The closed-door deposition in Chappaqua, New York, will mark the first time a former president has been forced to testify before Congress. It comes a day after Clinton’s wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, sat with lawmakers for her own statement.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump travels to Texas on Friday to talk about his energy and economic policies amid a red-hot Republican primary in the Senate. All three GOP candidates are expected to join him just days before the election.
Most Americans support an independent Palestinian state
About six in ten American adults support the creation of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. according to the new poll.
That is not significantly different from recent years, with at least half of American adults supporting an independent Palestinian state as of 2020.
But there has been an uptick among Democrats and independents in support for the two-state solution. About three-quarters of Democrats and roughly six in 10 independents say they support an independent Palestinian state.
According to separate Gallup polls, the opinions of the people who would be directly affected by a two-state solution are very different. Only about three in 10 Israelis living in Israel and Palestinians living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem say they support a two-state solution.
Democrats and independents create greater sympathy for the Palestinians
The changing American sentiment has been largely driven by Democrats, who are now much more likely to sympathize with the Palestinians than with the Israelis.
The Gallup polls show that about two-thirds of Democrats say their concerns lie more with the Palestinians, while only about two-in-ten sympathize more with the Israelis.
Democrats’ sympathy for the Palestinians increased as the war progressed, Gallup polls show, and independents’ views also changed.
This year, for the first time in Gallup’s trend, independents expressed more sympathy for Palestinians than for Israelis. About 4 in 10 independents are more sympathetic to the Palestinians, compared to about 3 in 10 for Israelis.
Anthropic’s CEO says it ‘cannot in good conscience accede’ to Pentagon demands for AI use
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said Thursday that the artificial intelligence company “cannot in good conscience join” the The Pentagon’s demands to allow unlimited use of its technology, deepening the public clash with the Trump administration, which is threatening to revoke its contract and take other drastic steps by Friday.
The creator of the AI chatbot Claude said in a statement that he is not walking away from the negotiations, but that the new contract language he received from the Defense Department has made “virtually no progress in preventing Claude’s use for mass surveillance of Americans or in fully autonomous weapons.”
Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s top spokesman, previously said on social media that the military “has no interest in using AI to conduct mass surveillance of Americans (which is illegal), nor do we want to use AI to develop autonomous weapons that operate without human intervention.”
Anthropic is the last of its peers – the Pentagon also has contracts with Google, OpenAI and Elon Musk’s xAI – not to supply its technology to a new internal US military network.
A nearly blind refugee is found dead after Border Patrol agents drop him off at the donut shop in Buffalo
Family friends of a nearly blind refugee from Myanmar who died after U.S. Border Patrol agents dropped him off at a donut shop in Buffalo are speaking out.
A nearly blind refugee from Myanmar who disappeared after U.S. Border Patrol agents dropped him off at a donut shop in Buffalo was found dead in the street five days later, prompting a police investigation and complaints from city officials that he had been abandoned without care for his safety.
Nurul Amin Shah Alam, 56, was apprehended by Border Patrol agents on February 19 after his release from a provincial jail, but was released the same day after federal authorities determined he was ineligible for deportation.
The officers took him to a Tim Hortons restaurant north of downtown Buffalo and dropped him off, authorities and attorneys said. His family, who had initially expected him to leave prison, were not told he had been released. Shah Alam’s attorney reported him missing to Buffalo police on February 22 after learning that an immigration detention center had failed to take him into custody.
Shah Alam was found dead on Tuesday evening. It was unclear when he died.
Khaleda Shah, a friend and spokesperson for the family, said the family wants justice.
The US and Iran conclude final nuclear talks without a deal as the risk of war looms
Iran and the United States held hours of indirect negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear program on Thursday but walked away without a deal, leaving the danger of a new war in the Middle East on the table as the US has amassed a massive fleet of nuclear weapons. aircraft and warships in the region.
Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, who mediated the talks in Geneva, said “significant progress had been made in the negotiations” without elaborating.
But just before the talks ended, Iranian state television reported that Tehran was determined to continue enriching uranium, rejected proposals to transfer it abroad and sought the lifting of international sanctions, signaling the country’s unwillingness to meet Trump’s demands.
Al-Busaidi said technical talks with lower-level representatives would continue next week in Vienna, home of the International Atomic Energy Agency. The United Nations nuclear watchdog would likely be crucial to any deal.
Americans’ sympathies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have changed dramatically, new polls show
According to him, American sympathies in the Middle East have shifted dramatically towards the Palestinians new Gallup pollafter decades of overwhelming support for the Israelis.
This shift was accelerated during the war in Gaza. Three years ago, 54% of Americans sympathized more with Israelis, compared to 31% of Palestinians.
Now their support is about evenly balanced: 41% say their sympathies lie more with the Palestinians, and only 36% say the same about Israelis.
The numbers reflect how support for Israel in the US has become highly controversial, with profound consequences for American politics and foreign policy. The changing sentiment has been largely driven by Democrats, who are now much more likely to sympathize with the Palestinians.
Gallup’s data shows that the shift occurred even before Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, and then increased during Israel’s subsequent military operations in Gaza. The polls have a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points, meaning sentiment toward Israelis and Palestinians is about equal.
A Columbia student detained by ICE is abruptly released after Mamdani meets with Trump
Students relax on the steps of the Low Memorial Library on the campus of Columbia University in New York City, Feb. 10, 2023. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File)
Federal immigration authorities arrested a Columbia University student early Thursday, sparking protests on campus and allegations that agents gained entry to the university’s residence hall by posing as police officers searching for a missing child.
However, just hours after student Ellie Aghayeva’s arrest, the federal government abruptly changed course, allowing her to walk free after an apparent intervention by President Donald Trump.
In one post on social media On Thursday afternoon, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he expressed his concerns about the arrest during an unrelated meeting with Trump, who then agreed to release her immediately.
“I am safe and okay,” Aghayeva wrote on Instagram minutes after Mamdani’s post, adding that she was “completely shocked” by the experience.
The dizzying series of events marked the latest consequence of the unlikely relationship between the Republican president and Mamdani, a democratic socialist who Trump once threatened to have been deported.
Trump heads to Texas, where three friends are competing in the Republican primaries in the Senate
So when he travels to the state on Friday, Trump will have all three candidates in the competitive race with him — just days before his party casts ballots in the primaries.
Trump’s hesitation to endorse the Texas Senate primary speaks to the tricky dynamics of the race.
Hillary Clinton Testifies She Has No Information About Epstein’s Crimes and Doesn’t Remember Meeting Him
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told members of Congress on Thursday that she had no knowledge of the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell, beginning two days of testimony that also allegedly implicates the former president Bill Clinton.
The statements in Chappaqua, the Clintons’ hometown, followed months of tense back and forth between the former powerful Democratic couple and the Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee as it investigates Epstein. It will be the first time a former president has been forced to testify before Congress.
Yet the demand for a reckoning over Epstein’s abuse of underage girls has become a virtually unstoppable force on Capitol Hill and beyond.
Trump, who has expressed regret that the Clintons are being forced to testify, bowed to pressure last year to release files on Epstein. Also the Clintons agreed to testify after their offer of affidavits was rejected by the Oversight panel and the chairman, Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., threatened criminal contempt of Congress’ charges against them.
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