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A key witness took the stand in the federal trial of Sean “Diddy” Combs Thursday, giving graphic detail of choreographed sexual encounters with the music mogul that were allegedly coercive, testimony that’s core to the prosecution’s case.The woman, who is speaking in court under the pseudonym Jane, began delivering testimony that is expected to last for days and which so far mirrors descriptions provided by another marquee witness against Combs, his ex-girlfriend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura.Combs, 55, faces upwards of life in prison if convicted of racketeering and sex trafficking crimes. Both Jane and Ventura are key witnesses to the latter charges.Jane took the stand after some courtroom drama: the judge threatened to remove Combs after he was “looking at jurors and nodding vigorously” while a different witness testified.Calling Combs’s behavior “absolutely unacceptable,” Judge Arun Subramanian said “it cannot happen again.”Communications between a defendant and a jury are strictly prohibited.The court had been hearing testimony from Bryana Bongolan, a friend of Ventura’s who had alleged that Combs dangled her from a 17th-story balcony before throwing her against furniture.Combs’s gestures to the jury took place as Bongolan was under tense questioning from his defense team, who sought to cast her as an unreliable witness who abused drugs.- ‘Hotel nights’ -Jane’s testimony was highly anticipated: she began by detailing how she had met Combs through a friend who was dating him at the time. But he came on strongly to Jane, she said, and when her friend got engaged to someone else, she began seeing Combs romantically.Their relationship began in earnest during a whirlwind five-day date at a Miami hotel, she said, describing Combs — as many others during the trial have — as “larger than life.””I was pretty head over heels for Sean,” she told jurors.Several heady months followed, including a romantic trip to Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas in February 2021.She said Combs first gave her illicit drugs on that trip. When the vacation ended, he wired her $10,000 because she had been unable to work — at the time she was creating content for brands on social media — and was a single mother.Jane silently collected herself and held her face in a tissue as she described how her blissful early days with Combs took a sharp turn in May 2021, when he began talking about his fantasies of seeing her with other men.She acquiesced because she wanted to make Combs happy, she said, and to her surprise he arranged for another man she dubbed Don to meet them at a hotel that very night.Jane thought the experience was a one-time thing — but she said instead it became “a door I was unable to shut.”The “hotel nights” became a regular feature of their relationship, Jane told jurors, even when she said she didn’t want it.”He was just dismissive,” she said, saying that approximately 90 percent of their relationship became a pattern of her having sex with other men under Combs’s direction.- Full-time job -Jane’s descriptions of the “hotel nights” — her provocative attire that Combs requested, red mood lighting, heavy drug use and copious baby oil — closely tracked with the testimony that Ventura gave on the stand of what she called “freak-offs.”Jane said that the amount of time she spent getting ready for hotel nights with Combs, which he demanded at a moment’s notice and sometimes flew her to, meant she did not work.Money from Combs and child support from her previous relationship were essentially her only income, she said. That testimony echoed Ventura’s, who had said her freak-offs with Combs came to feel like a full-time job. Combs put Jane up in a home in Los Angeles for $10,000 a month, she said, and when she spoke against hotel nights, he would bring up that point.”My feeling of obligation really started to stem from the fact that my partner was paying my rent,” she said.Jane told jurors their relationship continued up until Combs’s arrest in September 2024.Prosecutors say he ran a criminal enterprise of high-ranking employees and bodyguards who enforced his power with illicit acts including kidnapping, bribery and arson. Along with Ventura and Jane, witnesses have included former employees of Bad Boy Enterprises, Combs’s company.Jane’s testimony will continue Friday. The trial is epxected to last at least another month.

Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s unlikely bromance imploded in spectacular fashion Thursday as the US president and his billionaire former aide tore into each other in a very public, real-time divorce.Trump said in a televised Oval Office diatribe that he was “very disappointed” with criticisms from his top donor of a “big, beautiful” spending bill before Congress, before threatening to tear up the tycoon’s multi-billion-dollar US government contracts.The South African-born Musk hit back live, saying that the Republican would not have won the 2024 election without him and slamming Trump on his X social media platform for “ingratitude.”As the spat got increasingly bitter, Musk also posted that Trump “is in the Epstein files,” referring to US government documents on disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, who committed suicide in jail while awaiting trial for sex crimes.Shares in Musk’s Tesla electric vehicle manufacturer plummeted about 15 percent as the astonishing row escalated — wiping off more than $100 billion of the company’s value.Questions had long swirled about how long the extraordinary alliance could last between the world’s richest person and the most powerful.The world got the answer from Trump in a 10-minute rant after he was asked about Musk calling his tax and spending mega-bill a “disgusting abomination.””I’m very disappointed in Elon. I’ve helped Elon a lot,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, as visiting German Chancellor Friedrich Merz looked on.”Look, Elon and I had a great relationship. I don’t know if we will anymore.”His comments came less than a week since Trump held a grand Oval Office farewell for Musk as he wrapped up his time leading the cost-cutting Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).A wistful-sounding Trump took reporters through the break-up with Musk on live television Thursday, in what at times sounded more like a therapy session than a meeting with a foreign leader.The Republican suggested that Musk had “Trump derangement system,” missed working at the White House and had become “hostile” after his departure. – ‘Such ingratitude’ -Tesla and Space X boss Musk, who has criticized Trump’s bill on the grounds that it would raise the US deficit, hit back in a series of rapid-fire social media posts. He branded Trump’s claims “false” before doubling down on the sensitive issue of Trump’s election win. Musk was the biggest donor to Trump’s 2024 campaign, to the tune of $300 million.”Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate,” said Musk.”Such ingratitude.” Musk then posted a poll on whether he should form a new political party — a possible threat to Republican support, even if the foreign-born tycoon himself is barred from becoming president under the US Constitution.As the row moved to social media, Trump doubled down by threatening Musk’s massive government contracts, including for launching rockets and for the use of the Starlink satellite service.US media have put the value of the contracts at $18 billion.”Elon was ‘wearing thin,’ I asked him to leave,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform, adding that Musk had gone “crazy” about a plan to end electric vehicle subsidies in the spending bill.He then dropped the bombshell: “The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.”Trump’s decision to tap Musk to head DOGE was one of the most controversial of his second presidency. Musk’s young “tech bros” cut tens of thousands of government jobs and slashed US foreign aid.Trump and Musk’s whirlwind relationship initially blossomed, with the tech tycoon appearing in the Oval Office with his young son on his shoulders, flying with Trump aboard Air Force One and staying at the White House and Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.But the 53-year-old lasted just four months on the job, becoming increasingly disillusioned with Washington’s slow pace, while clashing with some of Trump’s cabinet members.The only winner from the public Trump-Musk spat? Germany’s Merz. Merz, who sat mutely while Trump bashed Musk, had prepared to avoid a repeat of the ambushes that Trump unleashed on the Ukrainian and South African presidents in the Oval Office. But in the end it was Musk who took the president’s fire.

Weeks after a military crisis, India and Pakistan have dispatched top lawmakers to press their cases in the United States, where President Donald Trump has shown eagerness for diplomacy between them.After crisscrossing the world, the delegations descended this week at the same time on Washington, which played a key mediatory role in a ceasefire after four days of fighting between the nuclear-armed adversaries in May.In strikingly similar strategies, the rival delegations are both led by veteran politicians who have been critical of their countries’ governments and are known for their ease in speaking to Western audiences.Pakistan has embraced an active role for the Trump administration while India, which has close relations with Washington, has been more circumspect and has long refused outside mediation on the flashpoint Himalayan territory of Kashmir.”Just like the United States and President Trump played a role in encouraging us to achieve this ceasefire, I believe they should play their part in encouraging both sides to engage in a comprehensive dialogue,” said Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the scion of a political dynasty whose Pakistan People’s Party says it belongs neither to the governing coalition nor opposition.”I don’t quite understand the Indian government’s hesitance,” he told AFP. “I’m the first to criticize the United States for so many reasons, but where they do the right thing, where they do the difficult task of actually achieving a ceasefire, they deserve appreciation.”India’s delegation is led by one of its most prominent opposition politicians, Shashi Tharoor, a former senior UN official and writer.He said he was putting the national interest first, despite disagreements domestically with Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi.Tharoor said he heard “total support and solidarity for India” during his meetings with US lawmakers and a “complete understanding of India’s right to defend itself against terrorism.”