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  • Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the United States.

    Birth date: June 14, 1946

    Birth place: New York, New York

    Birth name: Donald John Trump

    Father: Fred Trump, real estate developer

    Mother: Mary (Macleod) Trump

    Marriages: Melania (Knauss) Trump (January 22, 2005-present); Marla (Maples) Trump (December 1993-June 1999, divorced); Ivana (Zelnicek) Trump (1977-1990, divorced)

    Children: with Melania Trump: Barron, March 20, 2006; with Marla Maples: Tiffany, October 13, 1993; with Ivana Trump: Eric, 1984; Ivanka, October 30, 1981; Donald Jr., December 31, 1977

    Education: Attended Fordham University; University of Pennsylvania, Wharton School of Finance, B.S. in Economics, 1968

    As Trump evolved from real estate developer to reality television star, he turned his name into a brand. Licensed Trump products have included board games, steaks, cologne, vodka, furniture and menswear.

    He has portrayed himself in cameo appearances in movies and on television, including “Zoolander,” “Sex and the City” and “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.”

    Trump’s slogan, “Make America Great Again,” was first used by Ronald Reagan while he was running against President Jimmy Carter.

    For details on investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election, visit 2016 Presidential Election Investigation Fast Facts.

    1970s – After college, works with his father on apartment complexes in Queens and Brooklyn.

    1973 – Trump and his father are named in a Justice Department lawsuit alleging Trump property managers violated the Fair Housing Act by turning away potential African American tenants. The Trumps deny the company discriminates and file a $100 million countersuit, which is later dismissed. The case is settled in 1975, and the Trumps agree to provide weekly lists of vacancies to Black community organizations.

    1976 – Trump and his father partner with the Hyatt Corporation, purchasing the Commodore Hotel, an aging midtown Manhattan property. The building is revamped and opens four years later as the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The project kickstarts Trump’s career as a Manhattan developer.

    1983-1990 – He builds/purchases multiple properties in New York City, including Trump Tower and the Plaza Hotel, and also opens casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey, including the Trump Taj Mahal and the Trump Plaza. Trump buys the New Jersey Generals football team, part of the United States Football League, which folds after three seasons.

    1985 – Purchases Mar-a-Lago, an oceanfront estate in Palm Beach, Florida. It is renovated and opens as a private club in 1995.

    1987 – Trump’s first book, “Trump: The Art of the Deal,” is published, and becomes a bestseller. The Donald J. Trump Foundation is established in order to donate a portion of profits from book sales to charities.

    1990 – Nearly $1 billion in personal debt, Trump reaches an agreement with bankers allowing him to avoid declaring personal bankruptcy.

    1991 – The Trump Taj Mahal files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

    1992 – The Trump Plaza and the Trump Castle casinos file for bankruptcy.

    1996 – Buys out and becomes executive producer of the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants.

    October 7, 1999 – Tells CNN’s Larry King that he is going to form a presidential exploratory committee and wants to challenge Pat Buchanan for the Reform Party nomination.

    February 14, 2000 – Says that he is abandoning his bid for the presidency, blaming discord within the Reform Party.

    January 2004 – “The Apprentice,” a reality show featuring aspiring entrepreneurs competing for Trump’s approval, premieres on NBC.

    November 21, 2004 – Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts Inc. files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

    2005 – Establishes Trump University, which offers seminars in real estate investment.

    February 13, 2009 – Announces his resignation from his position as chairman of Trump Entertainment Resorts. Days later, the company files for bankruptcy protection.

    March 17, 2011 – During an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Trump questions whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

    June 16, 2015 – Announces that he is running for president during a speech at Trump Tower. He pledges to implement policies that will boost the economy and says he will get tough on immigration. “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best…They’re sending people who have lots of problems,” Trump says. “They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people.”

    June 28, 2015 – Says he’s giving up the TV show “The Apprentice” to run for president.

    June 29, 2015 – NBCUniversal says it is cutting its business ties to Trump and won’t air the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants because of “derogatory statements by Donald Trump regarding immigrants.”

    July 8, 2015 – In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Trump says he “can’t guarantee” all of his employees have legal status in the United States. This is in response to questions about a Washington Post report about undocumented immigrants working at the Old Post Office construction site in Washington, DC, which Trump is converting into a hotel.

    July 22, 2015 – Trump’s financial disclosure report is made public by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

    August 6, 2015 – During the first 2016 Republican debate, Trump is questioned about a third party candidacy, his attitude towards women and his history of donating money to Democratic politicians. He tells moderator Megyn Kelly of Fox News he feels he is being mistreated. The following day, Trump tells CNN’s Don Lemon that Kelly was singling him out for attack, “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”

    September 11, 2015 – Trump announces he has purchased NBC’s half of the Miss Universe Organization, which organizes the annual Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants.

    December 7, 2015 – Trump’s campaign puts out a press release calling for a “complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”

    May 26, 2016 – Secures enough delegates to clinch the Republican Party nomination.

    July 16, 2016 – Introduces Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.

    July 19, 2016 – Becomes the Republican Party nominee for president.

    September 13, 2016 – During an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says his office is investigating Trump’s charitable foundation “to make sure it’s complying with the laws governing charities in New York.”

    October 1, 2016 – The New York Times reports Trump declared a $916 million loss in 1995 which could have allowed him to legally skip paying federal income taxes for years. The report is based on a financial document mailed to the newspaper by an anonymous source.

    October 7, 2016 – Unaired footage from 2005 surfaces of Trump talking about trying to have sex with a married woman and being able to grope women. In footage obtained by The Washington Post, Trump is heard off-camera discussing women in vulgar terms during the taping of a segment for “Access Hollywood.” In a taped response, Trump declares, “I said it, I was wrong and I apologize.”

    October 9, 2016 – During the second presidential debate, CNN’s Cooper asks Trump about his descriptions of groping and kissing women without their consent in the “Access Hollywood” footage. Trump denies that he has ever engaged in such behavior and declares the comments were “locker room talk.” After the debate, 11 women step forward to claim that they were sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by the real estate developer. Trump says the stories aren’t true.

    November 8, 2016 – Elected president of the United States. Trump will be the first president who has never held elected office, a top government post or a military rank.

    November 18, 2016 – Trump agrees to pay $25 million to settle three lawsuits against Trump University. About 6,000 former students are covered by the settlement.

    December 24, 2016 – Trump says he will dissolve the Donald J. Trump Foundation “to avoid even the appearance of any conflict with my role as President.” A spokeswoman for the New York Attorney General’s Office says that the foundation cannot legally close until investigators conclude their probe of the charity.

    January 10, 2017 – CNN reports that intelligence officials briefed Trump on a dossier that contains allegations about his campaign’s ties to Russia and unverified claims about his personal life. The author of the dossier is a former British spy who was hired by a research firm that had been funded by both political parties to conduct opposition research on Trump.

    January 20, 2017 – Takes the oath of office from Chief Justice John Roberts during an inauguration ceremony at the Capitol.

    January 23, 2017 – Trump signs an executive action withdrawing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation trade deal negotiated by the Obama administration and awaiting congressional approval.

    January 27, 2017 – Trump signs an executive order halting all refugee arrivals for 120 days and banning travel to the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. Additionally, refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely from entering the United States. The order is challenged in court.

    February 13, 2017 – Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigns amid accusations he lied about his communications with Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak. Flynn later pleads guilty to lying to the FBI.

    May 3, 2017 – FBI Director James Comey confirms that there is an ongoing investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during a hearing on Capitol Hill. Less than a week later, Trump fires Comey, citing a DOJ memo critical of the way he handled the investigation into Clinton’s emails.

    May 2017 – Shortly after Trump fires Comey, the FBI opens an investigation into whether Trump “had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests,” citing former law enforcement officials and others the paper said were familiar with the probe.

    May 17, 2017 – Former FBI Director Robert Mueller is appointed as special counsel to lead the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, including potential collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russian officials. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein makes the appointment because Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from investigations into Trump’s campaign.

    May 19, 2017 – Departs on his first foreign trip as president. The nine-day, five-country trip includes stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican, a NATO summit in Brussels and a G7 summit in Sicily.

    June 1, 2017 – Trump proclaims that the United States is withdrawing from the Paris climate accord but adds that he is open to renegotiating aspects of the environmental agreement, which was signed by 175 countries in 2016.

