AFP USA

Wildfires threatened to engulf parts of Hollywood on Thursday as a growing number of blazes raged across Los Angeles, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee their homes and claiming at least five lives.Over 100,000 people have been told to flee at least five separate blazes, including in the heart of historic Hollywood, just a few hundred meters (yards) from the storied theaters of Hollywood Boulevard.Fighters in helicopters dumped water on the Hollywood Hills blaze where an evacuation order was issued for a number of streets in the historic district.Sharon Ibarra, 29, told AFP she had rushed into Hollywood when she heard of the blaze to see if she could help her boss with her two babies.”I am super nervous, scared because of everything that has happened in the other places,” she said. The sudden eruption created gridlock on Hollywood’s streets, hampering efforts by people who live in the area — a mixture of ritzy homes and rent-controlled apartments — to leave.Fast-moving flames fanned by powerful winds have levelled 1,500 structures, many of them multi-million dollar homes in a rolling tragedy that the US media describe as the worst in the city’s history.Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone said his crews were struggling with the scale and speed of the unfolding disasters.”We’re doing the very best we can. But no, we don’t have enough fire personnel in LA County between all the departments to handle this,” he said.New fires appeared to be spotting as embers were thrown up to 2.5 miles (four kilometers) including one that razed a large property late Wednesday in the densely populated Studio City area.Adam Vangerpen of Los Angeles County Fire Department said crews were fighting to stop this new fire from spreading.”It’s a four-story home… we did just have the winds pick up again, so we are seeing some ember casting,” he said.”Our hope is to hit it hard and make sure that we’re trying to keep it out of the brush right now, because with the winds picking up there in the hills, that is a concern of ours.”Millions of Angelenos have watched in horror as a series of blazes have erupted around America’s second biggest city, sparking panic and fear.Winds with gusts up to 100 miles (160 kilometers) an hour spread the fire around the ritzy Pacific Palisades neighborhood with lightning speed.At least 16,000 acres (6,500 hectares) burned there, with 1,000 homes and businesses razed.A separate 10,600-acre (4,300-hectare) fire was burning around Altadena, north of the city, where flames tore through suburban streets.- Lost everything -Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said five people were known to have perished, with more deaths feared.Among those who died was 66-year-old Victor Shaw, whose sister told local broadcaster KTLA he had ignored pleas to leave as the fire swept through his Altendena area neighborhood because he wanted to stay and protect their home.”When I went back in and yelled out his name, he didn’t reply back,” Shari Shaw said.”I had to get out because the embers were so big and flying like a firestorm that I had to save myself.”Shaw’s body was found by a friend some time later on the driveway of his razed home, a garden hose in his hand.William Gonzales got out alive, but his Altadena home was gone.”We have lost practically everything; the flames have consumed all our dreams,” he told AFP.Ride-hailing companies Uber and Lyft are offering evacuating residents free rides to shelter locations.Pasadena fire chief Chad Augustin said up to 500 buildings had been lost to the flames in that area.He hailed the bravery of first responders. “Our death count today would be significantly higher without their heroic actions,” Augustin told reporters.US President Joe Biden cancelled a trip to Italy this week to focus on the federal response to the fires. “We’re doing anything and everything, and as long as it takes to contain these fires,” Biden earlier told reporters.His incoming successor Donald Trump blamed the California governor Gavin Newsom for the devastation, calling on him to resign. “This is all his fault,” Trump said on his Truth social platform. – Climate crisis -Having destroyed perhaps hundreds of multimillion-dollar homes, the Pacific Palisades fire looked set to be one of the costliest blazes on record.AccuWeather said it estimated up to $57 billion of losses.Wildfires are part of life in the US West and play a vital role in nature.But scientists say human-caused climate change is altering weather patterns.Southern California had two decades of drought that were followed by two exceptionally wet years, which sparked furious vegetative growth — leaving the region packed with fuel and primed to burn — and then has had no significant rain for eight months.