- ‘No equivalence’ -Gunmen on April 22 massacred 26 tourists on the Indian-administered part of Kashmir, most singled out as Hindus, in the deadliest attack on civilians in decades in the scenic region that has seen a long-running insurgency.India accused Pakistan of backing the assailants and launched strikes on Pakistani territory. More than 70 people were killed in missile, drone and artillery fire on both sides.”There can be no equivalence between a country sending terrorists and a country having its civilians killed — holiday-makers, tourists, men shot down in front of their wives and children after being asked their religion,” Tharoor told a news conference.He said he was “puzzled” by those who believe denials of responsibility by Pakistan, pointing to how US forces found Osama bin Laden in the country.Tharoor also noted that former Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari — Bilawal’s father — had advocated peace with India but was in power during the siege of Mumbai on November 26, 2008.”If they can’t control what they’re doing to us, why bother to talk to them?” said Tharoor, who pointed to the outsized role of the military in Pakistan.- ‘A new normal’ -Trump has repeatedly credited his administration with averting nuclear war and said the United States had negotiated an agreement to hold talks between the two sides at a neutral site, an assertion that met India’s silence.Pakistan had cool relations with Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden, whose aides bitterly resented Islamabad’s role in the Afghanistan war, but Pakistan has quickly worked to woo Trump including with the arrest of a suspect in a deadly 2021 attack that killed more than 170 people, including 13 US troops, during the withdrawal from Kabul.Bilawal — recalling how his mother, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, was killed in an attack — said Pakistan was ready to discuss terrorism with India but that Kashmir as a “root cause” also needed to be on the table.He said that India was establishing a dangerous new precedent in South Asia where whenever there is a terrorist attack in any country, “you go straight to war.””I think that the fate of 1.7 billion people and our two great nations should not left in the hands of these nameless, faceless, non-state actors and this new normal that India is trying to impose on the region,” he said.The two delegations have no plans to meet in Washington.

The US Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a $10 billion lawsuit by the Mexican government accusing American gun manufacturers of fueling drug cartel violence.In a unanimous 9-0 opinion, the top court said a federal law — the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) — shields the gunmakers from liability.”Mexico’s lead claim — that the manufacturers elect to sell guns to, among others, known rogue dealers — fails to clear that bar,” said Justice Elena Kagan, author of the opinion.”Mexico’s complaint does not plausibly allege that the defendant manufacturers aided and abetted gun dealers’ unlawful sales of firearms to Mexican traffickers.”Gunmaker Smith & Wesson and gun distributor Interstate Arms had sought dismissal of the Mexican government’s suit, which has been winding its way through US courts since 2021.Mexico, which is under pressure from President Donald Trump to curb drug trafficking, had accused the firearms makers of aiding and abetting illegal gun sales because they allegedly know that some of their products are being unlawfully sold to the drug cartels.A federal judge tossed out the case in 2022 saying Mexico’s claims failed to overcome the protections of the PLCAA, which was passed by Congress in 2005 and shields US gunmakers from liability for criminals misusing their products.An appeals court revived the case, citing an exception to the law, and Smith & Wesson and Interstate Arms sought relief from the Supreme Court.In a statement, Mexico’s foreign ministry said it “strongly disagrees” with the Supreme Court’s dismissal of the suit.The Mexican government “will continue to do everything in its power to curb illicit arms trafficking, exhausting all available legal and diplomatic remedies,” it said.The National Rifle Association gun rights group welcomed the ruling as a “huge legal win” while Smith & Wesson CEO Mark Smith celebrated what he called an end to “this ridiculous lawsuit against our company.”- ‘El Jefe’ -A majority of the justices on the conservative-dominated top US court had appeared to side with the firearms companies during more than 90 minutes of oral arguments in March.Mexico maintains that 70-90 percent of the weapons recovered at crime scenes have been trafficked from the United States.The southern US neighbor tightly controls firearms sales, making them practically impossible to obtain legally.Even so, drug-related violence has seen more than 480,000 people killed in Mexico since the government deployed the army to combat trafficking in 2006, according to official figures.Catherine Stetson, representing the Mexican government before the Supreme Court, said 600,000 US guns are illegally trafficked into Mexico every year and some companies are even “designing certain guns to target the Mexican market,” giving them Spanish names such as “El Jefe.”The case comes against a backdrop of US-Mexico trade tensions with Trump threatening tariffs on imports from Mexico, citing a lack of progress in stemming the flow of drugs such as fentanyl into the United States.Democratic Senator Dick Durbin said the Supreme Court decision does not address the “crisis” of gun trafficking from the United States to Mexico.”Lawless gun manufacturers, international criminals, and drug cartels are weaponizing our lax gun laws in America to facilitate violence, traffic drugs, and wreak havoc across the globe,” Durbin said in a statement.”Our fight for common sense gun safety reform continues,” he said, urging his fellow senators to back his “Stop Arming Cartels Act.”