    July 7, 2017 – Meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in person for the first time, on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in Hamburg, Germany.

    August 8, 2017 – In response to nuclear threats from North Korea, Trump warns that Pyongyang will “face fire and fury like the world has never seen.” Soon after Trump’s comments, North Korea issues a statement saying it is “examining the operational plan” to strike areas around the US territory of Guam.

    August 15, 2017 – After a violent clash between neo-Nazi activists and counterprotesters leaves one dead in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump holds an impromptu press conference in the lobby of Trump Tower and declares that there were “fine people” on both sides.

    August 25, 2017 – Trump’s first pardon is granted to former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of criminal contempt for disregarding a court order in a racial-profiling case. Trump did not consult with lawyers at the Justice Department before announcing his decision.

    September 5, 2017 – The Trump administration announces that it is ending the DACA program, introduced by Obama to protect nearly 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. Trump calls on Congress to introduce legislation that will prevent DACA recipients from being deported. Multiple lawsuits are filed opposing the policy in federal courts and judges delay the end of the program, asking the government to submit filings justifying the cancellation of DACA.

    September 19, 2017 – In a speech at the United Nations General Assembly, Trump refers to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “Rocket Man” and warns that the United States will “totally destroy North Korea” if forced to defend itself or its allies.

    September 24, 2017 – The Trump administration unveils a third version of the travel ban, placing restrictions on travel by certain foreigners from Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen. (Chad is later removed after meeting security requirements.) One day before the revised ban is set to take effect, it is blocked nationwide by a federal judge in Hawaii. A judge in Maryland issues a similar ruling.

    December 4, 2017 – The Supreme Court rules that the revised travel ban can take effect pending appeals.

    December 6, 2017 – Trump recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and announces plans to relocate the US Embassy there.

    January 11, 2018 – During a White House meeting on immigration reform, Trump reportedly refers to Haiti and African nations as “shithole countries.”

    January 12, 2018 – The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump allegedly had an affair with a porn star named Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels. The newspaper states that Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, arranged a $130,000 payment for a nondisclosure agreement weeks before Election Day in 2016. Trump denies the affair occurred. In March, Clifford sues Trump seeking to be released from the NDA. In response, Trump and his legal team agree outside of court not to sue or otherwise enforce the NDA. The suit is dismissed. A California Superior Court judge orders Trump to pay $44,100 to Clifford, to reimburse her attorneys’ fees in the legal battle surrounding her nondisclosure agreement.

    March 13, 2018 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and will nominate CIA Director Mike Pompeo as Tillerson’s replacement.

    March 20, 2018 – A New York Supreme Court judge rules that a defamation lawsuit against Trump can move forward, ruling against a July 2017 motion to dismiss filed by Trump’s lawyers. The lawsuit, filed by Summer Zervos, a former “Apprentice” contestant, is related to sexual assault allegations. In November 2021, attorneys for Zervos announce she is dropping the lawsuit.

    March 23, 2018 – The White House announces that it is adopting a policy, first proposed by Trump via tweet in July 2017, banning most transgender individuals from serving in the military.

    April 9, 2018 – The FBI raids Cohen’s office, home and a hotel room where he’d been staying while his house was renovated. The raid is related to a federal investigation of possible fraud and campaign finance violations.

    April 13, 2018 – Trump authorizes joint military strikes in Syria with the UK and France after reports the government used chemical weapons on civilians in Douma.

    May 7, 2018 – The Trump administration announces a “zero tolerance” policy for illegal border crossings. Sessions says that individuals who violate immigration law will be criminally prosecuted and warns that parents could be separated from children.

    May 8, 2018 – Trump announces that the United States is withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal.

    May 31, 2018 – The Trump administration announces it is imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum imported from allies Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

    June 8-9, 2018 – Before leaving for the G7 summit in Quebec City, Trump tells reporters that Russia should be reinstated in the group. The annexation of Crimea in 2014 led to Russia’s suspension. After leaving the summit, Trump tweets that he will not endorse the traditional G7 communique issued at the end of the meeting. The President singles out Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for making “false statements” at a news conference.

    June 12, 2018 – Trump meets Kim in person for the first time during a summit in Singapore. They sign a four-point statement that broadly outlines the countries’ commitment to a peace process. The statement contains a pledge by North Korea to “work towards” complete denuclearization but the agreement does not detail how the international community will verify that Kim is ending his nuclear program.

    June 14, 2018 – The New York attorney general sues the Trump Foundation, alleging that the nonprofit run by Trump and his three eldest children violated state and federal charity law.

    June 26, 2018 – The Supreme Court upholds the Trump administration’s travel ban in a 5-4 ruling along party lines.

    July 16, 2018 – During a joint news conference with Putin in Helsinki, Trump declines to endorse the US government’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election, saying he doesn’t “see any reason why” Russia would be responsible. The next day, Trump clarifies his remark, “The sentence should have been, ‘I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be Russia.” He says he accepts the intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the election but adds, “It could be other people also.”

    August 21, 2018 – Cohen pleads guilty to eight federal charges, including two campaign finance violations. In court, he says that he orchestrated payments to silence women “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office.” On the same day, Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort is convicted on eight counts of federal financial crimes. On December 12, Cohen is sentenced to three years in prison.

    October 2, 2018 – The New York Times details numerous tax avoidance schemes allegedly carried out by Trump and his siblings. In a tweet, Trump dismisses the article as a “very old, boring and often told hit piece.”

    November 20, 2018 – Releases a statement backing Saudi Arabia in the wake of the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Virginia resident, killed in October at a Saudi consulate in Turkey. Khashoggi was a frequent critic of the Saudi regime. The Saudis initially denied any knowledge of his death, but then later said a group of rogue operators were responsible for his killing. US officials have speculated that such a mission, including the 15 men sent from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to murder him, could not have been carried out without the authorization of Saudi leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In the statement, Trump writes, “Our intelligence agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the Crown Prince had knowledge of this tragic event, maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!”

    December 18, 2018 – The Donald J. Trump Foundation agrees to dissolve according to a document filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. The agreement allows the New York attorney general’s office to review the recipients of the charity’s assets.

    December 22, 2018 – The longest partial government shutdown in US history begins after Trump demands lawmakers allocate $5.7 billion in funding for a border wall before agreeing to sign a federal funding package.

    January 16, 2019 – After nearly two years of Trump administration officials denying that anyone involved in his campaign colluded with the Russians to help his candidacy, Trump lawyer and former New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani, says “I never said there was no collusion between the campaign, or people in the campaign. I said the President of the United States.

    January 25, 2019 – The government shutdown ends when Trump signs a short-term spending measure, providing three weeks of stopgap funding while lawmakers work on a border security compromise. The bill does not include any wall funding.

    February 15, 2019 – Trump declares a national emergency to allocate funds to build a wall on the border with Mexico. During the announcement, the President says he expects the declaration to be challenged in court. The same day, Trump signs a border security measure negotiated by Congress, with $1.375 billion set aside for barriers, averting another government shutdown.

    February 18, 2019 – Attorneys general from 16 states file a lawsuit in federal court challenging Trump’s emergency declaration.

    March 22, 2019 – Mueller ends his investigation and delivers his report to Attorney General William Barr. A senior Justice Department official tells CNN that there will be no further indictments.

    March 24, 2019 – Barr releases a letter summarizing the principal conclusions from Mueller’s investigation. According to Barr’s four-page letter, the evidence was not sufficient to establish that members Trump’s campaign tacitly engaged in a criminal conspiracy with the Russian government to interfere with the election.

    April 18, 2019 – A redacted version of the Mueller report is released. The first part of the 448-page document details the evidence gathered by Mueller’s team on potential conspiracy crimes and explains their decisions not to charge individuals associated with the campaign. The second part of the report outlines ten episodes involving possible obstruction of justice by the President. According to the report, Mueller’s decision not to charge Trump was rooted in Justice Department guidelines prohibiting the indictment of a sitting president. Mueller writes that he would have cleared Trump if the evidence warranted exoneration.

