week ending Nov 11

Fed's Powell: "Not confident" policy is tight enough, supply-side help may be finished (Reuters) - U.S. Federal Reserve officials "are not confident" that interest rates are yet high enough to finish the battle with inflation, and may be nearing the end of how much help they can expect in lowering price pressures from improvements in the supply of goods, services and labor, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said on Thursday. In comments more significant in flagging some of the Fed chair's emerging views about structural economic changes following the pandemic, Powell said the Fed "is committed to achieving a stance of monetary policy that is sufficiently restrictive to bring inflation down to 2% over time; We are not confident that we have achieved such a stance." Missed the event? "If it becomes appropriate to tighten policy further, we will not hesitate to do so," Powell said in remarks prepared for delivery to an International Monetary Fund research conference, while adding that further policy moves would be conducted "carefully...allowing us to address both the risk of being misled by a few good months of data, and the risk of overtightening. We are making decisions meeting by meeting." The fight to restore price stability "has a long way to go," the Fed chair said. While Powell's remarks about the immediate policy outlook did not go much beyond those given after the Fed's Oct. 31 - Nov. 1 meeting, when policymakers held the benchmark interest rate steady in the range of 5.25% to 5.5%, they did delve into the Fed chair's views about how the final phase of the inflation battle may unfold - with more "disinflation" possibly having to come from an economic slowdown. The progress on inflation to date has been relatively cost free in terms of lost jobs or rising unemployment, helped along by an easing of the supply chain problems that developed during the pandemic as well as an unexpected rise in the number of people available to take jobs. But "it is not clear how much more will be achieved by additional supply-side improvements," Powell said, a development that could mark the end of those relatively pain-free gains in lowering inflation. Going forward, "it may be that a greater share of the progress in reducing inflation will have to come from tight monetary policy restraining the growth of aggregate demand," Powell said. Over a longer term, he said, the Fed may also be less able than in the past to ignore supply shocks as a source of persistent price increases, with the pandemic experience showing that "it can be challenging to disentangle supply shocks from demand shocks in real time, and also to determine how long either will persist." Powell said that could mean policymakers in the future are more likely to react to supply-driven price increases than they might have otherwise, given the tendency to "look through" many supply problems as likely short-lived in a dynamic economy. "Supply shocks that have a persistent effect on potential output could call for restrictive policy to better align aggregate demand with the suppressed level of aggregate supply," he said. "The sequence of shocks to global supply chains experienced from 2020 to 2022 suppressed output for a considerable time and may have persistently altered global supply dynamics." On another key structural question, Powell said it was "too soon" to know if the low and falling interest rate world that characterized the decades before the pandemic were gone for good, but that would be a focus of the Fed's next framework review, to begin late next year.

Fed’s Harker calls for holding rates steady: 'The path we are on is the correct one' –Philadelphia Federal Reserve president Patrick Harker said Wednesday night he's in favor of continuing to hold rates steady, adding that strong readings on economic growth won't be enough to move him off this view. "This economy is proving to be resilient … but I believe that the path we are on is the correct one," Harker said in a speech in at Northwestern University. "I am not going to be swayed easily by a single month's worth of data. One month can just be an outlier and not a harbinger." Harker's comments come after the economy turned in a sizzling performance in the third quarter, growing at an annualized rate of nearly 5% driven by strong consumer spending. He expects GDP growth to cool in the coming quarters but isn't expecting a recession. Like many Fed officials, Harker reiterated the lags with which monetary policy can impact the economy. "Holding the rate steady will give those lags time to catch up," Harker said. "It will allow us to make more measured and educated policy rate decisions." The Fed held rates steady in a range of 5.25%-5.50% for the second policy meeting in a row last week.

Powell calls Fed policy 'restrictive,' cautions on being 'misled' by data -Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell said Thursday that monetary policy is in "restrictive territory" and putting downward pressure on inflation, cautioning that the Fed would not be misled by "a few months of good data."Still, he made it clear the central bank is keeping its options for more interest rate hikes on the table, with Powell reiterating in a speech at the International Monetary Fund in Washington that "if it becomes appropriate to tighten policy further, we will not hesitate to do so."The Fed chair also emphasized a "meeting by meeting" approach and cautioned on not overreacting to economic data, good or bad. The economy turned in a sizzling performance in the third quarter, growing at an annualized rate of nearly 5%. “We will continue to move carefully, however, allowing us to address both the risk of being misled by a few good months of data, and the risk of overtightening.” Central bank officials are wrestling with whether to take further action on rates after leaving them unchanged at their last two policy meetings. The Fed’s benchmark rate is in a range of 5.25%-5.50%, the highest in 22 years.Investors do not expect the Fed to vote for additional hikes, but the the majority of the rate-setting committee has penciled in one more rate hike this year, leaving the last meeting in mid-December a possibility.Officials will draw up fresh estimates for the path of interest rates then.Other Fed officials have offered varying responses this week to the question of whether rates should go higher, or not.Two hawks, Fed Governor Michelle Bowman and Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari, made it clear they think there is possibly more tightening to come. "I am not ready to say we are in a good place," Kashkari told The Wall Street Journal, saying he was in favor of over tightening rather than under tightening.Bowman said Thursday in a speech that she expects the central bank will need to increase rates further to bring inflation down in a timely way — even though she supported last week’s decision to hold rates steady to assess economic data.Some components of inflation focused on services minus volatile food and energy prices have picked up, she said during her speech at the New York Bankers Association’s Financial Services Forum in Palm Beach, Fla.She said she sees a risk that it remains "stubbornly persistent." She also says there’s a risk that higher energy prices could reverse some of the progress made on bringing down inflation so far.Richmond Fed President Tom Barkin said Thursday he also isn’t yet convinced that inflation is on a "smooth glide path down to 2%," noting that “shelter and services inflation remain higher than historical levels.” "Whether a slowdown that settles inflation requires more from us remains to be seen." That’s why he supported the decision to hold rates at the last meeting, Barkin added. With rates restrictive and financial conditions tightened, the Fed has time to make decisions on the data and monetary policy, he said.Some Fed officials, however, offered more of a dovish view about rates this week.Philadelphia Federal Reserve President Patrick Harker said Wednesday night he's in favor of continuing to hold rates steady, noting that strong readings on economic growth won't be enough to move him off this view.Harker underscored that cutting rates won't happen in the short term and that rates will have to remain higher for longer.Similarly, Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic on Thursday said he thinks policy is likely "sufficiently restrictive" at current levels, but that there will still be bumps along the way.

Fed repo facility sinks below $1 trillion as bills stand out | - The amount of money that investors are parking at a major Federal Reserve facility dropped below $1 trillion for the first time in more than two years. A total of 94 participants on Thursday put a combined $993 billion at the Fed's overnight reverse repurchase agreement facility, used by banks, government sponsored enterprises and money-market mutual funds to earn interest. It marks a steep decline from a record $2.554 trillion stashed on Dec. 30 and is the smallest sum since August 2021. "It's a big number," said Deutsche Bank strategist Steven Zeng, referring to the decline past $1 trillion. "I can see it falling further with dealers owning so much of the new bond." Primary dealers on Thursday took down about twice as much of the Treasury's $24 billion 30-year bond auction as normal. Dealers often finance those purchases in the repo market, and the additional collateral stands to push overnight rates higher — a move that could prompt investors to pull more cash out of the Fed's repo facility. Demand for the facility, however, has been fading this year as the Treasury ramped up fresh bill issuance, offering an alternative for short-term investors. Money-market funds have been scooping up the Treasury's deluge of bills since June, after President Joe Biden signed legislation suspending the debt ceiling until 2025. That buying has accelerated as traders bet that the Fed is near the end of its interest-rate hiking cycle, giving them room to allocate their record amount of assets into bills — without the fear that they'll miss out on further rate increases.

Highest-Ever Treasury Short Positioning by Hedge Funds into Last Week Was “Accident Waiting to Happen,” Massive Short-Covering Ensued, Pushed Down Yields. “Basis Trade” at it Again by Wolf Richter • The fireworks over the past few weeks in the US Treasury market involved, as you’d expect, hedge funds creating and then covering massive highly leveraged short positions.According to an aggregate of Commodity Futures Trading Commission figures going back to 2006, cited by Bloomberg this morning, hedge funds had taken on the most ever leveraged net short positions in Treasury futures trades by October 31.Amid these short positions, the 10-year Treasury yield rose to 5% by October 23, and the rising yields mean falling prices in the cash Treasury market, and the Treasury-short bets were working, but that moment of 5% glory was followed by the insta-plunge in yields the same day, followed by further drops in yields. Dropping yields means prices rallied. And yet during that week, hedge funds continued to pile into this leveraged short trade until October 31.And by October 31, the net short-positions in Treasury futures had reached the highest level ever, and this extreme positioning “was an accident waiting to happen,” Gareth Berry, strategist at Macquarie Group, told Bloomberg.Then on November 1, the Treasury department’s Quarterly Refunding announcement, designed to whack down longer-term yields, pulled the rug out entirely from that short trade. And those trades unraveled.“Price action in Treasuries for the past few months was a classic case of a persuasive story feeding the price action, until it went too far, leading to an overshoot which is now correcting,” Gareth Berry, told Bloomberg.These short trades also involved the “basis trade”: selling Treasury futures and buying bonds in the Treasury cash market and extracting a small profit from the difference between them, but multiplied by huge leverage.The basis trade has come under SEC scrutiny, which is supposed to regulate hedge funds; and by bank regulators who are worried because banks supply some of the funding to hedge funds for this trade, and they could get hit by the blowback. And the Fed is worried because hedge funds also borrow in the repo market, and leveraged bets blew out the repo market in 2019, when the Fed ended up stepping in to bail out those goofballs. And leveraged bets blowing up contributed to the crazy volatility in the Treasury market in March 2020 when the Fed then threw heaven and earth at it.In August 2023, Fed researchers found that hedge funds were back at it: They found that short futures positions in the 2-year, 5-year, and 10-year Treasury contracts rose by $411 billion in 10 months, to $715 billion, and that total leveraged Treasury shorts rose to $860 billion – but that was based on data as of May 9. And the trade has ballooned since then. No one really knows how large this trade it. And the Fed researchers pointed at this basis trade as a vulnerability for financial stability: “The cash-futures basis trade is an arbitrage trade that involves a short Treasury futures position, a long Treasury cash position, and borrowing in the repo market to finance the trade and provide leverage. This trade presents a financial stability vulnerability because the trade is generally highly leveraged and is exposed to both changes in futures margins and changes in repo spreads. Hedge funds unwinding the cash-futures basis trade likely contributed to the March 2020 Treasury market instability.” Today, Fed Governor Lisa Cook in a speech on financial stability, pointed at hedge funds and the basis trade: “For example, several indicators suggest that Treasury cash-futures basis trades—trades that involve the sale of a Treasury future and the purchase of a Treasury security deliverable into the futures contract—likely gained in popularity recently. Because the basis trade is often highly leveraged, a funding shock or heightened volatility in Treasury markets could force hedge funds to abruptly unwind their positions at potentially distressed prices.” “I will keep an eye on how these leveraged trades might interact with Treasury market liquidity.” The SEC has proposed new rules to reform the Treasury market to get a handle on these leveraged bets; among other things, those rules would treat hedge funds like the broker-dealer arms of banks. Meanwhile, back in the Treasury market, the massive short-covering that helped push down the 10-year yield last week seems to have run its course, and today the 10-year yield already jumped by 15 basis points from the low on Friday to 4.65% at the moment.

'This is a good one': Fed's Waller not fretting yield curve inversion - One of the most reliable indicators of a looming recession — when longer-dated Treasury bonds yield less than short-term bonds — might not be as foolproof as many believe, according to Federal Reserve Gov. Christopher Waller. Speaking at an event at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis on Tuesday, Waller cautioned against reading too much into the fact that two-year Treasuries are yielding higher than their 10-year counterparts, as they have been for more than a year. This phenomenon is known as a yield curve inversion as short-term bonds, which are usually seen as safer investments and therefore carry lower yields, become viewed as riskier and thus outpace longer-duration assets. During the past several decades, such conditions have consistently preceded a recession, so the trend has bolstered economic forecasts of a looming downturn. But Waller said the current yield environment is not necessarily a harbinger of slower growth. In fact, he argued, it could actually be a positive development. "I always try to tell people, there's good inversions and there are bad inversions," Waller said. "This is a good one." Waller — who said he was speaking as an academic rather than a policymaker — explained that 10-year Treasury yields could lag behind those of two-year notes because of the current inflationary environment. With sharply rising prices, he said, investors might want a premium for short-term commitments, but could feel comfortable about the longer-term outlook for price stability. "If you think inflation is going to come down in the future, you don't need all this compensation for inflation if you hold a 10-year [note], but inflation is high in the short-run, so you need that compensation in the short run," Waller said. "So the short rate is above the long, but it's good news, because what are the markets thinking? Inflation is coming down. The Fed is going to do their job. That's a good thing." Long-term Treasury values are used as a benchmark for many financial instruments, including mortgages and other loans. Last month, yields rose to their highest levels since the subprime mortgage crisis, a development that Fed Chair Jerome Powell said would contribute to higher borrowing costs and therefore could enhance the tightening of financial conditions brought on by higher interest rates.

The October Employment Report and Business Cycle Indicators at November’s Start -by Menzie Chinn -- October NFP employment came in at 150K (below consensus 180K), private NFP at 99K (vs 158K consensus). Here’s the picture of business cycle indicators followed by the NBER’s BCDC, along with S&PGMI’s (nee Macroeconomic Advisers) monthly GDP:Figure 1: Nonfarm Payroll employment incorporating preliminary benchmark (dark blue), civilian employment (orange), industrial production (red), personal income excluding transfers in Ch.2017$ (green), manufacturing and trade sales in Ch.2017$ (black), consumption in Ch.2017$ (light blue), and monthly GDP in Ch.2017$ (pink), GDP (blue bars), all log normalized to 2021M11=0. Source: BLS via FRED, BLS preliminary benchmark, Federal Reserve, BEA 2023Q2 third release incorporating comprehensive revisions, S&P Global/IHS Markit (nee Macroeconomic Advisers, IHS Markit) (10/2/2023 release), Atlanta Fed (11/1/2023 release), and author’s calculations.There is some thought that the civilian employment (CPS) series peaks before the CES nonfarm payroll employment series does. Over the last four recessions this has been true twice (using the data available at the time) [1]. So, the decline in the civilian employment might be taken as an indicator of recession, even if it does not predict economic actvity vere well.Note that while civilian employment as measured by the CPS fell slightly, the employment series adjusted to the NFP concept rose in October. Here are the alternative series:Figure 2: NFP employment incorporating preliminary benchmark calculated by author (bold blue), Philadelphia Fed early benchmark (red), household employment adjusted to conform to NFP concept (tan), and QCEW covered employment adjusted by Census X-13 by author (green), all in thousands, seasonally adjusted. Source: BLS via FRED, Philadelphia Fed, BLS, BLS-QCEW, and author’s calculations.That being said, two indicators not followed by the NBER are suggestive. First the real-time Sahm Indicator.Source: FRED, accessed 11/3/2023.The October reading is 0.33, where 0.50 is the threshold for a recession call.Rashad Ahmed calls my attention to heavy truck sales. As I pointed out in this post, heavy truck sales are a pretty good coincident indicator of recessions (certainly more so than VMT or gasoline supplied).Figure 3: Heavy truck sales, in millions, SAAR (black). NBER defined peak-to-trough recession dates shaded gray. Source: Census via FRED, NBER.Sales are down about 16% from the most recent peak in May. Year-on-year growth in sales is 0%. For now, the estimated probability for recession in October is 8%. By way of contrast, in the 2007 recession, the y/y change was about 30% when the recession started.So, maybe no recession in October (although all variables weill be revised), but these two (coincident) indicators are moving in that direction.

Johnson embraces deficit fight, setting up battle over Medicare, Social Security - Democrats and progressive advocacy groups are homing in on Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) past support for steep cuts to entitlements, as the new Speaker embraces a deficit commission that could spotlight the issue in the run-up to the 2024 election. President Biden called out congressional Republicans during his State of the Union address for wanting to cut the program. While budget experts say Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are unsustainable in their current form, most Republicans acknowledge the political risks of wanting to shrink benefits — but are also opposed to tax increases to bolster the programs. Johnson’s fervent support for trillions of dollars in cuts during his time as chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC) could be a blueprint for GOP budgets if the party wins control of the government. “The greatest threat to our national security is our nation’s debt,” Johnson said during his first speech in the House chamber after he was elected Speaker. “We know this is not going to be an easy task and tough decisions will have to be made, but the consequences if we don’t act now are unbearable.” Johnson promised to establish a bipartisan debt commission “immediately,” and indicated at a press conference this past week that he was close to naming members. The idea for a 16-member debt commission that would examine Social Security and Medicare solvency was initially floated by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as part of debt limit negotiations. Entitlements have long been a political third rail, but some in the GOP wanted to use the debt ceiling negotiations to extract promises to reduce entitlement spending. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid currently make up nearly half of the entire federal budget, with a total annual price tag of $2.7 trillion. The commission’s recommendations would receive priority consideration by Congress. But they would be scheduled for a final vote during the lame-duck session immediately after the 2024 election, putting maximum distance between representatives and voters. McCarthy’s proposal was slammed by the White House, though it was eventually included in a stopgap government funding bill introduced in September. The bill would have reduced discretionary spending for most domestic programs by nearly 30 percent. “On top of breaking their promise to the country about keeping the government open, the House GOP is now threatening to single-handedly shut the American government down unless they can jam a death panel for Medicare and Social Security down the country’s throat,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in a post at the time on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. But that bill failed to advance amid House GOP infighting, and the commission was not included in the legislation that ultimately passed both chambers to keep the government funded through mid-November. Still, Johnson is pushing ahead. “I believe we’re going to have very thoughtful people on both sides of the aisle in both chambers come together and have some very productive discussions about that,” Johnson told reporters. “When I said I want to do it immediately, I meant that, and it’s a top priority right now.” While Johnson said he doesn’t believe he should dictate objectives or benchmarks, Democrats and left-wing advocacy groups have said his record speaks for itself. “Mike Johnson was one of the chief architects of trying to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Mike Johnson also wants to end Social Security and Medicare as we know it,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said during a CNN interview after Johnson was elected. “The kind of commission Johnson announced is designed to give Congress political cover for cutting Americans’ earned benefits,” Max Richtman, president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, said in a statement Oct. 25 after Johnson was elected. “It is unfortunate and disappointing that one of the Speaker’s first priorities is creating a mechanism intended to slash programs that American workers pay for in every paycheck, fully expecting the benefits to be there when they need them,” Richtman said. Alex Lawson, executive director of Social Security Works, said he thinks President Biden learned important lessons from former President Obama trying to negotiate the debt limit with Republicans after they took control of the House in 2011 and forced a series of deep spending cuts. “The fiscal cliff, the supercommittee, sequestration, all of those things were a disaster for President Obama’s ability to push his agenda,” Lawson said. “And I think you’ve seen that President Biden learned those lessons really well and understands that this is just a political trap by the Republicans to try to get Democrats to take the blame for Republicans’ long-standing policy of cutting and or destroying Social Security.”

White House says money for Ukraine military aid is running out with Congress divided on whether to provide more - Ukraine military aid is quickly running out as House Speaker Mike Johnson and the Senate remain at odds over the Biden administration’s multi-billion dollar request for more funding. A $425 million security package announced on Friday pushed the US to the limit on the money available to Kiev.“We are beginning to provide Ukraine with smaller [Presidential Drawdown Authority] packages in order to stretch out our ability to support Ukraine for as long as possible,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday.Last month, President Joe Biden requested more than $100 billion for national security, including $61.4 billion for Ukraine and $14.3 billion for Israel, urging Congress to pass the supplemental bill as a “comprehensive, bipartisan agreement.”The administration’s request includes $61.4 billion in aid for Ukraine and $14.3 billion in aid for Israel, $9.15 billion in funding for humanitarian aid, $7.4 billion in funding for Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific region and $13.6 billion to address security at the US-Mexico border.But the newly elected GOP speaker has yet to outline his plan for Ukraine funding after decoupling the request from Israel aid, which the House passed Thursday.“Ukraine will come in short order, it will come next,” Johnson said at a press conference Thursday, linking it to a need for stricter border security policies which will be far harder to pass in the Democratic-led Senate. “If we’re going to take care of a border in Ukraine, we need to take care of America’s border as well.”The most recent package included $125 million from a presidential drawdown, which is equipment and weaponry pulled directly from Defense Department stocks and quickly shipped to Ukraine. But it is one of the smallest drawdown packages given to Ukraine since the start of the war more than 18 months ago, as the White House acknowledged it needed to stretch what little funding it had left.The package also included $300 million under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), which exhausted the funding for that authority. Under USAI, the government contracts with industry to provide equipment to Ukraine, intending it as a longer-term transfer of supplies to Kyiv.