Sean “Diddy” Combs’s legal team sought to cast doubt Thursday on a witness who claimed the hip-hop mogul dangled her off a balcony before throwing her onto furniture.Bryana Bongolan testified in the music icon’s ongoing federal criminal trial in New York that she was staying over with her friend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura — Combs’s ex and a key trial witness — when the alleged assault happened.Bongolan, a designer, said Combs repeatedly shouted with expletives that “you know what you did” — and she said she repeatedly told him she did not.Defense attorney Nicole Westmoreland probed inconsistencies between civil lawsuits, pre-trial interviews with the government and Bongolan’s testimony this week — a common tactic defense teams deploy when trying to portray witnesses as unreliable.Westmoreland even suggested Combs could have been on tour on the East Coast when Bongolan had said the balcony incident took place.”You came in here and you lied to the ladies and gentleman of the jury, isn’t that true?” Westmoreland asked.”I can”t agree with you,” Bongolan retorted.The prosecution asked Bongolan if she had an exact memory of when the event took place, to which she replied that she did not.But she said that “I have no doubt” when asked if she was certain Combs had dangled her off a balcony.Bongolan told prosecutors she did not go to the police out of fear: “I was just scared of Puff,” she told the court, using another nickname for Combs.The defense team for the musician, who faces racketeering and sex trafficking charges, has sought to cast Bongolan as a drug abuser.- ‘Seek justice’ -Bongolan is among dozens of people who have filed civil suits against Combs in recent years, legal action she told jurors Wednesday she took “because I wanted to seek justice for what happened to me on the balcony.”Bongolan, who remains friends with Ventura, said the incident left her with post-traumatic stress, including recurring nightmares and paranoia. “Sometimes I scream in my sleep,” she told jurors, testifying under an immunity order that protects her from prosecution for anything she discloses in her testimony.Ventura alleged that she suffered harrowing abuse under Combs, her former on-and-off partner of more than a decade, opening the floodgates against the one-time music powerhouse when she first filed suit against him in November 2023.That suit was settled out of court in less than 24 hours.Combs, 55, faces upwards of life in prison if convicted of crimes of sex trafficking and racketeering.On Tuesday, a hotel security guard said he received $100,000 in a brown paper bag from Combs in exchange for now-infamous surveillance footage that showed the artist-entrepreneur violently kicking and dragging Ventura in a hotel.The prosecution is next expected to call Jane, a woman who will speak under a pseudonym in relation to one of the sex trafficking charges against Combs.Combs, 55, faces upwards of life in prison if convicted of crimes of sex trafficking and racketeering. Prosecutors say he ran a criminal enterprise of high-ranking employees and bodyguards who enforced his power with illicit acts including kidnapping, bribery and arson. 

