the Securities and Exchange Commission, raising the possibility of a federal investigation of the company. 

Haugen claims the documents provide evidence that the company withheld information that might have affected investors’ decisions about purchasing Facebook’s stock. Among other things, she says that the documents show that Facebook knew that its number of actual users — a key measurement of its ability to deliver the advertising it depends on for its profits — was lower than it was reporting.   

The SEC has not indicated whether or not it will pursue an investigation into the company, and a securities fraud charge would be difficult to prove, requiring evidence that executives actively and knowingly misled investors. But even an investigation could be harmful to the company’s already bruised corporate image. 

In a statement provided to various media, a company spokesperson said, “We make extensive disclosures in our S.E.C. filings about the challenges we face, including user engagement, estimating duplicate and false accounts, and keeping our platform safe from people who want to use it to harm others . . . All of these issues are known and debated extensively in the industry, among academics and in the media. We are confident that our disclosures give investors the information they need to make informed decisions.”   

Antitrust suit 

Facebook is already being sued by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which claims that between the company’s main site, Instagram, and WhatsApp, Facebook exercises monopoly power in the social media market. The agency is demanding that the three platforms be split up.   

Facebook has publicly claimed it does not have monopoly power, but internal documents made available by Haugen demonstrate that the company knows it is overwhelmingly dominant in some areas, potentially handing the FTC additional ammunition as it attempts to persuade a federal judge to break up the company.  

Legislative action 

Congress doesn’t agree on much these days, but Haugen’s testimony in a hearing last month sparked bipartisan anger at Facebook and Instagram, especially over revelations that the latter has long been aware that its platform is harmful to the mental health of many teenage users, particularly young girls. 

Several pieces of legislation have since been introduced, including a proposal to create an “app ratings board” that would set age and content ratings for applications on internet-enabled devices.  

Others seek to make social media companies like Facebook liable for harm done by false information circulating on the platform, or to force the company to offer stronger privacy protections and to give users the right to control the spread of content about themselves. 

Ramya Krishnan, a staff attorney at the Knight First Amendment Institute and a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School, is one of many academics who have been pushing for lawmakers to require Facebook and other social media platforms to allow researchers and journalists better access to data about their audiences and their engagement.   

“We’ve seen increased interest among lawmakers and regulators in expanding the space for research and journalism focused on the platform, reflecting the understanding that in order to effectively regulate the platforms we need to better understand the effect that they are having on society and democracy,” she told VOA.

Internal dissent 

One of the most striking things about the documents released this week is the amount of anger inside Facebook over the company’s public image. The disclosures include reams of internal messages and other communications in which Facebook employees complain about the company’s unwillingness to police content on the site.   

“I’m struggling to match my values to my employment here,” one employee wrote in response to the assault on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, which was partly organized on Facebook. “I came here hoping to effect change and improve society, but all I’ve seen is atrophy and abdication of responsibility.”  

The documents show that the company is losing employees — particularly those charged with combating hate speech and misinformation — because they don’t believe their efforts have the support of management. 

Advertiser boycott 

Last year the Anti-Defamation League organized a campaign to pressure companies to “pause” their advertising on Facebook in protest over its failure to eliminate hateful rhetoric on the platform. In a statement given to VOA, Jonathan A. Greenblatt, the group’s CEO, said it is preparing to do so again. 

“Mark Zuckerberg would have you believe that Facebook is doing all it can to address the amplification of hate and disinformation,” Greenblatt said. “Now we know the truth: He was aware it was happening and chose to ignore internal researchers’ recommendations and did nothing about it. So we will do something about it, because literally, lives have been lost and people are being silenced and killed as a direct result of Facebook’s negligence.”   

He continued, “We are in talks to decide what the best course of action is to bring about real change at Facebook, whether it’s with policymakers, responsible shareholders, or advertisers,” he said. “But make no mistake: We’ve successfully taken on Facebook’s hate and misinformation machine before, and we aren’t afraid to do it again. It’s time to rein in this rogue company and its harmful products.” 
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Democrats in the U.S. Congress continued to be mired in negotiations on President Joe Biden’s major social safety net and climate control spending plan, particularly which  programs to keep and which ones to remove as well as the means to pay for them.