Uncle Sam Doesn't Have One Thin Dime for Joe Biden's $106 Billion War Package - by David Stockman November 06, 2023 - When you are faced with an existential threat to your very national survival, you mobilize your economy for all-out struggle and impose heavy-duty “War Taxes” to pay for a dramatic build-up of military capabilities. For instance, between 1939 and 1945 Federal government receipts rose nearly seven-fold – from $6 billion to $42 billion per year, owing to across-the-board tax increases that took the average income tax rate from 4% to 24% and the top rate to upwards of 90%. Relative to the national economy, Federal receipts (red bars) rose from 6% of GDP to a peak of nearly 20% in 1945. On top of that came a huge amount of war bonds and borrowing. Accordingly, outlays from taxes and borrowing (blue bars), mostly for military mobilization, rose from less than 10% of GDP in 1940 to a war-time peak of 40% in 1944-1945. Call that America’s national mobilization triggered by Pearl Harbor. It’s what a self-respecting democracy does when its very existence is called into question. Alas, to a man and woman Israel’s leadership has likened the barbaric Hamas attacks of October 7th to Pearl Harbor. And Netanyahu in particular has insisted that Israel’s withering bombardment of Gaza must not give way to a “pause” or ceasefire just as Washington did not stand down after Pearl Harbor, either. Fine. But then again, where is Netanyahu’s powerful “budget speech” to the Knesset akin to FDR’s famous call to arms and economic sacrifice before the Congress in January 1942? Where is Netanyahu’s lobbying campaign for an all-out Israeli economic mobilization and stiff War Taxes that would dramatically increase the government’s claim on the nation’s economic resources? Where is the plan for a true Garrison State with the vastly expanded military budget and armed forces that would be needed in the future to protect Israel’s citizens from being caught flat-footed again? Where are the plans for the hundreds of thousands of additional soldiers that would be required to ensure that the several thousand Hamas barbarians who inhabit the open-air prison on Israel’s southern border never again break through a properly sealed-off, militarized barrier on the perimeter of the Gaza Strip? Of course, there is no such thing in the works. There is a whole lot of lobbying going on – but it’s not in the Knesset. Instead, it’s on behalf of a largely symbolic $14 billion Israel aid package from the war finance capital of the world on the Potomac. But in the great scheme of things that’s a false comfort to the Israelis and an unaffordable virtue signal for the Washington pols. The fact is, Uncle Sam is flat-out broke. Washington cannot afford a single dime of the $106 billion package that Biden is trying to shove down the collective throats of America’s hapless legislators. That especially includes the utter waste of another $61 billion for Washington’s insane proxy war against Russia in Ukraine and the $14 billion for Israel, as well. In truth, Israel has not yet even begun to tighten its own economic belt to pay for the war policy that its militaristic and religious extremist government insists upon. Indeed, the pending US aid package amounts to only 2.5% of Israel’s GDP and comes on the back of Netanyahu’s ceaseless decades-long campaign for a Garrison State national security policy, but one funded on the cheap via a quasi-pacifist defense spending level. That’s right. Israel’s military expenditures had plunged from more than 20% of GDP at the time of the last existential crisis during the Yom Kippur War of 1973 to just 5% of GDP on the eve of the October 7 attacks. In effect, Netanyahu falsely told Israeli voters that they didn’t have to take the risks and make the territorial concessions implicit in a two-state and diplomatically-based solution to the Palestine problem. But at the same time, they could also avoid having to be taxed to the gills to pay for the alternative – a costly, heavily militarized Garrison State. The wink and nod underlying this false solution, of course, was a pitiless willingness to keep Hamas in check by “mowing the grass” every few years in Gaza, as a desperate Israeli government is now doing once again to the horror of much of the civilized world. So even more than the failure of Israel’s vaunted intelligence operations in the run-up to the October 7th massacres, the real deep policy failure is the flaccid blue line below, slouching toward 5.0% of GDP defense spending after the Netanyahu coalition came to dominate policy in the 1990s. You simply can’t have a Garrison State policy – no negotiations with the Palestinians, no two-state solution, no continuation of the Oslo or other international negotiations process and the quarantine of 2.3 million largely destitute Palestinians in a congested dysfunctional strip of land cheek-by-jowl with the Mediterranean Sea – on a 5% of GDP war budget.As we recently pointed out, Israel’s $25 billion defense budget is a pittance compared to its booming, technologically advanced and robust $550 billion national economy. The latter, in turn, is 20X larger than what had been the $28 billion that passes for an economy in the shambles of Gaza – a whisp of GDP mainly funded by foreign philanthropists and malign actors alike. And even that will soon virtually cease to exist. Even if you count the aid from the so-called malign actors – a few hundred million per year from Iran and others – that flows through Qatar to Hamas, there is simply no contest. Israel is an economic Goliath relative to the thin resources of the Hamas terrorist apparatus and does not need any virtue signaling hand-outs from the politicians of the bankrupt state domiciled on the Potomac in order to handle its own security.

Treasury’s Yellen calls Republican effort to cut IRS funding for Israel ‘damaging and irresponsible’ -- (AP) — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen called Republicans’ most recent round of proposed funding cuts to the IRS “damaging and irresponsible” during a Tuesday event meant to commemorate new customer service improvements to the agency. “Playing politics with IRS funding is unacceptable,” Yellen said, referring to an aid bill that passed the House last week that would cut $14 billion from the nation’s tax collector in exchange for providing assistance to Israel as it pursues a war against militant Hamas in Gaza. The bill is unlikely to be approved by the Democratic-controlled Senate. While House Republicans say the IRS cuts would save taxpayer money and offset spending, independent budget analysts say the cuts would cost taxpayers billions of dollars from uncollected tax revenues. President Joe Biden has said he would veto the bill if it reaches his desk. “The current proposals to cut funding for the IRS make this an especially crucial time to talk about the importance of this work,” Yellen said in a speech at IRS headquarters in Washington.

Senate Republicans unveil border security demands for Ukraine funding - Senate Republicans, led by Sens. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Tom Cotton (Ark.) and James Lankford (Okla.), on Monday unveiled a list of immigration reforms they will demand be attached to any foreign aid package funding the war in Ukraine, signaling a difficult negotiation with Democrats in the next few weeks. The Republican senators who have been in talks with a broader cross-section of the Senate GOP conference want a variety of changes to immigration and asylum policy, which Democrats have so far resisted. They want the Department of Homeland Security to resume construction of the southwestern border wall, beef up pay for Border Patrol agents, reform the nation’s asylum laws, crack down on humanitarian parole of illegal migrants and deny asylum to migrants who cross through safe third countries before coming to the United States. “We must make policy changes to reduce the flow of immigration. The world is on fire and threats to our homeland are at an all-time high. President Biden’s border policies are not working and it’s time to change course. Our proposal makes the necessary changes that our country needs at this critical time,” said Graham, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, in a statement accompanying a one-page list of proposals. The GOP senators want to raise the standard for asylum requests for migrants who claim “credible fear of persecution.” They want claimants to demonstrate it would be “more likely than not” they would face persecution if they remain in their home countries — a higher bar than the current requirement of facing a “significant possibility” of persecution. They say migrants should be required to request asylum at legal ports of entry, which they argue would make it easier for Border Patrol agents to focus on drug smugglers and criminals. They want to reduce what they call “frivolous delays” in deportation proceedings by making the denial of a migrant’s claim for asylum “controlling” when that same migrant tries to raise a need for asylum as a defense from being removed from the country. “President Biden’s immigration policies have put American workers last and exposed our communities to crime and terrorism. This border package will cut off the flow of illegal migration, prioritize legitimate claims to entry, and restore order,” Cotton said in a statement attached to the multi-point proposal. The GOP senators want to end the practice they call “catch and release,” whereby illegal migrants are released into the country even if they don’t make asylum claims. They want to prohibit the Department of Homeland Security from using broad class-based criteria to grant humanitarian parole and codify two existing parole programs: the Cuban Family Reunification Program and parole for the spouses and children of active-duty members of the military. “We have needed significant updates in border security law for years,” Lankford said in a statement. “But President Biden has allowed the cartels to exploit the loopholes in our asylum laws like no other President in history. We must close those loopholes and secure our border.”

Schumer blasts Senate GOP border proposal as ‘total non-starter’ - Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) says the package of proposed border security reforms Republicans unveiled Monday is a “total non-starter” that will only imperil the chances of passing money for the war in Ukraine. He slammed the proposal for being largely drawn from the House-passed Secure the Border Act of 2023, which didn’t pick up a single Democratic vote in the lower chamber. “If Republicans inject partisanship into otherwise bipartisan priorities, that is only going to make it harder to avoid a shutdown,” Schumer said on the Senate floor. “A group of Senate Republicans released a proposal for border security that they want in exchange for Ukraine funding, and they know full well what they came up with is a total non-starter.” The new Senate GOP proposal would require the Department of Homeland Security to resume construction of the border wall, reform U.S. asylum laws, crack down on the administration’s use of humanitarian parole to release unlawful migrants into the United States, and prohibit migrants from requesting asylum in the United States if they first pass through a safe third country. “Senate Republicans basically copy and pasted large chunks of the House’s radical H.R. 2 bill and that’s their asking price for helping Ukraine,” Schumer said. “Making Ukraine funding conditional on the hard-right border policies that can’t ever pass Congress is a huge mistake by our Republican colleagues.” “By tying Ukraine to border, Republicans are sadly making it harder, much harder, for us to help Ukraine in their fight against [Russian President Vladimir] Putin,” he said. A White House spokesperson said President Biden “supports comprehensive reforms to our immigration system.” “If Republicans want to have a serious conversation about reforms that will improve our immigration system, we are open to a discussion. We disagree with many of the policies contained in the new Senate Republican border proposal,” the spokesperson said. The White House aide said the Senate Republican proposal lacked anything to create an earned path to citizenship for so-called “Dreamers” — based on never-passed proposals in Congress called the DREAM Act — who migrated to the country at a young age and have become productive members of society despite lacking citizenship. Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.), however, predicted that Schumer and other Democrats will soften their position on negotiating border security reforms as part of a foreign aid package. “I would expect him to say that, and I would expect that to be the initial position of the White House as well, but I think they should start sooner rather than later, if we’re going to get action on a supplemental package, in negotiating with our colleagues that put forward that proposal because it does represent the view, a majority view — it doesn’t include everyone — of Republicans,” Thune said. “Our folks have put a lot of work into this. It is a national security issue, there’s no question about.” “I think he’s going to have to be prepared to negotiate,” Thune said of Schumer.

US, European Officials Broach the Idea of Peace Talks With Ukraine - US and European officials are finally broaching the possibility of peace talks with Russia in conversations with the Ukrainian government, NBC Newsreported on Friday.The position marks a notable shift in US policy toward the war as the US and its closest allies have discouraged the idea of peace talks since Russia invaded in February 2022. Before the invasion, the US refused to engage with Russia on its key security concern: the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO.The NBC report, which cited unnamed US officials, said the conversations “have included very broad outlines of what Ukraine might need to give up to reach a deal.” Some of the talks took place last month at a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, a grouping that’s held meetings since the Russian invasion and includes military representatives from about 50 countries.The talks about negotiations with Russia started due to Western concerns about the situation on the battlefield and the fact that it’s becoming more difficult to keep funding the war.Recent reports have revealed that Ukrainian officials don’t believe they can win the war, except for President Volodymyr Zelensky. Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Gen. Valery Zaluzhny described the war as a “stalemate” in comments to The Economist and said there will likely be no “beautiful breakthrough.”A close aide to Zelensky told Time Magazine that Zelensky was “deluding himself” into believing Ukraine could win, adding, “We’re out of options. We’re not winning. But try telling him that.”The Time report also quoted a Ukrainian official who said even if the West provides all the weapons Ukraine needs, they don’t have the soldiers to use them. A source told NBC that one of the Biden administration’s top concerns is the lack of “manpower,” saying that the West could provide Ukraine with the weaponry, “but if they don’t have competent forces to use them, it doesn’t do a lot of good.”The Biden administration has failed so far to get new funding to continue the proxy war. The Pentagon has about $5 billion left made available by an “accounting error” to ship weapons, but other types of aid have dried up. The administration wants another $61 billion to fund the war for another entire year, but Republicans are prioritizing military aid to Israel.The NBC report said the administration has no indication that Russia is ready to negotiate at this point as time is on Russia’s side, and President Vladimir Putin believes he can “wait out the West.” One idea being floated by US officials to incentivize Ukraine into negotiating is NATO offering security guarantees short of membership, but that would be a non-starter for Russia as one of its main motives for invading was Ukraine’s alignment with the alliance.Peace talks between Russia and Ukraine only happened in the early days of the war, in March 2022 and April 2022. At the time, Russia’s main demand was Ukrainian neutrality. But since then, Russia has annexed the territory it controls in Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk, and now says any peace deal must recognize those territories as Russian.The US and its allies discouraged the 2022 peace talks, and there is significant evidence they worked to block a deal. According to Ukrainska Pravda, then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told Zelensky in April 2022 that even if Ukraine was ready to sign a deal with Russia, the West was not.

Top US General Warns Israel's Killing of Civilians Will Create More Hamas Members - Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown has expressed concern that Israel’s killing of Palestinian civilians will help Hamas recruit more militants and cautioned against a long war in Gaza.Asked by reporters if the high civilian casualty rate will create more Hamas fighters, Brown said, “Yes, very much so. And I think that’s something we have to pay attention to.”“That’s why when we talk about time — the faster you can get to a point where you stop the hostilities, you have less strife for the civilian population that turns into someone who now wants to be the next member of Hamas,” he said.Brown, who replaced Gen. Mark Milley as the top US military officer last month, said Israel’s stated goal of eliminating Hamas is a “large order” but did not call for a ceasefire. He also claimed Israel was following the laws of war despite the massive child casualty rate.Israel has been relentlessly bombing Gaza since October 7 and launched a ground invasion of the north on October 27, but a US official told The New York Times recently that the campaign has not come close to destroying Hamas. Regardless of the US concerns and the White House acknowledging Israel has killed “many, many thousands of innocent people,” the US is providing unconditional support for the war. The Pentagon has said there are “no limits” on how Israel can use its US-provided weapons.

Diplomats Warn White House Support for Israel Is Destroying US Image in Middle East - CNN reports that American diplomats in the Middle East sent a diplomatic cable to the White House raising the alarm that the Israeli military operations in Gaza are causing severe damage to the US reputation in the region. Washington is Tel Aviv’s most dedicated backer, sending billions of dollars in weapons to Israel every year.CNN says it obtained the cable authored by a diplomat stationed in Oman. Israel’s destructive and deadly military campaign in Gaza “is losing us Arab publics for a generation,” the outlet reports the diplomat as saying. Robust US support for Israel’s actions is being seen “as material and moral culpability in what they consider to be possible war crimes,” the cable reads.It continues, “We are losing badly on the messaging battlespace.”After a Hamas attack on October 7, Israel launched a massive military operation in Gaza. In just over a month of bombings, more than 11,000 civilians have been killed. The death toll includes over 4,000 children. Tel Aviv’s operations have been widely condemned by governments and organizations around the globe.UN Secretary-General António Guterres said this week the high rate of civilian casualties shows something wrong is happening in Israel. “When one looks at the number of civilians that were killed with the military operations, there is something that is clearly wrong,” he said. On Wednesday, Barbara Leaf, assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, told Congress the death toll in Gaza is potentially higher than reported.The diplomatic cable said the damage done to the US image by supporting the Israeli bombing in Gaza will not be quickly repaired. Washington is Tel Aviv’s indispensable backer. The US provides Israel with nearly $4 billion in military assistance annually. The White House is asking Congress to approve $14 billion in additional security aid for Tel Aviv to support its operations in Gaza. On top of providing Israel with military aid, the Biden administration has blocked efforts at the UN Security Council to call for a ceasefire.The author of the cable highlighted a recent commentary in a state-run Egyptian newspaper that said President Joe Biden has been the cruelest American leader. “President Biden’s cruelty and disregard for Palestinians exceeded all previous US presidents,” it says.

Pentagon Says US Is Flying Drones Over Gaza to Look for Hostages - The Pentagon has acknowledged that the US is flying drones over Gaza to help Israel locate hostages, demonstrating deep US involvement in the war.“In support of hostage recovery efforts, the US is conducting unarmed UAV flights over Gaza, as well as providing advice and assistance to support our Israeli partner as they work on their hostage recovery efforts,” Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said on Friday.The New York Times reported that the flights started days after October 7, and they are being conducted by MQ-9 Reaper drones, which are capable of carrying powerful missiles. At least six MQ-9s are involved in the operations, which the Times says suggests the US is taking a more “active role” in the war than previously known.The US has also deployed special operations forces to Israel in the wake of the October 7 attack. US officials said the American commandos are in Israel to help locate hostages and insist they are not assigned to combat roles. Besides the drone flights and special operations, the US has also shipped new weapons to Israel and deployed significant firepower to the region, including two aircraft carrier strike groups. President Biden is looking for an additional $14 billion to spend on the Gaza onslaught, which is on top of the $3.8 billion Israel receives in annual military aid.

Massive march in Washington, as millions take part in global protests against the genocide in Gaza - What's happening:

• Millions protest worldwide against the genocide in Gaza
• More than a quarter million demonstrate in Washington, D.C.: “You can’t convince the American people that this is right.”
• Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters rally in Los Angeles and Anaheim, California: “I believe there has to be one state for all of its people with equal rights.”
• Thousands protest in north Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois: “I think we need to shut things down until they are free”
• Dozens of pro-Palestinian protests erupt across Canada, with more than 40,000 workers, students and youth marching in Toronto
• Over 10,000 protest Israeli genocide in San Francisco, California, “Not another nickel, not another dime, no more money for Israel’s crimes!”
• Norfolk, Virginia demonstrators welcome call for political general strike: “I would support a general strike. Something drastic has to happen.”
• Powerful appeal to workers at Port of Oakland stalls military vessel en route to Israel
• Hundreds attend IYSSE and Students for Justice in Palestine rally at Detroit’s Wayne State University

Israel Continues to Rebuff US Calls for 'Humanitarian Pause' - The US has nothing to show for its calls for a temporary “pause” in Israel’s onslaught on Gaza as the Israeli military says it’s cut off north Gaza from the south and a new phase of heavy ground fighting is expected.Secretary of State Antony Blinken was rebuffed when he visited Israel on Friday and called for a “humanitarian pause.” President Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday and discussed the idea of a “tactical pause,” but there’s no sign the Israeli leader agreed.White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said the US was at the “beginning of the conversation” with Israel about the idea of a pause. “So you can expect that we’re going to continue to advocate for temporary, localized pauses in the fighting,” he said.The Biden administration has refused to use the term “ceasefire,” claiming a stop in Israel’s assault would only benefit Hamas.Israeli media has reported that Israeli ground troops are expected to enter Gaza City soon, where they will meet fierce resistance from Hamas and other militant groups. “We’re closing in on them,” said Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht. “We’ve completed our encirclement, separating Hamas strongholds in the north from the south.”According to AP, hundreds of thousands of people are believed to still be in northern Gaza. The Israeli military says there is a one-way evacuation corridor for people to leave, but many are afraid to use the route.Israeli airstrikes have continued to pound northern Gaza, hitting hospitals, UN shelters, refugee camps, and ambulances in recent days. Israel has also continued to bomb southern Gaza despite telling Palestinians to flee there.

'Never Again for Anyone': Hundreds Rally at Statue of Liberty Demanding Gaza Cease-Fire --Hundreds of Jewish Americans and allies rallied Monday at the Statue of Liberty in New York to demand an immediate cease-fire in Gaza as the death toll from Israel's month long assault on the Palestinian territory topped 10,000.Members of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), IfNotNow, and other groups were joined by unaffiliated Jews of conscience and allies at a sit-in at the iconic New York landmark, where rabbis led songs, chants, and prayers."We refuse to allow a genocide to be carried out in our names," JVP said on social media. "Cease-fire now to save lives! Never again for anyone!"Many demonstrators wore the same T-shirts reading "Not in My Name" that have been seen at other Jewish-led protests including the takeoverof Grand Central Station in Midtown Manhattan and a rally at the U.S. Capitol last month, part of what JVP has called the largest-ever mobilization of Jewish Americans for Palestine."My ancestors were greeted by the Statue of Liberty while escaping pogroms. While it is a symbol of refuge for my family, I am hauntingly aware that the U.S. denied entry to Jewish refugees throughout the entirety of the Holocaust," said Sarah Koshar of JVP. "From Ellis Island to Gaza, never again means never again—for anyone."JVP's Jay Saper said that "the famous words of our Jewish ancestor Emma Lazarus etched into this very monument compel us to take action supporting the Palestinians of Gaza yearning to breathe free."

US Official Says Israel Has Not Come Close to Destroying Hamas Leadership - Despite the massive bombing campaign and ground invasion in Gaza, a senior Pentagon official believes Israel has not come close to taking out Hamas’s leadership, The New York Times reported Saturday.The report reads: “One senior US defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details, said the operations so far have not come close to destroying Hamas’s senior and middle leadership ranks.”According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, at least 9,770 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli onslaught, including 4,008 children. The Times report said the US was making suggestions to Israel to reduce civilian casualties, such as using smaller bombs, but the Biden administration is refusing to leverage military aid.According to The Washington Post, the US is not conditioning military aid or using other leverage it has over Israel because it “would be so politically unpopular in any administration and partly because, aides say, Biden himself has a personal attachment to Israel.”The Post report also said that White House advisors believed Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza would only lead to destabilization and escalation. Regardless of the US officials’ view of the war, they are seeking an additional $14 billion from Congress to keep funding the onslaught.Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Israel on Friday and suggested a “humanitarian pause,” but the idea was rejected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.The following day, Blinken traveled to Amman and met with Arab leaders who called for a real ceasefire, an idea the Biden administration has rejected. “It’s our view that a ceasefire now would simply leave Hamas in place and able to regroup and repeat what it did on October 7,” Blinken said.

US Forces Attacked 38 Times in Syria and Iraq Since October 17 - More drones and rockets were fired at US bases in Iraq and Syria on Sunday and Monday, bringing the total number of attacks on US troops since October 17 to 38. The attacks started in response to the US’s support for Israel’s onslaught in Gaza and show no sign of waning. Pentagon officials said on Monday thatat least 45 US troops have been injured in the spate of attacks. The total number of injuries is more than twice what the Pentagon has previously reported. The US military is monitoring about two dozen US service members who may be suffering from traumatic brain injuries due to the attacks.On October 27, the US launched airstrikes in eastern Syria against Iranian-linked targets in order to “deter” more attacks. But US bases in the region came under fire 19 more times since then.An umbrella group of militias that calls itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has taken credit for many of the attacks on US bases. The US has blamed Iran for the attacks due to its support for Shia militias in the region, although there’s no evidence Tehran is directing the attacks.On Sunday, Iran’s defense minister warned the US it should reach a ceasefire in Gaza. “Our advice to the Americans is to immediately end this war and implement a ceasefire, otherwise they will be hit hard,” said Defense Minister Mohammad Reza Ashtiani. “We have always recommended the Americans not to support the Zionist regime.