A top Waymo executive said Wednesday the United States could lead globally on autonomous driving, expressing hope that a national standard under the incoming Trump administration would boost safety.Tekedra Mawakana, co-chief executive of the Google-owned robotaxi venture, said the “race” around autonomous driving had “matured” compared with Donald Trump’s first presidential administration, alluding to a global competition in which the US company is competing with Chinese and German auto players.”This is a real opportunity for US leadership and so enabling safe sustainable transportation that is autonomous is very aligned with what I think this administration will want to do,” Mawakana said during a fireside chat interview at the Consumer Electronics Show. Tech experts expect the Trump administration to set a national standard on autonomous driving standards after Trump donor and Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk embraced the move.Musk, who is expected to play an influential role in the Trump White House, has expressed frustration with the gap between Texas and California when it comes to rules on autonomous vehicles.Musk plans to launch a robotaxi venture that would compete directly with Waymo. He is targeting the venture to begin by 2027.Mawakana declined to comment directly on whether she trusted Musk to treat competitors fairly in his dealings with Trump. But she welcomed competition, saying “making the road safer is an important mission, and it’s too big for one company.”Although autonomous driving is still a long way from mainstream use, Waymo made strides in 2024. The company operates commercially in three US cities and plans two more US city launches in 2025. It currently provides more than 150,000 trips weekly. Mawakana cautioned of the risk with a national standard of “a race to the bottom on safety,” but said Trump’s team had been “very forward-leaning” on autonomous driving.”As far as a national framework, that’ll be great. It’s just that that framework should require people to demonstrate their safety record,” she said.

A-list actors, musicians and other celebrities were among the tens of thousands of people affected by deadly wildfires in Los Angeles Wednesday, as the entertainment industry screeched to a halt.The showbiz capital has been besieged by multiple out-of-control blazes, with Hollywood events including a glitzy awards show and a Pamela Anderson film premiere among those cancelled as firefighters battle flames in hurricane-force winds.Hundreds of homes were destroyed in the swanky Pacific Palisades area, a favorite spot for celebrities where multimillion-dollar houses nestle on beautiful hillsides, while other infernos sprang up across the north of the city.Mandy Moore, the singer and “This Is Us” actress, told followers on Instagram she had fled with her children and pets from the path of a blaze that had left her Altadena neighborhood “leveled.” “My sweet home. I am devastated and gutted for those of us who’ve lost so much. I’m absolutely numb,” she wrote, in a caption to footage of the destruction.Emmy-winning actor James Woods posted a video on X showing flames engulfing trees and bushes near his Pacific Palisades home as he got ready to evacuate, and shortly afterwards said all the fire alarms were going off.”I couldn’t believe our lovely little home in the hills held on this long. It feels like losing a loved one,” Woods said.”Star Wars” star Mark Hamill told followers on Instagram that he had fled his Malibu home with his wife and pet dog, escaping down a road flanked by active fires.Fellow Emmy-winning actor Billy Crystal said the Pacific Palisades house he and his wife lived in for 46 years burned down on Wednesday.”Words cannot describe the enormity of the devastation we are witnessing and experiencing,” he said in a statement to People magazine. “Janice and I lived in our home since 1979. We raised our children and grandchildren here. Every inch of our house was filled with love,” he said.Oscar winner Jamie Lee Curtis was also forced to evacuate, later writing on Instagram: “Our beloved neighborhood is gone. Our home is safe. So many others have lost everything.”Meanwhile, next week’s unveiling of the Oscar nominations was pushed back until January 19, to give Academy members affected by fires more time to cast their ballots this week. – Premieres cancelled -Several other major Hollywood events have been called off or postponed due to the disaster.The annual Critics Choice Awards gala, which honors the year’s best in film and television and is attended by dozens of A-listers, was delayed from Sunday to January 26.Anderson’s premiere for “The Last Showgirl” was scrapped.Paramount cancelled a glitzy red-carpet screening of the Robbie Williams musical film “Better Man,” and Netflix pulled the plug on a press conference for its Golden Globe winner “Emilia Perez.”Filming of Los Angeles-based shows such as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Hacks” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live” was paused. And the Universal Studios theme park was closed for the day due to the extreme winds and fire conditions.- ‘Burn’ -Steve Guttenberg — star of 1984 comedy “Police Academy” — was among those helping get people out of Pacific Palisades as the fire began spreading on Tuesday.The “Cocoon” actor expressed frustration at how some of those fleeing the blaze had abandoned their cars on one of the only roads in and out of the ritzy neighborhood.”If you leave your car… leave the key in there so a guy like me can move your car so that these fire trucks can get up there,” he told a live television broadcast.Reality TV personalities Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt from “The Hills,” an MTV show that ran until 2010, said they lost their house after evacuating.”I’m watching our house burn down on the security cameras,” Pratt wrote on Snapchat.