The president held talks at the White House Tuesday night with Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, two moderate lawmakers in Biden’s own Democratic party who have staunchly opposed much of his original $3.5 trillion Build Back Better plan that would provide the biggest expansion of government benefits to American families in five decades. 

Senate Democrats led by Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts unveiled a plan earlier Tuesday that would impose a new minimum tax on corporations, along with a new “billionaires tax” that would impose levies on individuals who own at least $1 billion in assets, or who receive $100 million in earnings for three consecutive years.  

The plan was conceived after Sinema came out against a much simpler plan to raise conventional tax rates on wealthy Americans and corporations. Sinema announced her support for the new minimum corporate tax as “a common-sense step,” but some House Democrats have raised concerns about the legality of the billionaires’ tax.  

For his part, Manchin has come out in opposition of an expansion of Medicare and Medicaid, the government’s health care programs for elderly and low-income Americans, respectively, as well as providing 12 weeks of paid family leave and making the new child tax credit permanent, criticizing them as either costly or unnecessary new government “entitlements.”

Manchin is also opposed to a proposed $150 billion clean electricity program that would replace the nation’s coal and gas-fired power plants with wind, solar and nuclear energy. The program is a pillar of the president’s strategy to combat climate change, but Manchin represents one of the largest coal-producing states in the nation. His opposition has left the administration scrambling to create an alternative strategy, such as grants and loans to help utilities switch to renewable energy.  

Biden has expressed hope that he can reach agreement this week on what he has acknowledged will be a more limited spending plan of about $2 trillion or less, with some provisions, such as two tuition-free years of community college, jettisoned from the final package.  

Representative Ro Khanna of California, a key member of the House Progressive Caucus, told the U.S. cable news television program “Fox News Sunday” that the president recently told a group of lawmakers that he needs passage of both the social safety net bill and a separate $1.2 trillion measure that funds key upgrades to the nation’s physical infrastructure before he travels to Glascow, Scotland later this week for the United Nations-sponsored COP26 climate conference.   

With the 100-member Senate equally split between Republicans and Democrats, the policy agreement and votes of Manchin and Sinema are key to passage of the legislation, along with the tie-breaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris. Currently, no Republicans support the legislation. 

The infrastructure spending plan drew the support of 19 Republicans in the Senate, along with that of all 50 Democrats, but progressive House Democrats blocked its passage there until agreement could be reached on the social safety net legislation. 

White House press secretary Jen Psaki acknowledged the high stakes involved in the difficult negotiations Tuesday. “The alternative to what is being negotiated is not the original package — it is nothing,” she told reporters.  

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters.
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A British court will consider this week whether Julian Assange, founder of the Wikileaks website, can be extradited to the United States on charges of hacking and theft. The two-day hearing is scheduled to begin Wednesday in London’s high court. 

U.S. prosecutors appealed a British district court verdict from January, which ruled that Assange should not be extradited because it was possible he could commit suicide in a maximum-security U.S. prison.

That premise will be challenged by prosecutors, said lawyer Nick Vamos, a former head of extradition at Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service, now a partner at London-based law firm Peters & Peters. 

“What the U.S. government (has) now done is come forward with a specific assurance about exactly how, where and in what condition he will be detained. So, provided his medical condition and his risk of suicide hasn’t changed, then you would assume that the U.S. government (has) met the test that the district judge in the first judgment set them,” Vamos told VOA. 

Other developments since the January ruling could affect the case. Sigurdur Thordarson, a former Wikileaks insider-turned-FBI informant, has said he fabricated evidence used by the prosecution. 

Meanwhile last month, Yahoo News published a story alleging the CIA plotted to kidnap or even kill Assange in 2017 when he sought asylum at the Ecuadorean embassy in London. Yahoo said the story was based on interviews with 30 former U.S. intelligence and national security officials. 