Jurors began deliberating their verdict in Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein’s rape and sexual assault retrial Thursday after hearing from three women who allege the cinema power broker preyed on them.A New York state appeals court had thrown out Weinstein’s 2020 convictions, citing irregularities in the presentation of witnesses at his original trial, which resulted in two victims of his alleged abuse testifying for a second time.Judge Curtis Farber issued instructions Thursday to jurors, one of whom had to be swapped out for an alternate after falling ill, before they retired to consider their verdict.He called on the panel to use their “common sense” for this “very important decision” and reminded them that Weinstein was “presumed innocent.”After six weeks of deliberations, the jury must decide whether Weinstein, accused by dozens of women of being a sexual predator, is guilty of sexual assaults in 2006 on former production assistant Miriam Haley and former model Kaja Sokola, and of rape in 2013 of aspiring actress Jessica Mann.”He raped three women, they all said no,” prosecutor Nicole Blumberg said Wednesday as she recounted the evidence of the three alleged victims of Weinstein who testified at the trial.- ‘All the power’ -The Hollywood figure had “all the power” and “all the control” over the alleged victims, which is why jurors should find him guilty, she said.”The defendant thought the rules did not apply to him, now it is the time to let him know that the rules apply to him.”There is no reasonable doubt; tell the defendant what he already knows — that he is guilty of the three crimes.”Weinstein’s defense attorney insisted the sexual encounters were consensual, pointing to a “casting couch” dynamic between the movie mogul and the women.”We don’t want to police the bedroom” except in cases of rape, Blumberg fired back.Weinstein, the producer of box office hits “Pulp Fiction” and “Shakespeare in Love,” has never acknowledged wrongdoing.The cinema magnate, whose downfall in 2017 sparked the global #MeToo movement, has been on trial again since April 15 in a scruffy Manhattan courtroom.He is serving a 16-year prison sentence after being convicted in California of raping and assaulting a European actress more than a decade ago.Two of the accusers in this case — Haley and Mann — testified at Weinstein’s original trial.Their accounts helped galvanize the #MeToo movement nearly a decade ago, but the case is being re-prosecuted at a new trial in New York.His 2020 convictions on charges relating to Haley and Mann, and his 23-year prison term, were overturned last year by the New York Court of Appeals.The tribunal ruled that the way witnesses were handled in the original trial was improper.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz came through his Oval Office encounter with Donald Trump relatively unscathed Thursday — despite differences over Ukraine as the US president said it might be better to let Moscow and Kyiv fight it out like children.A month into his job, Merz unleashed a charm offensive on the 78-year-old Trump, presenting him with a framed copy of the birth certificate of his grandfather Frederick, who was born in Germany in 1869.Merz also hailed Trump as being the “key person in the world” when it came to ending the Ukraine war, saying the US leader could “really do that now by putting pressure on Russia.”It was a backhanded way of urging Trump to overcome his aversion to putting sanctions on Russia over its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, as the more than three-year-old war grinds on.The polite meeting showed that the conservative German leader had done his homework as he sought to avoid ambushes like those that Trump unleashed on Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and South Africa’s president.But they did not see eye to eye on everything.- ‘Fighting in a park’ -Trump — who spoke to Russian leader Vladimir Putin a day earlier — said it might be better to let the two sides fight it out, comparing the war that has left thousands dead and swathes of Ukraine in ruins to a children’s brawl.”Sometimes you see two young children fighting like crazy. They hate each other, and they’re fighting in a park, and you try and pull them apart,” Trump told reporters.”Sometimes you’re better off letting them fight for a while.”Trump said however that he had urged Putin not to retaliate after Ukraine launched daring drone attacks on its airbases, destroying several nuclear capable bombers.”I said ‘don’t do it,'” Trump told reporters, adding that Putin had told him he had no choice but to respond and it was “not going to be pretty.”Trump did make a series of off-color references to the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II — still a deeply sensitive subject in modern-day Germany.Praising Merz for Germany raising its defense spending in line with his demands for NATO members to cough up, Trump said he was not sure World War II US general Douglas MacArthur would have agreed.Then, referring to the upcoming 80th anniversary of the allied D-Day landings that led to the end of the war, Trump said: “That was not a pleasant day for you?”Merz, 69, calmly replied: “This was the liberation of my country from Nazi dictatorship. We know what we owe you.” – Tariffs deal possible -Merz avoided other possible pitfalls as Trump spent much of his time on a lengthy discourse against his billionaire former advisor Elon Musk.Topics like US tariffs on the EU and the prospect of a trade deal barely came up, with Trump saying he believed a deal was possible.On Trump’s threat to hammer the European Union with sharply higher tariffs, Merz, leader of the bloc’s biggest economy, had earlier argued that it must be self-confident in its negotiations with Washington.Nor did Trump confront Merz over free speech issues in Germany as US media had reported he might — a bugbear the administration has repeatedly brought up with European leaders despite its own record.Merz told reporters in Washington ahead of the meeting that if Trump brought up German domestic politics “I will state my opinion very clearly if necessary.”Trump and some in his administration have given vocal support to the far-right and anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which came second in February elections.US Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and former Trump adviser Elon Musk have all weighed in in support of the AfD, which in Germany is shunned by all other political parties.Despite the tensions, Merz had said earlier that he was “looking forward” to his first face-to-face meeting with Trump.The German chancellor is believed to have studied videos of previous Oval Office ambushes and learned how to stay calm and let Trump talk.

