Author: potus

WASHINGTON (AP) — Just after midnight, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski was pacing in a Senate hallway, alone and looking concerned.It had suddenly become clear to all her Republican colleagues that her vote would be their best chance of passing President Donald Trump’s sweeping bill of tax and spending cuts. Had she decided whether she would support the bill? “No,” Murkowski said, shaking her head and putting her hand up to signal that she didn’t want to answer any questions.Around 12 hours later, after she had convinced Senate leaders to change the bill to benefit her state and voted for the…

A customer tries on the Apple Vision Pro headset during the product launch at the Apple Store in New York City on February 2, 2024. Angela Weiss | AFP | Getty ImagesApple has accused a former engineer for its Vision Pro headset computer of stealing company trade secrets before starting a new job at Snap, according to a lawsuit filed in California last week.In the June 24 court filing, Apple accuses Di Liu, a senior design engineer, of downloading thousands of documents in his final days at the Cupertino company last year and saving them to his personal cloud accounts.This lawsuit…

(The Center Square) – The Trump administration on Tuesday announced new permitting reforms after years of the oil and gas industry calling on administrations and Congress to streamline a burdensome process. The Department of Energy published an interim final rule rescinding all National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations. It also published new NEPA guidance procedures that “replace outdated rules with clear deadlines, restore agency authority, and put us back on the path to energy dominance, job creation, and commonsense action,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said.The NEPA reforms restore the DOE’s role “originally envisioned by Congress – informing agency decision makers, not…

As American foreign policy hinges more and more on the gut instinct of one person—President Donald Trump, of course—it’s tempting to wonder how policymakers from a previous generation might think about the White House today. Would Henry Kissinger have preferred a smaller National Security Council, for example? But surely, a figure of his stature and media savviness would have clashed with the current occupant of the Oval Office? While there are several tomes on Kissinger, his contemporary and sometime rival, Zbigniew Brzezinski, has not been profiled as much. The journalist Edward Luce seeks to change that in his new biography,…

Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) passengers walk off a train at the Richmond station on March 15, 2023 in Richmond, California.Justin Sullivan | Getty ImagesCommuters in and around San Francisco rode into work for free on Tuesday morning due to an outage in the Clipper card system, which is used to handle payments for train, bus and ferry rides.”ATTENTION: The Clipper system is experiencing an outage on all operators this morning,” the Bay Area Clipper account wrote in a post on X. “Please be prepared to pay your fare with another form of payment if required by your transit agency.”Many…

(The Center Square) – After more than 26 hours of debate and a record number of vote-a-rama amendments, the U.S. Senate narrowly passed President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ Tuesday.The massive budget reconciliation bill hikes the debt ceiling by $5 trillion and implements President Donald Trump’s tax, energy, border security and defense agenda. But the cost and complexity of the bill required Vice President J.D. Vance to break the chamber tie with Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Thom Tillis, R-N.C., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, voting no.By permanently extending the bulk of the 2017 tax cuts – rather than extending them for…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans are getting closer to the finish line in getting their tax and spending cut bill through Congress with a final House vote possible on Wednesday. At some 887 pages, the legislation is a sprawling collection of tax breaks, spending cuts and other Republican priorities, including new money for national defense and deportations. President Donald Trump has admonished Republicans, who hold majority power in the House and Senate, to skip their holiday vacations and deliver the bill by the Fourth of July. Democrats are united against the legislation, but are powerless to stop the bill if Republicans…

(The Center Square) – Local leaders and Ford executives continue to support Michigan’s newest Ford plant, BlueOval Battery Park Michigan.The 1.8 million-square-foot facility is still expected to open next year and will create 1,700 permanent new jobs for the community.“The future of Marshall looks better today than it has in 40 years,” said Scott Wolfersberger, mayor of the City of Marshall. “Ford is truly a great American company, and we should all be proud that they selected Marshall as the place to invest for its long-term future.”Wolfersberger joined local business owners and business groups at a press conference recently to discuss…

(The Center Square) — The U.S. Senate rejected a bid by Maine’s Republican Sen. Susan Collins to hike taxes on the nation’s wealthiest to help bail out cash-strapped rural hospitals that are expected to take a hit from the Grand Old Party’s mega bill. On Tuesday, Collins led a group of 18 Republican senators, including former Senate Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, in support of her amendment to President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act to raise taxes on the ultra-wealthy income earners to help rural hospitals facing steep Medicaid cuts in the spending plan.Collins’ amendment had called for setting…

WASHINGTON (AP) — The sprawling Republican budget bill approved by the Senate Tuesday removes a proposed tax on solar and wind energy projects but quickly phases out tax credits for wind, solar and other renewable energy.The Senate approved the bill 51-50 as President Donald Trump and GOP lawmakers move to dismantle the 2022 climate law passed by Democrats under former President Joe Biden. Vice President JD Vance broke a tie after three Republican senators voted no.The bill now moves to the House for final legislative approval. The excise tax on solar and wind generation projects was added to the Senate…