Vamos said the defense will claim there is political motivation behind the extradition request.

“It will be argued that, well, if the CIA were willing to assassinate him — that’s one arm of the U.S. government — then really, you can’t trust the other arm of the U.S. government, the Department of Justice, to act fairly and to prosecute him in accordance with human rights standards and what we would consider to be a fair trial,” he said. 

The CIA and U.S. lawyers leading the extradition appeal have yet to comment on the Yahoo story. Former CIA director and former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told The Megyn Kelly Show podcast in September that all actions taken were “consistent with U.S. law.” 

“We desperately wanted to hold accountable those individuals that had violated U.S. law, that had violated requirements to protect information and had tried to steal it. There is a deep legal framework to do that. And we took actions consistent with U.S. law to try to achieve that,” Pompeo said. 

Military leak 

In 2010 and 2011, Assange oversaw the publication by Wikileaks of tens of thousands of diplomatic cables and military reports relating to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He said the leaks exposed abuses by the U.S. military. 

Assange sought refuge in the Ecuadorean embassy in London in 2012 after facing accusations of rape in Sweden, a case that was later dropped. He stayed there for seven years until Ecuador allowed British police to arrest him in April 2019. He was then jailed for 50 weeks for breaching bail. 

Now 50, he is currently being held in Belmarsh prison in London, as he is considered a flight risk. 

Experts say the extradition case raises vital questions about freedom of the press.

“There is the huge, huge issue of global media freedom and the way that this case could set a terrible precedent for any journalist, any publisher, trying to expose the misdeeds and wrongdoing of government, so that government can be held accountable,” Julia Hall of Amnesty International said in an interview with VOA. 

Assange faces 18 U.S. federal charges relating to allegations of hacking, theft of classified material and the disclosure of the identities of U.S. informants, which prosecutors say put the informants’ lives at risk. 

A verdict on the extradition appeal will likely take several weeks. Whoever loses can appeal the decision to Britain’s Supreme Court, which could take several years. However, Supreme Court judges may rule against considering the case, Vamos said.

“It has to be on a point of law of general public importance. The Supreme Court doesn’t hear factual disputes and doesn’t hear arguments that have been settled well before in lower courts,” he told VOA. 

 
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The Senate confirmed two prominent anti-Trump Republicans to serve in the Biden administration on Tuesday with former Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona approved to serve as the ambassador to Turkey, and Cindy McCain, the wife of the late Senator John McCain, approved to serve as the ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture. 

The Senate also voted to confirm former Democratic Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico to serve as ambassador to New Zealand, and Victoria Reggie Kennedy of Massachusetts, the widow of former Senator Ted Kennedy, to serve as ambassador to Austria. 

The nominations were approved through voice vote, a process taking only minutes that can be used so long as no senators object. Republicans, led by Senator Ted Cruz, are requiring the vast majority of Biden’s other State Department nominees to go through a much more extensive and time-consuming process. 

Democratic Senator Chris Coons thanked senators for acting quickly on the four nominations but said he remains concerned about the overall pace of confirmations for the president’s diplomatic corps. 

“There are dozens of countries where there is no confirmed American ambassador, and I hope that this moment of progress will be a predictor of other progress to come soon,” Coons said. 

Flake was a rare critic of former President Donald Trump among Senate Republicans. He served just one term in the Senate, opting not to seek reelection in the face of what was certain to be a difficult GOP primary. 

McCain endorsed Biden in the presidential election, which at the time was viewed as possibly helping Biden broaden his appeal to Republicans and independents in Arizona, a crucial swing state that her husband had represented in Congress for 35 years. 
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U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday rebooted his country’s lapsed relationship with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations by attending the annual meeting of the 10-member bloc virtually and announcing plans to provide up to $102 million to expand the U.S. strategic partnership in the Indo-Pacific region.

“Our partnership is essential in maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific, which has been the foundation of our shared security and prosperity for many decades,” Biden said in his opening remarks delivered from the White House as leaders of nine of the 10 nations listened. “And the United States strongly supports the ASEAN outlook and the Indo-Pacific — on the Indo-Pacific and the rules-based regional order.”

