“The agreement, which Argentina’s central bank announced Monday, allows for a $20 billion currency swap that’s aimed at propping up the Argentina peso ahead of crucial midterm elections that will determine the political success of President Javier Milei, a staunch ally of President Donald Trump.
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Beyond the $20 billion of financing for Argentina through the swap, Bessent has said he’s also organizing another $20 billion in financing that will be funded by private lenders or sovereign wealth funds.”
“Paul Ingrassia, President Donald Trump’s embattled nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, told a group of fellow Republicans in a text chain the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday should be “tossed into the seventh circle of hell” and said he has “a Nazi streak,” according to a text chat viewed by POLITICO.
Ingrassia, who has a Senate confirmation hearing scheduled Thursday, made the remarks in a chain with a half-dozen Republican operatives and influencers, according to the chat.
“MLK Jr. was the 1960s George Floyd and his ‘holiday’ should be ended and tossed into the seventh circle of hell where it belongs,” Ingrassia wrote in January 2024, according to the chat.
“Jesus Christ,” one participant responded.
Using an Italian slur for Black people, Ingrassia wrote a month earlier in the group chat seen by POLITICO: “No moulignon holidays … From kwanza [sic] to mlk jr day to black history month to Juneteenth,” then added: “Every single one needs to be eviscerated.””
“European leaders and Ukraine’s allies issued a carefully worded warning to U.S. President Donald Trump early Tuesday over his lukewarm support for Kyiv, backing his call to halt fighting but rejecting any suggestion of territorial concessions to Moscow.”
“A man pardoned by President Donald Trump for storming the Capitol on Jan. 6 was arrested last week for allegedly threatening to kill House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries.”
“Ukraine shouldn’t have to give up territory as part of a peace deal with Russia, the EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump pushed Kyiv to give up land to end the war.
“If we just give away the territories, then this gives a message to everybody that you can just use force against your neighbors and get what you want,” Kallas told journalists in Luxembourg after a meeting of foreign ministers. “I think this is very dangerous. That’s why we have the international law in place, [so] that nobody does that.”
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“What you can conquer back is one question, but the other question is also what do you recognize as the territory of another country?” said Kallas, a former prime minister of Estonia. “I come from a country that was occupied for 50 years, but [a] majority of the countries in the world didn’t recognize them to be Russian territories. And that also meant a lot.””
One reason the U.S. is behind China in rare earth metals is that China can tell companies what to do for the good of the country, while Congress and presidents have allowed companies to chase short-term profits at the expense of the country.
““With a single phone call, Putin appears to have changed President Trump’s mind on Ukraine once again,” a second person familiar with the negotiations told POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook.”
“By hiking tariffs on nearly all imports to the United States earlier this year, President Donald Trump effectively imposed one of the largest tax hikes in American history—and did so without congressional approval.
Now, the Trump administration is reportedly preparing to spend some of the revenue from those tax increases—also without congressional approval.”