Blinken Visits Iraq as Attacks on US Troops Continue - Secretary of State Antony Blinken made an unannounced visit to Iraq on Sunday amid a spate of attacks on US troops in the region over US support for Israel’s onslaught on Gaza.US forces in Iraq and Syria have come under attack 32 times, including a drone launched at a base in Syria that was reported on Sunday. The US launched airstrikes in eastern Syria on October 27 to “deter” future attacks, but the strategy has clearly failed.“I made very clear that attacks or threats coming from militias that are aligned with Iran are totally unacceptable, and we will take every necessary step to protect our people,” Blinken said in Iraq, according to AFP.Blinken met with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani and thanked him for condemning the attacks on US troops. Blinken said al-Sudani is “working with his own security forces and others to take necessary action … to seek to prevent them.”Many of the Shia militias and political factions in Iraq are strongly opposed to the US presence in the country and have been pushing for it to end since the US killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in a January 2020 drone strike in Baghdad. Soleimani was killed alongside Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who led the Popular Mobilization Forces, an umbrella group of Iraqi militias that was formed in 2014 to fight ISIS. In the wake of the killing of Soleimani and al-Muhandis, Iraq’s parliamentvoted to expel US troops, and Iraqi prime ministers have been under pressure to do so ever since. In an effort to placate anti-US factions, the USformally changed its presence in Iraq from a combat role to an advisory role in December 2021. But the US did not withdraw any troops at the time and still has 2,500 in the country today. A group that calls itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has taken credit for many of the attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria. The US has not been attributing them to a specific group and is saying Iran is ultimately responsible due to its support for the Shia militias, but there’s been no evidence showing Tehran is directing the attacks.

US Announces Presence of Guided-Missile Submarine in the Middle East - The US military announced on Sunday that a US nuclear-powered submarine was in the Middle East in the latest provocation aimed at warning regional actors against attacking Israel or US forces.US Central Command said an Ohio-class submarine entered the region without offering other details. A US Navy spokesperson later told Business Insider that it is a guided-missile submarine (SSGN), which can carry 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles, as opposed to a ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN), which would be armed with nuclear weapons.The submarine represents another form of substantial American firepower in the region. The US typically does not announce the location of its Ohio-class submarines unless it’s looking to send a threatening message. The US recently docked a nuclear-armed Ohio-Class submarine in South Korea for the first time since the 1980s, a significant provocation toward North Korea.Since the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel, the US has deployed two aircraft carrier strike groups, air defenses, more troops, and additional fighter jets and bombers to the region. US MQ-9 Reaper drones are also flying over Gaza, and US special operations forces are in Israel.The show of force has not deterred attacks on US forces based in Syria and Iraq, and Hezbollah and Israel continue to trade fire across the Lebanon-Israel border. Yemen’s Houthis have also fired missiles and drones at Israel and said the attacks would continue until Israel ends its onslaught on Gaza

US drone shot down over Yemen - An American drone was shot down off the coast of Yemen on Wednesday by the Iranian-backed Houthis, according to a U.S. Defense official. The U.S. official said the drone was an MQ-9 Reaper, a surveillance drone that can be armed with missiles. The drone costs around $32 million. The attack is the latest on U.S. forces in the Middle East, where the Pentagon says Iranian-backed groups are seeking to take advantage of the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The U.S. has been assaulted in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed militants firing rockets and explosive drones around 40 times since the war began. The Pentagon said this week that 46 U.S. service members have been injured, including more than 20 with traumatic brain injuries. The Houthis are a faction in Yemen that have been fighting a major civil war against the country’s government for years. Houthi forces also fired rockets at a U.S. warship last month and have targeted positions in Israel.

Pentagon confirms four new attacks on US bases after defensive airstrike - American troops were hit four times by Iranian-backed groups in the Middle East after a U.S. strike Wednesday on an Iranian facility in Syria. Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said Thursday the U.S. has now been attacked 46 times since Oct. 17, following the breakout of a major war between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas. That includes 24 attacks in Iraq and 22 in Syria, Singh said. The attacks have all involved explosive drones and rockets. “If these attacks continue against our personnel, we won’t hesitate at a time and place of our choosing to respond again,” Singh told reporters at a briefing. A total of 56 troops have been injured in the attacks, but most are minor injuries and every service member has since returned to duty, according to the Pentagon. The latest attacks follow a U.S. airstrike Wednesday, which took out a major weapons facility in Syria used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iranian-backed militants. Singh said the strike inflicted significant damage on the storage facility. “We were able to render that building pretty much non-usable,” she said. The Wednesday strike came after the Houthis, who are also backed by Iran, shot down an MQ-9 Reaper drone off the coast of Yemen. The U.S. has bolstered its presence in the Middle East following the Israel-Hamas war and also struck an Iranian-backed militant site in late October. But the ongoing conflict has sparked fury on Capitol Hill, where Republicans have blamed the Biden administration for failing to stop the attacks. “The message to terrorists must be clear: attacks on U.S. servicemembers, assets, and interests will not be tolerated,” Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of House Armed Services Committee, said in a statement. “Hitting a storage facility should not be the final response by the U.S.” Singh said the U.S. is carrying out “proportionate” responses but did not seek to escalate the conflict, while the primary mission was to ensure the Israel-Hamas war does not widen. “We want to make sure we can contain this conflict to Israel and Hamas and we have not seen this conflict widen,” she said. “We are sending a message and I think the message has been received.”

US Launches More Airstrikes in Eastern Syria Against IRGC Site - The Pentagon said on Wednesday night that the US launched more airstrikes in eastern Syria that targeted a facility used by “Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups.”“This strike was conducted by two US F-15s against a weapons storage facility,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a statement. He said the strike was “a response to a series of attacks against US personnel in Iraq and Syria by IRGC-Quds Force affiliates,” referring to the Shia militias that operate in both countries.The US launched similar airstrikes on October 27 in an attempt to “deter” further attacks on US forces in the region. But the rocket and drone fire on US bases has not stopped. At least 41 attacks have been reported since October 17, injuring at least 45 US troops.An umbrella group of Shia militias that calls itself the Islamic Resistance of Iraq has taken credit for many of the attacks on US bases. The militias receive support from Iran, but it’s unclear if Tehran is directing the attacks. The Pentagon previously acknowledged it had no evidence of direct Iranian involvement.For their part, Iran has denied any role in the attacks on US troops. Responding to US allegations, Iran’s representative to the UN said Tuesday that Tehran “has never been involved in any actions or attacks directed at the United States military forces in Syria and Iraq.”There are no reports of casualties yet in the US strikes. If IRGC personnel were hit, it would risk a huge escalation with Iran.Austin said the US urges against escalation, but it’s unlikely the Shia militias will back down as the US continues to support Israel’s onslaught on Gaza. “The United States is fully prepared to take further necessary measures to protect our people and our facilities. We urge against any escalation. US personnel will continue to conduct counter-ISIS missions in Iraq and Syria,” Austin said.Also on Wednesday, Israel launched airstrikes in southern Syria, and ISIS attacks were reported in desert regions, killing 26 members of a pro-government militia and four Syrian soldiers.

White House Says Israel Has Killed 'Many, Many Thousands of Innocents' - The White House acknowledged on Monday that the US-backed Israeli onslaught on Gaza has killed “many, many thousands of innocent people” as the Biden administration continues unconditional support for Israel’s war.The comments were made by White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby, who previously told reporters to expect that Israel would continue to kill innocent civilians. Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Tuesday that at least 10,328 Palestinians have been killed, including 4,237 children. Thousands more are missing and presumed to be under the rubble.The Biden administration has cast doubt on the numbers coming from Gaza’s Health Ministry but is not denying civilians are being killed on a massive scale. Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder has also acknowledged that “thousands” of civilians have been killed.Despite the grim death toll, the US still refuses to place any limits on Israel’s use of American weapons. When asked on Tuesday about the civilian casualties, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said, “We don’t put conditions on weapons that we’re sending or that Israel is using.”The administration is also refusing to disclose the types of weapons it’s sending to Israel. Kirby said in an October 23 press briefing that the US is shipping military equipment to Israel “on a near daily basis” but that the administration won’t detail what Israel’s receiving “for their own operational security purposes.”

White House cautions Israel against reoccupying Gaza - The White House is cautioning Israel against reoccupying Gaza after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested Israel could be there “for an indefinite period” after the war.“We’re having active discussions with our Israeli counterparts about what post-conflict Gaza looks like,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Tuesday. “The president maintains his position that reoccupation by Israeli forces is not the right thing to do.”In mid-October, President Biden told CBS News’s Scott Pelley on “60 Minutes” that reoccupation of Gaza by Israel would be a “big mistake.” Israel formally withdrew its military presence and settlements from inside Gaza in 2005. Still, Biden said taking out “the extremists” is necessary.The year after Israel withdrew from the territory, Hamas was elected to govern the area. In arecent interview, Netanyahu said he thinks Israel will have an “overall security responsibility” for the area because “we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have it.”In an interview with ABC News’s David Muir, Netanyahu said there will be no cease-fire without the release of hostages. His comments come after U.S. officials have been pressing Israel to agree to a humanitarian pause in Gaza, but Israel has yet to agree.Biden recently had a phone call with Netanyahu to discuss the use of a tactical pause.Netanyahu signaled it could be a possibility, but as the humanitarian crisis worsens, U.S. officials are trying to determine how to handle its support for Israel with its continued calls for a pause.According to Kirby, the White House is keeping the “many, many thousands of innocent Palestinians” who have been killed and injured in the fighting in their thoughts and prayers.

Biden Discusses Potential Three-Day Pause for Hostage Deal With Netanyahu - President Biden asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to pause Israel’s assault on Gaza for three days to allow progress in Hamas releasing hostages, Axios reported on Tuesday.The request was made in a Monday phone call, but Israel continues to rebuff US calls for a “humanitarian pause” in Gaza. On Tuesday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog spoke with Vice President Kamala Harris and said there would be no type of ceasefire without Hamas releasing all of its hostages.According to Axios, the US, Israel, and Qatar have discussed a proposal that would involve Hamas releasing 10-15 hostages and then using the three-day pause in fighting to verify the names of the remaining captives and deliver the list.Israel has said a total of 240 people were captured during the October 7 attack, although Hamas has claimed over 60 are missing due to Israeli airstrikes. So far, Hamas has released four hostages and says it’s ready to release 12 more foreign nationals but can’t because of the Israeli bombardment.In the call on Monday, Netanyahu told Biden that he didn’t trust Hamas’s intentions and that he didn’t believe they would agree to a deal regarding hostages. He also is worried that if Israel pauses its brutal assault for three days, it will lose international support for the onslaught.In an interview with ABC News on Monday, Netanyahu said he’s open to “little” pauses but not a ceasefire without the release of hostages first. “Well, there’ll be no ceasefire, general ceasefire, in Gaza without the release of our hostages,” he said. “As far as tactical little pauses, an hour here, an hour there. We’ve had them before, I suppose, will check the circumstances in order to enable goods, humanitarian goods to come in, or our hostages, individual hostages to leave. But I don’t think there’s going to be a general ceasefire.”

House censures Tlaib for Israel criticism - The House voted to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib Tuesday night, rebuking the Michigan Democrat for her criticism of Israel following Hamas’s unprecedented attack on the U.S. ally. The chamber approved the reprimand in a 234-188-4 vote, with 22 Democrats bucking party leadership to support the resolution and four Republicans voting against it. The vote is the culmination of a week-plus effort by Republicans to punish Tlaib — the only Palestinian American serving in Congress — for comments critical of Israel that have drawn condemnation from both sides of the aisle. And it marks the pinnacle of the current controversy surrounding Tlaib. The congresswoman posted a video on X over the weekend that said President Biden “supported the genocide of the Palestinian people” and included clips of protesters changing “from the river to the sea,” which the Anti-Defamation Leagues characterizes as antisemitic. In a subsequent social media post, Tlaib defended her use of the controversial phrase. The remark sparked bipartisan condemnation and prompted a statement from House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) that, without naming Tlaib, criticized her use of the phrase, which he said is “widely understood as calling for the complete destruction of Israel” and “unacceptably risks further polarization, division and incitement to violence.” Still, Democratic leadership earlier Tuesday had urged their members to vote against advancing the resolution, defending Tlaib’s right to make the controversial comments, despite most disagreeing with her words. Democrats largely stuck together on the procedural vote, with only one voting against the motion to table, before a larger group split off on the final vote. The censure resolution, sponsored by Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.), accuses Tlaib of “promoting false narratives regarding the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and for calling for the destruction of the state of Israel,” referencing her use of the controversial phrase on social media. It also cites a statement from Tlaib on Oct. 8, the day after Hamas launched its attack, which suggested that U.S. aid to Israel was partially to blame for the violence in the Middle East. Tuesday’s vote makes Tlaib the second lawmaker to be censured this year and the 26th in history. House Republicans voted to rebuke Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) in June for his efforts against former President Trump.

Sanders Blasts AIPAC After Group Thanks Him for Not Demanding Cease-Fire in Gaza - After the American Israel Public Affairs Committee on Sunday publicly thanked U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders for declining to join global calls for a cease-fire in Israel's war on the Gaza Strip, the Vermont Independent rebuffed the lobbying group."AIPAC has supported dozens of GOP extremists who are undermining our democracy," Sanders said on social media. "They're now working hard to defeat progressive members of Congress. We won't let that happen. Let us stand together in the fight for a world of peace, economic and social justice, and climate sanity."Sanders' comments were similar to those of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) earlier this week. Responding to the group attacking her on social media, the congresswoman, who supports a cease-fire, said: "AIPAC endorsed scores of January 6th insurrectionists. They are no friend to American democracy. They are one of the more racist and bigoted PACs in Congress as well, who disproportionately target members of color. They are an extremist organization that destabilizes U.S. democracy."On Sunday, the pro-Israel organization—which has given tons of money to federal lawmakers in both major parties—shared on social media a clip from Sanders' nearly 10-minute appearance on CNN's "State of the Union" with Dana Bash.During the interview, Sanders pointed out that Israel gets $3.8 billion in annual military aid from the United States and stressed the need for the nation to stop its indiscriminate bombing campaign in Gaza, echoing his Senate floor speech from Wednesday.Like his address earlier this week, Sanders also decried the current conditions in the besieged enclave, blasted the right-wing government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for undermining regional peace, and stuck with his call for a "humanitarian pause," or a temporary halt to hostilities, rather than a cease-fire, or a long-term suspension of fighting.Asked by Bash about his position, Sanders responded, "I don't know how you can have a cease-fire, a permanent cease-fire, with an organization like Hamas, which is dedicated to turmoil and chaos and destroying the state of Israel." “The immediate task right now is to end the bombing, to end the horrific humanitarian disaster, to build, go forward with the entire world, for a two-tier, two-state solution to the crisis, to give the Palestinian people hope," he continued.

The Jewish American Dilemma - by James Howard Kunstler -- At this moment, when there is an awful struggle over the Hebrews’ place in the world — so dire that you’re waiting for World War Three to vaporize everything you’ve ever cared about — one observes the Jewish American scene with trepidation. Since I am a Jewish American, I’m just going to flop this one on the table like so much meat to see what kind of animals it brings out of the woodwork to fight over it. The Hamas war has exposed a deep current of animosity against Israel and against Jews generally world-wide, even here. This, you understand, is happening at a time of what we might call epic global political mental illness. A mass formation psychosis appears to grip many population groups, each in its own way, but often expressing itself as a longing for death, ranging from the economic suicide of Western Europe to the rise of Jihad to the desolate nihilism of American nose-ring youth. Jewish Americans have played a leading role in American intellectual and political life through the 20th century and into this one. We Jews increasingly dominated the arenas of literature, academia, medicine, law, news media, and show biz. Business and government, too. In America, we mostly overcame (or seemed to) the deep, old-world superstitions against us, thanks to successful near-total cultural assimilation. Old World Jews, scattered in diaspora among alien nations, were united for centuries by the longing to return to Jerusalem, the ancestral homeland. “Next year in Jerusalem!” is the toast that concludes each Passover seder. The modern activist manifestation of that, starting in 19th century Europe, was Zionism, the political movement to reinhabit the Bible land of the Middle East. The label Zionism has recently been confabulated with a notion that it stands for Jews wielding a disdainful sense of superiority against non-Jews. This is, of course, a false understanding. Mostly, it is an envious projection because Jews succeeded so well in America, and they succeeded, as I averred above, largely because they assimilated so completely. How else can you explain a Jew such as Samuel Goldwyn (born Szmuel Gelbfisz, later Samuel Goldfish) of Gloversville, New York, rising to run Hollywood’s MGM studio and turning out movies like Gone with the Wind that showed the rest of the nation what America was about? Or Irving Berlin who wrote God Bless America? For the Jews who arrived here in the late 19th and early 20th century, America became even more of a promised land than that sliver of Biblical real estate on the Mediterranean. They succeeded here beyond their wildest dreams. Why dream idly about returning to the Middle East when the USA turned out to be the real Land of Milk and Honey? Hence, a revision in American Judaism became necessary. Tikkun Olam means repair the world. This has been driving American Judaism since the early 20th century. Meanwhile, the genocide of the 1940s gave new impetus to next year in Jerusalem for what remained of the European Jews, and thus you get the establishment of Israel in 1948 — notwithstanding the geopolitical legerdemain that actually brought it about. American Jews, while sympathetic to a fault with the founding of Israel, and deeply vested emotionally in its success, had a different agenda in the USA after World War Two. They endeavored to repair America. Tikkun Olam! Mostly this expressed itself in Jewish support and involvement in the Civil Rights movement, since the end of discrimination against anybody was considered a good thing for the Jews as well as humanity in general. The country needed a moral repair job, especially after defeating manifest evil in the big war. But then something happened. Several things. One was that not all of black America necessarily regarded the Civil Rights movement as the great moral victory it was touted to be. A lot of black youth in the 1960s opted out early on and went their own way in black separatist movements of various kinds. As a practical matter, it also slowly became obvious that the new Civil Rights laws did not raise up the black underclass out of poverty and misery. Jewish liberal apostates would even argue that the vast federal social safety-net program largess that accompanied Civil Rights Inc. only made the condition of poor blacks worse. This became a growing fiasco for American Jewish liberals, who, by the 1980s, then strove to impose another set of repairs (more tikkun olam) on American society: multiculturalism, meaning it was no longer necessary to promote a common culture that people would be encouraged to assimilate into, to join a consensus of values and behaviors. Instead, all cultures could behave according to their own rules. That hasn’t worked out so well either, and the world repairers have lately had to resort to coercion such as tyrannical diversity, equity, and inclusion policies and the shoving aside of equal opportunity for enforced equal outcomes (“equity”). That business has only produced additional unintended consequences, such as the new epidemic of institutional incompetence and the resentment of at least half the population against new forms of counter-discrimination (cultural Marxism, in short). Another poorly understood byproduct of this failure to repair the world is the guilt and shame secretly experienced by the American liberal Left over the apparent failure of the Civil Rights movement they fought so hard for, and the subsequent failed efforts to tweak it and save it (still more tikkun olam). Thus, we see the absurd racist “anti-racism” of the universities, and so many other affronts to common sense and reality itself. But the worst byproduct of all this tragically misguided tikkun olam is that the main political vehicle for it, the Democratic Party, has gone so insane that it now devotes itself fanatically to the utter destruction of what remains of our country. This is most particularly true in the law, which might be considered the backbone of America. Lawfare attorneys such as Marc Elias work tirelessly to turn American election law upside down and inside out so it becomes increasing impossible to know who is voting and if the ballots are legitimate. The Democratic Party has decided it’s okay to use the law in bad faith to persecute and jail its political opponents. The Democratic Party has destroyed Americans’ faith in the federal courts, the Department of Justice, and the FBI. The Democratic Party allows an invasion of millions of unvetted aliens across the border, quite a few of them possibly bent on making mayhem here as global tensions careen into hot war. If they really want to repair the world, it’s time for Jewish Americans to get out of the Democratic Party and re-assimilate into an American common culture — a consensus about reality — that is consistent with running a successful, orderly, and just society.

New York Times blasts Cotton for ‘harvesting disinformation’ about journalists in Middle East -The New York Times sent a scathing rebuke in response to a letter from Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) demanding more information from the outlet on its news-gathering process as it covers the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas.In a letter to Times leadership dated Thursday, Cotton cited “reports” that suggested journalists working on its behalf were embedded with Hamas around the time of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel and “knew about the attack.”“If your employees, as part of their work, participated in terrorist activities or if your organization or employees provided material support (including any funding) to Hamas, the leadership of your organization may also face criminal penalties under federal law,” he said. Cotton’s letter follows a report from the pro-Israel media watchdog HonestReporting that asked if freelancers working for the Times, CNN and other leading news organizations had advanced knowledge of the attack or were complicit in it.The group’s leader on Thursday said it was simply “asking questions” after a stream of denials and condemnations from the Times, CNN, Reuters and other outlets followed.In its response to Cotton, the Times wrote that his letter “exacerbates” the “spread of disinformation and incendiary rhetoric” around journalists covering the war.“You are merely parroting disinformation harvested form the internet based on a website that has conceded it had no evidence for its claims,” the Times said.Cotton separately wrote a letter to the Department of Justice on Thursday asking it to probe whether or journalists working for the international news outlets “committed federal crimes by supporting Hamas terrorists.”Western Propaganda Gets More Desperate as World Majority Sides with China and Russia Against the US over Gaza - The New York Times, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Telegraph have all recently run pieces attempting to paint Russia and China as anti semitic and/or anti Israel. The propaganda comes as the US tries to discredit any attempts by Moscow and Beijing to lead more international involvement in the Palestine-Israel peace process.Let’s start with The New York Times, which has run at least two articles in recent days in which the argument basically boils down to the following: some people in Russia and China say bad things about Jews on the Internet; therefore the governments are anti-Israel.Here’s the New York Times in an Oct. 28 piece, “As China Looks to Broker Gaza Peace, Antisemitism Surges Online”:But even as China seeks to turn down the temperature diplomatically, a surge of antisemitism and anti-Israeli sentiment is proliferating across the Chinese internet and state media, undermining Beijing’s efforts to convey impartiality. China has already come under pressure from the United States and Israel for its refusal to condemn Hamas for its Oct. 7 attack that started the war.On China’s heavily censored internet, inflammatory speech critical of Israel is rampant, with commenters seemingly emboldened by that refusal. And China’s state-run media is seizing on the conflict to accuse the United States of turning a blind eye to Israeli aggression, while perpetuating tropes of Jewish control of American politics.China Daily, a state-run newspaper, ran an editorial on Monday declaring that the United States was on the “wrong side of history in Gaza.” It said Washington was exacerbating the conflict by “blindly backing Israel.” The piece goes on to mention other cases of private citizens making statements the Times deems questionable, such as an influencer with millions of followers who decided to call Hamas a “resistance organization” rather than a “terrorist organization.” The Times concludes:It is hard to say whether the anti-Israeli positions in state media and antisemitism on the Chinese internet are part of a coordinated campaign. But China’s state media rarely veers from the official position of the country’s Communist Party, and its hair-trigger internet censors are keenly attuned to the wishes of its leaders, quick to remove any content that sways public sentiment in an unwanted direction, especially on matters of such geopolitical importance.First off, I remember when news media outlets in the First Amendment-loving US used to criticize China for its lack of press freedom; but the New York Times is now accusing Beijing of not cracking down enough on its news media and online discourse in order to silence criticism of Israel and the US. Good luck with that.Inherent in this complaint from the Times is a belief that China should not try to take a balanced approach to the conflict, it must “condemn Hamas” and it cannot criticize the US approach to the conflict, nor the US’ decades-long failure to broker a peace agreement.What’s more is that the Times is in effect concluding that the comments of random private citizens (and the government’s inability or unwillingness to censor them) in a country of 1.4 billion people is therefore the official position of the Chinese government. If we apply that same standard to the US, how easy is it to go on Twitter, Facebook, etc. and find crazy comments by Americans? Is it fair to conclude that those rantings represent US policy? In many cases, they’re not far removed from Washington’s increasingly unhinged actions throughout the world, but that still doesn’t make them the official position of the state.