The last U.S. president to attend an ASEAN-U.S. meeting was in 2017 when Donald Trump attended in Manila.

This year’s summit is hosted by Brunei. The other members of the regional bloc are Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Myanmar was not allowed to attend — the group banned its military junta leader for ignoring a peace road map agreed to six months ago. 

Biden underscored the importance of ASEAN and called the relationship a “linchpin for maintaining the resilience, the prosperity, and security of our shared region.”

The White House said  the new funding will go toward health, climate, economic and education programs.

Included in the package is $40 million that will go to an initiative to help address the current COVID-19 pandemic and strengthen ASEAN’s ability to prevent, detect and respond to future outbreaks of infectious diseases.

Another $20.5 million will finance climate mitigation, and up to $20 million will support cooperation on trade and innovation. Another $17.5 million is earmarked for education projects, and $4 million to promote gender equality and equity.

US-China rivalry

The summit is the first time in four years that an American president participated at the top level with an economically dynamic regional bloc seen as key to countering an increasingly assertive China.

Marc Mealy, senior vice president for policy at the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council, said he welcomes Biden’s re-engagement. “We’re talking about a region that by 2030 is going to be one of the largest regional economies in the world,” he said.

While the United States is seen as a security guarantor against rising Chinese ambition in the region, Washington is lagging behind Beijing in terms of economic ties. According to ASEAN data, the bloc became China’s largest trading partner in 2020.

ASEAN and China are also part of the world’s biggest free trade agreement, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. The U.S. is not part of the deal, which covers nearly 30% of the global economy.

The U.S. is also left out of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, a free trade agreement formerly known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The 2016 TPP was promoted by former president Barack Obama but Trump withdrew from it in 2017.

“On several issues, whether it’s trade or climate, the United States plays an important role in setting the table, and then sometimes leaves the table,” said Prashanth Parameswaran, a fellow at the Wilson Center’s Asia program.

He pointed out that geographically, Washington is at a disadvantage and will need to work harder to win ASEAN support at the same time that regional players, including China, Japan, South Korea and Australia, are eager to step in.

“When you raise the bar, and then you subsequently walk away, there’s a double disadvantage,” Parameswaran said.

In recent years, the U.S.-China rivalry in Southeast Asia has intensified significantly. The Biden administration is continuing the Free and Open Indo-Pacific strategy in the region, which singles out Beijing for pursuing regional hegemony.

But most members of ASEAN refuse a binary choice between the U.S. and China and underscore the need to cooperate with both, while ensuring freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Straits.

“What’s the benefit for conflict happening in that area? Who gets the benefit?” Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Pandjaitan said to VOA. “Nobody. COVID is enough (to) create the problem,” he said.

Where’s Myanmar? 

Although Myanmar did not attend the ASEAN meeting, U.S. officials said the delicate state of that nation was part of discussions. In February, the military deposed the elected government and jailed its leader amid allegations of electoral fraud in last November’s elections. 

In April, participants agreed on a five-point plan that called for an immediate end to violence and sent a special ASEAN envoy to the country, formerly known as Burma.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the bloc, with the help of the U.S., is trying to reach a regional solution. On Monday, he said he met virtually with officials from Myanmar’s government-in-exile.

“We discussed broader diplomacy with key countries in the region and those with influence on the military junta, and how the United States could send strong messages to those countries, as well,” he said. “And in fact, just this morning, President Biden has participated in the U.S.-ASEAN Summit, and ASEAN has taken the step of denying a seat at that summit to the junta leader.” 

That exclusion, Parameswaran said, was no mere formality.

“I think it’s a significant move,” he said. … In a virtual setting, you literally had a screen where Myanmar was a blank screen while the meeting was going on. And I think this is a very sort of vivid signal from ASEAN. I think the jury remains out on how ASEAN manages this challenge. I mean, the fact remains that when ASEAN admitted Myanmar into the grouping, they were very aware of these challenges, and they decided to keep Myanmar in rather than keeping Myanmar out. So, this is something which ASEAN can’t sort of sweep under the rug and sort of say this is a Myanmar problem. It is a Southeast Asia problem. It is an ASEAN problem.” 