Chinese companies have turned out in force again at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, with their prospects overshadowed by the threat of steeper tariffs from incoming US president Donald Trump.XPeng’s “flying car” and TCL’s AI-enhanced television were just a few of the products offered by Chinese companies that have won attention at CES, the annual Las Vegas tech confab.The potential for Trump’s trade policies to roil the global tech industry has loomed large over the event. Trump campaigned on a threat to impose 60 percent tariffs on Chinese goods, and has reinterated a hardline stance since winning the November election.  Analysts view the threat as at least partly a negotiating tactic, but note that Trump’s first term included a bruising trade war with Beijing, including tariffs that were maintained and enhanced during President Joe Biden’s tenure. Chinese companies expressed varying levels of concern about the threat.”We are worried about Trump’s government policy, but we think it might not last long,” said Mekia Yang of startup Jitlife, which makes its “smart” suitcases in Guangdong Province.”Trump might act tough at the beginning, and then he might change, because there will be some pressure from domestic markets,” due to rising prices, she said. Zhanbin Ao of Mammotion Technology Co., which sells autonomous lawnmowers, acknowledged unease about new levies but said the company is currently shifting production to Thailand, Vietnam and other Asian countries. “So once we move our manufacturing to other countries, a tariff is not an issue for us,” he said.Other Chinese companies brushed off the threat. Haojia Dengyang of Shenzhen Haoqitansuo Technology, predicted its products would attract US customers even with new tariffs “because they’re valuable, they can really help people.”Shenzhen Haoqitansuo sells smartphone cases, charging devices and other products under the Torras brand in the United States.- Retaliation? -At a November CES press preview held after the election, organizers took a diplomatic line on politics. Gary Shapiro, president of CES organizer the Consumer Technology Association, expressed hope Trump would pivot from the aggressive antitrust posture of the Biden administration that he likened to “death by a million cuts.”But Shapiro also railed against tariffs, saying they amounted to a tax on consumers.Trump’s threatened 60 percent levy on Chinese goods “would be devastating,” Shapiro said.China and other targeted markets “are going to hit back on us, so our exports will be affected as well,” he said. “This is not good for the country.””We need a future of strong trade ties with our friends and allies around the world. In today’s world, no country can go it alone…we must avoid unnecessary tariffs,” Shapiro later said at an industry dinner Wednesday.Like their Chinese counterparts, US companies at CES have steered away from political discussion at product launch events. But executives told AFP the issue is top of mind, even if they aren’t sure exactly what to expect.John Pfeifer, CEO of Oshkosh, said most of the industrial company’s goods sold in the United States are made within the country’s borders, but a fraction are imported. “If they do a 20 percent blanket tariff on anything coming into the US, that would have an impact on us,” he said, pointing to operations in Europe, Mexico and India.”We’d have to decide, okay, what to do — to either reshore this or reengineer so that we can get a different supply base to avoid that tariff.”Oshkosh might also resort to price hikes if tariffs lift prices of critical parts or materials imported to US plants, Pfeifer said.  Like Oshkosh, US agricultural giant John Deere manufactures the vast majority of its equipment sold in the United States within the country’s borders.”It’s a little early to tell what the tariff situation would be, but we’ve navigated through this in the past,” said Deanna Kovar, president, Worldwide Agriculture & Turf Division at Deere.She described the impact on Deere’s products as secondary to the concerns about retaliatory tariffs.”Our biggest concern is to make sure our customers have markets for their products — the corn, the soybeans, the pistachios and almonds that they grow and that there aren’t retaliatory tariffs,” she said.”The most important thing is our customers and that their businesses are viable in the long run,” she said.