The Impossibility of Negotiated Settlements in the Gaza and Ukraine Conflicts - by Yves Smith -Although some analysts have given reasons why negotiated solutions to the wars in the Gaza and Ukraine are not in the cards, for the most part, they have also been hesitant to say that in a simple noun-verb sentence. Perhaps they hope against hope that a frame-breaking event will radically shift the current boundary conditions for the various parties. Or they hew to the “messaging can create realities” school of thought, and don’t want to legitimate very bad outcomes, no matter how likely they seem. Or it may be that as a matter of personal style, they are averse to being declarative.So let’s look at why, despite the new round of Western officials (and in the case of Gaza, what is coming to be called the Global Majority) and the press making noises about talks the Middle East and Russia-Ukraine, there are yawning chasms between what the two sides are willing to do, and no prospect of meaningful movement in their positions even if the key players change. If you parse down the problem to key considerations, it’s not hard to find the underlying rigidities.With Israel and Palestine, there is a widespread consensus, which includes many non-Zionist Jews, that the only route to a durable peace is the two state solution. But the current hard right government and an ever-more-powerful settler cohort are committed to a policy of securing Israel for Jews only, and on top of that, a “historical” Israel which means more territory. Existing conditions, such as the degree of balkanization of Palestinian living space, also render a two state solution untenable. And the Hamas October 7 attacks have radicalized some of the moderate Jews in Israel. A Palestinian state would have a military. Not hard in the current climate to scaremonger around that prospect. It is true that Prime Minister Netanyahu has powerful personal incentives to keep the crisis going as long as possible. The prospect of imprisonment wonderfully focuses the mind. Therefore US punditocracy too often depicts Netanyahu were the problem. The implication is f he could be removed, the situation would become more tractable. That’s false.While Netanyahu has been the lead architect of the anti-Palestinian policies and is an extremely cunning politician, those positions and practices are now very well embedded. The second problem is that the economic marginalization and cordoning of the Palestine population has become so advanced that it looks impossible to unwind it….tacitly, without costs to Israelis that they would not accept. Key sections from an article in Vox from February 2023 by Jonathan Guyer. Note his prescient call of the risk of a third Initifada:The third issue is despite the US in theory having leverage over Israel, in practice we don’t due to the power of the Israel lobby in the Beltway. Guyer’s article pointed out that when the Biden State Department top human rights appointee Sarah Margon had her confirmation held up for two years over a tweet that approved of AirBnB removing listings in settlements in the West Bank. Ranking member and gentile James Risch depicted Jewish Margon as an anti-Semitic. She eventually withdrew her candidacy.As Professor John Mearsheimer put it in his interview last Friday with Judge Napolitano (starting at 1:34): [...]Mearsheimer charitably depicts Biden and Blinken as interested in curbing Israel, ifnothing else for the benefit of Israel. But that’s hard to see. Alastair Crooke pointed out in (also in a Judge Napolitano interview) that Biden had done less than any recent president to advance the two state solution (I infer that means even Trump gave it more lip service).Biden also has the established habit of saying things that are expedient at the time that have no relationship to his policy aims, like telling China’s President Xi that the US supports the China one-state policy, then turning around and continuing to escalate in Taiwan. So he and Blinken are mouthing the two state remedy because even though it is no answer, it at least makes them appear responsible and fair-minded when they are anything but.So one has to wonder what the latest Blinken round of visits to the Middle East was supposed to accomplish, since all it did was expose our impotence. Even the Financial Times could not hide that the meetings with Netanyahu and then Arab leaders were a train wreck. Netanyahu rejected even any itty bitty ceasefire, branded a humanitarian pause, to get relief in, demanding that Hamas release all hostages first.¹ The fact that Israel has welched or underperformed on its past begrudging promises to let trucks from Egypt in, would make that a non-starter even before getting to Hamas being sure to stick to its position of wanting to trade hostages for Palestinian prisoners. And of course the Arab states are not about to budge. Blinken got a more pointed version of what he was told before. From the pink paper:

Hawley pens letter calling for TikTok ban amid Israel-Hamas war -- Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has urged the Biden administration to implement a ban on the social media platform TikTok, sharing concerns about the Chinese-owned company’s handling of content about the Israel-Hamas war. In a letter sent to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Tuesday, Hawley wrote that the ongoing conflict is a “crucial test case” for TikTok, adding that the platform has the “power to radically distort the world-picture that America’s young people encounter.” “According to one poll, 51% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 24 believe that Hamas’s murder of civilians was justified — a statistic notably different from other age cohorts,” Hawley wrote in his letter, obtained and published by NBC News. “Analysts have attributed this disparity to the ubiquity of anti-Israel content on TikTok, where most young internet users get their information about the world.” Hawley also said the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) hasn’t conducted a full review of the platform or demanded that ByteDance, the Chinese-owned entity that owns TikTok, sell off its stake in the platform. Yellen is the chairperson of the CFIUS, an interagency committee that is authorized to review certain transactions involving foreign investment in the U.S. and certain real estate transactions by foreign persons. The senator also noted how the Chinese government partnered with TikTok in 2019 to surveil Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, saying that the Chinese platform “censored American user content critical of this repression.” “This simply heightens the stakes of the TikTok question: the longer this app is allowed to operate in the U.S., the longer its Chinese Communist Party overseers will apparently be able to propagandize Americans,” Hawley said in his letter. “That is unacceptable.”

Republican congressman says labor crunch biggest threat to US cybersecurity -Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.) said during a Thursday morning event that labor shortages within the cyber sector present the biggest long-term threat to U.S. cybersecurity. “Workforce — in five years, if we don’t fix this workforce problem, that is probably the biggest threat that we have toward ensuring that when it comes to cybersecurity,” Garbarino said. The GOP lawmaker spoke at a panel hosted by Punchbowl News, where he discussed the future of cybersecurity and artificial intelligence’s (AI) place in it. Garbarino stressed that the workforce shortage in the cyber sector, which, according to cybersecurity workforce analytics platform Cyber Seek, currently sits at more than 570,000 job openings, creates opportunities for “bad actors” such as China, Russia, Iran and North Korea to “attack” companies and the U.S. government. It’s not only the shortage of workers that concerns Garbarino, but the pressure building across sectors to hire highly skilled workers equipped to fight against ransomware and other attacks. Garbarino began sharing these concerns about the ongoing labor crunch in June during a House Homeland Security Committee subpanel hearing. “We need not only enough people, but the right people with the right skills in the right jobs to meet the growing cyber threat,” Garbarino said. Former National Cyber Director Chris Inglis, who urged the government to hire more workers in cyber and tech during that same hearing, mentioned that the administration has “been successful in filling two-thirds of the jobs that have the word ‘cyber’ and [‘information technology’] in it, and that’s the good news.” However, he said that there is still more that needs to be done.

Researchers say service members’ personal information is easy to buy online -- It is “not difficult” to obtain the sensitive, personal information of American military service members, and brokers are selling such data on the open market, creating a risk to U.S. national security, a new report from Duke University says.Researchers at the university’s Sanford School of Public Policy easily bought the sensitive information of American active-duty service members and of veterans for up to $0.32 from various .org and .asia websites.The data includes nonpublic information about health, finances and religious practices, according to the study. Researchers said data brokers fail to use best practices on determining the identity of people, can sell data to third-party data brokers who can then sell to foreign countries and that “these inconsistent practices are highly unregulated by the U.S. government.”The ability to exploit such data poses a serious risk to national security, allowing bad actors to blackmail or damage a service member’s reputation.“An industry that builds and sells detailed profiles on Americans could be exploited by hostile actors to target military servicemembers and veterans, as a subset of the U.S. population,” they wrote, noting that foreign governments could also hack the collected data from brokers. “Many veterans often still know currently classified information, even if they are no longer active-duty members of the military.”Data brokers, operating in a multibillion-dollar industry, collect detailed personal information on nearly every American in the country to sell and share with other companies.Some data brokers include well-known credit reporting agencies such as Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, but also tech companies such as Oracle and smaller, private firms.The information they mine can be incredibly detailed, such as a person’s political beliefs, lifestyle habits and health conditions.

Former Meta staffer’s allegations renew calls for kids online safety bill - A former Meta employee told a Senate panel Tuesday that the company’s top executives dismissed warnings about teens on Instagram facing unwanted sexual advances and widespread bullying. The allegations from Arturo Béjar, a former Facebook engineer who later returned to the company as a consultant, renewed a push for a bipartisan child online safety bill that would regulate Meta and other social media giants. The hearing highlighted the rare bipartisan support in the Senate for the issue of kids’ safety online. Senators on both sides of the aisle doubled down on the need for Congress to take urgent action, specifically rallying around the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA). “No parent or child can trust Facebook, or Meta, after this whistleblower’s powerful account, laying bare their denial and deception,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), chair of the subcommittee and a lead sponsor of KOSA. “Congress must act. It must pass the Kids Online Safety Act,” Blumenthal added. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), the ranking member of the subcommittee, said it was time for Congress to take action “years ago,” and joined Blumenthal in calls for the bill to be brought to the floor this year. Béjar, who revealed his allegations in a Wall Street Journal report last week, alleged Meta executives know about the harm to kids and potential mitigation solutions, but chose not to act.

Political advertisers banned from using Meta’s generative AI tools -- Political advertisers will not be allowed to use Meta’s new generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools, the company said on Monday. Meta began rolling out its generative AI features for advertisers, which can create multiple backgrounds and versions of ad text and automatically adjust image and video sizing, in early October. However, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram said in a note on Monday that they cannot be used by advertisers running ads “for Housing, Employment or Credit or Social Issues, Elections, or Politics, or related to Health, Pharmaceuticals or Financial Services.” “We believe this approach will allow us to better understand potential risks and build the right safeguards for the use of Generative AI in ads that relate to potentially sensitive topics in regulated industries,” Meta said. The new rule, which was first reported by Reuters, was described by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) on Tuesday as a “step in the right direction.” “Deceptive AI has the potential to upend our democracy, making voters question whether videos they are seeing of candidates are real or fake,” Klobuchar said in a statement. “This decision by Meta is a step in the right direction, but we can’t rely on voluntary commitments alone.”

Lawmakers push 702 reauthorization requiring warrant to access info on Americans -A bipartisan group of Senate and House lawmakers introduced a bill Tuesday that would require the intelligence community to secure a warrant before tapping into information on Americans swept up during surveillance of foreigners abroad.Led by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the bill would reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act with significant reforms – including what one senior White House official called the “red line” of requiring the intelligence community to secure a warrant before peering at Americans’ data.The sponsors of the Government Surveillance Reform Act bring together lawmakers aligned on few issues beyond privacy, with Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) joining in the Senate, and Reps. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) opposite Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), flanking speakers in a press conference to roll out the bill.“Americans understand that it’s possible to confront our country’s adversaries ferociously, without throwing our constitutional rights into the garbage can,” Wyden said at a press conference to roll out the bill. “Our Founding Fathers made it clear that if government agencies want to read an American’s private communications, they should get — a — warrant,” he said, emphasizing the last three words.

Fear of Chinese dominance looms over Biden Treasury Department’s next rule on electric car tax credits - The Treasury Department is about to impose rules that could make it even harder to persuade Americans to buy electric cars — and already has Republicans primed to accuse President Joe Biden of aiding China. The department is expected to set rules in the coming weeks spelling out how hard a line it’s taking against electric vehicle batteries that contain ingredients from adversaries like China — a key issue for the EV tax breaks in Biden’s signature climate law. The tax credit — worth up to $7,500 per vehicle — is a major part of the administration’s strategy to get more electric vehicles on the road. But the law forbids offering the incentives for vehicles whose batteries have parts or minerals from hostile nations, in an attempt to counter China’s dominance of the industry and encourage the growth of a home-grown supply chain. The administration is well aware of the high stakes in how it opts to interpret that prohibition, both for the success of Biden’s climate ambitions and for his ability to persuade voters that his policies will bring jobs and prosperity. Setting a super strict bar against Chinese content could mean that virtually no electric cars and trucks qualify for the tax break, advocates for the auto industry say. But other industries, including domestic miners, have warned the administration that their own prospects would wither if Treasury leaves a wide-open door to battery ingredients from China. No matter what the department decides, Republicans including former President Donald Trump are already wielding the soft-on-China hammer against Biden, especially in must-win Michigan. Meanwhile, uncertainty over Treasury’s decision is freezing private investment in electric vehicle manufacturing in the United States, automakers say — at a time when the growth of EV sales is also slowing below what some manufacturers had expected.

Senators urge US to take steps to boost battery production, citing China (Reuters) - Two influential Democratic U.S. senators urged the Energy Department to take steps to boost U.S. battery manufacturing and next-generation battery research, citing China's dominance and export controls, according to a letter seen by Reuters. Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner and Energy Committee Chair Joe Manchin cited experts saying that the United States is "ten to twenty years behind Asia in commercialization of battery technology," and noted that China accounts for more than 75% of battery cell production. "The U.S. must become a leader in manufacturing batteries and battery components, while securing our supply chains for the materials that make up those components," the senators wrote in a previously unreported letter seen by Reuters, citing China's decision last month to restrict exports of graphite, critical to manufacturing battery anodes. China dominates the global EV battery supply chain including production of graphite - the single largest component. The letter noted in 2022 the United States produced less than 10% of lithium-ion batteries in 2022 and said demand is expected to grow over seven times by 2035. The letter wants a committee briefing by Dec. 1 "on ongoing research and development of next-generation battery technologies." Lithium-ion batteries, the Pentagon has said, are crucial to thousands of military systems from "handheld radios, to unmanned submersibles and to future capabilities like lasers, directed energy weapons and hybrid electric tactical vehicles," the letter noted. China accounts for 70% of the global production of lithium-ion batteries, the letter said, noting of five critical minerals required for most lithium-ion batteries, China "controls between 60-100% of the mining or refining for these minerals." The letter also said "it is critical that the U.S. lead in next-generation battery technology and alternative chemistries" and coordinate with the Department of Defense and other national security agencies "to support procurement of innovative, U.S.-developed energy storage technologies." A spokesperson for Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Senate votes in favor of rescinding Biden waiver of ‘Buy America’ requirements for steel, iron in EV chargers The Senate on Wednesday voted in favor of getting rid of the Biden administration’s exemption from “buy America” requirements for electric vehicle (EV) charger components. The vote was 50-48. Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Jon Tester (Mont.), as well as Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) voted with more Republicans in favor of removing the exemption. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) was the only Republican to vote “no.” It was intended to overturn a waiver issued by the Biden administration in February that exempted steel, iron and construction materials used to make electric vehicle chargers from the “Buy America” restrictions. The waiver allows the administration to fund chargers made with foreign materials through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. It will only apply if the final assembly of the chargers occurs in the U.S. The administration has a broader goal of building out a network of electric vehicle chargers to support the transition to electric vehicles and mitigate climate change. Adequate charging infrastructure is seen as a major hurdle in this shift. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who sponsored the resolution to get rid of the waiver, said in a written statement ahead of the vote that the administration is “directing taxpayer dollars toward foreign-made EV chargers.” Ahead of the vote, the White House threatened to veto it, arguing that the resolution would actually undermine domestic manufacturing for the chargers. This is because without the waiver, chargers would fall under a general Reagan-era waiver exempting most manufactured products from the “Buy America” requirements, the White House said. “The Administration’s policy immediately requires that EV chargers purchased through FHWA grants be manufactured in the United States,” the White House said. “The policy is also phasing in additional Buy America domestic content requirements for EV chargers over the next year to align with the thresholds set forth by Congress,” it added. Supporters of the administration’s policy also pointed to investments that have recently been made in domestic electric vehicle charging. “Since enacting the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law nearly two years ago, the electric vehicle charging industry has announced investments of over $500 million in more than 40 plants for assembling American-made EV chargers,” said Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) in a floor speech.“ These plants — in states like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, North Carolina and other states — are bringing more manufacturing jobs back to the U.S.”

Farm bill faces battle as GOP pushes to strip climate, SNAP funding for subsidies Congress appears unlikely to pass a new farm bill by the end of this year amid standoffs over Republicans’ push to extend subsidies to three specific Southern crops — at the potential cost of billions in both food aid and popular farm conservation programs. Funding for farm bill programs is currently set to expire at the end of the year. Senate leaders say they’ll need to extend it — possibly through a separate measure that would keep the government funded — to buy more time for negotiations. But in the House, Republicans are pressuring newly minted Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to pass a new farm bill this year. On Friday, House Agriculture Committee ranking member David Scott (D-Ga.) called on the committee to pass a temporary one-year extension to the bill instead. “The extremism and cynicism that has taken hold of the broader House Republican Conference makes a five-year farm bill reauthorization by the year’s end increasingly unlikely,” he said. That’s a prospect that committee Chairman Glenn Thompson (R-Pa.) on Thursday told The Hill he was open to. “With how the Senate is proceeding, we’re not going to have a [combined] farm bill by January,” he said, adding that the bill would require an “extension” to make sure programs don’t run out. But he also said that he thinks the Republican-controlled House can finish the full legislation this year — a punishing timeline that would require drafting, debating, and voting on the mammoth $1.4 trillion bill over just a few weeks in December. Getting the bill across the finish line will also require the GOP-controlled House to reach a compromise with the Democratic-majority Senate, which promises to be a tough battle. And the consequences of not extending funding through either a stopgap measure or a new bill by the end of the year would be dire, threatening food aid and farm payments for tens of millions of Americans. Republicans make contentious push for select crop subsidies In brief, the proposal Thompson laid out aims to increase subsidies for a few select crops — peanuts, cotton and rice — which are the only commodities that won’t get automatic price increases under the prior 2018 farm bill. To pay for this increase, Republican supporters of those programs want to cut food aid and take money from $20 billion previously allocated to conservation payments backed by Democrats, environmental groups and a wide array of farm groups. Thompson argues this move is necessary because “at least two of those commodities are really upside down right now,” or facing expenses above the market prices of their products — an apparent allusion to cotton and peanuts. To get more money to farmers growing those crops, Thompson proposed increases to an obscure farm welfare program, the Agricultural Risk Coverage/Price Loss Coverage (ARC/PLC) Program, which is intended to insulate farmers against sudden crashes in market prices for their crops. To determine how much farmers should be paid, each of the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) 22 covered commodities — from corn to cotton — have a set “reference price.” Broadly speaking, if market prices in a county fall below that price, farmers get a check for the difference. But critics say the proposed increases to the ARC/PLC will direct money only to a few thousand of the nation’s biggest farmers at the expense of programs that benefit all of them.

House GOP approves cutting EPA budget by nearly 40 percent - House Republicans approved legislation Friday that would slash nearly 40 percent of the budget for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The funding bill, passed by a 213-203 vote, cuts 39 percent of the EPA’s budget and would be the smallest budget the agency has had in three decades. Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), Mike Lawler (N.Y.) and Marc Molinaro (N.Y.) voted against the bill, while Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (Texas) was recorded as voting for it. Republicans have had longstanding complaints about the agency, which takes on pollution, contamination and climate change, arguing that it overreaches. Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho), who chairs the subcommittee that wrote the bill, characterized the funding reductions it would deliver as necessary to curtail Inflation and the national debt. “Cutting funding is never easy or pretty, but with the national debt in excess of $33 trillion and inflation at an unacceptable level, we had to make tough choices to rein in federal spending,” Simpson said on the floor Thursday. The massive funding cut proposed by the GOP has virtually no chance of becoming law in this year’s budget but marks a starting point in negotiations for Republicans as they look to negotiate with Democrats in the Senate on funding the government. The bill is one of 12 annual government funding bills Republicans hoped to have passed by a Nov. 17 deadline to prevent a shutdown. However, Republicans face a challenge in staying unified on spending as they look to approve the remaining five bills in the tight window. In addition to the top-line EPA cuts, the GOP bill would also rescind provisions from the climate, tax and health care bill that Democrats passed last year. It targets funding aimed at helping underserved communities combat climate change and pollution. It additionally seeks to defund the EPA’s efforts to curtail toxic pollution and planet-warming emissions, preventing the agency from using funding to enforce its rules on power plants. The bill would also deliver cuts, albeit less dramatic ones, to the Interior Department, reducing its funding by about 4.5 percent. It delivers a steeper cut of 13 percent to the National Park Service. The legislation would also require the Biden administration pursue drilling off the coast of Alaska, where the administration does not currently plan to offer new oil lease sales. It would require the administration to auction off the right to drill for oil there at least twice a year and would also require twice-a-year-oil lease sales in regions of the Gulf of Mexico. The bill looks drastically different from its counterpart in the Senate, which calls for $7 billion more in total funding than the legislation passed in the House and was approved with overwhelming bipartisan support in committee earlier this year.