US President Donald Trump said Thursday he was “very disappointed” by Elon Musk’s criticism of his policy mega-bill, adding he didn’t know if his friendship with his billionaire former advisor would survive.In an extraordinary rant in the Oval Office as visiting German Chancellor Friedrich Merz sat mutely beside him, Trump unloaded on SpaceX and Tesla boss Musk in his first comments on the issue.”Look, Elon and I had a great relationship. I don’t know if we will anymore. I was surprised,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office after former advisor Musk slammed the bill as an “abomination”.”I’m very disappointed, because Elon knew the inner workings of this bill better than almost anybody sitting here… All of a sudden, he had a problem,” Trump added.Musk hit back minutes later on his X social network, saying the 78-year-old president’s claims he had advance sight of the bill were “false.””Whatever,” he added above a video of Trump saying Musk was upset about the loss of subsidies for electric vehicles.The latest clash comes less than a week since Trump held a grand Oval Office farewell for Musk as he wrapped up his time leading the cost-cutting Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).Musk stunned reporters at the time by turning up with a black eye that he said was caused by his son.”You saw a man who was very happy when he stood behind the Oval desk, and even with the black eye. I said, you want a little makeup? We’ll get you a little makeup,” Trump said. “But he said, ‘No, I don’t think so,’ which is interesting and very nice. He wants to be who he is.” Trump said he could understand why Musk was upset with some steps he had taken, including withdrawing a nominee to lead the NASA space agency whom the tech tycoon had backed.The US president’s “big, beautiful bill” on tax and spending — the centerpiece of his domestic agenda — could define his second term and make or break Republican prospects in the 2026 midterm elections.Musk however called it a “disgusting abomination” on Tuesday. A day later, the magnate called for Republicans to “kill the bill,” and for an alternative plan that “doesn’t massively grow the deficit.”

In banning most travel to the United States by citizens of 12 countries, President Donald Trump is fine-tuning a playbook popular with his base, even as his singling out of particular nations left many scratching their heads.Trump rose to power vowing a harsh line on non-European immigration to the United States, thrilling crowds during his 2016 campaign by vowing a wall with Mexico and stunning the then political establishment by urging a “complete shutdown” of Muslims entering the country.On entering the White House the first time in 2017, he swiftly banned travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, prompting mass protests at airports as critics derided his “Muslim ban.”With his new travel restrictions, Trump is again targeting US adversaries. But he has also made more exemptions and included travel from several small African countries that not major sources of visitors — Chad, the Republic of the Congo and Equatorial Guinea.Chad maintains more cooperation with the West than military-run Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, which were not affected, and last year held elections, although their conduct was criticized.Several other small nations faced a partial ban including Burundi, Sierra Leone, Togo and, in Central Asia, Turkmenistan.The White House in said in a fact sheet that countries were put on the blacklist due to terrorism ties or because of high rates of their citizens overstaying visas. Others were targeted as they lack central governing authority. They include violence-ravaged and predominantly Black Haiti, whose migrants have long been maligned by Trump, who last year spread unfounded conspiracy theories that they were eating native-born Americans’ pets in Ohio.Alex Nowrasteh, vice president for economic and social policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said Trump’s motivation was to decrease legal immigration and asked: “The only real mystery is what took him so long?””It’s not totally crazy to think that they chose countries that don’t matter much — in terms of not sending many migrants here — and that throwing them on the list probably helps their marketing,” Nowrasteh said.”It’s not going to have an enormous effect on our economy or society,” he said of the new ban. “What I think it really does is undermine the American reputation of standing with people around the world who are fighting for freedom.”- ‘Extreme dangers’? -Trump justified the new measures by pointing to an attack on a Jewish protest in Boulder, Colorado by an Egyptian man who had been seeking asylum.Trump in a message said the attack showed the “extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted.”But Egypt — a longstanding US ally and aid recipient due largely to its relations with Israel — was not targeted.Other major nations left off the blacklist included Pakistan, which India has long accused of supporting extremists, triggering a four-day conflict last month after a massacre of tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir.Pakistan maintains intelligence cooperation with the United States and Trump thanked Islamabad in March for arresting a suspect over an attack that killed US troops during the 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan.On the other hand, Afghanistan was on the blacklist due to the Taliban government. An exemption was made for Afghans who helped the fallen Western-backed government, although Trump has cut funding to implement that program.”Let’s be clear: this policy is not a response to any new threat,” said Shawn VanDiver, head of the AfghanEvac group that supports Afghan allies.”It’s a long-planned political move, delayed until the aftermath of the Boulder attack to give it the appearance of urgency. This is about optics and fear, not safety,” he said.Among the chief targets both in the first term and now has been Iran, an arch-enemy of the United States since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Iranian-Americans have among the highest incomes of any ethnic group in the United States and the community is overwhelmingly critical of the government in Tehran.“National origin tells us nothing about whether an individual is a terrorist threat. Yet, that is precisely what Trump’s bans have been based on,” said Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council.