Jimmy Carter was to be honored Thursday with a state funeral at Washington’s National Cathedral, amid a groundswell of tributes honoring the 39th US president and the last from the so-called Greatest Generation.The service caps a week of mourning that has seen Americans quietly filing past the flag-draped coffin in the US Capitol to pay their respects to Carter, who died on December 29 at the age of 100 in his home state of Georgia.President Joe Biden will deliver the eulogy for his fellow Democrat at the Episcopal church that has been a traditional venue for send-offs of US presidents, from Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan to George H.W. Bush.Biden revealed in an interview with USA Today published Wednesday that Carter had asked him to do the honors when the pair — longstanding friends — met for the last time four years ago.”Carter was a decent man. I think Carter looked at the world not from here but from here, where everybody else lives,” Biden said as he gestured from above his head towards his heart.Biden’s living predecessors — Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump — are expected to join around 3,000 mourners at the service, and Thursday has been designated a national day of mourning, with federal offices closed.Carter, who served a single term before a crushing election loss to Ronald Reagan in 1980, was perceived as naive and weak in the dog-eat-dog world of Washington politic.- ‘Decent and humble’ -A more nuanced image of him has emerged as the years passed, reassessing achievements like the brokering of a peace deal between Israel and Egypt.He also received high praise for his post-presidential humanitarian efforts, and a Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.The first president to reach triple digits, he had been in hospice care since February 2023 in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, where he died and will be buried next to his late wife, former first lady Rosalynn Carter.Mourners begun paying their respects on Saturday, as the carefully choreographed six-day farewell got underway with US flags flying at half-staff around the country.A black hearse bearing Carter’s remains paused at his boyhood family peanut farm in Plains, where a bell was rung 39 times and staff stood in silent tribute.Crowds gathered along the roadside to say their goodbyes, snap photographs or salute as the motorcade rolled slowly past.Carter’s flag-draped casket arrived at Washington’s snow-covered US Capitol on Tuesday atop a gun carriage.It was accompanied by hundreds of service members, with military pallbearers carrying Carter to the Rotunda to lie in state ahead of Thursday’s ceremony — the first presidential funeral since Bush Senior died in 2018.Chuck Schumer, the leader of the Democrats in the Senate, described Carter as “one of the most decent and humble public servants we have ever seen.” “President Carter was a living embodiment of leadership through service, compassion, and a thirst for justice for all,” he said.

Homes reduced to ashes, businesses in flames, and in the midst of the devastation, haggard residents: the California city of Altadena, ravaged Wednesday by a violent fire, looked like an area that has just been bombed. “This was our home,” William Gonzales told AFP, pointing to smouldering ruins where only embers and a chimney remain.”We have lost practically everything,” he sighed. “The flames have consumed all our dreams.” Swathes of the Los Angeles area have been ravaged since Tuesday by violent fires that have killed at least five people.More than 100,000 people have been told to flee their homes in the face of flames and violent winds that have gusted up to 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour.In Altadena, behind the mountains north of Los Angeles, firefighters have been overwhelmed by the scale of a blaze that has already destroyed around 500 buildings, including many homes.On Wednesday, the streets were filled with ash, with buildings everywhere in flames.AFP met a shopkeeper in his sixties who was crying in front of the ruins of his liquor store.”This was my whole life,” he sobbed.A dazed Jesus Hernandez said he did not know if his parents would be compensated for their $1.3 million house.”Hopefully the insurance can pay for most of it, if not, then we’re going to have to stay with friends or someone,” he said.- Water cut – Fires have sprouted all over the Los Angeles area in little more than 24 hours, with the latest breaking out in the Hollywood Hills, mere yards (meters) from storied Hollywood Boulevard.Vicious winds have flung embers up to 2.5 miles (4 kilometers), sparking new spot fires faster than firefighters can quell them.The Santa Ana winds that are currently blowing are a classic part of Californian autumns and winters. But this week, they have reached an intensity not seen since 2011, according to meteorologists. That has combined with tinder dry countryside to create the perfect fire storm — and a nightmare for firefighters who have also struggled with water supplies.In the Pacific Palisades fire, hydrants stopped working after massive storage tanks ran dry.David Stewart said he was not prepared to just surrender his neighborhood to the flames.”The county turned off our water supply so we’re out there with shovels throwing dirt on fires,” he told AFP.”We saved I think three neighbors’ houses so far but the fires are still moving towards our house.”He struggled to make sense of the area he has lived his whole life.”This was a just a little antique shop, a pizza place. These places have been here forever, ever since I’ve been alive.”A fretful Jesse Banks was trying to make contact with his son, who had fled the flames earlier in the day.”My son left the house before us on foot, he doesn’t have a cell phone or anything like that, so I’m searching for him now,” he said.”I’ve lived in this area for over 20 years and we’ve seen fires in the mountains and the hills and that, but never anything like this.” The fight is far from over. Wind speeds were expected to moderate, but a Red Flag warning — alerting residents to high fire risk — was set to remain in place until Friday evening.Amid the catastrophe, scientists’ warnings, which regularly remind us that humanity’s dependence on fossil fuels is increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme events, are being felt in the flesh. “It’s probably climate change affecting everything,” said shop owner Debbie Collins.”I’m sure it’s added to it, made this happen. The world’s just in a really bad place and we need to do more.” 