Biden announces $16.4B in new funding for Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor The Biden administration will announce a $16.4 billion investment for rail projects along Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor on Monday as part of the overall investments in infrastructure by President Biden, a longtime Amtrak user. The funding will go to 25 passenger rail projects and will come from the bipartisan infrastructure law’s overall $66 billion investment in rail. The projects are an effort to move “the United States closer to his vision for world-class passenger rail,” an official said. Biden will travel to Wilmington, Del., to make the announcement, officials said. As a senator, the president took the Amtrak for decades while commuting to Washington, D.C. The projects include rebuilding 100-year-old tunnels and bridges, upgrading tracks, power systems, signals and stations, and advancing future projects that aim to improve travel times by increasing operating speeds and reducing delays. The administration is also aiming to “ensure that train service is more convenient and climate-friendly than either driving or flying,” officials said. Officials noted the Northeast Corridor, which runs from Boston to D.C., supports 800,000 trips per day and is the most heavily traveled rail corridor in the U.S. The $16.4 billion will be dispersed through nearly $9 billion in fiscal 2022 and 2023 funds and $7.4 billion in future commitments. The Frederick Douglass Tunnel in Maryland will receive $4.7 billion to replace the tunnel, which officials said will increase the speed of the train from 30 mph to 110 mph. The Gateway Hudson River Tunnel in New York and New Jersey will receive $3.8 billion to replace the tunnel that was damaged by Superstorm Sandy in 2012.

House GOP attempts to cut Buttigieg salary to $1 via spending bill -- House Republicans moved to reduce Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s salary to $1, as lawmakers debate spending bills ahead of the government funding deadline next week.The salary cut for Buttigieg was put forth by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and adopted by voice vote as an amendment to the 2024 Transpiration and Housing and Urban Development spending bill.“Pete Buttigieg doesn’t do his job. It’s all about fake photo ops and taxpayer-funded private jet trip to accept LGBTQ awards for him,” Green posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “I’m happy my amendment passed, but he doesn’t deserve a single penny.”The underlying bill needs to be approved by the full House and is unlikely to be approved by the Senate.The Holman Rule — which gives members the ability to propose amendments for appropriations bills that decrease the salaries for specific federal workers or programs to $1, essentially defunding them — was reintroduced in January when House Republicans adopted a rules package following Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) battle to become speaker.It’s not the first time Greene and other Republicans have taken to the rule to slash salaries to target sending by the Biden administration. Greene offered another amendment reducing pay for Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in September.House Republicans are at odds over how to prevent a government shutdown that would begin in just over a week, and it remains to be seen whether the conference will rally behind new Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).A number of the proposals discussed in a House GOP conference meeting Tuesday would be non-starters in the Senate, which is moving ahead with its own strategy. Senate leaders and appropriators are considering a proposal to combine the remaining nine unpassed Senate appropriations bills into one large “maxi-bus” package.

House GOP pulls second funding bill in a week - House Republicans pulled their annual financial services and general government funding bill Thursday amid divisions on abortion-related provisions and FBI funding. It was the second time in a week GOP leaders opted to punt a vote on a funding bill over divisions within the party. GOP leadership hoped to pass the conference’s partisan plan laying out fiscal 2024 funding for the White House, the Treasury Department and other offices this week. But a planned vote was pulled at the last minute Thursday as the conference struggled to unify behind the measure. Some moderate Republicans came out in opposition against language seeking to prohibit Washington, D.C., from carrying out a law that aims to protect people from employer discrimination based on their reproductive health decisions. “I think that we need to be much more respectful of the difficult decision that women have to make,” Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-N.Y.) said of the thorny policy rider Wednesday. “I think we need to respect the city’s determination, and I think it’s a provision that is unnecessary in the bill.” He told reporters shortly ahead of the planned vote Thursday that he was prepared to vote against the measure and suggested “there’s probably about five to eight of us that have expressed a concern regarding the one provision being placed in the bill.” In the House Republicans’ narrow majority, just a handful of members can sink any partisan bill. The bill has also faced opposition from the right flank amid scrutiny of the FBI, as some conservatives have accused the agency of political weaponization. An amendment pushed by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) earlier this week sought to bar funding from being used “for the acquisition of property” for a new FBI headquarters. “I don’t believe that the FBI deserves a massive new headquarters or Washington field office,” he said, while accusing the agency of working to “censor factual information harmful to their preferred political candidates.” Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), who heads the subcommittee that crafted the bill, pushed back on Gaetz’s criticism at the time, saying, “it is bad policy for the Congress to be taking steps to deny a federal agency that is in serious need, in my opinion, of an improvement to their headquarters.” “Notice I said improvement,” Womack said on the floor. “I didn’t say some massive big expansion, necessarily. But what I do know is that when I toured the FBI headquarters, I saw it in a state of disrepair that is going to need the attention of the owners of that property. And that’s us.” But other conservatives are still critical of FBI funding. Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) signaled he was a part of that camp in remarks to reporters Thursday, while saying he also planned to vote against the bill. “FBI was a big deal. I raised that on the floor with Womack. It’s in disrepair. Well, the FBI is in disrepair as well,” he said, adding the bill didn’t go far enough to cut spending. “I mean, we’re just nibbling around the edges,” Norman said, telling The Hill that the public is “tired of just going around in circles, and [if] we’re not going to cut, let’s just tell the American people we’re going bankrupt.” The bill is among the 12 annual government funding bills House Republicans sought to pass this month as they look to strengthen their hand in spending talks with Senate Democrats later this year.

Where are the 12 US government funding bills to avert shutdown? (Reuters) - Congress is staring down a Nov. 17 deadline for avoiding U.S. government shutdowns and likely will have to approve a short-term spending bill giving lawmakers more time to negotiate on the 12 bills to fund federal programs through Sept. 30, 2024.The Democratic-controlled Senate and Republican-controlled House of Representatives have struggled for months over their respective bills. Once passed, the two chambers would then have to agree on compromise versions before sending them to President Joe Biden for signing into law.But first, the House and Senate would have to agree upon the overall dollar amount of spending for the 12 bills combined. They have been battling over that figure since May, with the House seeking a lower level than the Senate, which has written its bills in accordance with an agreement reached by Biden and former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.Here is a rundown of the status of the 12 appropriations bills.

House Speaker Mike Johnson proposes 2-step stopgap funding bill to avert government shutdown - House Speaker Mike Johnson unveiled his proposal on Saturday to avoid a partial government shutdown by extending government funding for some agencies and programs until Jan. 19, and continuing funding for others until Feb. 2.The approach is unusual for a stopgap spending bill. Usually, lawmakers extend funding until a certain date for all programs. Johnson decided to go with the combination approach, addressing concerns from GOP lawmakers seeking to avoid being presented with a massive spending bill just before the holidays."This two-step continuing resolution is a necessary bill to place House Republicans in the best position to fight for conservative victories," Johnson said in a statement after speaking with GOP lawmakers in an afternoon conference call. "The bill will stop the absurd holiday-season omnibus tradition of massive, loaded up spending bills introduced right before the Christmas recess."The bill excludes funding requested by President Biden for Israel, Ukraine and the U.S. border with Mexico. Johnson said separating Biden's request for an emergency supplemental bill from the temporary, stopgap measure "places our conference in the best position to fight for fiscal responsibility, oversight over Ukraine aid, and meaningful policy changes at our Southern border."Hardline conservatives, usually loathe to support temporary spending measures of any sort, had indicated they would give Johnson some leeway to pass legislation, known as a continuing resolution, or CR, to give Congress more time to negotiate a long-term agreement.But, some were critical in their reactions following the conference call."My opposition to the clean CR just announced by the Speaker to the @HouseGOP cannot be overstated," Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, tweeted on X. "Funding Pelosi level spending & policies for 75 days - for future 'promises.'"The federal government is operating under funding levels approved last year by a Democratic-led House and Senate. Facing a government shutdown when the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, Congress passed a 47-day continuing resolution that funds the government through Nov. 17, but the fallout was severe. Rep. Kevin McCarthy was booted from the speakership days later, and the House was effectively paralyzed for most of the month while Republicans tried to elect a replacement. Republicans eventually were unanimous in electing Johnson speaker, but his elevation has hardly eased the dynamic that led to McCarthy's removal — a conference torn on policy as well as how much to spend on federal programs. This past week, Republicans had to pull two spending bills from the floor - one to fund transportation and housing programs and the other to fund the Treasury Department, Small Business Administration and other agencies - because they didn't have the votes in their own party to push them through the House.

Analyst dubs Speaker’s stopgap funding bill a ‘disaster’ Political analyst Larry Sabato criticized Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) two-tier stop-gap government funding bill as a “disaster” on Saturday, after days of internal negotiations over the best way to fund the government.“It’s a disaster. Everybody knows it’s a disaster,” Sabato said in a CNN interview Saturday. “Even if it passes the House, which is hardly assured — there will be all kinds of plans and objections and the rest of it — the Senate isn’t going to go along with this and the President isn’t going to go along with this.”Johnson’s plan makes some government funding run out on Jan. 19 with the remainder running out on Feb. 2, a novel strategy meant to discourage omnibus bills.“This two-step continuing resolution is a necessary bill to place House Republicans in the best position to fight for conservative victories,” Johnson said in a statement on Saturday. “The bill will stop the absurd holiday-season omnibus tradition of massive, loaded up spending bills introduced right before the Christmas recess.”“Separating out the CR from the supplemental funding debates places our conference in the best position to fight for fiscal responsibility, oversight over Ukraine aid, and meaningful policy changes at our Southern border,” he continued.It’s already faced pushback from Democrats as well a s some Republicans.

Biden administration decries GOP funding cuts to financial services — — The Biden administration said that a proposed funding slash to the Treasury Department could delay critical rule rollouts and hamper agencies' ability to police financial institutions, spurring the White House to promise to veto the bill should it reach the president's desk. A House funding bill, the latest skirmish in a long conflict between lawmakers that threatened to shut down the federal government in mid-November, would provide the Treasury Department with $13 billion in discretionary funding, $1.2 billion less than the previous fiscal year. While the Republican House bill may still be amended before it comes up for a vote, it represents the beginning of a new round of budget negotiations between the administration and House Republicans, and shows the distance between the two parties. Specifically, it does so in how both parties see the oversight of banks and other financial institutions, and how much money they're willing to allocate to that end. The Biden administration laid out its views in an Office of Management and Budget report.Among other line items, the administration said that a reduction in funding to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network could delay the rollout of the beneficial ownership rule, "undercutting a critical anti-money-laundering initiative and reducing support for the small businesses that will be required to use the new system."The Community Development Financial Institution Fund, which provides liquidity to CDFIs, would also be cut by $45 million under the GOP bill. "This reduction would decrease financial assistance and technical assistance awards to certified and emerging CDFIs, reducing economic opportunity in economically distressed communities, including rural and urban areas," the Biden administration said in the report.

House GOP Coronavirus Panel Subpoenas Health Department Official - Bloomberg Law

• Republicans accuse HHS official of deliberate non-compliance
• Democrats, agency call the subpoena “another” distraction

A House special subcommittee is serving a senior Biden administration health official with a subpoena, alleging she spent months evading questioning from lawmakers related to their probe into Covid’s origins.The Republican heads of three oversight panels notified the Department of Health and Human Services on Thursday that Assistant Secretary for Legislation Melanie Anne Egorin must testify at a deposition on Nov. 16. The letter notified HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra of the subpoena, sent by the House Oversight’s select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic. This is the latest subpoena from Republicans in their quest to probe the origin of the coronavirus...

Lawmakers introduce bill to classify 9-1-1 operators as first responders — Rep. Norma Torres (D-Calif.) says she still vividly remembers speaking with a child during her days as a 9-1-1 operator. “The only thing I could hear was thumping, really loud. Screams, horrific screams. Followed by five shots,” Torres said. Torres says she only got the call because her department did not have enough bilingual dispatchers. “I was still in training. I should not have been answering those calls,” Torres said. This is one of the many reasons why Torres and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Penn) introduced their bill to classify 9-1-1 operators as first responders, instead of clerical workers. “There’s legal protections that are not available for them because of that classification. There’s grants and funding that cannot flow to them because of that designation,” Fitzpatrick said. Fitzpatrick and Torres hope those added protection and resources will help keep more of the 9-1-1 operators currently facing burnout on the job. “The numbers are going down and as a citizen, the things you want when you call 9-1-1, you want them to pick up on the first ring, number one. Number two, you want them to be able to speak your language, and number three you want them to be trained to deal with your specific situation,” Fitzpatrick said. Fitzpatrick says the bill would also allow for improved training.

Supreme Court appears inclined to uphold gun ban for domestic abusers -- A majority of Supreme Court justices leaned toward upholding a federal law criminalizing gun possession for people under domestic violence restraining orders during oral arguments Tuesday. The case follows several landmark Supreme Court decisions that expanded gun rights over the past 15 years, with the dispute marking the justices’ first plenary Second Amendment case since they established a new legal test last year. A Texas man’s challenge of his conviction under the domestic violence gun law has forced the justices to consider the limits of their recent expansion and perhaps clarify the test for lower courts that have voiced confusion. Zackey Rahimi was placed under a restraining order after he dragged his girlfriend, with whom he has a child, in a parking lot and attempted to shoot a witness. Rahimi later participated in a series of five shootings, court filings show, and was indicted on the gun charge after police searched Rahimi’s home and found a rifle and a pistol. Several justices during Tuesday’s argument directed fierce questions at Rahimi’s public defender, J. Matthew Wright, appearing hesitant to rule Congress had no authority to prohibit him from possessing a gun. Although justices in both ideological camps expressed concerns with the Biden administration’s basic argument that the statute is constitutional because Congress can disarm people who are not “law-abiding, responsible citizens,” several justices instead suggested using a dangerousness standard to resolve the case. “It’s a facial challenge, and I understand your answer to say that there will be circumstances where someone could be shown to be sufficiently dangerous, that the firearm can be taken from him. And why isn’t that the end of the case?” Chief Justice John Roberts asked Wright. Justice Samuel Alito, one of the court’s leading conservatives, however, probed some legal groups’ arguments that domestic violence protective orders are sometimes granted quickly in a “he said, she said situation.” “The person thinks that he or she is in danger and wants to have a firearm,” Alito said. “Is the person’s only recourse to possess the firearm and take their chances if they get prosecuted?” Liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor then chimed in to note Alito’s hypothetical was not the facts of the case at hand. Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative, repeatedly read directly from Rahimi’s protective order and noted the claims submitted by his girlfriend. Conservative Justice Clarence Thomas similarly asked questions about facts underlying Rahimi’s specific case. “She did submit a sworn affidavit giving quite a lot of detail about the various threats, right?” Barrett asked. “So it’s not just like he showed up and the judge said, ‘Credible finding of violence.’” Multiple justices also accused Wright of changing his argument to avoid facing how it could be leveraged to strike down other laws. “I’m so confused,” Barrett told Wright at one point.

Mike Johnson has accused Biden of bribery. Now impeachment is in his hands - House Republicans are approaching their Biden impeachment inquiry with renewed vigor following the election of Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who has cautioned against rushing an investigation even as he’s previously accused the president of bribery. As Speaker, Johnson has stressed a reserved approach to impeachment, invoking the founders in calling it the “heaviest power that we have,” while saying he has no predetermined outcome. But as a prominent voice of the House Judiciary Committee, he was vocal in criticizing President Biden, at one point saying bribery is “what happened here.” House Republicans have failed to demonstrate that Biden took a bribe — an allegation that surfaced as a result of a conversation with a Ukrainian oligarch that came to the FBI in a tip the bureau was unable to verify. The White House has vigorously denied any wrongdoing by Biden and noted that even as Republicans have pored over the business dealings of his brother and son, they’ve failed to connect the president to their work overseas. But as Johnson takes the helm from a former Speaker who at times seemed reluctant to pursue the matter, he said last week the House would soon have to determine how to move forward with an investigation shared across three committees. “I do believe that very soon we are coming to a point of decision on it,” he said Thursday. “I have been very consistent, intellectually consistent in this, and persistent that we have to follow due process, and we have to follow the law,” he said. “That means following our obligation on the Constitution and doing appropriate investigations in the right way at the right pace, so that the evidence comes in, and we follow the evidence where it leads. You follow the truth where it leads.” While the GOP has fanned the flames, it has yet to find a smoking gun that implicates the president of directly benefiting from his family’s international business dealings or making policy decisions as vice president because of them. The crux of the allegations stem back to Biden’s efforts as vice president to remove Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin. Republicans argue those moves were not because of Shokin’s failure to address corruption, as Biden has said, but rather to benefit Biden’s son, who was serving on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma at the time. But Biden’s actions were in line with those of the international community, and State Department correspondence from the time shows the U.S. withheld aid to Ukraine due to concern about Shokin’s failure to make meaningful reforms. Johnson, however, has expressed confidence that Biden was involved in wrongdoing. “The president bribed or pressured a foreign leader to fire that country’s top prosecutor because the prosecutor was investigating his son, and he used $1 billion of U.S. taxpayer money to have that bidding done, and then he bragged about it on video,” he said on Fox News in August, referring to Biden’s past comments about Shokin’s ouster.

Biden allies look to mitigate fallout over latest dismal poll - The White House and the Biden campaign are working to tamp down Democratic anxieties over the latest set of polling showing President Biden trailing former President Trump in several key swing states. Biden allies and campaign officials largely shrugged off the New York Times/Siena College poll released Sunday, noting it was a full year away from when voters will cast their ballots. And they noted then-President Barack Obama faced a similarly dire outlook in 2011, when he was seeking reelection. While some current and former Biden aides acknowledged the latest poll painted an unflattering picture, they dismissed the idea that the sky is falling on the president’s chances and pushed back hard against the suggestion that he should consider stepping aside as the party’s presumptive nominee. “Two things can be true: One, the polls are concerning, yes. It’s hard to say the sky is red when it’s blue, right? It’s a bad poll. But polls are a report card … for this moment in time. The grade you get today does not mean it’s the grade you’re going to get next week or next year,” Michael LaRosa, a former aide to first lady Jill Biden, said on CNN. The poll found Biden trailing Trump, the front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination, in five out of six battleground states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania — while leading Trump in Wisconsin. Biden carried all six states in 2020, and they will likely determine the winner of the 2024 election. More voters trusted Trump on the economy and foreign policy, the poll found, and it showed Biden losing support among young voters and Black voters, two key demographics that helped propel him to the White House in 2020. The New York Times poll followed months of polls that have found voters are concerned about Biden’s age, that they don’t approve of his handling of the economy and that his approval ratings remain mired around 40 percent. But Biden aides have repeatedly dismissed the fixation on polling, arguing it was not predictive of Biden’s success in 2020 and that it’s too soon to be predictive of his fate in 2024. “Predictions more than a year out tend to look a little different a year later. Don’t take our word for it: Gallup predicted an eight-point loss for President Obama only for him to win handily a year later. Or a year out from the 2022 midterms, when every major outlet similarly predicted a grim forecast for President Biden,” Biden campaign spokesperson Kevin Munoz said.

Axelrod suggests Biden drop out of 2024 presidential race - Former President Obama’s senior adviser David Axelrod on Sunday suggested President Bidendrop out of the 2024 presidential race in the wake of a new poll showing the incumbent trailing former President Trump.Pointing to a New York Times and Siena College poll published Sunday, Axelrod wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter: “It’s very late to change horses; a lot will happen in the next year that no one can predict & Biden’s team says his resolve to run is firm.”Arguing Biden is “justly proud of his accomplishments,” Axelrod said Biden’s poll numbers will “send tremors of doubt” through the Democratic Party.“Not ‘bed-wetting,'” but legitimate concern, Axelrod wrote.“Trump is a dangerous, unhinged demagogue whose brazen disdain for the rules, [norms], laws and institutions or democracy should be disqualifying,” Axelrod wrote in a separate post.“But the stakes of miscalculation here are too dramatic to ignore.”“Only @JoeBiden can make this decision,” he continued. “If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party. What he needs to decide is whether that is wise; whether it’s in HIS best interest or the country’s?” The poll found Biden trailing Trump in five out of six battleground states including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania by margins of 3 to 10 percentage points among registered voters. In Wisconsin, Biden was ahead by 2 percentage points, according to the poll.The poll’s findings serve as a major blow to Biden’s campaign after the incumbent carried all six states in 2020 when up against Trump, The New York Times reported.Biden’s reelection campaign has faced growing concerns from voters within his own party over his age and policy actions on various issues, notably the economy.The poll found that 71 percent of registered voters said they agree to some degree that Biden is “just too old to be an effective president,” while only 39 percent said the same about Trump.Asked if Biden has the “mental sharpness to be an effective president,” 62 percent of participants said no, while 35 percent agreed with the statement. Meanwhile, 52 percent of participants said they believe Trump has the mental sharpness to be an effective president, while 44 percent said he does not.

Washington Post reports Trump plan to deploy military against political opponents if he returns to the White House -- Ex-president Donald Trump and his aides are discussing plans to invoke the Insurrection Act on January 20, 2025, his first day in office if he wins the 2024 presidential election, and then use the military against political opponents, the Washington Post reported on its website Sunday. The main target of this operation would be the mass protests that Trump and his fascist advisers fully expect to erupt should Trump return to the White House in 2025. It would be millions of working people and youth who would bear the brunt of police-military violence. This would be accompanied by an across-the-board effort to prosecute those targeted by Trump for “retribution,” including both Democrats like President Joe Biden and former officials of the Trump administration whom Trump came to regard as disloyal, such as former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, a retired general, and former Attorney General William Barr. The Post report gives only a brief examination of the dangers of a military coup ordered by a re-elected Trump, and none at all to the danger of intervention by the military or fascist mobs in the event of a closely contested or disputed presidential election The article focuses instead primarily on Trump’s plans for legal retaliation against Biden and “disloyal” Republicans, declaring, “Donald Trump and his allies have begun mapping out specific plans for using the federal government to punish critics and opponents should he win a second term, with the former president naming individuals he wants to investigate or prosecute… “In private, Trump has told advisers and friends in recent months that he wants the Justice Department to investigate onetime officials and allies who have become critical of his time in office, including his former chief of staff, John Kelly, and former attorney general William P. Barr, as well as his ex-attorney Ty Cobb and former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Mark A. Milley. … Trump has also talked of prosecuting officials at the FBI and Justice Department, a person familiar with the matter said.”