What’s next? 

Sullivan told VOA that the U.S. will continue to support ASEAN’s five-point plan to bring about a solution. 

“We will continue to stay focused on our steadfast support for the people of Burma for a democratic path in Burma,” he said. “And for the protection of the safety, security and human rights of the citizens.” 

On to the G-20 

In a way, these meetings form a preview for the administration’s vow to conduct “aggressive diplomacy.” What that looks like in practice is likely to come into focus in the coming days, as Biden heads to Rome on Thursday for the meeting of the world’s 20 wealthiest nations, known as the G-20. And from there, to the 26th United Nations climate summit in Glasgow.

“President Biden and key European partners will sit down at these two summits to coordinate policies on Iran, on supply chains, on global infrastructure efforts and so much else,” Sullivan said. 

He noted that two of the world’s top leaders who won’t attend the summits in person could affect the outcome.

“Neither China nor Russia will be attending the summit in person at the leader level, largely, it seems, due to COVID-19,” Sullivan said. “The U.S. and Europe will be there. They’ll be there energized and united at both the G-20 and at COP26, driving the agenda, shaping the agenda as it relates to these significant international issues.” 

Eva Mazrieva, Virginia Gunawan contributed to this report.
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Nothing says Halloween like a visit to a pumpkin patch where selections range from cute to specimens so gigantic, they arrive by truck. Titi Tran has this report from Orange County, California.

Camera:    Titi Mary Tran
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Months before Rosa Parks became the mother of the modern civil rights movement by refusing to move to the back of a segregated Alabama bus, Black teenager Claudette Colvin did the same. Convicted of assaulting a police officer while being arrested, she was placed on probation yet never received notice that she’d finished the term and was on safe ground legally.

Now 82 and slowed by age, Colvin is asking a judge to end the matter once and for all. She wants a court in Montgomery to wipe away a record that her lawyer said has cast a shadow over the life of a largely unsung hero of the civil rights era.

“I am an old woman now. Having my records expunged will mean something to my grandchildren and great grandchildren. And it will mean something for other Black children,” Colvin said in a sworn statement.

Her attorney, Phillip Ensler, said the statement will be filed Tuesday with legal documents to seal, destroy and erase records of her case.

Colvin left Alabama at age 20 and spent decades in New York, but relatives always worried what might happen when she returned for visits since no court official ever said she had finished probation, according to Ensler.

“Her family has lived with this tremendous fear ever since then,” he said. “For all the recognition of recent years and the attempts to tell her story, there wasn’t anything done to clear her record.”

Currently living in Birmingham before a move to stay with relatives in Texas, the octogenarian Colvin will make her request to a juvenile court judge oddly enough since that’s where she was judged delinquent and placed on what, for all practical purposes, amounted to a lifetime of probation, Ensler said.

The city bus system in Montgomery, like the rest of public life across the Deep South, was strictly divided along racial lines in the 1950s. Blacks had to use one water fountain while whites used another; the front of a bus was for white people; Black riders were required by law to move to the back.Parks, a 42-year-old seamstress and activist with the NAACP, gained worldwide fame after refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man on Dec. 1, 1955.

Her treatment led to the yearlong Montgomery Bus Boycott, which propelled the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. into the national limelight and often is considered the start of the modern civil rights movement.

A 15-year-old high school student at the time, Colvin got fed up and refused to move even before Parks.

A bus driver called police on March 2, 1955, to complain that two Black girls were sitting near two white girls and refused to move to the back of the bus. One of the Black girls moved when asked, a police report said, but Colvin refused.

The police report said Colvin put up a struggle as officers removed her from the bus, kicking and scratching an officer. She was initially convicted of violating the city’s segregation law, disorderly conduct and assaulting an officer, but she appealed and only the assault charge stuck.