At least five people have been killed in wildfires rampaging around Los Angeles, officials said Wednesday, with firefighters overwhelmed by the speed and ferocity of multiple blazes — including in Hollywood.Up to 1,500 buildings have burned in fires that have broken out around America’s second biggest city, forcing over 100,000 people from their homes.Hurricane-force winds whipped up fireballs that leapt from house to house in the upmarket Pacific Palisades area, incinerating a swathe of California’s most desirable real estate favored by Hollywood celebrities.On Wednesday evening, a new fire erupted in the Hollywood Hills, just a few hundred meters (yards) from the storied Hollywood Boulevard, sparking an evacuation order for the world’s entertainment capital.Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone said his crews were overwhelmed by the scale and speed of the unfolding disasters.”We’re doing the very best we can. But no, we don’t have enough fire personnel in LA County between all the departments to handle this,” he said.The fire raging in Pacific Palisades had consumed around 16,000 acres (6,500 hectares) as of Wednesday afternoon, taking 1,000 homes and businesses with it.A separate 10,600-acre (4,300-hectare) fire was burning around Altadena, north of the city, where flames tore through suburban streets.Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said five people were known to have perished, with more deaths feared.”Remember, this is still a very fluid situation, there’s zero containment on this fire. I’m really praying we don’t find more, but I don’t think that’s going to be the case,” he said.William Gonzales got out alive, but his Altadena home was gone.”We have lost practically everything; the flames have consumed all our dreams,” he told AFP.- Hydrants run dry -Pasadena fire chief Chad Augustin said up to 500 buildings had been lost to the flames.He hailed the bravery of first responders. “Our death count today would be significantly higher without their heroic actions,” Augustin told reporters.Vicious gusts pushed the flames, whipping red-hot embers hundreds of yards (meters) and sparking new spot fires faster than firefighters could quell them.Late Wednesday, a fire began in Runyon Canyon in the heart of Hollywood, close to historic sites like the Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Walk of Fame and the El Capitan Theatre, as well as the AFP bureau.An evacuation order was put in place for a number of streets, all the way down to Hollywood Boulevard, as firefighters took to the skies to dump water on the blaze.”There is no time to delay,” Margaret Stewart of LAFD said.”We do not want people stuck. We want everyone safely exiting, get in your vehicles, grab your friend who doesn’t have a car, and head south.”The sudden eruption created gridlock on Hollywood’s streets, hampering efforts by people who live in the area — a mixture of ritzy homes and rent-controlled apartments — to leave.Los Angeles Department of Water and Power chief executive Janisse Quinones pleaded with people to save water after hydrants in Pacific Palisades ran dry.President-elect Donald Trump took to his social media platform on Wednesday to claim — wrongly — that the lack of water was the result of the state’s environmental policies.In fact, much of Los Angeles’ water comes from the Colorado River, and farming — rather than residential use or firefighting — takes the lion’s share of all water that flows into Southern California.US President Joe Biden cancelled a trip to Italy this week to instead focus on the federal response to the fires. “We’re doing anything and everything, and as long as it takes to contain these fires,” Biden earlier told reporters.- ‘Panic mode’ -Having razed perhaps hundreds of multimillion-dollar homes, the Pacific Palisades fire looked set to be one of the costliest blazes on record.AccuWeather said it estimated up to $57 billion of losses.More than 300,000 households were without electricity in the region, according to Poweroutage.us. Utilities in California frequently de-energize lines during high winds to minimize the risk of new fires.Wildfires are part of life in the US West and play a vital role in nature.But scientists say human-caused climate change is altering weather patterns.Southern California had two decades of drought that were followed by two exceptionally wet years, which sparked furious vegetative growth — leaving the region packed with fuel and primed to burn.Meteorologist Daniel Swain said the fierce winds — which have gusted up to 100 miles (160 kilometers) an hour — are stronger than the usual seasonal Santa Ana winds, but are not unexpected.”The winds are the driver, but the real catalyst… is this incredible antecedent dryness,” he said.”That’s something that we haven’t seen in records going back to the 1800s.”