JD Vance: Ohio’s abortion vote ‘was a gut punch’ - Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) says his state’s vote Tuesday to enshrine abortion rights “was a gut punch” for anti-abortion officials such as himself. In a lengthy post online, Vance, who campaigned against the effort to ensure abortion access, attempted to parse out why the measure won with support from nearly 57 percent of voters. “For pro lifers, last night was a gut punch. No sugar coating it,” he wrote. “We have to recognize how much voters mistrust us (meaning elected Republicans) on this issue,” he added. “Having an unplanned pregnancy is scary. Best case, you’re looking at social scorn and thousands of dollars of unexpected medical bills. We need people to see us as the pro-life party, not just the anti-abortion party.” Abortion rights proponents have celebrated the Ohio vote. “The results in Ohio underscore what the vast majority of Americans believe: politicians should not interfere in decisions that should be between a woman and her doctor,” Vice President Harris said in a statement. It’s the latest state where voters have taken to the polls to stop restrictions on abortion access after the Supreme Court eliminated Roe v. Wade last year. States including Montana, Kentucky and Kansas have also voted in support of abortion rights after the high court’s ruling.

Republicans struggle for way out of abortion quagmire The GOP’s election losses Tuesday underscored the political quicksand they find themselves in when it comes to abortion. Republican candidates tried to reframe and moderate their positions on the issue and sought to paint Democrats as too extreme heading into this week’s contests. But the party found itself on the defensive in deep-red and purple states alike, including Ohio, Kentucky and Virginia. In some of the highest-profile races of the night, Republicans — and the anti-abortion movement in general — lost decisively. “The more we talk about abortion, the worse we’re doing,” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) told reporters Wednesday. Instead, he said Republicans should focus on talking about improving the economy and bringing down the high cost of living. But the results showed reproductive rights remains an energizing issue for voters more than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, leaving Republicans frustrated after another round of losses and without a clear idea of how to move forward. “You have to … say, ‘Look, this isn’t working,’” said Patrick Brown, a fellow at the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center. “We need to figure out not just new messaging, although I think that’s important, but in some cases it’s going to require new positions and messier compromises than we’ve been pushing for.” Yet when the issue of abortion eventually emerged Wednesday during the third GOP debate, none of the candidates broke new ground in their answers, and none could agree on how best to move forward. “I think of all the stuff that’s happened to the pro-life cause — they have been caught flat-footed on these referenda, and they have been losing the referenda,” said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), following a referendum in Ohio the night before that enshrined abortion rights into the state constitution. DeSantis said Republicans and abortion opponents must “do a better job on” those ballot measures and referendums. Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley leaned into familiar messaging, saying that the country needed to find a “consensus” because Republicans do not have the 60 votes needed in the Senate to pass any nationwide ban. “Let’s agree on what — how we can ban late-term abortions. Let’s make sure we encourage adoptions and good quality adoptions. Let’s make sure we make contraception accessible,” Haley said. Meanwhile, Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) pushed several of his fellow 2024 rivals to back a national 15-week ban, though such a bill was introduced in the Senate last year and never advanced. Biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, for his part, pointed to issues such as access to contraception, adoption and “sexual responsibility for men.” Those comments came against the backdrop of an election night in which abortion was seen as the major factor propelling Democratic candidates to victory, even when the issue wasn’t directly on the ballot.

Ramaswamy shuts down suggestion that comment about Haley’s daughter was low blow -Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy denied that citing former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s daughter on the GOP debate stage Wednesday was a “low blow” in a post-debate conversation with CNN’s Dana Bash.During the debate, Ramaswamy went after Haley for criticizing his use of Tiktok.“She made fun of me for actually joining TikTok, while her own daughter was actually using the app for a long time,” he said.Haley immediately shot back.“Leave my daughter out of your voice,” she said before referring to Ramaswamy as “scum.”Ramaswamy said the comment was a snide critique of Haley’s parenting.“The error is somebody sanctimoniously lecturing the rest of the country about the perils of [TikTok] while actually failing to set an example of leadership a little closer to home,” he said. “We have to show up and engage with the next generation. That’s the point I was making, and I stand by it.”Ramaswamy called out other GOP candidates for refusing to use the app, which he has embraced in an attempt to court younger voters.“I think that this is part of my problem with the older generation of Republicans,” he said. “They say, ‘Well, TikTok has some vague bad things with China,’ failing to recognize even American-owned companies hand over their user data to China.”

Haley calls Ramaswamy ‘scum’: ‘Leave my daughter out of your voice’ - Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley blasted entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy as “scum” after he brought up her daughter on Wednesday night’s third Republican presidential debate stage in Miami. “In the last debate, she made fun of me for actually joining TikTok while her own daughter was actually using the app for a long time. So you might want to take care of your family first,” Ramaswamy said as the candidates clashed over the video-sharing app, which is owned by Beijing-based parent company ByteDance. “Leave my daughter out of your voice,” Haley said. “You’re just scum.” The exchange prompted boos from the audience at the debate. “You have her supporters propping her up, that’s fine,” Ramaswamy quipped. Winners and losers from the third Republican debate TikTok emerged as a key talking point in the debate as the GOP White House hopefuls sparred over foreign policy. The app has come under scrutiny, with many calling for a ban in the U.S. “The next generation of Americans are using it,” Ramaswamy said of the app. Haley and Ramaswamy took the stage in Miami alongside three other fellow Republican White House contenders: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott. The GOP front-runner, former President Trump, didn’t participate.

Trump seeks to fuel outrage with NY witness stand appearance -- Former President Trump went on offense during a contentious day of testimony in a New York civil fraud trial, lashing out repeatedly at the judge and prosecutors in the case and bolstering his political operation’s claims about the trial. While the former president’s lengthy rants against the prosecutors and judge handling the case may not benefit him legally, Trump’s combative testimony dominated cable news and further fueled the former president’s preferred narrative that the case against him and his business is politically motivated. Trump’s testimony was a focal point of coverage on cable news throughout the day. Even CNN, which has at times avoided airing his commentary because it often contains misinformation, broadcast Trump’s comments as he departed the courtroom Monday. “We’re taking days and days, and weeks and weeks, and it goes on, and then you look at the outside world and what’s happening,” Trump told reporters assembled outside the courtroom Monday. “But of course they’re getting their wish because I don’t have to be here for the most part, but I sort of do have to be here because I want to be here, because it’s a scam,” he continued. “And this is a case that should have never been brought, and it’s a case that now should be dismissed. Everybody saw what happened today.” Trump took the stand Monday in a sweeping civil case alleging decades of fraud by him and his businesses. The attorney general’s office is asking for $250 million in financial penalties and a ban on Trump and his children from serving as officers or directors of New York companies. The former president has for months spun the narrative that he is a victim of politically motivated charges, even as those charges have piled up in separate cases in Washington, D.C., New York, Florida and Georgia. He has targeted New York Attorney General Letitia James in particular, lashing out repeatedly at the Democratic attorney general and accusing her of what amounts to election interference. The former president’s time on the witness stand at times appeared to be geared as much for a political audience as it was for those assembled in the courtroom. He frequently avoided directly answering questions, gave meandering answers and suggested the case against him was politically motivated as he lashed out at Judge Arthur Engoron and James. “We’re trying to figure out, why are you doing this?” Trump said at one point. “No one understands it. Well, I understand it — it’s called pol-i-tics,” he added. At the same time, Trump’s campaign operation was quick to seize on any comments from James or Engoron that could be perceived as biased.

‘I'm not a windmill person’: Trump takes the witness stand and doesn't break character - — Testimony by Donald Trump in a civil fraud trial Monday quickly descended into bitter sniping as Trump’s discursive answers and outbursts prompted the judge to repeatedly admonish him. During his four hours on the witness stand, the former president lost his temper and attacked the judge, railing against the person who will decide the fate of his business empire and suggesting one of his pretrial rulings was “very stupid.” Trump continually flouted the judge’s instructions to provide succinct and direct answers to questions, instead offering much of the political animus Trump typically deploys on the campaign trail. “It’s a terrible thing you’ve done. You know nothing about me,” Trump said to Justice Arthur Engoron during one verbal strike from the witness stand. “You believe that political hack back there,” he added, looking toward New York Attorney General Tish James, who brought the $250 million civil fraud case against Trump, his adult sons and officers in the Trump Organization. In a crucial pretrial ruling, the judge found that Trump systematically inflated his assets on financial statements to obtain favorable terms from banks and insurers. Because it is a bench trial, meaning there is no jury, Engoron will decide what penalties Trump and his company will face. Trump’s primary defense, which he has offered publicly since the start of the trial and which he repeated during his testimony, is that his financial statements contained “very, very powerful” disclaimers and therefore weren’t intended for use by banks or insurers. “We have a disclaimer clause that says do your own due diligence, don’t under any circumstances count on anything in here,” Trump said. Of the financial statements, he said: “If you were borrowing money … they were not really documents that the banks paid much attention to. They looked at the deal, they looked at the asset … but these were not very important.” After Trump launched into yet another monologue about the disclaimers, the judge stopped him. “No, no, no,” Engoron said. “We’re not going to hear about the disclaimer clause. If you want to hear about the disclaimer clause, read my opinion again — or for the first time, perhaps.” “You’re wrong in your opinion,” Trump replied, adding: “He called me a fraud and he didn’t know anything about me.” Aside from grimacing, Engoron didn’t react to Trump’s attacks. But the judge did become incensed at several points when Trump seemingly refused to answer questions he was being asked by a lawyer for the attorney general’s office. “I beseech you to control him if you can,” Engoron told Trump lawyer Chris Kise less than an hour into the former president’s turn on the witness stand. “If you can’t, I will,” the judge said. “I will excuse him and draw every negative inference that I can.” “This is not a political rally. This is a courtroom,” Engoron told Kise, ordering him to counsel his client to provide answers responsive to the questions.

Donald Trump testifies in New York civil fraud trial -- Donald Trump brought bombastic rhetoric to the witness stand Monday in the civil fraud case against him and his business, as he spent his time on the stand attacking the New York attorney general who brought the case and the judge overseeing the trial itself.Trump’s testimony at times mimicked his appearances on the campaign trail, where the former president has made the four criminal cases against him – along with the New York attorney general’s civil fraud case – a central part of his argument to be elected president again in 2024.Judge Arthur Engoron, who has clashed with Trump throughout the trial, at first tried to stop the former president’s political barbs and speechifying, telling his lawyer Chris Kise to “control your client” and threatening to have Trump removed as a witness. Eventually, the judge stropped trying to control Trump – he and the attorney general’s lawyer questioning Trump let him rant, and then mostly disregarded the missives.The high-stakes civil case strikes at the heart of Trump’s brand – his real estate empire. New York Attorney General Letitia James is suing Trump for $250 million and seeking to bar him from doing business in the state. Engoron has already ruled Trump and his co-defendants were liable for fraud. The New York attorney general’s office said they will rest their case after Ivanka Trump’s testimony on Wednesday.Here are some of the key takeaways from Trump's day on the stand:

• Trump's campaign comes to the courtroom: The former president’s rhetoric at times during his testimony might as well have been at one of his rallies in front of supporters. He went after the attorney general. The judge. And the “political witch hunt” that he’s been railing against for years now. On the witness stand, the charged rhetoric was even more remarkable, as he attacked the judge sitting right next to him, with James in the courtroom watching his testimony just feet away. “The fraud is on the court, not on me,” Trump said.
• Trump gets an angry response from the judge: Judge Engoron tried at the outset of Trump’s testimony to stop the former president from making speeches and instead answer the questions, but it did little to change Trump’s approach. The judge responded by threatening to remove Trump from the witness stand, though that didn’t deter the former president either. “This is not a political rally,” Engoron said to Trump, telling Trump's attorney Christopher Kise to “control your client.”
• Trump acknowledges changing valuation of Trump Tower triplex: The attorney general’s office pressed Trump on the properties central to his identity and brand: Mar-a-Lago, Trump Tower and other key parts of his real estate empire. The AG's office attorney Kevin Wallace also pressed Trump on why valuations of properties were changed, such as his Trump Tower triplex, which was devalued on his financial statement in 2017 after a Forbes article found he had dramatically exaggerated the size of the apartment. Trump acknowledged there had on occasion been mistakes, such as the Trump Tower apartment valuation.
• Trump’s descriptions of his properties: The former president’s rhetorical flourishes went beyond attacking those who are investigating him. He also took the opportunity to play salesman and play up his properties. One of his chief complaints about the judge is a citation in his decision that Mar-a-Lago was worth $18 million, a number based on Florida tax appraisal records “It’s much more valuable,” Trump said of Mar-a-Lago, “and we’ll show that in two weeks or five weeks or nine weeks or whenever this thing goes, that it’s biggest value is using it as a club.” Wallace took the answer to pin him down on that valuation. “You believe that as of today Mar-a-Lago is worth $1.5 billion?” Wallace asked. “I think between a billion and a billion-five,” Trump responded.

At Trump's New York fraud trial, judge makes clear who's in charge (Reuters) - As Donald Trump on Monday began using his time on the witness stand at his civil fraud trial to air grievances and avoid direct answers to questions, Arthur Engoron, the trial judge and a prime Trump target, decided enough was enough. "Mr. Kise, can you control your client?" Engoron asked Trump's lawyer, Christopher Kise. "This is not a political rally. This is a courtroom." It wasn't the first time the 74-year-old Engoron, a former taxicab driver who has spent two decades on the bench, lost patience with the defense in New York Attorney General Letitia James' lawsuit. James has accused Trump, his family business, his adult sons and many other defendants of manipulating financial statements, asset values and Trump's net worth to defraud banks and insurers. Since the trial began in a downtown Manhattan courtroom one month ago, Engoron has fined the former U.S. president twice for violating a gag order barring him from criticizing the judge's law clerk, and on Nov. 3 expanded that order to cover Trump's lawyers. Trump, a Republican, criticized James while on the witness stand, saying the Democrat "should be ashamed of herself" for leading what he again called a "political witch hunt."He was also unsparing with Engoron, a Democrat and American Civil Liberties Union member, telling the courtroom that on a question of law "I'm sure the judge will rule against me because he always rules against me."During Monday’s proceedings, Engoron threatened to cut off Trump’s defiant, often rambling testimony.When Trump resisted answering a yes-or-no question from a lawyer from James' office on the valuation of a Wall Street office tower, Engoron interrupted."We got another speech" from Trump, he told Kise. "I beseech you to control him if you can. If you can't, I will."

Trump and His Lawyers Dare N.Y. Judge to Throw Him in Jail - As Donald Trump prepared to take the stand in the civil fraud trial that could destroy his business empire, the ex-president and his attorneys settled on a strategy built on spite and unbridled antagonism. According to two sources familiar with the matter and another person briefed on Team Trump’s legal strategies, Trump and his lawyers want to intentionally provoke the judge into a nuclear-level overreaction.They certainly seem to be carrying out the plan on Monday. Trump dodged questions and ranted about this “haters” while on the witness stand, leading Judge Arthur Engoron to scold him repeatedly and push the former president’s attorneys to rein in their client. “I beseech you to control him if you can,” Engoron implored. “If you can’t, I will. I will excuse him and draw every negative inference that I can.”An explosive response from Engoron could include ordering Trump to be remanded to a jail cell for the night. The judge in the case had already imposed a gag order on Trump, warning him to refrain from attacks on the judge’s staff. Late last week, the order was expanded to also include Trump’s attorneys. Trump has still shown a brazen willingness to violate it repeatedly. And as bizarre as it may sound, there are attorneys and political advisers to Trump who have told the former president that a so-called “remand order” to put him in custody for repeatedly breaching the judge’s rulings might be a good thing — both legally and politically.The ex-president’s legal advisers had long ago told Trump that his chances of winning at trial are close to zero — hence, their scorched-earth, “Fyre Festival”-style courtroom performances. According to the three sources, several Trump attorneys and other key allies have advised him that the more the New York judge supposedly “overreacts” — including perhaps remanding Trump — the better their case for an appeal will be. “I call it the Chicago 7 disruption strategy,” Alan Dershowitz, the celebrity lawyer who defended then-President Trump during his first impeachment, tells Rolling Stone. “When a defendant honestly believes he can’t possibly get a fair trial from the judge, one of the tactics is to antagonize the judge to a point of causing reversible errors,” Dershowitz says. “That is what happened in the Chicago 7 case, and I was one of the lawyers on the appeal in that case. Abbie Hoffman provoked Judge Hoffman to such a degree that the judge made mistake after mistake. And courts of appeal often reverse convictions or verdicts when the judge has made serious errors.”In recent weeks, the former president and some of his lawyers in the New York civil fraud trial have discussed the likelihood of Engoron very aggressively responding to Trump team’s strategy of relentless hostility and defiance. The tactics have included attacks on Engoron’s court clerk, filibustering the prosecution’s witnesses with repetitive questions, and raising legal arguments the judge had already specifically prohibited. This has included Trump asking his legal advisers if the judge would, or could, actually go so far as to send him to jail for a short time, the sources tell Rolling Stone. Trump has been told such an order is probably unlikely — though Engoron has publicly put the option on the table. This is one reason why Trump and his counselors have kept up with their brazen strategy of infuriating a judge who has openly threatened the former president with possible jail time.

Trump attorney says New York attorney general is ‘just not that bright’ -- Former President Trump’s attorney Alina Habba went after New York Attorney General Letitia James on Monday, saying she’s “just not that bright.”James is leading the ongoing civil trial against Trump alleging that he and his adult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, spent years committing business fraud by inflating and deflating the value of their company’s assets.Habba, in a Newsmax interview Monday, said James doesn’t have a good case. However, Judge Arthur Engoron already ruled that the fraud occurred, and the ongoing trial is set to determine damages.“She’s just not that bright. I’m sorry, I have to say it,” Habba said. “I’ve seen their case; I’ve seen their lawyers. They don’t know what they’re talking about.”She argued that what the judge ruled is fraud is actually industry standard behavior.“Just because a bank who’s giving you a loan says it’s worth what the loan amount is, which is what happens when anybody takes a loan out, they’re never going to say the real value,” she continued. “They’re going to say what they want to say and not a penny more, or what the loan amount is and not a penny more.” “She needs to educate herself, maybe go to some — I don’t even know how to express how ridiculous this is,” Habba said. “It’s like being in a circus with a bunch of — I mean, what I want to say I can’t say on TV, but it’s crazy. You know, it’s just ridiculous. Anybody with a brain understands that this is just completely insane.”

Trump gag order expanded to his attorneys by New York judge - The New York judge overseeing former President Trump’s financial fraud trial on Friday extended a gag order issued in the case to Trump’s attorneys, barring them from making comments about his communications with his staff and saying the comments have spurred threats. Judge Arthur Engoron has already prohibited Trump from making public comments about his court staff after the former president attacked one of his clerks on social media after posting a picture of her with Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and falsely calling her Schumer’s “girlfriend.” Trump has since twice violated the order, racking up $15,000 in fines between the two incidents. But even amid the steep penalties for their client, Trump’s attorneys this week repeatedly questioned Engoron’s communication with court staff during the trial. “As I have stated on the record, seemingly to no avail, my law clerks are public servants who are performing their job in the manner in which I request. This includes providing legal authority and opinions, as well as responding to questions I pose to them. Plainly, defenders are not entitled to the confidential communications among me and my court staff,” he wrote in the order. The order bars Trump’s attorneys from commenting on his staff both in and out of court and warns failure to follow it will “result in serious sanctions.” \

Trump testimony wraps in New York civil fraud case: Recap - Former President Trump clashed frequently with the judge overseeing his New York fraud trial as the former president spent hours on the witness stand in Manhattan on Monday. Trump’s highly anticipated testimony grew chaotic, with the judge asking Trump’s attorney to take control of his client. The former president also ticked off his political grievances from the witness stand, to which the judge responded that the court hearing was “not a political rally.” The trial puts Trump’s long storied career as a real estate mogul and business executive in major jeopardy. At stake are Trump’s business licenses and the potential for him to lose control of some of his most famed properties.Follow below for live updates from The Hill’s Ella Lee in New York. Trump has finished testifying in his civil fraud case, following a contentious day of testy back-and-forth between the former president, the New York attorney general’s office and the judge. The former president may be called as a witness in the defense’s case, which is expected to begin later this week after Trump's daughter Ivanka Trump testifies Wednesday. Trump's legal team said shortly after he wrapped up his testimony that they intend to file a mistrial in the former president's fraud case. The grounds for the motion were not immediately clear but appeared to reference the judge's principal clerk who has become an unwitting main character in the trial. “We obviously will be moving for mistrial … we don't want to put anyone at risk,” Trump attorney Alina Habba said. Trump briefly addressed cameras assembled outside the courtroom as he left for the day, arguing the case should be dismissed. “It’s a terrible thing that’s happening here. We’re taking days and days, and weeks and weeks, and it goes on and then you look at the outside world and what’s happening,” Trump said. “But of course they’re getting their wish, because I don’t have to be here for the most part, but I sort of do have to be here because I want to be here, because it’s a scam,” Trump said. “And this is a case that should have never been brought, and it's a case that now should be dismissed.” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in remarks outside the state's Supreme Court that she was undeterred by what she called “distractions” and “name calling” by Trump during his hours on the witness stand Monday. “He rambled, he hurled insults but we expected that,” James told reporters. “But I will not be bullied, I will not be harassed. This case will go on,” she concluded noting that the judge has already proved the crux of the fraud case she has brought against Trump.