    May 1, 2019 – The New York Times publishes a report that details how Giuliani, in his role as Trump’s personal attorney, is investigating allegations related to former Vice President Joe Biden, a potential Trump opponent in the 2020 presidential race. Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company called Burisma Holdings. In 2016, the elder Biden pressured Ukraine to oust a prosecutor who had investigated Burisma for corruption. Giuliani suggests that Biden’s move was motivated by a desire to protect his son from criminal charges. Giuliani’s claims are undermined after Bloomberg reports that the Burisma investigation was “dormant” when Biden pressed the prosecutor to resign.

    June 12, 2019 – Trump says he may be willing to accept information about political rivals from a foreign government during an interview on ABC News, declaring that he’s willing to listen and wouldn’t necessarily call the FBI.

    June 16, 2019 – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveils a sign at the proposed site of a Golan Heights settlement to be named Trump Heights.

    June 18, 2019 – Trump holds a rally in Orlando to publicize the formal launch of his reelection campaign.

    June 28, 2019 – During a breakfast meeting at the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman reportedly discuss tensions with Iran, trade and human rights.

    June 30, 2019 – Trump becomes the first sitting US president to enter North Korea. He takes 20 steps beyond the border and shakes hands with Kim.

    July 14, 2019 – Via Twitter, Trump tells Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Illhan Omar and Ayanna Pressley to “go back” to their home countries. Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley are natural-born US citizens; Omar was born in Somalia, immigrated to the United States and became a citizen.

    July 16, 2019 – The House votes, 240-187, to condemn the racist language Trump used in his tweets about Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar and Pressley.

    July 24, 2019 – Mueller testifies before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee.

    July 25, 2019 – Trump speaks on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump asks Zelensky for a “favor,” encouraging him to speak with Giuliani about investigating Biden. In the days before the call, Trump blocked nearly $400 million in military and security aid to Ukraine.

    August 12, 2019 – A whistleblower files a complaint pertaining to Trump’s conduct on the Zelensky call.

    September 11, 2019 – The Trump administration lifts its hold on military aid for Ukraine.

    September 24, 2019 – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the beginning of an impeachment inquiry related to the whistleblower complaint.

    September 25, 2019 – The White House releases notes from the July 25 call between Trump and Zelensky. The readout contains multiple references to Giuliani and Barr. In response, the Justice Department issues a statement that says Barr didn’t know about Trump’s conversation until weeks after the call. Further, the attorney general didn’t talk to the President about having Ukraine investigate the Bidens, according to the Justice Department. On the same day as the notes are released, Trump and Zelensky meet in person for the first time on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. During a joint press conference after the meeting, both men deny that Trump pressured Zelensky to investigate Biden in exchange for aid.

    September 26, 2019 – The House releases a declassified version of the whistleblower complaint. According to the complaint, officials at the White House tried to “lock down” records of Trump’s phone conversation with Zelensky. The complaint also alleges that Barr played a role in the campaign to convince Zelensky that Biden should be investigated. Trump describes the complaint as “fake news” and “a witch hunt” on Twitter.

    September 27, 2019 – Pompeo is subpoenaed by House committees over his failure to provide documents related to Ukraine. Kurt Volker, US special envoy to Ukraine, resigns. He was named in the whistleblower complaint as one of the State Department officials who helped Giuliani connect with sources in Ukraine.

    October 3, 2019 – Speaking to reporters outside the White House, Trump says both Ukraine and China should investigate alleged corruption involving Biden and his son. CNN reports that the President had brought up Biden and his family during a June phone call with Xi Jinping. In that call, Trump discussed the political prospects of Biden as well as Elizabeth Warren. He also told Xi that he would remain quiet on the matter of Hong Kong protests. Notes documenting the conversation were placed on a highly secured server where the transcript from the Ukraine call was also stored.

    October 6, 2019 – After Trump speaks on the phone with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the White House announces that US troops will move out of northern Syria to make way for a planned Turkish military operation. The move marks a major shift in American foreign policy and effectively gives Turkey the green light to attack US-backed Kurdish forces, a partner in the fight against ISIS.

    October 9, 2019 – Turkey launches a military offensive in northern Syria.

    October 31, 2019 – Trump says via Twitter that he is changing his legal residency from New York to Florida, explaining that he feels he is treated badly by political leaders from the city and state.

    November 7, 2019 – A judge orders Trump to pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit against his charity filed by the New York state attorney general. According to the suit, Trump breached his fiduciary duty by allowing his presidential campaign to direct the distribution of donations. In a statement, Trump accuses the attorney general of mischaracterizing the settlement for political purposes.

    November 13, 2019 – Public impeachment hearings begin and Trump meets Erdogan at the White House.

    November 20, 2019 – During a public hearing, US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland says he worked with Giuliani on matters related to Ukraine at the “express direction of the President of the United States” and he says “everyone was in the loop.” Sondland recounts several conversations between himself and Trump about Ukraine opening two investigations: one into Burisma and another into conspiracies about Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 US election.

    December 10, 2019 – House Democrats unveil two articles of impeachment, one for abuse of power and one for obstruction of Congress.

    December 11, 2019 – Trump signs an executive order to include discrimination against Jewish people as a violation of law in certain cases, with an eye toward fighting antisemitism on college campuses.

    December 13, 2019 – The House Judiciary Committee approves the two articles of impeachment in a party line vote.

    December 18, 2019 – The House of Representatives votes to impeach Trump, charging a president with high crimes and misdemeanors for just the third time in American history.

    January 3, 2020 – Speaking at Mar-a-Lago, Trump announces that a US airstrike in Iraq has killed Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Quds Force.

    January 8, 2020 – Iran fires a number of missiles at two Iraqi bases housing US troops in retaliation for the American strike that killed Soleimani. No US or Iraqi lives are reported lost, but the Pentagon later releases a statement confirming that 109 US service members had been diagnosed with mild traumatic brain injuries in the wake of the attack.

    January 24, 2020 – Makes history as the first President to attend the annual March for Life rally in Washington, DC, since it began nearly a half-century ago. Trump reiterates his support for tighter abortion restrictions.

    January 29, 2020 – Trump signs the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement into law, which replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement.

    January 31, 2020 – The Trump administration announces an expansion of the travel ban to include six new countries. Immigration restrictions will be imposed on: Nigeria, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan, Kyrgyzstan and Myanmar (known as Burma), with exceptions for immigrants who have helped the United States.

    February 5, 2020 – The Senate votes to acquit Trump on two articles of impeachment. Sen. Mitt Romney is the sole Republican to vote to convict on the charge of abuse of power, joining with all Senate Democrats in a 52-48 not guilty vote. On the obstruction of Congress charge, the vote falls along straight party lines, 53-47 for acquittal.

    May 29, 2020 – Trump announces that the United States will terminate its relationship with the World Health Organization.

    July 10, 2020 – Trump commutes the prison sentence of his longtime friend Roger Stone, who was convicted of crimes that included lying to Congress in part, prosecutors said, to protect the President. The announcement came just days before Stone was set to report to a federal prison in Georgia.

    October 2, 2020 – Trump announces that he has tested positive for coronavirus. Later in the day, Trump is transferred to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and returns to the White House on October 5.

    November 7, 2020 – Days after the presidential election on November 3, CNN projects Trump loses his bid for reelection to Biden.

    November 25, 2020 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has granted Michael Flynn a “full pardon,” wiping away the guilty plea of the intelligence official for lying to the FBI.

    December 23, 2020 – Announces 26 new pardons, including for Stone, Manafort and son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles.

    January 6, 2021 Following Trump’s rally and speech at the White House Ellipse, pro-Trump rioters storm the US Capitol as members of Congress meet to certify the Electoral College results of the 2020 presidential election. A total of five people die, including a Capitol Police officer the next day.

    January 7-8, 2021 Instagram and Facebook place a ban on Trump’s account from posting through the remainder of his presidency and perhaps “indefinitely.” Twitter permanently bans Trump from the platform, explaining that “after close review of recent Tweets…and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence.”

    January 13, 2021 – The House votes to impeach Trump for “incitement of insurrection.” He is the only president to be impeached twice.

    January 20, 2021 – Trump issues a total of 143 pardons and commutations that include his onetime political strategist, Steve Bannon, a former top fundraiser and two well-known rappers but not himself or his family. He then receives a military-style send-off from Joint Base Andrews on Inauguration morning, before heading home to Florida.