US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said Thursday that NATO allies were close to a deal on spending ahead of a summit later this month, in a bid to satisfy US President Donald Trump’s demand that it reach five percent of GDP.Trump is pressuring alliance members to announce a massive boost in the target for their military budgets at the June 24-25 summit in the Netherlands.”Countries in there are well exceeding two percent and we think very close, almost near consensus, on a five percent commitment for NATO in The Hague later this month,” Hegseth said after meeting his NATO counterparts in Brussels. NATO chief Mark Rutte has put forward a compromise agreement of 3.5 percent of GDP on core military spending by 2032, and 1.5 percent on broader security-related areas such as infrastructure.”This alliance, we believe, in a matter of weeks, will be committing to five percent — 3.5 percent in hard military and 1.5 percent in infrastructure and defence-related activities,” Hegseth said. “That combination constitutes a real commitment, and we think every country can step up.”The threat from Russia after more than three years of war in Ukraine and worries about US commitment to Europe’s security under Trump are driving up military budgets in Europe.Multiple diplomats say Rutte appears on track to secure the deal for the summit in The Hague, though a few allies are still hesitant about committing to such levels of spending.”I have total confidence we will get there,” Rutte said after the meeting. “Look at the Russian threat. The Chinese build-up. We live in a different world. We live in a more dangerous world.”Most vocal in its reluctance has been Spain, which is only set to reach NATO’s current target of two percent of GDP by the end of this year.But Defence Minister Margarita Robles said Madrid would not veto a deal, even if it did not agree with setting a “fixed percentage” figure. Diplomats say other countries are also haggling over making the timeline longer and dropping a demand for core defence spending to increase by 0.2 percentage points each year. The deal appears an acceptable compromise to most, which will allow Trump to claim that he has achieved his headline demand, while in reality setting the bar lower for struggling European allies.Currently only a handful of NATO countries most worried about Russia, such as Poland and the Baltics, are on target to spend five percent on defence. – ‘America can’t be everywhere’ -In a connected move, NATO ministers signed off at their meeting on new capability targets for the weaponry needed to deter Russia.German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius estimated the new requirements meant Berlin would need to add “around 50,000 to 60,000″ more soldiers to its army. His Dutch counterpart Ruben Brekelmans said reaching the level requested would cost the Netherlands at least 3.5 percent of GDP.”The new defence investment plan, of course, is rooted in what we need in terms of the hard capabilities,” Rutte said.Hegseth, a former TV presenter, rocked NATO on his last visit in February with a fiery warning that Washington could look to scale back its forces in Europe to focus on the threat from China.This time around Hegseth said he did not want to “get ahead” of any decisions from Trump as the United States conducts a review of its force deployments worldwide. “We’re going to make sure we shift properly to the Indo-Pacific and re-establish deterrence there, and then we’re going to increase burden-sharing across the world,” he said.”America can’t be everywhere all the time, nor should we be.”- Ukraine question -While US officials are focused on getting Trump a win on defence spending in The Hague, they have sidestepped talks on supporting Ukraine in its fight with Russia. Hegseth underscored the United States’ disengagement with Kyiv by skipping a meeting of Ukraine’s backers in Brussels on Wednesday, and is set to miss a second sit-down with Ukraine officials Thursday. Kyiv’s European allies are pressing to overcome US reluctance and invited Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky to the Hague summit as a sign of support. So far, NATO has said only that Ukraine will be represented at the gathering, without confirming that Zelensky will be in attendance.