One rum, two owners: the decades-long legal battle between the Cuban government and spirits giant Bacardi over the popular Havana Club rum brand has entered a new phase with the enactment of a new US trademark law.Entitled “No Stolen Trademarks Honored in America Act” and signed into law last month by outgoing US President Joe Biden, it prohibits US courts from recognizing trademarks that were “illegally confiscated” by the Cuban government since the 1959 Cuban Revolution.The law cements Bacardi’s rights to Havana Club and could prevent Cuba’s state-owned Cubaexport and its French partner, beverage giant Pernod Ricard, from asserting their rights to the brand in the United States.While Cuba currently cannot export its rum to the United States because of a decades-long trade embargo, the government in Havana and Pernod Ricard believe that maintaining trademark rights to the iconic drink is important in case restrictions are lifted.The law, which was championed by incoming Secretary of State and Cuba hardliner Marco Rubio, was swiftly criticized by the government of the Communist island, which said that it violates international norms.”Once again, the United States government provides space for the dark interests of the most aggressive anti-Cuban sectors whose manipulation of the American political system has become a practice,” the government said in a recent statement.Bacardi, which was exiled from Cuba after the country’s Communist revolution, says that the Cuban government unlawfully seized rum distilleries and the Havana Club brand from its founder Jose Arechabala SA in 1960. But the Cuban government has maintained its rights to the brand and has marketed Havana Club worldwide, with the exception of the United States because of the embargo Washington imposed in 1962. In 1976, Cuba managed to assert its rights to the brand in the United States, until Bacardi contested it in 1995 and started selling its own rum in the United States under the Havana Club brand.- Booming market -The legal fight is unlikely to subside because the rum industry is booming.According to a recent report by Dublin-based consultancy Research and Markets, the global rum market is expected to grow at an average rate of 7.7 percent per year over the next six years, jumping from $19.1 billion in 2024 to $32.2 billion by 2031. In 2016, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) renewed Cubaexport’s registration of the Havana Club brand for ten years, but the enactment of the law is likely to complicate its renewal in 2026.John Kavulich, director of the New York-based Cuba-US Trade and Economic Council described the law as “an immensely cost-effective” lobbying effort for Bacardi.”Most significantly was the complete lack of opposition — even from the most vocal members of the United States Congress who support commercial, economic, financial, and political re-engagement with Cuba,” Kavulich said to AFP.After the brief thaw in US-Cuban ties that began under Barack Obama (2009-2017) and the strengthening of sanctions during Republican Donald Trump’s first presidency (2017-2021), which largely remained unchanged under Democrat Biden, tensions with Havana could rise further under Trump’s second term.