    February 13, 2021 – The US Senate acquits Trump in his second impeachment trial, voting that Trump is not guilty of inciting the deadly January 6 riots at the US Capitol. The vote is 43 not guilty to 57 guilty, short of the 67 guilty votes needed to convict.

    May 5, 2021 – Facebook’s Oversight Board upholds Trump’s suspension from using its platform. The decision also applies to Facebook-owned Instagram.

    June 4, 2021 Facebook announces Trump will be suspended from its platform until at least January 7th, 2023 – two years from when he was initially suspended.

    July 1, 2021 – New York prosecutors charge the Trump Organization and Trump Payroll Corporation with 10 felony counts and Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg with 15 felony counts in connection with an alleged tax scheme stretching back to 2005. Trump himself is not charged. On December 6, 2022, both companies are found guilty on all charges.

    February 14, 2022 – Accounting firm Mazars announces it will no longer act as Trump’s accountant, citing a conflict of interest. In a letter to the Trump Organization chief legal officer, the firm informs the Trump Organization to no longer rely on financial statements ending June 2011 through June 2020.

    May 3, 2022 – The Trump Organization and the Presidential Inaugural Committee agree to pay a total of $750,000 to settle with the Washington, DC, attorney general’s office over allegations they misspent money raised for former President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

    June 9-July 21, 2022 – The House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol holds eight hearings, where it hears from witnesses including top ex-Trump officials, election workers, those who took part in the attack and many others. Through live testimony, video depositions, and never-before-seen material, the committee attempts to paint the picture of the former president’s plan to stay in power and the role he played on January 6.

    August 8, 2022 – The FBI executes a search warrant at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of an investigation into the handling of presidential documents, including classified documents, that may have been brought there.

    August 12, 2022 – A federal judge unseals the search warrant and property receipt from the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. The unsealed documents indicate the FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search, including some materials marked as “top secret/SCI” – one of the highest levels of classification, and identify three federal crimes that the Justice Department is looking at as part of its investigation: violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records.

    September 21, 2022 – The New York state attorney general files a lawsuit against Trump, three of his adult children and the Trump Organization, alleging they were involved in an expansive fraud lasting over a decade that the former President used to enrich himself. According to the lawsuit, the Trump Organization deceived lenders, insurers and tax authorities by inflating the value of his properties using misleading appraisals.

    October 3, 2022 – Trump files a lawsuit against CNN for defamation, seeking $475 million in punitive damages.

    November 15, 2022 – Announces that he will seek the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.

    November 19, 2022 – Trump’s Twitter account, which was banned following the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, is reinstated after users respond to an online poll posted by Twitter CEO and new owner Elon Musk.

    December 19, 2022 – The Jan. 6 insurrection committee votes to refer Trump to the Department of Justice on at least four criminal charges. Four days later the panel releases its final report recommending Trump be barred from holding office again.

    February 9, 2023 – Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts are restored following a two-year ban in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, a Meta spokesperson confirms to CNN. On March 17, 2023, YouTube restores Trump’s channel.

    March 30, 2023 – A grand jury in New York votes to indict Trump, the first time in American history that a current or former president has faced criminal charges.

    April 4, 2023 – Surrenders and is placed under arrest before pleading not guilty to 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records in Manhattan criminal court. Prosecutors allege that Trump sought to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election through a hush money scheme with payments made to women who claimed they had extramarital affairs with Trump. He has denied the affairs. Hours after his arraignment, Trump rails against the Manhattan district attorney and the indictment during a speech at his Florida resort at Mar-a-Lago.

    May 9, 2023 – A Manhattan federal jury finds Trump sexually abused former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996 and awards her $5 million for battery and defamation.

    May 15, 2023 – A report by special counsel John Durham is released. In it he concludes that the FBI should never have launched a full investigation into connections between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia during the 2016 election. The report does not recommend any new charges against individuals or “wholesale changes” about how the FBI handles politically charged investigations, despite strongly criticizing the agency’s behavior.

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  • Takeaways from the indictment of Donald Trump in the classified documents case | CNN Politics

    Takeaways from the indictment of Donald Trump in the classified documents case | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Special counsel Jack Smith returned an historic indictment against former President Donald Trump that was unsealed Friday, the first time that a former president has been charged with crimes in federal court.

    Trump faces a total of 37 counts, including 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information. His aide, Walt Nauta, faces six counts, including several obstruction and concealment-related charges stemming from the alleged conduct.

    “We have one set of laws in this country, and they apply to everyone applying those laws, collecting facts, that’s what determines the outcome of an investigation,” Smith said in a short appearance in Washington, DC, on Friday. “Nothing more and nothing less.”

    The 49-page indictment included new details about how Trump allegedly took classified documents to Mar-a-Lago after leaving office in 2021 and resisted the government’s attempts to retrieve the classified materials. In his statement, Smith encouraged the public to read it “in full to understand the scope and the gravity of the crimes charged.”

    Here are the key takeaways from the indictment:

    Trump and Nauta face nearly a half-dozen charges relating to obstruction and concealment of documents in the Justice Department’s probe, which will help prosecutors make the argument that Trump’s alleged conduct went well beyond the classified document snafus involving President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence.

    The indictment lays out how Nauta allegedly moved the boxes out of the storage room where a Trump attorney was set to search for classified materials in a response to a May 2022 subpoena, and how the aide only moved some of those boxes back before the attorney’s search. Prosecutors, pointing to phone calls and other evidence, allege that Nauta moved these boxes at Trump’s direction.

    To bolster the narrative that Trump knew he was concealing materials that were being sought in a grand jury subpoena, the indictment points to a conversation Trump had with his attorneys about how to respond to the subpoena, in which Trump allegedly suggested that his team could not turn over the classified documents the subpoena demanded.

    “Wouldn’t it be better if we just told them we don’t have anything here?” Trump is alleged to have said.

    After his attorney collected 38 records that would be turned over to the DOJ, the attorney discussed with Trump storing them in his hotel room. Trump, during the back and forth, made a “plucking motion,” the indictment said, which the attorney memorialized as meaning: “why don’t you take them with you to your hotel room and if there’s anything really bad in there, like, you know, pluck it out.”

    Trump is accused of showing classified documents on two occasions to others.

    The episodes described in the indictment suggest Trump knew the information was classified and highly sensitive and may help prosecutors explain to a jury why Trump’s alleged willful retention of national defense information is such a serious crime.

    One of those occasions that Trump allegedly showed others classified records he took from the White House was a 2021 meeting in Bedminster, New Jersey, when Trump “showed and described a ‘plan of attack’ that Trump said was prepared by the Defense Department,” a meeting CNN first reported was captured on an audio recording.

    “Trump also said ‘as president I could have declassified it,’ and ‘Now I can’t, you know, but this is still a secret,’” according to the indictment.

    According to prosecutors, in August or September 2021 Trump also showed a document at Bedminster to a representative of his political action committee: a classified map related to a military operation and “told the representative that he should not be showing it to the representative and that the representative should not get too close.’”

    The indictment says Trump retained documents related to national defense that were classified at the highest levels and some so sensitive they required special handling.

    That includes one Top Secret document, dated June 2020, “concerning nuclear capabilities of a foreign county” found at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, according to the indictment.

    This document was not only classified as “Top Secret” but included additional restrictions of “ORCON” and “NOFORN.”

    Documents designated as ORCON cannot be disseminated outside of the department issuing it without approval. Those labeled NOFORN cannot be shared with foreign nationals.

    For the prosecution, the Justice Department has singled out 31 documents in particular for each of the 31 willful retention counts. Several of the records concern the military capabilities of various countries, with one of the records – marked as NOFORN – also including handwritten annotation in a black marker.

    The materials include White House intelligence briefings “related to various foreign countries.” One record relates to the “timeline and details of attack in a foreign country,” while another December 2019 document concerns “foreign country support of terrorist acts against the United States interests.”

    Nationally security law experts previously told CNN that when prosecutors are investigating a classified materials case, they look for so-called “Goldilocks documents” that are sensitive enough to drive home the seriousness of the crime but not so sensitive that they cannot be used in a trial.

    In addition to the timeline in the charging papers – sometimes broken down by the minute explaining how boxes with classified information moved around Trump’s Florida resort after Trump allegedly brought them there from the White House – the indictment includes six pictures that allowed prosecutors to vividly make their case that classified documents had been moved all over Mar-a-Lago.