The case was sent to juvenile court because of Colvin’s age, and records show a judge found her delinquent and placed her on probation “as a ward of the state pending good behavior.” And that’s where it ended, Ensler said, with Colvin never getting official word that she’d completed probation and her relatives assuming the worst — that police would arrest her for any reason they could.

Ensler said it’s “murky” as to whether Colvin is actually still on probation, but she never had any other arrests or legal scrapes. She even became a named plaintiff in the landmark lawsuit that outlawed racial segregation on Montgomery’s buses. Still, Colvin said, the trauma endured, particularly for relatives who constantly worried that police were out to get her.

“My conviction for standing up for my constitutional right terrorized my family and relatives who knew only that they were not to talk about my arrest and conviction because people in town knew me as ‘that girl from the bus,'” she said.

The chief court clerk in Montgomery County did not return a phone message about Colvin’s request, and Ensler said it was uncertain when a judge might rule.
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Global pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions are just a fraction of what’s needed to prevent catastrophic global warming. That’s the warning from the United Nations, ahead of the critical COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow, Britain next week – where world leaders will try to agree on further action to combat global warming. Henry Ridgwell looks at what is at stake ahead of the meeting.
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Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians, resumed a busy American visit Monday after an overnight hospital stay, meeting with President Joe Biden after earlier meetings with the Turkish ambassador and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.     

He said at the White House later Monday that he was abundantly satisfied with his visit, praising Biden as a “man of faith, and man of vision.”     

“We cannot allow any short-sighted political agendas to interfere with our relationships, that are through, and in, Christ Jesus, the Lord and Savior of the world.” he said.  

While Bartholomew’s visit was expected to draw attention to the plight of the small Orthodox Christian minority in his homeland of Turkey, he took a diplomatic tone at an earlier breakfast meeting hosted by Turkish Ambassador Hasan Murat Mercan, according to remarks released by the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.     

Bartholomew said his mission as patriarch “is purely spiritual and demonstrates how Turkey can be – not only an inclusive society, but a bridge-builder between East and West.” He called the ambassador’s welcome an example of mutual “dialogue and respect.” 

The remarks did not refer to ongoing sore points such as the Turkish government’s closure of an Orthodox seminary on the Turkish island of Halki 50 years ago. 

Blinken, however, “reaffirmed that the reopening of the Halki Seminary remains a continued priority” according to State Department spokesperson Ned Price’s summary of their meeting later Monday.     

“They discussed the U.S. commitment to supporting religious freedom around the world and opportunities to work with the Orthodox Christian community worldwide on issues of shared concern, as well as with religious minorities in Turkey and the region,” Price said.   

Blinken also praised the “remarkable leadership” Bartholomew, sometimes known as the “green patriarch,” has shown in calling for solutions to the climate crisis.     

Bartholomew also said Monday he’d join with Pope Francis and the leaders of other major religions around the world to call on the global community to facilitate COVID-19 vaccinations for the world, especially for poor countries.     

Bartholomew, 81, was released from a Washington hospital Monday morning after an overnight stay early in his 12-day visit to the United States. He was brought to George Washington University Hospital on Sunday night after he felt “unwell” due to the long flight on Saturday and the busy schedule of events, according to the Greek Orthodox archdiocese. The hospitalization was recommended by his doctor “out of an abundance of precaution,” the archdiocese said.     

Bartholomew is the patriarch of Constantinople, based in Turkey. He is considered first among equals among Eastern Orthodox patriarchs, which gives him prominence but not the power of a Catholic pope. He does oversee Greek Orthodox and some other jurisdictions, although large portions of the Eastern Orthodox world are self-governing under their own patriarchs.   

The patriarch “is feeling well and is ready to continue” his official visit Monday, according to a tweet from Archbishop Elpidophoros of the U.S. archdiocese, who was part of the delegation meeting with Biden today.     

Bartholomew on Monday also gave a speech via videoconference for the Museum of the Bible in Washington, which he was originally scheduled to visit in person. 