Trump's attorneys in his civil fraud case double down on criticism of judge's clerk - As New York Attorney General Letitia James prepares to call Donald Trump to the witness stand in his $250 million civil fraud case Monday, lawyers for the former president have doubled down on their criticism of the law clerk who sits beside the judge in the courtroom."I do feel like truly that I'm fighting two adversaries," Trump attorney Chris Kise said Friday in court, referring to both the cadre of state lawyers and Engoron's legal clerk, who is frequently seen whispering in the judge's ear.The clerk, Allison Greenfield, has been the subject of the Trump team's ire since the second day of the trial, when Trump made a comment on his Truth Social platform suggesting that the clerk was "running this case against me," and shared a photo of her, about which he made a false claim.Engoron responded by imposing a limited gag order prohibiting public statements about his staff -- which Trump has violated twice, to the tune of $15,000 in fines. After Kise made a comment about Greenfield in court on Thursday, Engoron raised the possibility of expanding the gag order to apply to lawyers, and suggested that Kise might be a misogynist. Undeterred, Kise raised the issue in court again on Friday, citing an unsubstantiated report about Greenfield's "partisan political activity.""I think the defense will have to give serious consideration to seeking a mistrial," Kise said, appearing to further irritate Engoron, who has the sole authority to decide the outcome of the trial and, to some extent, the fate of The Trump Organization.Trump and the other defendants in the case have denied all wrongdoing.More than two weeks after Engoron imposed his limited gag order, which was accompanied by Trump removing his Truth Social post referencing Engoron's clerk, it was discovered that a copy of the post that had been published to Trump's campaign website had not been removed.That resulted in a $5,000 fine against Trump for violating the gag order."Incendiary untruths can, and in some cases already had, lead to serious physical harm," Engoron said regarding the penalty.

Takeaways from Donald Trump’s contentious testimony in his civil fraud trial Donald Trump brought bombastic rhetoric to the witness stand Monday in the civil fraud case against him and his business, as he spent his time on the stand attacking the New York attorney general who brought the case and the judge overseeing the trial itself. Trump’s testimony at times mimicked his appearances on the campaign trail, where the former president has made the four criminal cases against him – along with the New York attorney general’s civil fraud case – a central part of his argument to be elected president again in 2024. Judge Arthur Engoron, who has clashed with Trump throughout the trial, at first tried to stop the former president’s political barbs and speechifying, telling his lawyer Chris Kise to “control your client” and threatening to have Trump removed as a witness. Eventually, the judge stropped trying to control Trump – he and the attorney general’s lawyer questioning Trump let him rant, and then mostly disregarded the missives. The high-stakes civil case strikes at the heart of Trump’s brand – his real estate empire. New York Attorney General Letitia James is suing Trump for $250 million and seeking to bar him from doing business in the state. Engoron has already ruled Trump and his co-defendants were liable for fraud. The former president’s rhetoric at times during his testimony might as well have been at one of his rallies in front of supporters. He went after the attorney general. The judge. And the “political witch hunt” that he’s been railing against for years now. “This is a political witch hunt and I think she should be ashamed of herself,” Trump said of James. Trump’s attacks in a vacuum weren’t particularly remarkable – he’s used the same barbs throughout the course of the trial, which he’s attended repeatedly as a spectator. But on the witness stand, the charged rhetoric was even more remarkable, as he attacked the judge sitting right next to him, with James in the courtroom watching his testimony just feet away. “The fraud is on the court, not on me,” Trump said. “It’s a terrible thing you’ve done,” he said to the judge. “You believe this political hack back there and that’s unfortunate.” Kevin Wallace, the lawyer with the attorney general’s office who questioned Trump, tried to pin down the former president. But Trump, as is his speaking style, found ways to intertwine asides and attacks into his responses even when he was answering the question. After one particularly long monologue, Wallace asked Trump: “Done?”Wallace pressed Trump to acknowledge the differing values in his statements of financial condition, the financial documents that have been ruled to have fraudulently inflated the former president’s net worth to obtain better loan rates. An expert for the attorney general determined the Trump Organization saved $168 million in ill-gotten gains. Wallace pressed Trump on why valuations of properties were changed, such as his Trump Tower triplex, which was devalued on his financial statement in 2017 after a Forbes article found he had dramatically exaggerated the size of the apartment. Trump did acknowledge in a noteworthy exchange that there were mistakes in the financial statements, such as the Trump Tower apartment valuation. The value of the apartment fell from $327 million in 2016 to roughly $116.8 million in 2017 – which came after Forbes Magazine outed Trump in 2017 for claiming the apartment was more than 30,000 square feet when it turned out to be just under 11,000 square feet. Wallace asked Trump whether he was involved in the change. “Probably,” Trump said, before giving several possible explanations. He acknowledged there could have “been a mistake” but said that’s why his statements included disclaimer clauses and that banks are responsible for their own due diligence. “There’s a disclaimer clause where you don’t have to get sued by the attorney general of New York,” Trump said. “If I wanted to build up the statement like you said I did before you found out just how rich we are, I would’ve added brand value here and I would’ve increased it by tens of millions of dollars,” Trump said at another point in the questioning. “Done,” Trump said.

Trump dismisses risks, asks appeals court to toss gag order - Former President Trump diminished the risks of his attacks on those involved in his federal election interference case, complaining he has been hit with a gag order based on “speculation” about what his followers might do. The comment came in Trump’s first brief as he appeals a gag order issued by Judge Tanya Chutkan that bars him from making statements that would “target” foreseeable witnesses, prosecutors or court personnel involved in the case. The filing, which comes after several rounds of earlier briefs on the gag order, largely repeats Trump’s arguments that they are a violation of his First Amendment rights, contending they are especially important to the candidate for office. But they also dismiss Chutkan’s decision as “speculation that President Trump’s audiences might react to his speech with ‘harassment’ or ‘threats’ to prosecutors, witnesses, or court staff.” “President Trump has made many public statements about this case in the three months since his indictment, and yet the Department of Justice … submitted no evidence of any ‘threats’ or ‘harassment’ to prosecutors, witnesses, or court staff during that time,” his attorneys wrote. An initial September motion for the gag order mentioned numerous instances in which Trump’s prior comments about the election had spurred threats against his targets, including against two Georgia election workers later forced to leave their homes for their safety as well as a Pennsylvania election official who later received death threats against himself and his family. In the filing, Trump points to a moment in a hearing over the gag order in which prosecutors said the risks in this case were speculative. But in later filings, prosecutors accused Trump of making improper statements, including one directed at his former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying it violated prohibition on contacting or threatening witnesses. In the post, Trump mused over reports Meadows accepted an immunity deal, saying those who do so “are weaklings and cowards.” And while Chutkan declined to include herself in the gag order, she has faced threats since being assigned to the case, including by a Texas woman who left a threatening and racist voicemail for the judge. Chutkan has previously chided Trump’s team for failing to recognize the risks of his speech. “Several times the court and the government pointed to evidence causally linking certain kinds of statements with those risks, and Defendant never disputed it,” Chutkan said of their Oct. 16 hearing to weigh the matter. “The evidence is in the record; Defendant simply fails to acknowledge it.”

What Trump could lose in New York civil fraud trial -- Former President Donald Trump is at risk of losing the New York real estate empire that the rest of his career was built on.: Forcibly dismantling Trump's company is so unusual that no one is quite certain how it would play out. Trump already has been found to have inflated the value of his New York assets, via a partial summary judgment. The case now is in its penalty phase — and Trump testified yesterday, drawing a rebuke from the judge after veering off topic in his answers.In an earlier phase of the trial, the judge granted New York Attorney General Letitia James' request to cancel state business certificates that effectively allow many of Trump's properties to operate.Trump successfully appealed that part of the lower court's ruling, but the possibility could come back once the trial concludes How it works: If the business certificates were canceled, the relevant assets — which include Trump Tower, Trump Park Avenue, 40 Wall Street, and Trump National Golf Course Hudson Valley — would be put under the control of a court-appointed receiver, who operates much like an executor of an estate.The receiver would continue to manage the properties, but also could be allowed by the court to sell some — particularly if cash was needed to pay off legal penalties or creditors. Trump, who views himself as a consummate dealmaker, wouldn't be at the negotiating table. Even if he's able to keep his business certificates, there are other options on the table that could weaken his real estate empire. Prosecutors have asked for:

• A five-year ban on Trump or the Trump Organization entering into commercial real estate transactions in New York.
• A five-year ban on Trump or the Trump Organization applying for loans from any financial institutions chartered by or registered in New York.
• Permanent disbarment of Trump and his three oldest children from serving as officers or directors in a business headquartered, registered and/or licensed in New York.

The bottom line: The legal proceedings could forever alter Trump's business legacy — the same legacy he parlayed into his political career.

Former Watergate prosecutor says ‘Trump is toast’ in NY fraud trial -Nick Ackerman, a former Watergate prosecutor, said former President Trump is “toast” in his New York civil fraud case, arguing it is a “stupid move” for the former president to testify in his case after invoking the Fifth Amendment in a deposition for it last summer. “And basically at this point, Donald Trump is toast,” Ackerman said in a CNN interview. “I mean, he is basically going to be found to be a liar by the judge here.” New York Attorney General Letitia James’s (D) office is suing Trump, the Trump organization and Trump’s sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr., for $250 million over allegations of more than a decade of fraud. The suit accuses Trump, some of his children and their business of falsely inflating and deflating the value of the Trump Organization’s assets in order to receive lower taxes and more insurance coverage. Ackerman argued people are not only focused on the former president’s testimony, but also his deposition with James’s lawyers last summer, where he invoked the Fifth Amendment more than 400 times. “Now what does it mean to take the Fifth Amendment? It means that you are refusing to answer a question, because a truthful answer would tend to be incriminating,” Ackerman said. “Then what did Donald Trump do last week? He went into court and said, ‘Oh, I didn’t do anything fraudulent, I wasn’t involved in a fraud.’ Which is just the opposite what in effect he was saying when he took the Fifth Amendment in his deposition.” “So you’ve got contradictory testimony,” Ackerman continued. “You can use his assertion of the Fifth Amendment against him to basically find that he’s lying, that he’s manipulating the system when he goes in, refuses to answer questions, answers the questions in a half-baked manner.” Trump took the stand earlier this week, where he defended his business practices and condemned those involved in the case as politically motivated “Trump haters.” “I just don’t see how this judge at the end of the day is not going to find that, with respect to Donald Trump … ‘Liar, liar, pants on fire,'” Ackerman said. Ackerman said that in his more than 40 years of civil law experience, he has never seen anyone “do such a stupid move as to suddenly start testifying” after they’ve taken the Fifth Amendment.

What Trump’s volatile courtroom conduct means for his future criminal trials - — In the six weeks since the start of the $250 million civil fraud trial against Donald Trump, the former president has preened and glowered before news cameras in the courthouse halls.He has scowled, arms crossed in his seat at the defense table, whispering to his lawyers or throwing his hands in the air. He has earned himself a gag order, then a fine for violating the gag order and then a second fine for violating it again. He has abruptly exited the courtroom during proceedings.And on Monday, he put on a surly, volatile performance on the witness stand, lashing out at the judge and perceived political enemies, attempting to read from a note he retrieved from his suit pocket and generally making little effort to curb the type of meandering monologues he regularly offers on the campaign trail.The fraud trial is just the first in a long stretch of legal battles the former president is set to endure as he seeks to return to the White House next year. And it’s the public’s first glimpse of how candidate Trump conducts himself in and around the courtroom. Though his behavior — defiant, exasperated and often unruly — is no surprise, it is likely merely a taste of what’s to come. He’s facing three criminal trials in the first half of next year and a fourth yet to be scheduled — a gauntlet that guarantees his court dates will effectively become an extension of his political campaign. Indeed, Trump has already used the fraud trial in New York as a makeshift campaign stop, even injecting some of his frequent stump-speech lines into his testimony on Monday.But in some ways, the upcoming criminal trials will make the circus surrounding the fraud trial look like a sideshow. The stakes will be even higher, the political temperature will be even hotter and the restrictions on Trump’s conduct will be more onerous than the relatively lax procedures of the civil fraud case.It’s an immovable-object-meets-unstoppable-force scenario: What happens when the unbending rules that govern criminal trials collide with an explosive politician-defendant who shows no inkling of modifying his behavior?When it comes to courtroom restrictions, perhaps the most significant difference between Trump’s fraud trial and his criminal trials is that the fraud trial will be decided solely by a judge, whereas the criminal cases will all have juries.When jurors are in the room, judges tend not to tolerate anything less than strict decorum. They will likely order Trump to avoid talking or even gesturing while jurors are in the room, unless he is testifying. And if he takes the witness stand, he will be directed to keep his answers tight and directly responsive to the question because jurors are not supposed to hear inadmissible evidence.For bench trials, the environment is often more relaxed — and Trump has taken advantage of that in the fraud case.Even as Justice Arthur Engoron admonished Trump on Monday for some of his antics, the judge often allowed him to deliver rambling answers that had little to do with the questions at hand.Catherine Christian, a former prosecutor with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, said that was likely a strategic choice by the judge, both because there was no jury present and because it will provide the Trump team with less ammunition to claim bias during an appeal.

Donald Trump Comments on Daughter Ivanka’s Impending Court Appearance at NY Fraud Trial -- Ivanka Trump’s upcoming court appearance on Wednesday is proving difficult for father Donald. The eldest daughter of Trump has been called as a witness by the State of New York in the former president’s civil fraud trial and efforts to fight New York Attorney General Letitia James’ subpoena have all been denied. Taking to Truth Social on Tuesday night, Trump lamented the fact that, “Tomorrow my wonderful and beautiful daughter, Ivanka, is going to the Lower Manhattan Courthouse.” Ivanka has been a key player in both Trump business and politics and unlike her father and brothers, is no longer a defendant in the case. Unsurprisingly, Trump took aim at both James (“Corrupt and Racist New York State Attorney General”) and Judge Arthur Engoron in his post. Trump described Engoron as a “Trump Hating, out of control Clubhouse appointed Judge,” and claimed it was both James and Engoron who were the frauds. “Now they are trying to bring Ivanka into the case,” Trump continued. “Sad!”

Ivanka Trump begrudgingly testifies at Donald's NYC fraud trial - A polished Ivanka Trump begrudgingly showed up to a Manhattan courtroom Wednesday to answer questions about her dad’s business dealings — which she calmly claimed to have nothing to do with despite her role in helping him secure financing on several properties. The former first daughter, who lives in Miami, Fla., unsuccessfully tried to get out of testifying at the $250 million fraud case against her ex-president father and brothers Don Jr. and Eric — but ultimately was forced to show up in person to Manhattan Supreme Court on Wednesday morning.When a state lawyer called the mother of three to the witness stand, Justice Arthur Engoron dryly joked, “Who is she?”“I’m not involved. I didn’t know anything about it,” Ivanka, 41, said when asked about Donald Trump’s “statements of financial condition.”Ivanka — the last witness to be called by New York Attorney General Letitia James — arrived to the 60 Centre St. courthouse about an hour early, wearing a navy outfit including an overcoat, a pants suit, pumps and clutching a leather Chanel handbag.James — who observed the testimony Wednesday from the front row — claims in her lawsuit that Trump, 77, exaggerated his net worth by billions a year on annual statements of financial condition to save hundreds of millions on bank and insurance terms.While Ivanka, a businesswoman and former vice president of the Trump Organization, denied involvement in preparing the filings, court evidence showed that she was involved in securing financing for several Trump properties and she corresponded about the statements with potential lenders.In an August 2011 email to one banker — written as Ivanka was trying to get financing for the Trump National Doral Golf Club in Miami — she wrote: “My father will also send you his more recent financial statements by hard mail.”In a 2011 letter with Deutsche Bank seeking a loan for Doral, she wrote, “I am pleased to include” the most recent financial statement. Ivanka testified that her husband, Jared Kushner, introduced her to a private wealth manager with Deutsche Bank as the Trumps were seeking financing to buy and overhaul the Doral golf resort near Miami around 2010 or 2011.She said the family real estate company ultimately ended up going with Deutsche Bank to finance Doral, and in one 2011 email about the terms, she wrote, “It doesn’t get better than this” and “let’s discuss asap.”“Well, we ended up doing the deal with Deutsche Bank,” Ivanka said when asked if it was a good deal. “Yes, I thought generally the deal terms with Deutsche Bank were positive and we proceeded forward.”

Trump's daughter worried he was not wealthy enough, emails in NY fraud trial show (Reuters) - As Donald Trump sought to buy a Florida golf course in 2011, his daughter Ivanka expressed concern that he was not wealthy enough to close the deal, according to evidence presented Wednesday in a civil fraud trial that threatens the former U.S. president's business empire. The emails and other documents were presented as New York state lawyers wrapped up their case, which argues that Trump and his company inflated his net worth by as much as $2.2 billion to win better financing terms. They are seeking more than $250 million in penalties and restrictions that could strip Trump of some of his best known trophy properties. Testifying as the state's final witness, Ivanka Trump sought to distance herself from the questionable valuation methods that have already been ruled fraudulent by the judge overseeing the trial. She acknowledged that she worked on real-estate deals for the company but said she was not involved in calculating Trump's net worth. "I generally understood that there was a personal guarantee," she testified. "This level of granularity was not something that I can sit here today and say that I recall." Ivanka's testimony concluded in the afternoon. Trump's lawyer Christopher Kise said he would ask Engoron to resolve the case in the defense's favor on Thursday, though he is unlikely to prevail. The lawsuit by New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, accuses Trump and his family businesses of manipulating real estate asset values to dupe lenders and insurers and embellish Trump's reputation as a successful businessman. Trump has acknowledged on the witness stand that some of the estimates of golf courses, office towers and other company assets were inaccurate, though he said many were undervalued. Unlike her siblings and father, Ivanka Trump is not a defendant in the case. She joined her father during his 2017-2021 term in the White House, leaving her brothers in charge of the company during that time. But James said she nevertheless benefited from the company's fraudulent financial statements. "She was enriched. And clearly you cannot distance yourself from that fact," James said after he testimony.

Elise Stefanik files ethics complaint against Trump fraud trial judge --Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) filed a judicial ethics complaint Friday against the New York judge overseeing former President Trump’s civil fraud trial, claiming the judge has shown “inappropriate bias and judicial intemperance” toward the former president and calling on him to resign. Judge Arthur Engoron has displayed a “clear judicial bias” against Trump and broken “several rules” in the state’s judicial conduct code, Stefanik wrote in a letter to the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct. “This judge’s bizarre behavior has no place in our judicial system, where Judge Engoron is not honoring the defendant’s rights to due process and a fair trial,” Stefanik wrote, asserting that those “serious concerns” are amplified by Trump’s status as the front-runner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary. The letter trumpets many arguments Trump’s legal team has made throughout the case, including that there were “no victims” of the former president’s business dealings and that Engoron unfairly prejudged the case. Before the trial began, Engoron ruled that Trump, the Trump Organization and several executives — including Trump’s adult sons — were liable for fraud. The decision stripped Trump’s business licenses and put some of his iconic properties at risk, though a New York appeals court paused the cancellation of the business licenses until after it hears Trump’s case. Throughout the seven-week trial, which is ongoing, Engoron has become an unlikely foe of Trump. The two butted heads while the former president took the witness stand in the New York attorney general’s case against him. “I’m sure the judge will rule against me, because he always rules against me,” Trump said Monday. Engoron lodged repeated objections to the former president’s winding responses to the state’s questions — akin to his stump speeches on the campaign trail — and urged Trump attorney Chris Kise to rein him in. “Mr. Kise, can you control your client? This is not a political rally,” Engoron said. Trump’s behavior toward Engoron began to significantly break down after the judge issued a limited gag order barring the former president or other parties from speaking about the judge’s principal law clerk, whom Trump and his team have decried as biased and “Trump-hating.” The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. Sign up for the Tipsheet newsletter Stefanik’s letter discusses the clerk at length, detailing her purported political donations to Democratic donors and causes and criticizing the gag order. “If anyone in America must have the constitutional right to speak out against the judge, his staff, the witnesses, or the process, it’s a defendant going through a process he believes is politicized and weaponized against him,” Stefanik wrote. “To gag a defendant is un-American.”

Judge denies Trump bid to delay classified documents trial - A federal judge in Florida, for now, declined to delay the start of former President Trump’s criminal case over his handling of classified documents, though she did push back several pretrial deadlines in the case. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon ruled Friday that she would dismiss the motion from Trump’s legal team “without prejudice” against taking it up again in the future. The trial’s start date could be reconsidered at a scheduling conference March 1, she wrote.The order is a small victory for special counsel Jack Smith’s team, which had strongly argued against any delays in the case by suggesting that the former president wanted to push the case until after the 2024 presidential election. Trump is the undisputed front-runner in the GOP presidential primary.When Cannon heard arguments about a potential delay earlier this month, she appeared ready to side with Trump’s attorneys’ request to postpone the trial, saying she “has a hard time seeing how realistically this [current schedule] would work.” The Florida judge noted the 1.3 million pages of evidence — plus thousands of hours of security video shot at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort — that prosecutors in the Mar-a-Lago case gave to the defense in discovery, in addition to the former president’s other legal woes with schedules of their own. “I am not quite seeing a level of understanding on your part to these realities,” Cannon said at the time to prosecutor Jay Bratt, a member of special counsel Jack Smith’s team. Trump’s classified documents trial is scheduled to begin May 20, a little over two months after his Washington, D.C.-based trial on charges linked to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election is set to begin, March 4. Trump’s criminal case in New York over a hush-money payment is set to head to trial March 25, and a trial in Trump’s fourth criminal case, linked to his actions in Georgia after the 2020 election, has not yet been scheduled. Trump is facing Espionage Act charges in the Mar-a-Lago case after refusing to return classified records from his time as president, as well as obstruction of justice charges for his efforts to conceal them from prosecutors.

Moskowitz mocks Comer with his own ‘subpoena’ amid Hunter Biden probe -Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) went after Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) on Thursday, mocking the House Oversight Committee chair for sending out subpoenas in his probe investigatingPresident Biden’s family finances.The Oversight panel posted a video Wednesday of Comer signing subpoenas for the president’s son Hunter Biden, brother James Biden and their business partner Rob Walker as part of Republicans’ impeachment probe into the president. Recent developments in the probe have focused on a $200,000 loan the president made to his brother in 2018, according to revealed bank records. Comer alleges the loan repayment is proof of the president profiting from illicit international business.Moskowitz’s post recreated the video shot-for-shot with the congressman signing a prop “subpoena” for Comer instead, calling him a hypocrite over the investigation. Moskowitz said Comer himself had done the same, also giving his brother a $200,000 personal loan, according to reports from The Daily Beast on Thursday.“It has been reported that Comer also loaned his brother $200k. We fully expect James to comply, just like the Trumps,” Moskowitz said on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.The committee has also sought testimony from Hunter and James Biden’s wives, as well as the widow of Beau Biden, the president’s other son, and her sister.Democrats have argued the revealed bank records show nothing more than a short-term loan between family members made while Biden was a private citizen.