    The photos show boxes in a ballroom, a basement storage room – even in a bathroom and shower inside the Mar-a-Lago club’s Lake Room, according to the indictment.

    In one photo, there are boxes of spilled documents on the floor. The indictment states that Nauta found the contents of several boxes spilled on the floor of the storage room in December 2021, including a “Five Eyes” classified document, which means intelligence only shared among five countries: the US, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

    Nauta allegedly texted two photos of the spill to another Trump employee, prosecutors allege. The indictment includes that photo – illustrating how the classified documents Trump kept were interspersed with newspapers and photographs.

    With the 31 documents the indictment describes as underlying the 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information, the indictment also lists when those documents were recovered by the government. Twenty-one were retrieved on August 8, 2022 – the date of the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago – and 10 were retrieved on June 3, 2022, when Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran turned over classified documents in response to the Justice Department’s May 2022 subpoena.

    The indictment does not, however, list in the charges that any of the classified documents were turned over in January 2022, when Trump handed over 15 boxes to the National Archives. The Archives found nearly 200 classified documents in those boxes, according to the indictment, including 30 marked “top secret.”

    It’s notable that the indictment does not include any documents retrieved in January 2022, given that Trump and his allies in Congress have attacked the Justice Department for not charging Biden or others who had unauthorized classified documents in their possession.

    The difference of course, is that Biden – as well as former Pence – immediately contacted the National Archives and offered to return the documents, while prosecutors allege that Trump obstructed efforts to retrieve the classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

    A separate special counsel investigation into Biden’s handling of documents remains ongoing, while the Justice Department told Pence’s attorney no charges would be brought over the discovery of classified documents in his Indiana home.

    Trump has been summoned to appear in court in southern Florida at 3 p.m. ET Tuesday, where he will appear before a magistrate judge to hear the charges against him and is expected to enter a not guilty plea.

    On Friday, Smith pledged that his office would “seek a speedy trial on this matter consistent with the public interest and the rights of the accused.”

    Just how quickly the case goes to trial is still an open question, as the discovery process for this case could be lengthy. It will be further complicated by the fact that this prosecution involves classified materials.

    The Justice Department believes it will take prosecutors 21 business days – about a month – in court to present their case to a jury at trial, according to a document prosecutors filed with the court alongside the indictment. The estimate does not include how long the defense might take to present its case, which includes the possibility that Trump could chose to testify in his own defense.

    The case has been assigned to federal District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump-appointed judge who raised eyebrows last year when she oversaw court proceedings related to the Trump’s efforts to appoint a so-called special master to review the documents seized in the FBI’s August search of Mar-a-Lago. Her move to order the third-party review of the search was overturned by a conservative federal appeals court.

    Trump already has a trial scheduled for March 2024 in his New York criminal case, and additional investigations into the former president – including from the Fulton County district attorney and the special counsel’s separate January 6 probe – are still looming.

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  • Trump lawyer says there’s ‘no need’ to appear before grand jury in special counsel’s 2020 election probe | CNN Politics

    Trump lawyer says there’s ‘no need’ to appear before grand jury in special counsel’s 2020 election probe | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    John Lauro, the recent addition to former President Donald Trump’s legal team, told Fox News on Friday there is no reason for the former president to appear before a federal grand jury investigating the 2020 election aftermath, adding that Trump “did absolutely nothing wrong.”

    Earlier this week, Trump said he received a letter from special counsel Jack Smith informing him that he’s a target of the investigation and inviting him to appear before the grand jury. CNN previously reported that Trump’s team believed they had until Thursday to respond.

    The grand jury did not convene on Friday after meeting on Thursday.

    “There’s no need to appear in front of any grand jury right now,” Lauro said. “President Trump did absolutely nothing wrong. He’s done nothing criminal.”

    “The bottom line is that the special prosecutor, which is really the Biden Justice Department, is after President Trump and that’s the focus,” Lauro told Fox News.

    Lauro also echoed claims made by Trump and his GOP allies that the Justice Department is being politicized to target a political opponent and said that Trump merely asked for an audit in the wake of the 2020 election.

    “The only thing that President Trump asked is a pause in the counting so those seven contested states could either re-audit or recertify,” Lauro said of Trump’s actions following his election loss. “I’ve never heard of anyone get indicted for asking for an audit.”

    The target letter cites three statutes that Trump could be charged with: pertaining to deprivation of rights; conspiracy to commit an offense against or defraud the United States; and tampering with a witness, according to multiple news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, that cited a person familiar with the matter.

    The Justice Department has been investigating possible violations of the law around conspiracy and obstruction of the congressional proceeding on January 6, 2021, which is part of the witness tampering law, CNN previously reported following a Justice Department search of a Trump administration adviser’s home.

    Trump has already been indicted twice this year. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg charged the former president on 34 counts of falsifying business records in March, and Smith charged Trump on 37 counts in the classified documents investigation last month. Trump pleaded not guilty in both cases.

    Justice Department regulations allow for prosecutors to notify subjects of an investigation that they have become a target. Often a notification that a person is a target is a strong sign an indictment could follow, but it is possible the recipient is not ultimately charged.

    Trump addressed the target letter on Tuesday at a Fox News town hall in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, saying that Smith’s probe amounts to “election interference” and calling it a “disgrace.” His campaign is already fundraising off of the target letter.

    Lauro told Fox News that if he appears in court on Trump’s behalf, he’ll be representing “the sovereign citizens of this country who deserve to hear the truth.” The attorney also said he would request that cameras be allowed in the courtroom in Washington, DC, following any indictment of the president there.

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  • Blinken speaks to Russian foreign minister about WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan | CNN Politics

    Blinken speaks to Russian foreign minister about WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke Sunday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and called for the “immediate release” of detained Americans Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, according to the US State Department.

    “Secretary Blinken conveyed the United States’ grave concern over Russia’s unacceptable detention of a U.S. citizen journalist,” a readout from the department said.

    “Secretary Blinken further urged the Kremlin to immediately release wrongfully detained U.S. citizen Paul Whelan,” the readout continued, adding that the secretary and Lavrov “also discussed the importance of creating an environment that permits diplomatic missions to carry out their work.”

    Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter based in Russia, was detained last week on charges of espionage – the first time an American journalist has been detained on such accusations by Moscow since the Cold War. US officials in Moscow had not yet been granted consular access to Gershkovich as of Sunday.

    The Journal’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, said Sunday that the call between Blinken and Lavrov was “hugely reassuring.”

    “We know that the US government is taking the case very seriously right up to the top,” she told CBS News.

    Whelan, meanwhile, is serving out a 16-year prison sentence for the same charges, which he strongly denies. His brother David Whelan said in an email to the press Thursday that his family was sorry to hear “that another American family will have to experience the same trauma that we have had to endure for the past 1,553 days.”

    Whelan has been designated as wrongfully detained by the US State Department, and Gershkovich is expected to receive the same designation but had not yet as of Sunday morning. Tucker said she hopes the US government will act swiftly to label Gershkovich as wrongfully detained, saying it will be anofficial recognition that the charges against the reporter are “entirely bogus.”

    The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Sunday’s phone call was initiated by the US and that Lavrov told Blinken that Gershkovich’s fate would be determined by a Russian court.

    Lavrov also blamed Washington and the Western press for politicizing the arrest.

    “It was emphasized that it is unacceptable for officials in Washington and Western media to hype up [the issue] with the clear intention of giving this case a political coloring,” the statement said.

    Gershkovich is currently being held in the notorious Lefortovo pre-detention center until May 29. He faces up to 20 years in prison on espionage charges.

    Sunday’s call was only the third time that Blinken has spoken with his Russian counterpart since the war in Ukraine began, and all of those conversations have discussed detained US citizens. The two spoke in person for the first time since the war broke out on the sidelines of the G20 foreign ministers meeting in India last month, and Blinken said he raised the issues of the war, Russia’s suspension of its participation in the New START nuclear agreement, and Whelan’s ongoing detention.

    The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee on Sunday expressed support for the Biden administration’s efforts to negotiate with Russia for Gershkovich’s release.