In the evening, he was scheduled to attend a dinner at Georgetown University hosted by its president, John DeGioia, and Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington, D.C.  

On Thursday, he is scheduled to receive an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame in an event highlighting efforts to improve Orthodox-Catholic ties, centuries after the two churches broke decisively in 1054 amid disputes over theology and papal claims of supremacy. And on Nov. 2, he is scheduled to preside at a door-opening ceremony at St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and National Shrine in New York City. The shrine replaces a church destroyed during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the adjacent World Trade Center. 
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U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan met on Monday with representatives of Myanmar’s National Unity Government (NUG), set up by opponents of army rule, the White House said late on Monday. 

In the virtual meeting, Sullivan reiterated continued U.S. support for the pro-democracy movement in Myanmar and discussed ongoing efforts to restore the country’s path to democracy with NUG representatives Duwa Lashi La and Zin Mar Aung, the White House said in a statement. 

Sullivan expressed concern over the military’s violence and said, “the U.S. will continue to promote accountability for the coup”, according to the White House. 

Protests and unrest have paralyzed Myanmar since the Feb. 1 coup, with the military accused of atrocities and excessive force against civilians. The junta blames the unrest on “terrorists” allied with the shadow government. 

Recognizing Myanmar’s junta as the country’s government would not stop growing violence, the outgoing United Nations special envoy on Myanmar said earlier on Monday. 

Sullivan expressed particular concern over the recent arrest of pro-democracy activist Ko Jimmy and noted the United States will continue to advocate for his release, according to the statement. 

Sullivan and the NUG officials also discussed the COVID-19 pandemic in Myanmar and ongoing U.S. efforts to provide humanitarian assistance directly to the people of Myanmar, the statement added. 
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Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians, was released from a Washington hospital Monday morning after an overnight stay early in his 12-day visit to the United States. 

Bartholomew, 81, was scheduled to meet with President Joe Biden later Monday at the White House, and also to meet with Secretary of State Antony Blinken. 

The patriarch “is feeling well and is ready to continue” his official visit Monday, according to a tweet from Archbishop Elpidophoros of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. 

Bartholomew is the patriarch of Constantinople, based in Turkey. He is considered first among equals among Eastern Orthodox patriarchs, which gives him prominence but not the power of a Catholic pope. He does directly oversee Greek Orthodox and some other jurisdictions, although large portions of the Eastern Orthodox world are self-governing under their own patriarchs. 

Bartholomew was brought to George Washington University Hospital on Sunday night after he felt “unwell” due to the long flight here on Saturday and the busy schedule of events, according to the Greek Orthodox archdiocese. The hospitalization was recommended by his doctor “out of an abundance of precaution,” the archdiocese said. 

Making the latest of several trips to the country during his 30 years in office, Bartholomew is expected to address concerns ranging from a pending restructuring of the American Greek Orthodox archdiocese to his church’s minority status in his homeland, Turkey. His schedule Monday includes a visit to the embassy of Turkey in Washington. 

Also on Monday, Bartholomew is scheduled to give a speech via videoconference for the Museum of the Bible in Washington, according to the latest schedule released by the archdiocese. An earlier version of his schedule included an in-person visit. 

In the evening, he is scheduled to attend a dinner at Georgetown University hosted by its president, John DeGioia, and Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington, D.C.

On Thursday, he is scheduled to receive an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame in an event highlighting efforts to improve Orthodox-Catholic ties, centuries after the two churches broke decisively in 1054 amid disputes over theology and papal claims of supremacy. And on November 2, he is scheduled to preside at a door-opening ceremony at St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and National Shrine in New York City. The shrine replaces a church destroyed during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. 

 
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Efforts to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal are at a “critical phase” and Tehran’s reasons for avoiding talks are wearing thin, a U.S. official said Monday while raising the possibility of further diplomacy even if the deal cannot be resuscitated. 

U.S. Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley told reporters Washington was increasingly worried Tehran would keep delaying a return to talks but that it had other tools to keep Iran from developing a nuclear weapon and would use them if need be. 