Donald Trump returns to the White House in two weeks with everything seemingly going his way — from stronger grassroots support than ever to a cowed billionaire class and a demoralized opposition.Yet a chaotic and polarized Republican Party on Capitol Hill threatens to frustrate his ambitions for a legacy-defining second term unless he is able to master the political equivalent of herding cats.The Republican rank-and-file reveres Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) agenda of tax cuts, tough border controls and boosted fossil fuel production, but long-simmering disagreements on how to get it into law are starting to boil over.”Our members are ready to get to work and we have hit the ground running, as we promised everyone we would on the campaign trail,” an upbeat Mike Johnson, who leads the Republicans in the House of Representatives, told reporters this week.But Johnson’s troops have been locked in an increasingly heated debate with their Senate colleagues over whether to pass Trump’s entire agenda in one giant, all-or-nothing package or break it up into smaller chunks.Top MAGA policy aides have argued that a piecemeal approach would allow Trump to notch a straightforward early win on border security without having to get bogged down in more contentious fights.But House Republicans worry that, with their threadbare and fractious majority, they will only get one swing at this — and that renewing Trump’s fast-expiring 2017 tax cuts will fall by the wayside if it is peeled off from immigration reform.- ‘Big, beautiful bill’ -Trump muddied the waters in his inimitable style by flip-flopping on his own preference.”I like one big, beautiful bill and I always have, I always will,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday. “But if two is more certain, it does go a little bit quicker, because you can do the immigration stuff early.”The fight is just one of many potential speed bumps as Trump races against time to make his mark before the Republican iron grip on Washington is potentially weakened by midterm elections in just 22 months. The former real estate mogul, 78, is already behind the pace he set on winning his first term in 2016, when the Senate took important procedural steps towards passing his priorities before he set foot on Pennsylvania Avenue.Trump has previewed other upcoming battles — from reversing President Joe Biden’s offshore drilling restrictions to acquiring Greenland and the Panama Canal — that could drag the administration into court.But support from a Supreme Court bolstered by three of Trump’s own nominees seems more assured than an easy ride in Congress.Trumpist Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin acknowledged during a leadership challenge in the House last year that a disunited rank-and-file on Capitol Hill could be Trump’s biggest frustration.”The Republican Party, it’s like trying to herd cats. Everyone is going in different directions,” he told Fox News.Trump has already demonstrated that he is not above rolling up his sleeves and wading into the fray. – Charm offensive -He micro-managed Republicans through the recent House leadership election, upbraiding lawmakers by telephone in the middle of votes for ticking the wrong box, and strategizing in daily phone calls with key players.He has spent much of the post-election period on a charm offensive targeting high-profile business executives and key Republican interest groups at Mar-a-Lago, the oceanfront redoubt that he calls his “Winter White House” in Florida.Having won what critics see as tacit concessions from leading press barons and tech CEOs that he can expect less friction in 2025 than he got in 2017, Trump was due in Washington on Wednesday to build trust with Senate Republicans.A dinner is planned at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday with Republican governors — heavyweight, largely independent-minded politicians needed by Trump to execute his program at a state level — and various lawmakers are dropping by on Saturday.Trump also plans a giant bash for the entire Senate Republican group in the coming weeks, US media reported. On the Democratic side, leaders in Congress have pledged to work with Republicans to improve people’s lives — but also to hold Trump’s feet to the fire over campaign promises.”They are now in the majority. They now have the responsibility,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the floor of the chamber on Tuesday.”We and the American people will be watching.”

Tech giant Meta has rolled back restrictions around topics such as gender and sexual identity, a sweeping move advocacy groups fear will fuel hate speech.The change coincides with the company’s shock announcement on Tuesday that it was ending its third-party fact-checking program in the United States and adopting a crowd-sourced model to police misinformation similar to the Elon Musk-owned X.The latest version of Meta’s community guidelines said its platforms — which include Facebook and Instagram — would now permit users to accuse people of “mental illness or abnormality” based on their gender or sexual orientation.The updated version also struck out previous restrictions on referring to women as “household objects or property,” Black people as “farm equipment” and transgender or non-binary people as “it.””We’re getting rid of a number of restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender that are the subject of frequent political discourse and debate,” Joel Kaplan, Meta’s chief global affairs officer, wrote in a blog post.”It’s not right that things can be said on TV or the floor of Congress, but not on our platforms.”But advocacy groups quickly voiced concern that the policy shift threatened the safety of marginalized communities.”Removal of fact-checking programs and industry-standard hate speech policies make Meta’s platforms unsafe places,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, president of the advocacy group GLAAD.”Without these necessary hate speech and other policies, Meta is giving the green light for people to target LGBTQ people, women, immigrants, and other marginalized groups with violence, vitriol, and dehumanizing narratives.”Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, in a video announcing the changes, claimed the previous restrictions on immigration and gender were “just out of touch with mainstream discourse.””What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas, and it has gone too far,” Zuckerberg said.The move comes just weeks before Donald Trump returns to the White House with his Republican Party also back in control of Congress after fiercely attacking social media speech restrictions during the election campaign.Gender identity issues were also a key line of attack by Trump and Republicans against their Democratic opponents.After the move was announced on Tuesday, CyberWell, a nonprofit focused on combating online antisemitism, denounced the “systematic lowering of the bar” by Meta on policies against hate speech and harassment.”This change particularly undermines the safety of all marginalized communities,” CyberWell executive director Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor said in a statement.