    “Certainly the Biden administration should continue its efforts to negotiate and to try to get the release of this journalist, but overall, people should be very cautious about staying in Russia,” Republican Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.”

    Turner noted that the US government “gave people notice that they should get out of Russia” and said he would continued to encourage people to do so. The Biden administration has echoed those assessments. While the Kremlin has asserted that Russia is safe for accredited journalists, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told CNN on Friday, “Russia is not safe for Americans.”

    Turner appeared on “State of the Union” on Sunday from southern Poland, where he said he is “meeting with those who are active in intelligence and meeting with our servicemembers who are active in the support of Ukraine.”

    Pressed by Bash on remarks by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley that the war in Ukraine will likely not be won this year, the Ohio lawmaker appeared to agree.

    “One thing I can tell you is that Russia is not going to win either,” he said. “This is a war that Russia is not winning, and they’re not winning it because Ukraine realizes that they’re standing up for democracy, they’re fighting for their country. And as they continue to do so, the United States’ assistance and certainly the assistance of our NATO allies and partners are making a huge turnout for the battlefield.”

    This story has been updated with additional reaction.

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  • The government wants to change how it collects race and ethnicity data. Here’s what you need to know | CNN Politics

    The government wants to change how it collects race and ethnicity data. Here’s what you need to know | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    If you’ve filled out a survey at any point in the last 25 years, chances are you were asked two questions about your race and ethnicity: Whether you are of Hispanic or Latino descent, and then separately, if your race is White, Black, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American or another race.

    A new proposal aims to change that, merging the two questions into one and adding a new category for people of Middle Eastern and North African descent. That would alter how the government – and by extension, the research community studying Americans’ demographics, opinions, voting habits and behaviors – measures and reports on the race and ethnicity of the American public.

    The proposal put forth by a working group of government statisticians and methodologists is at least partly an effort to reduce the share of Americans choosing a nebulous “some other race” category that is required to be included in the decennial census and the American Community Survey, two of the key government studies measuring American demographics.

    While some researchers say the proposed changes would improve the accuracy and depth of the data available on race and ethnicity, others – particularly those who advocate for the Afro-Latino community – fear the plan would make it harder to understand racially driven inequalities in the US.

    Decisions about what gets measured and how reach far beyond the numbers that appear on the Census Bureau’s website: Data gathered through these questions drives the way racial disparities in housing, health care and employment are understood and tracked, how congressional districts are drawn, and how the resources of some government programs are allocated and assessed. It can affect policymaking at the federal, state and local levels.

    “The simple fact is that if your community is not visible in the statistics, you are functionally invisible when it comes to political representation,” said Thomas Wolf, the deputy director of the democracy program at the liberal-leaning Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU law school.

    The public comment period on the changes closes on April 27 after being extended. Nearly 18,000 comments had already been submitted on the Federal Register notice page as of Sunday morning. Once the comment period ends, the standards will be in the hands of the nation’s chief statistician, Dr. Karin Orvis. Final decisions on the standards are expected by the summer of 2024.

    Here’s what to know about the proposals.

    The Office of Management and Budget sets standards for both the wording of questions and the types of data government agencies and surveys must collect when they are gathering information about Americans’ racial and ethnic identities.

    The existing standards, which have been in place since 1997, call for one question asking whether respondents have Hispanic or Latino background followed by a second question on racial identity, with options for American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and White.

    Because of a congressional law passed in 2005, the decennial census and the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey are also required to include a “some other race” category in the second question.

    Over time, the Census Bureau has seen a notable increase in the number of people choosing that option. In the 2020 census, “some other race” was the second-largest racial group with 49.9 million people opting for it. That trend has raised questions about whether the two separate questions accurately capture the racial makeup of the country.

    “The ‘some other race’ category is intended to be a residual category for people who do not identify with any of the minimum OMB categories,” Merarys Rios-Vargas, the chief of the ethnicity and ancestry branch of the Census Bureau’s population division, said during a webinar on the proposed changes hosted by the NALEO Education Fund last month. “But when the residual category is the second-largest response group, changes need to be made, and we have identified a solution with the combined question.”

    If implemented, the new standards would merge collection of race and ethnicity information into a single question, expand the categories used to measure race and ethnicity, and mandate the collection of more detailed information on race and ethnicity whenever possible.

    The proposed combined question measuring a respondent’s race or ethnicity includes seven broad categories: White, Hispanic or Latino, Black or African American, Asian, American Indian or Alaska Native, Middle Eastern or North African, and Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander. Respondents can choose multiple categories from that list. The congressionally mandated “some other race” category would also continue for the decennial census and ACS.

    Under the existing standard, respondents of Middle Eastern or North African, or MENA, descent were typically considered racially White. Census Bureau research conducted in 2015 suggested that without a distinct MENA category, roughly 12% of people who otherwise had been identified as MENA chose “some other race,” but that dipped to just 3% with the addition of a separate MENA category.

    The proposed changes would also require the collection of more detailed information on national or tribal origin within each of the major racial or ethnic categories. An example provided by the working group includes checkboxes for some common subgroups (such as Italian under White, Puerto Rican under Hispanic or Latino, Korean under Asian, etc.) as well as an open-ended box in which respondents could write in any additional detail they wanted to share.

    The proposed standards result from a review launched by the Office of the Chief Statistician of the United States last year, building on work conducted in the previous decade by the Census Bureau, the OMB and others. A working group of federal experts put together the proposed changes, and the OMB released the working group’s proposals for public comment in late January.

    Part of the challenge in formulating these questions is that race itself is more a social than a scientific matter. As the Census Bureau puts it, the categories “generally reflect a social definition of race recognized in this country and not an attempt to define race biologically, anthropologically, or genetically.”

    Because the questions used in government work set the standard for much other research, they can affect the way Americans classify their own racial and ethnic identity.

    “The way that we talk about race in this country has been very much shaped by the way we ask about it,” said Mark Hugo Lopez, the director of race and ethnicity research at the Pew Research Center.

    A Pew survey in January 2020 asking respondents to describe their race or ethnicity without offering categories found that about 8 in 10 gave responses that fit within the OMB’s race or ethnicity categories. When the same participants were separately asked about their race and ethnicity using questions from the 2020 census, nearly all respondents were consistent across the two formats, but the mismatch was significantly larger for those of Hispanic or Latino heritage.

    The government’s working group noted that a “large and increasing percentage of Hispanic or Latino respondents” to both the Census and the ACS are skipping the race question outright or choosing “some other race.”

    Recently released data from the 2020 census made public by the Census Bureau shows that 43.6% of the Hispanic population either skipped the race question or reported being “some other race” alone during the decennial count. The Census Bureau contends that its research shows this is because “a large proportion of the Hispanic population does not identify with any of the current Office of Management and Budget race categories.”

    Wolf, of the Brennan Center, noted the challenge that type of mismatch could present to the usefulness of the data.

    “If someone’s self-identification doesn’t map onto the categories that federal law recognizes, the data does not really help people activate and protect their civil rights,” he said.

    Researchers outside the government are largely dependent on the OMB standards to frame questions on race and ethnicity in a way that allows comparisons with the gold-standard government studies that track American demographics. Some of these researchers are concerned that respondents who do not see themselves represented in the data may be less inclined to participate in surveys. Insights Association, a professional organization for market researchers, conducted testing on how to ask about race and ethnicity in a way that respondents prefer and found that a single question with more detailed response categories received the most positive feedback.

    Cindy Neumann, the director of research for the Insights Association, said, “Where [respondents] feel that they’re included, we feel that they’re going to be a little bit more willing to participate in research, and engage a bit more.”

    A 2015 test by the Census Bureau found that a combined question on race and ethnicity decreased the share of respondents choosing “some other race” or skipping the question entirely. For Hispanic respondents, a significantly higher share identified as Hispanic alone under the combined format, suggesting they could be less likely to select one of the race categories also offered in a combined question than they would have using separate questions.

    Some are concerned that the proposed standards aren’t measuring the right information.

    Many of the public comments submitted in response to the proposals or shared during a series of town halls OMB hosted in March have focused on the language used in the Black or African American category. A movement has emerged to add a category to measure those who are descended from enslaved people in the United States separately from people of African or Caribbean descent. The comments submitted reflect disagreement about the specific language and structure that would best capture the community, but suggestions have included adding categories for American Descendants of Slavery, American Freedmen, or Foundational Black American, separating Black American from African American, and adding a separate question asking whether a person is a descendant of enslaved people. Each could measure a part of the population that some feel is unrecognized under the current standards.

