House Democrat issues subpoenas for Trump tax returns
WASHINGTON — A top House Democrat on Friday issued subpoenas for six years of President Donald Trump’s tax returns, giving Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig a deadline of next Friday to deliver them.
Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., issued the subpoenas days after Mnuchin refused to comply with demands to turn over Trump’s returns. Mnuchin told the panel he wouldn’t provide Trump’s tax records because the panel’s request “lacks a legitimate legislative purpose,” as Supreme Court precedent requires.
Neal reminded the two Trump appointees in a Friday letter that federal law states that the IRS “shall furnish” the tax returns of any individual upon the request of the chairmen of Congress’ tax-writing committees and that Ways and Means “has never been denied” a request.
The White House and the Democratic-controlled House are waging a multi-front battle over investigations into Trump and the administration has been refusing to comply across the board, refusing to comply with subpoenas for the unredacted report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and documents related to the testimony by former White House Counsel Donald McGahn.
Venezuela’s Guaidó promises to persevere despite crackdown
CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó is looking to jumpstart his movement to oust Nicolas Maduro in the wake of last week’s failed military uprising, promising to persevere in the face of a deepening crackdown.
In an interview Friday with The Associated Press, Guaidó reiterated his willingness to consider inviting foreign troops to force Maduro from power, echoing the line from Washington that “all options” are on the table for dealing with Venezuela’s rapidly-escalating crisis.
He blamed the socialist leader for blocking all attempts to negotiate a solution and noted: “The biggest obstacle to that is Maduro.”
The 35-year-old national assembly president, who the U.S. and some 50 other countries recognize as Venezuela’s rightful leader, sat for the interview at his party’s headquarters two days after the No. 2 leader in congress was jailed and as several other lawmakers took refuge in foreign embassies. All are facing arrest for joining Guaidó and a small cadre of security forces in a military rebellion April 30 that was the closest the opposition has come in years to overthrowing Maduro.
Cuba launches widespread rationing in face of crisis
HAVANA — The Cuban government announced Friday that it is launching widespread rationing of chicken, eggs, rice, beans, soap and other basic products in the face of a grave economic crisis.
Commerce Minister Betsy Díaz Velázquez told the state-run Cuban News Agency that various forms of rationing would be employed in order to deal with shortages of staple foods. She blamed the hardening of the U.S. trade embargo by the Trump administration. Economists give equal or greater blame to a plunge in aid from Venezuela, where the collapse of the state-run oil company has led to a nearly two-thirds cut in shipments of subsidized fuel that Cuba used for power and to earn hard currency on the open market.
“We’re calling for calm,” Díaz said, adding that Cubans should feel reassured that at least cooking oil would be in ample supply. “It’s not a product that will be absent from the market in any way.”
Cuba imports roughly two thirds of its food at an annual cost of more than $2 billion and brief shortages of individual products have been common for years.
From wire sources
In recent months, a growing number of products have started to go missing for days or weeks at a time, and long lines have sprung up within minutes of the appearance of scarce products like chicken or flour. Many shoppers find themselves still standing in line when the products run out, a problem the government has been blaming on “hoarders.”
“The country’s going through a tough moment. This is the right response. Without this, there’ll be hoarders. I just got out of work and I was able to buy hot dogs,” said Lazara García, a 56-year-old tobacco-factory worker.
Schedules show West Virginia governor largely absent in job
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — He’s a billionaire who owns mines, farms and the swankiest resort in all of West Virginia. But how Jim Justice spends his time as the state’s 36th governor has largely been a mystery.
Since he took office a little more than two years ago, Justice has been dogged by criticism that he’s rarely at the Statehouse. He’s been called a part-time governor and criticized for missing key policy debates. Some lawmakers have suggested he can’t focus on governing because he’s busy tending to his expansive business empire, which has recently come under scrutiny from the federal government.
The Republican governor has pushed back hard on those claims amid calls to resign over his absenteeism and insisted he has “not stopped working ” since taking office.
Yet his schedule for the past seven months — recently released to The Associated Press in response to a request filed under West Virginia’s open records law — shows he almost never meets with his Cabinet, is rarely at the capital and was largely missing at one of the most critical points of this year’s legislative session. The schedules mostly show him at photo ops or simply unaccounted for.
“He seems like he doesn’t have his whole heart in it,” said Sen. Roman W. Prezioso Jr., the Democratic Senate minority leader. “He’s got too much on his plate. You either want to be governor or you want to run your business. You’re going to have to choose one or the other.”
___
House passes $19B disaster aid bill over Trump opposition
WASHINGTON — The House on Friday passed a $19 billion disaster aid bill that would deliver long-sought relief to farmers, victims of hurricanes and floods, and rebuild southern military bases, as Democrats try to dislodge the legislation from a Senate logjam over aid to hurricane-slammed Puerto Rico.
The measure passed by a 257-150 vote over the opposition of most Republicans, who said it should also include the Trump administration’s $4.5 billion request for stepped up humanitarian aid and law enforcement along the U.S.-Mexico border, which is facing a wave of migrants fleeing violence in Central America.
The House had passed an earlier $14 billion version of the measure in January, but the legislation has been held up in the Senate amid a fight between President Donald Trump and Democrats over aid to Puerto Rico. Trump is feuding with Democratic officials on the island and falsely claims that Puerto Rico has already received $91 billion in aid.
Trump took to Twitter on Thursday to urge Republicans to vote against the bill.
“House Republicans should not vote for the BAD DEMOCRAT Disaster Supplemental Bill which hurts our States, Farmers &Border Security,” Trump tweeted. “We want to do much better than this. All sides keep working and send a good BILL for immediate signing!”