“We’re in a critical phase of the efforts to see whether we can revive the JCPOA,” Malley said, referring to the deal formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. “We’ve had a hiatus of many months, and the official reasons given by Iran for why we’re in this hiatus are wearing very thin.” 

While saying that the window for both the United States and Iran to resume compliance with the agreement would eventually close, Malley said the United States would still be willing to engage in diplomacy with Iran even as it weighed other options to prevent Tehran from getting the bomb. 

He also hinted at the economic benefits that might flow from Iran’s return to the agreement, under which Tehran took steps to limit its nuclear program in return for relief from U.S., European Union and U.N. economic sanctions. 

Then-U.S. President Donald Trump abandoned the pact in 2018 and reimposed harsh U.S. sanctions. About a year later, Iran began violating some of the deal’s limits, including on uranium enrichment. Enriching uranium can provide a path to obtain the fissile material for an atomic bomb, an ambition Iran denies. 

While saying the window for returning to the JCPOA will not be open forever because eventually Iran’s nuclear advances will have overtaken it, Malley said Washington would continue to look for diplomatic arrangements with Tehran. 

“You can’t revive a dead corpse,” he said, stressing that the United States had not reached that point yet. “We will continue to pursue diplomacy, even as we pursue other steps if we face a world in which we need to do that.” 

Malley declined to describe those other steps. Since talks in Vienna on reviving the deal adjourned in June, Washington has increasingly spoken of pursuing other options, a phrase that hints at the possibility, however remote, of military action. 

The envoy, who spent last week consulting U.S. partners in the Gulf and in Europe, emphasized that all sides had “a strong preference for diplomacy, for an effort to revive the JCPOA and, were that to happen, to find ways to engage Iran economically.” 

Iran has said for more than a month that it would “soon” return to indirect talks in Vienna with the United States on resuming compliance with the accord but has yet to set a date. 

Iran’s nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani, plans to meet on Wednesday in Brussels with the EU’s Enrique Mora, who coordinates talks among Iran and other parties to the deal: Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States. 

Western officials worry that the longer Iran remains outside the nuclear deal, the more expertise it will gain, shortening the time it might need to race to build a bomb if it chose to. 

In a step likely to raise tensions, Iran is expanding its enrichment of uranium beyond the highly enriched threshold of 20% purity at a Natanz plant where it is already enriching to 60%. But the new activity does not involve keeping the product, the U.N nuclear watchdog said. 

 
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The United States will soon reopen its air borders for fully vaccinated foreign visitors who have one of three approved COVID-19 vaccines or who can present a negative COVID-19 test within 24 hours of travel, the White House announced Monday. 

The new rules take effect Nov. 8, and “only limited exceptions” will be allowed, senior Biden administration officials said during a background briefing with reporters. Those include vaccine exemptions for travelers from about 50 countries with exceptionally low vaccination rates, which include some of the world’s poorest nations, many of those in Africa. Children under the age of 18 are also exempt from the vaccine requirement at this time, but will still have to present a negative test.

Accepted vaccines only include the three approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration:: Moderna, Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson.

Exemptions will include “certain COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial participants, those with medical contraindications to the vaccines, and those who need to travel for emergency or humanitarian reasons,” the White House said. Additionally, those who are granted an exception must agree to be vaccinated in the U.S. if they intend to stay for more than 60 days.

“The new system also includes enhanced testing requirements, strengthening contact tracing, as well as masking,”a senior administration official said. ”These are strict safety protocols that follow the science and public health to enhance the safety of Americans here at home, and the safety of international air travel.” 

In 2019, nearly 80 million international visitors came to the U.S., according to data from the U.S. Travel Association. That figure cratered in early 2020, when the pandemic hit and the administration of former President Donald Trump imposed restrictions that barred tens of thousands of travelers from most of the world.

Unvaccinated air passengers — including unvaccinated U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents — will now need to provide a negative test within one day of departure. Children under two years old will not need to test, and accommodations will be allowed for people who have documented their recovery from the virus within the last 90 days.

 
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