    Among advocates for the Afro-Latino community, researchers worry that asking about Hispanic or Latino ethnicity within the same question as race could minimize the detail available about the racial makeup of the Latino community.

    “If I, for example, a Black Latina, want to mark my Latinoness but also say that I’m a Black woman, then I have to choose Latino as my race and Black as my race and then I’m counted as multi-racial,” said Danielle Clealand, an associate professor at the University of Texas who studies Afro-Latino identity. “What it does is turn many of us who identify as Black or White or Native American as multi-racial, and that is not how we self-identify.”

    Critics of the proposal say multiple questions are necessary to measure race, ethnicity and national origin, since a single question could muddy the measurement of those identifiers, even if responses related to each of those concepts are available for respondents to choose.

    “You don’t measure two concepts with one question, and so by putting Hispanic ethnicity and race into one question, you are risking a huge undercount not only of racially stigmatized groups but also of the overall Latino origin population,” said Nancy López, a sociology professor at the University of New Mexico who directs and co-founded the school’s Institute for the Study of “Race” and Social Justice.

    “It’s not going to help us know how you are treated, and if there’s an injustice that needs to be rectified,” she said.

    The components of race and ethnicity that can affect how a person experiences the world may not be evident in their answers, according to critics of the proposal. A person’s racial or ethnic self-identification may not match the way they are perceived and treated by others, or may not align with their national origin or ethnic heritage. If the questions ultimately used in the government standards aren’t clear about which aspects they measure, their utility could be diminished, the critics say.

    The stakes are extremely high. In making any changes to the way race and ethnicity are measured, the working group and the chief statistician will need to strike a balance between reflecting the ways Americans choose to identify themselves with fulfilling the need for data that allows the government to enforce its own laws.

    “Does this allow us to do the things that the census is intended to do – voting rights, civil rights, allocation of congressional districts,” said Lopez from Pew. “Race and ethnicity is central to the work of folks who are in those spaces.”

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  • Trump lawyers rail against DOJ in letter, reveal foreign leader briefings may be among classified documents taken from White House | CNN Politics

    Trump lawyers rail against DOJ in letter, reveal foreign leader briefings may be among classified documents taken from White House | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Two of Donald Trump’s defense lawyers now believe that classified briefings of phone calls with foreign leaders were among “all manner of documents” in 15 boxes that Trump returned to the National Archives a year after he left the presidency, according to a new letter his lawyers sent to Congress.

    This organization of the materials “indicates that the White House staff simply swept all documents from the President’s desk and other areas into boxes, where they have resided ever since,” the two lawyers, Timothy Parlatore and Jim Trusty, wrote to the GOP chair of the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday.

    Their characterization not only reveals new details about the documents but also comes as part of a broadside against the Justice Department’s investigation into Trump over the classified documents that lays out talking points for Republicans as they try to portray the ongoing probe as politically motivated.

    The lawyers urge Congress to tell the Justice Department to “stand down,” even as special counsel Jack Smith’s probe has shown signs of nearing its end and even though Congress doesn’t have the power to control DOJ criminal investigations.

    Parlatore and Trusty say they reviewed the 15 boxes earlier this year that are now part of the Justice Department’s investigation. They saw placeholder pages where classified documents were removed by the National Archives, according to the letter.

    “The vast majority of the placeholder inserts refer to briefings for phone calls with foreign leaders that were located near the schedule for those calls,” the lawyers wrote.

    The 15 boxes were turned over to the Archives in January 2022. The FBI seized more boxes in August 2022 during a court-authorized search that found more than 100 classified documents, including 18 at the highest “top secret” classification level. Trump’s own legal team later found more classified materials in a search other locations.

    The Justice Department has never said exactly what was in the classified material found in Trump’s possession after the presidency. Trump’s lawyers say in their letter that the Justice Department has refused to tell them whether any of the documents remain classified.

    It’s not clear why at this point in the special counsel’s investigation that the Trump legal team was given access to the boxes turned over to the National Archives to look through them.

    Wednesday’s letter was sent to House Intelligence Chairman Mike Turner, and it represents Trump’s legal team seeking a political lifeline by asking Congress tell the Justice Department to step aside because they believe the intelligence community should conduct the investigation into what happened with the classified documents.

    “DOJ should be ordered to stand down, and the intelligence community should instead conduct an appropriate investigation and provide a full report to this Committee, as well as your counterparts in the Senate,” the lawyers wrote to Turner.

    “This is indicative of the staff’s packing processes and not any criminal intent by President Trump,” the lawyers argued.

    The lawyers also pointed to classified documents since discovered at the residences and offices of President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence.

    “As demonstrated by the discovery of documents with classification markings in the homes of President Trump, President Biden, and Vice President Pence, deficient document handling and storage procedures are not limited to any individual, administration, or political party,” the lawyers wrote.

    The intelligence community said in August following the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago that it was conducting its own damage assessment of the classified documents that had been retrieved.

    Earlier this month, intelligence leaders in Congress were provided access to some of the classified documents that had been taken from the residences and offices of Trump, Biden and Pence so that Congress could do its own review.

    Trump’s legal team sent Wednesday’s letter to Turner and copied other intelligence leaders in Congress, including the Democratic-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee. Trump’s allies have for years assailed the various probes into the former president, yet even his former attorney general, William Barr, has said the classified documents investigation puts the former president in serious legal jeopardy.

    In a February interview with CNN, Parlatore signaled Trump’s legal strategy, saying that DOJ should be “benched” on matters related to classified material and it should be left up to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to conduct an administrative review of the White House’s procedure for handling such documents at the end of each presidency.

    In Wednesday’s letter, Trump’s lawyers criticized the Justice Department’s handling of the case before the search of Mar-a-Lago, arguing that federal investigators put Trump on the defensive by issuing a grand jury subpoena instead of working cooperatively with Trump.

    The letter also tried to defend a certification made by one of Trump’s attorneys last year following the subpoena. In June 2022, the lawyer, Christina Bobb, signed a certification that Trump had complied with the subpoena by turning over the classified documents in his possession.

    “Ultimately, President Trump’s legal team complied with DOJ’s demands, performing as diligent a search as they could by Mr. (Jay) Bratt’s arbitrary deadline, and submitted a certification that affirmed the same,” the lawyers wrote in Wednesday’s letter.

    “To be clear, the certification stated that a diligent search was conducted, and all responsive documents found were provided — not that the search turned up all possible materials, as many media outlets have falsely characterized the certification as saying,” they added.

    The certification that Bobb signed, however, states that “any and all responsive documents accompany this certification.” Trump did not, however, turn over all classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

    Bobb has since testified to the grand jury, and another attorney who worked on the draft response to the subpoena, Evan Corcoran, was recently forced to testify to the federal grand jury about the response and other discussions with Trump, after prosecutors believed Trump used his attorney to advance a crime.

    Wednesday’s letter also did not note that the FBI’s August 2022 search warrant came after federal investigators were told that Trump directed the movement of boxes from a basement storage room to his residence at Mar-a-Lago following receipt of the subpoena.

    This story has been updated to reflect additional lawmakers copied on the letter from Trump’s lawyers.

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  • How Meta got caught in tensions between the US and EU | CNN Business

    How Meta got caught in tensions between the US and EU | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Facebook-parent Meta has perhaps become the most high-profile casualty of a long-running privacy dispute between Europe and the United States — but it may not be the last.

    Meta has been fined a record-breaking €1.2 billion ($1.3 billion) by European Union regulators for violating EU privacy laws by transferring the personal data of Facebook users to servers in the United States. Meta said Monday it would appeal the ruling, including the fine.

    The historic fine against Meta — and a potentially game-changing legal order that could force Meta to stop transferring EU users’ data to the United States — isn’t just a one-off decision limited to this one company or its individual business practices. It reflects bigger, unresolved tensions between Europe and the United States over data privacy, government surveillance and regulation of internet platforms.

    Those underlying and fundamental disagreements, which have simmered for years, have now come to a head, casting a significant shadow over thousands of businesses that depend on processing EU data in the United States.

    Beyond its huge economic implications, however, the fine has once again highlighted Europe’s deep mistrust of US surveillance powers — right as the US government is trying to build its own case against foreign-linked apps such as TikTok over similar surveillance concerns.

    The origins of Meta’s fine this week trace back to a 2020 ruling by Europe’s top court.

    In that decision, the European Court of Justice struck down a complex transatlantic framework Meta and many other companies had been relying on until then to legally move EU user data to US servers in the ordinary course of running their businesses.

    That framework, known as Privacy Shield, was itself the outgrowth of European complaints that US authorities didn’t do enough to protect the privacy of EU citizens. At the time Privacy Shield was created, the world was still reeling from disclosures made by National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden. His disclosures highlighted the vast reach of US surveillance programs such as PRISM, which allowed the NSA to snoop on the electronic communications of foreign nationals as they used tech tools built by Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo, among others.

    PRISM relied on a basic fact of internet architecture: Much of the world’s online communications take place on US-based platforms that route their data through US servers, with few legal protections or recourse for either foreigners or Americans swept up in the tracking.

    A 2013 European Parliament report on the PRISM program captured the EU’s sense of alarm, noting the “very strong implications” for EU citizens.

    “PRISM seems to have allowed an unprecedented scale and depth in intelligence gathering,” the report said, “which goes beyond counter-terrorism and beyond espionage activities carried out by liberal regimes in the past. This may lead towards an illegal form of Total Information Awareness where data of millions of people are subject to collection and manipulation by the NSA.”

    Privacy Shield was a 2016 US-EU agreement designed to address those concerns by making US companies certifiably accountable for their handling of EU user data. For a time, it seemed as if Privacy Shield could be a lasting solution facilitating the growth of the internet and a globally connected society, one in which the free flow of data would not be impeded.

    But when the European Court of Justice invalidated that framework in 2020, it reiterated longstanding surveillance concerns and insisted that Privacy Shield still didn’t provide EU citizens’ personal information the same level of protection in the US that it enjoys in EU countries, a standard required under GDPR, the EU’s signature privacy law.

    The loss of Privacy Shield created enormous uncertainty for the more than 5,300 businesses that rely on the smooth transfer of data across borders. The US government has said transatlantic data flows support the more than $7 trillion dollars of economic activity that occurs every year between the United States and the European Union. And the US Chamber of Commerce has estimated that transatlantic data transfers account for about half of all data transfers in both the US and the EU.

    The Biden administration has moved to implement a successor to Privacy Shield that contains some changes to US surveillance practices, and if it is fully implemented in time, it could prevent Meta and other companies from having to suspend transatlantic data transfers or some of their European operations.

    But it’s unclear whether those changes will be enough to be accepted by the EU, or whether the new data privacy framework could avoid its own court challenge.

    The possibility that US-EU data transfers may be seriously disrupted is refocusing scrutiny on US surveillance law just as the US government has been sounding its own alarms about Chinese government surveillance.

    US officials have warned that China could seek to use data collected from TikTok or other foreign-linked companies to benefit the country’s intelligence or propaganda campaigns, using the personal information to identify spying targets or to manipulate public opinion through targeted disinformation.

    But US moral authority on the issue risks being eroded by the EU criticism, a problem for the US government that may only be compounded by its own missteps.

    Just last week, a federal court described how the FBI improperly accessed a vast intelligence database meant for surveilling foreign nationals in a bid to gather information on US Capitol rioters and those who protested the 2020 killing of George Floyd.

    The improper access, which was not “reasonably likely” to retrieve foreign intelligence information or evidence of a crime, according to a Justice Department assessment described in the court’s opinion, has only inflamed domestic critics of US surveillance law, and could give ammunition to EU critics.

    The intelligence database at issue was authorized under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — the same law used to justify the NSA’s PRISM program and which the EU has repeatedly cited as a danger to its citizens and a reason to suspect transatlantic data sharing.

    While the US distinguishes itself from China based on commitments to open and democratic governance, the EU’s concerns about the US are not much different in kind: They come from a place of deep mistrust of broad surveillance authority and suspicions about the potential misuse of user data.

    For years, civil liberties advocates have alleged that Section 702 enables warrantless spying on Americans on an enormous scale. Now, the FBI incident may only further validate EU fears; add to the existing concerns that led to Meta’s fine; contribute to the potential unraveling of the US-EU data relationship; and damage US credibility in its push to warn about the hypothetical risks of letting TikTok data flow to China.

    If a new transatlantic data agreement is delayed or falls apart, Meta won’t be the only company stuck with the bill. Thousands of other companies may get caught in the middle, and the United States will have to hope nobody looks too closely at why while still trying to make a case against TikTok.

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  • McCarthy floats potential impeachment inquiry into Garland over IRS whistleblower claims | CNN Politics

    McCarthy floats potential impeachment inquiry into Garland over IRS whistleblower claims | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Speaker Kevin McCarthy is floating the possibility that the House could open an impeachment inquiry into Attorney General Merrick Garland over Internal Revenue Service whistleblower allegations that Justice Department leadership improperly interfered in the Hunter Biden probe, which Garland has denied.

    “If it comes true what the IRS whistleblower is saying, we’re going to start impeachment inquiries on the attorney general,” McCarthy said Monday on Fox News.

    In congressional testimony publicly released on Thursday, two IRS whistleblowers alleged to lawmakers that the president’s son had been given preferential treatment by the Justice Department.

    McCarthy said on Fox News that the IRS agents who came forward “watched the abuse of power in how Hunter Biden was treated.”

    The allegation that the DOJ has been politicized against conservatives has been central to how House Republicans approach their congressional investigations, though there is scant evidence backing up most of their claims.

    Garland rejected those claim during a Friday news conference.

    “Some have chosen to attack the integrity of the Justice Department … by claiming that we do not treat like cases alike,” Garland said. “This constitutes an attack on an instutiton that is essential to American democracy … nothing could be further from the truth.”

    Regarding the Hunter Biden probe, the whistleblowers made several explosive allegations, including that the IRS had recommended far more serious charges for the president’s son and that US Attorney in Delaware David Weiss was blocked from bringing charges in other states.

    Garland said Friday that Weiss was “permitted to continue his investigation and to make a decision to prosecute any way in which he wanted to and in any district in which he wanted to.”

    “I don’t know how it would be possible for anybody to block him from bringing a prosecution, given that he has this authority,” Garland said.

    Hunter Biden will plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and struck a deal with federal prosecutors to resolve a felony gun charge, the Justice Department said Tuesday in court filings.

    As part of the plea agreement, the Justice Department has agreed to recommend a sentence of probation for the two counts of failing to pay taxes in a timely matter for the years 2017 and 2018, according to sources. Hunter Biden owed at least $100,000 in federal taxes for 2017, and at least $100,000 in 2018, but did not pay what was due to the IRS by the deadlines.

    A judge will have the final say on any sentence.

    Garland said Friday he would “support Mr. Weiss explaining or testifying” about the allegations raised by the whistleblowers “when he deems it appropriate.”

    McCarthy said on Fox News Monday, “We have requested by July 6, Weiss to come in and answer these questions because the IRS whistleblowers took copious notes.”

    The federal prosecutor overseeing the Hunter Biden investigation sent a letter to House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan in early June saying that he had “ultimate authority” over the probe.

    Weiss, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, makes clear in a letter obtained by CNN that he was granted this authority, cutting against Republican claims that Garland and the DOJ are “weaponized” against conservatives and politicizing the Hunter Biden case.

    “I want to make clear that, as the attorney general has stated, I have been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution, consistent with federal law, the Principles of Federal Prosecution, and Departmental regulations” Weiss wrote to Jordan on June 7.

    In response, Jordan has asked Weiss to explain and provide further information about the letter stating he had “ultimate authority” over the probe.

    Jordan asked in a letter to Weiss why he was the one to respond to Congress on June 7, when the initial letter from Jordan about alleged retaliation against the IRS whistleblowers was addressed to Garland. “Who instructed you to sign and send your June 7 letter to the committee?,” Jordan asked.

    Hunter Biden’s lawyer pushed back in a statement on Friday against the whistleblowers’ claims, saying it was “preposterous and deeply irresponsible” to suggest that federal investigators “cut my client any slack” during their “extensive” five-year probe.

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