Comer shoots off more subpoenas for Hunter Biden associates, gallerist, art patron -House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) issued four more subpoenas and four interview requests Thursday as part of the committee’s investigation into Hunter Biden, the president’s son — a sign that the committee’s work related to impeachment is ramping up. Two former business associates of Hunter Biden received subpoenas: Eric Schwerin, who closely worked with Hunter Biden at Rosemont Seneca Partners, and Mervyn Yan, an official with Chinese energy company CEFC with whom Hunter Biden had reportedly butted heads over expense reimbursements. Comer also sent subpoenas to George Bergès, the gallerist who showcased Hunter Biden’s paintings that sold for up to $500,000; and Elizabeth Naftali, one of the buyers of the artworks who had visited the White House several times. The moves come one day after the House Oversight Committee subpoenaed Hunter Biden, the president’s brother James Biden, and several other family members. “A plethora of bank records, texts, emails, and a transcribed interview with Biden family associate Devon Archer all show the Bidens and their business partners sold access to the highest levels of our government, including Joe Biden himself, to the detriment of America’s interests,” Comer said in a statement. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the committee, criticized the move. “What Chairman Comer and Congressional Republicans want the American people to believe is that this investigation is about the facts. But at every turn, Chairman Comer has been met with evidence that shows President Biden has committed no wrongdoing, much less an impeachable offense,” Raskin said in a statement, arguing that Comer has “abuse[d] the Committee’s authority” and “degrade[d] Congressional subpoena power” over “conspiracy theories and embarrassing lies.” And Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.), another member of the committee, tore into Comer for subpoenaing Naftali — who he said is the aunt of a three-year-old hostage in Gaza taken by Hamas in the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel. “In the clearest sign yet of House Republicans’ devious and distorted priorities, Chairman Comer has decided to subpoena a private American citizen whose 3-year-old niece is currently being held hostage in Gaza by the terrorist group Hamas,” Goldman said in a statement, charging that Comer had “stooped to an entirely new low of abandoning the American families of hostages in a pathetic attempt to score political points against President Biden.” A GOP Oversight Committee spokesperson responded in part by taking issue with Goldman’s description of Naftali as a “private citizen,” noting that President Biden had appointed her to the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad last year, and criticizing his invocation of the hostage crisis.

Sam Bankman-Fried Could Get 100 Years in Prison. What Is Fair? - After a monthlong trial and about four hours of deliberation, a jury convicted the FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried of seven counts of fraud and conspiracy last week. He had been accused of stealing billions of dollars from his cryptocurrency exchange’s customers and investors, funneling the money into his investments and extravagant spending. Now, Judge Lewis Kaplan of the Southern District of New York will decide how many years in prison, if any, those crimes warrant. The looming sentencing raises age-old questions about the appropriate punishment for economic crimes. The maximum term is more than 100 years for Bankman-Fried, who will turn 32 in March, the month when he’ll be sentenced. But federal sentencing guidelines, meant to ensure consistency across courts around the country, also allow for flexibility. Sentences for the same crimes can vary greatly, depending on factors like the severity of the offense, the convicted person’s cooperation and the judge’s inclinations. White-collar crimes tend to be punished less severely than violent crimes, because offenders aren’t a physical threat to society. In 1990, Michael Milken, known as the “junk bond king,” pleaded guilty to six felony counts of fraud and conspiracy and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He was released in about two years after cooperating with the government, and President Donald Trump pardoned him in 2020. Bernie Madoff, who pleaded guilty to 11 criminal counts for a 30-year $64 billion fraud, was sentenced to 150 years in prison in 2009. He died in custody in 2021. Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos, went to trial and was sentenced last November to about 11 years in prison after being found guilty of four counts of defrauding investors. Her recommended sentencing range was 11 to 14 years, with a maximum of 20. What is fair? That depends in part on how a judge views the purpose of punishment. There are three classic theories:

• Deterrence: Severe sentences send a message to would-be criminals and prevent crimes. “If you’re going to deter, you have to reach an audience,” John Coffee, a Columbia University law professor and an expert on white-collar crime, told DealBook. Bankman-Fried’s is a “rare case” that gets lots of media coverage, he said, so millions will hear of his punishment, serving deterrence goals.
• Retributive justice: Wrongdoing must always be punished. Proponents argue for harsh sentences that exact what they consider commensurate vengeance.
• Rehabilitation: The goal is to restore offenders so they can re-enter the community. That means less severe sentences generally and, for economic crimes, perhaps higher fines and restitution to victims, all premised on the notion that people can be redeemed if given the opportunity.

Coffee said S.B.F.’s economic crimes may be second in severity only to Madoff’s, warranting an extensive sentence, though he considers Madoff’s sentence unjust because it was not servable at his advanced age. The professor said that Bankman-Fried could conceivably serve 50 years, given his age, his offenses and the attention his punishment is bound to get in the media, but that he would probably be sentenced to 20 years or more. He said that Judge Kaplan was known to be “very fair,” but that he was not “overly lenient.” First-time white-collar offenders rarely get extensive sentences, much less the maximum, said Jennifer Taub of Western New England University’s law school, who is the author of “Big Dirty Money: The Shocking Injustice and Unseen Cost of White Collar Crime.” She thinks Bankman-Fried could be sentenced to about 25 years and released much sooner if he behaves well. Taub noted that maximum sentences outlined in the guidelines didn’t reflect the ultimate punishments in most cases, though the stark possibilities can persuade defendants to make a deal with the government. Bankman-Fried’s former colleagues at FTX and its sister firm, Alameda Research, who pleaded guilty and testified against him may serve little or no time in prison.

Bankman-Fried’s parents could face their own legal perils, experts say - Sam Bankman-Fried’s parents spent many of their waking hours in October seated on a wooden bench in a Manhattan courtroom, a few feet behind the former cryptocurrency mogul, watching as federal prosecutors convinced a jury their son had orchestrated one of the biggest financial frauds in history. Get a curated selection of 10 of our best stories in your inbox every weekend. Now, as Bankman-Fried awaits sentencing that could send him to prison for the rest of his life, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried — formerly eminent Stanford Law professors — should worry about their own potential criminal exposure for their roles in their son’s collapsed crypto empire, legal experts say. The couple already face a challenge in civil court from the creditors of FTX, the bankrupt crypto exchange that Bankman-Fried co-founded. He gave his parents a $10 million cash gift and bought them a $16.4 million property in the Bahamas that FTX investors and customers have sued to recover, according to the lawsuit. Beyond the financial windfall, both parents’ level of involvement with their son’s work will likely bear on their legal vulnerability. Bankman, a tax expert and clinical psychologist, served as an adviser to his son on business matters as far back as 2018 and remained a key member of his inner circle through the exchange’s implosion a year ago, according to the civil suit and evidence from the criminal trial. Fried, an ethics scholar and co-founder of a Democratic fundraising organization, advised her son on concealing campaign donations in a scheme that elicited guilty pleas from two of his top deputies, according to the civil suit. Lawyers for Bankman and Fried have said in a statement the claims in the civil suit are “completely false.” Neither has been charged with any criminal wrongdoing. A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan declined to comment. But the fate of Bankman-Fried’s parents remains a loose thread in the FTX saga. He received “counsel from his parents this entire time, so they’re very, very close to the heart of this story, unfortunately,” said Mark Bini, a former federal prosecutor specializing in financial crime. “The closer a person is to the main defendant, the more likely that a judge or jury would find there was a meeting of the minds on intent.” And Bankman-Fried himself is set to stand trial again in March on separate charges that he committed bank fraud and bribed Chinese officials. As prosecutors continue to review the matter, they could turn up evidence that would compel them to charge the parents, legal experts say. “Anyone who is in the mix … or intimately involved with an individual committing a crime and on the radar of federal prosecutors are in a danger zone,” he said. “And Sam’s parents certainly should be concerned about the possibility of charges.”

SEC's Gensler says rebooted FTX is possible if done 'within the law' — A revived FTX could work if new leadership does so with a clear understanding of the law, SEC chair Gary Gensler told CNBC on the sidelines of DC Fintech Week. Gensler was referring to reports that Tom Farley, a former president of the New York Stock Exchange, is among a short list of three bidders vying to buy what remains of the bankrupt crypto exchange. Farley launched his own digital asset exchange in May called Bullish, which is reportedly one of the final contenders in the bankruptcy auction. "If Tom or anybody else wanted to be in this field, I would say, 'Do it within the law,'" Gensler said on Wednesday. "Build the trust of investors in what you're doing and ensure that you're doing the proper disclosures — and also that you're not commingling all these functions, trading against your customers. Or using their crypto assets for your own purposes." FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty last week on all seven criminal counts against him, including fraud and money laundering charges. His exchange, which filed for bankruptcy a year ago, was funneling customer money to sister hedge fund Alameda Research, according to the charges. Alameda was a market maker for the FTX exchange, and was given privileges, such as a $65 billion line of credit requiring no collateral. Unlike other customers on the platform, Alameda was also granted the unique ability to go negative in its trading bets, without having its positions liquidated. "We would never let the New York Stock Exchange also operate a hedge fund and trade against their members or trade against customers in the market," said Gensler. FTX and Alameda were supposed to be separated by a firewall. But the evidence presented in the monthlong trial made clear how cozy they were in practice. "FTX and Alameda had an extremely problematic relationship," Castle Island Venture's Nic Carter told CNBC. "Bankman-Fried operated both an exchange and a prop shop, which is super unorthodox and just not really allowed in actually regulated capital markets." Separate to the criminal charges, the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission brought civil suits against FTX. The SEC in December accused Bankman-Fried of running nothing less than a "brazen," yearslong fraud "from the start." Gensler said that, when it comes to considering new rules regulating the industry, existing securities laws are "very robust and strong." They just need to be enforced. "There's nothing about crypto that's incompatible with securities laws," he said. "You've got just a lot of worldwide actors that are currently not complying with these time-tested laws."

FTX claims Bybit, one of world’s largest crypto exchanges, used VIP status to pull hundreds of millions of dollars during collapse -The bankruptcy estate of FTX filed its latest lawsuit on Friday as part of its attempt to make customers whole, suing the crypto exchange Bybit for nearly $1 billion. After FTX collapsed in November 2022 under Sam Bankman-Fried, the new leadership stewarded by John J. Ray III has sought to claw back funds from insiders, customers, and recipients of FTX's investments. Friday's lawsuit represents one of the largest claims as part of the bankruptcy proceedings. VIP status Before its bankruptcy, FTX was one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world, with a number of major traders counted among the company's clients, including Alameda—the trading arm of FTX led by Bankman-Fried's one-time girlfriend, Caroline Ellison. Another active trader on FTX was Mirana, the investment arm of Bybit, currently the sixth-largest cryptocurrency spot exchange by volume. According to the lawsuit, Mirana's large account balance on FTX—which hovered around $850 million in November 2022—afforded it special privileges on the platform relative to average FTX customers, including concierge support and increased access to employees. FTX's treatment of preferred traders was at the heart of fraud charges brought by the Department of Justice against Bankman-Fried and his inner circle, with prosecutors arguing that Alameda was able to use other customers' funds for its own purposes, including venture investments and real estate purchases. A jury in a New York federal court found Bankman-Fried guilty of all counts earlier this month. While Mirana did not have access to other customers' funds, it did receive VIP treatment. According to the lawsuit filed in a Delaware bankruptcy court, Mirana—along with its affiliated entities and senior employees—rushed to withdraw assets from its FTX accounts in November 2022 as questions around the exchange's solvency intensified. Because of Mirana's preferred status, Bybit's investment arm was able to prioritize its withdrawal requests, reducing the funds available to other customers. The lawsuit also alleges that FTX held assets on Bybit, allowing Bybit to seize those funds and use them as leverage to force FTX to prioritize its withdrawals. Through this process, Mirana was able to withdraw nearly $500 million of its digital assets from FTX in the final days before FTX disabled withdrawals. The bankruptcy estate further alleges that Bybit has refused to allow FTX to reclaim the $125 million still held in Bybit accounts and has used an "ostensibly independent entity" called BitDAO to devalue tens of millions of dollars of cryptocurrency tokens held by FTX. Bybit and Alameda had agreed to a token swap in October 2021, where Alameda received 100 million tokens native to the BitDAO project in exchange for around 3.4 million of FTX's native token, FTT. FTX alleges that in May 2023, Bybit sought to reverse the trade. After FTX refused, BitDAO announced it would rebrand the project and change the structure of the tokens, including restricting FTX's ability to redeem its BitDAO tokens. The FTX bankruptcy estate is seeking to claw back assets it values at $953 million from Bybit, according to pricing as of Nov. 1, 2023.

There’s a News Black Out on the Strange Doings in the JPMorgan Chase/Jeffrey Epstein Sex Trafficking Case in Manhattan - By Pam and Russ Martens ~ There are extremely strange things happening in a very high-profile federal court case in Manhattan where the largest bank in the United States, JPMorgan Chase, stands accused by victims of facilitating Jeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking ring that sexually abused minors as the bank doled out $40,000 to $80,000 a month in hard cash for more than a decade without filing the legally required Suspicious Activity Reports.Further implicating the bank is the fact, documented by internal emails, that executives and staff of JPMorgan Chase were visitors to Epstein’s Manhattan mansion where rapes and sexual assaults of minors have been alleged by victims as occurring. (See our report: A JPMorgan Court Filing Shows Another Bank Exec Visited Jeffrey Epstein’s Sex-Trafficking Residences 13 Times – Two More Times than Jes Staley.)A recent entry on the docket of the case shows that a federal marshal has now been ordered to be present for the Fairness Hearing this Thursday, November 9, at 4 p.m. in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Needing an armed federal marshal for a hearing involving the largest bank in the United States; its lawyers from Big Law firm WilmerHale; and plaintiffs’ high-profile attorney, David Boies – seems like something that might rouse the curiosity of reporters at expensive media real estate in Manhattan. But adding to the aura of strangeness surrounding the case is the fact that both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal – two newspapers that had previously been actively reporting on the case – have failed to share this latest intrigue with their readers. The likely reason the federal marshal has been summoned for the hearing is that David Boies has taken the questionable action of making public on the court docket an exhibit showing what purports to be 105 pages of personal emails sent by a Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking victim, Sarah Ransome. The final email states this: “David and Demon – You’ve made the biggest mistake crossing me. You’ve underestimated me and I’m coming for you. Sarah Ransome” Throughout the series of emails, Ransome refers to Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, as “Demon” instead of Dimon. (Given the five felony counts and frauds that Dimon has presided over at the bank, one might be forgiven for selecting an unpleasant moniker for the bank’s top honcho.) In an email dated October 24, 2023 to leaders of countries in the Middle East, Ransome writes this: “My bad choices because life dealt me a rather rough hand doesn’t change the fact that I was raped repeatedly and trafficked by Epstein, no matter how hard the U.S. and Israeli Administration deflect that they indeed have broken the Geneva Convention and have been committing war crimes globally for decades…We all know that the material Epstein filmed for both governments has been used to broker deals in their favour for years.” Ransome doesn’t offer any evidence to back up that claim but there is plenty of evidence on the record to tie Epstein to Israel. On May 3, the Wall Street Journal reported as follows:“The documents show that between 2013 and 2017, Epstein planned at least three dozen meetings with Mr. Barak [Ehud Barak, the former Prime Minister of Israel]. They had appointments every month for 11 consecutive months starting in December 2015, the documents show. Another major Epstein tie to Israel was Epstein’s largest financial benefactor, Leslie Wexner, the former CEO of the retailing conglomerate that previously owned Victoria’s Secret, Abercrombie & Fitch, Bath & Body Works, and numerous other retail chains. Epstein, for unexplained reasons, ended up owning Wexner’s former upper East Side mansion in Manhattan where many of the rapes of young women and girls occurred; Wexner’s company jet was transferred to Epstein and later dubbed the “Lolita Express”; and Epstein owned a home at one point on the grounds of Wexner’s estate in New Albany, Ohio. Wexner also signed a Power-of-Attorney in 1991 giving Epstein wide control of his finances.In June 2020, Ohio reporter Bob Fitrakis wrote the following for the Columbus Free Press regarding Leslie Wexner’s charitable organization known as the Wexner Foundation and its ties to Israel: “The media obtained a leaked document from the Wexner Foundation entitled, ‘Wexner Analysis: Israeli Communication Priorities 2003.’ The report was prepared to sell the war in Iraq and provides insight into Wexner’s relationship with the state of Israel.“Wexner’s philanthropic side is more public. In 1998, the Wall Street Journal reported that Wexner was part of the “ ‘Mega Group,’ a loosely organized club of 20 of the nation’s wealthiest and most influential Jewish businessmen.” The Mega Group meets purportedly to discuss ‘philanthropy,’ but others have speculated that their charitable interests are often a cover for lobbying activities on behalf of Israel. The Wall Street Journal identified the late Max Fisher, a Detroit financier and billionaire, as a member of the Mega Group. Fisher was used as a private Middle East diplomat by President Gerald Ford during the 1970s and is considered Wexner’s mentor.“The Wexner Analysis emphasized that ‘now is the time to link American success in dealing with terrorism and dictators from a position of strength to Israel’s ongoing efforts to eradicate terrorism on and within its borders.’ ” Ransome is one of two women who are objecting to the terms of the class action settlement with victims that is scheduled for a legally-required Fairness Hearing this Thursday. JPMorgan Chase has agreed to settle the case with a payment of $290 million, of which plaintiffs’ lawyers, including David Boies, are set to receive $87 million in legal fees and another $2.5 million in expenses. In Boies’ reply brief regarding the two women’s objections to the settlement, he states that the objections from the woman identifying herself as Jane Doe 7 should be dismissed as “unsubstantiated and meritless.” As for Sarah Ransome’s objections, Boies offers this: “Ms. Ransome is an Epstein victim whose views and feelings are entitled to thoughtful consideration. As indicated in the emails Ms. Ransome has sent to a variety of public officials around the world, as well as to Class Counsel, examples of which are included in the attached Composite Exhibit A, Ms. Ransome is obviously a woman in distress. However, her feelings of wide-ranging conspiracies against her need to be considered in the context of Epstein’s treatment of his victims, which included boasting that his collaborators included many rich and powerful business leaders and public officials, and that they would help destroy anyone who crossed him. It’s not Ransome’s job to map out the specifics of an international sexual blackmail conspiracy. That’s the job of the U.S. Department of Justice and its criminal division whose prosecutors are paid by the American taxpayers to deliver the truth and the facts in a timely fashion to the American people. Unfortunately for the American people and Epstein’s victims, the U.S. Department of Justice has fallen down on the job. (See our report: New Court Documents Suggest the Justice Department Under Four Presidents Covered Up Jeffrey Epstein’s Money Laundering at JPMorgan Chase.)

WilmerHale’s Plan to Buy Blanket Immunity for JPMorgan for Banking Jeffrey Epstein’s Sex Trafficking Ring Has Backfired Badly - By Pam and Russ Martens ~ On October 20 we reported that JPMorgan Chase, a serial recidivist when it comes to crime, had paid $1.085 billion in legal expenses in just the last six months. A nice chunk of that money went to the Big Law firm, WilmerHale, which has been representing JPMorgan Chase this year in multiple lawsuits involving the bank’s dark history of financial dealings with child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. (See Related Articles at the bottom of this article.) When the largest bank in the United States pays big bucks to a law firm with a roster of 1,000 attorneys, it doesn’t expect its $290 million class action settlement with Jeffrey Epstein’s victims to blow up in its face just days before the final Fairness Hearing – a legally required court event to determine if the terms of the agreement are “fair, adequate and reasonable.” That Fairness Hearing will be conducted today in Judge Jed Rakoff’s courtroom in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in lower Manhattan at 4 p.m. It’s a big embarrassment for both WilmerHale and JPMorgan Chase that 16 state Attorneys General and the Attorney General for the District of Columbia are objecting to the terms of the settlement, along with two Epstein claimants.Judge Rakoff had given the lawyers that hatched the terms of the settlement until November 6 to file their responses to the Attorneys General challenges. The lawyers included WilmerHale representing JPMorgan Chase and high-profile attorney, David Boies (and others) representing the Epstein victims.Boies brings a lot of baggage with him as a result of his prior representation of now convicted rapist Harvey Weinstein and the strong-arm tactics Boies employed on Weinstein’s behalf. (See Ronan Farrow’s blockbuster investigative report in The New Yorker, Harvey Weinstein’s Army of Spies.)We had anticipated that WilmerHale might file a respectful response to the Attorneys General objections, perhaps agreeing to change the language in the settlement that the Attorneys General found improper. These are, after all, the highest law enforcement offices in 16 states and the District of Columbia. We could not have been more wrong. The response from WilmerHale effectively blasted the Attorneys General for sticking their nose where it didn’t belong. What the Attorneys General are challenging boils down to this: Under the federal law known as the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), Attorneys General have the right to bring claims on behalf of sex trafficked victims. The language in the JPMorgan Chase settlement proposes to extinguish those rights. The State Attorneys General explained it as follows in their filing with the court: “Section 1.25 [of the proposed settlement agreement] releases claims that could be brought to recover damages from the Released Defendant Parties on behalf of a Member of the Class by any other party, including any sovereign or government, relating to or arising from any Member of the Class’s harm, injury, abuse, exploitation, or trafficking by Jeffrey Epstein or by any person who is in any way connected to or otherwise associated with Jeffrey Epstein, as well as any right to recovery on account thereof. (Emphasis added.)” WilmerHale and David Boies’ settlement agreement hoped to pay Boies and his fellow lawyers working on behalf of the victims $87 million in legal fees; $2.5 million in legal expenses; and buy blanket immunity going forward for all those JPMorgan executives and the bank’s ultra wealthy clients who were regular visitors to Epstein’s mansions/brothels; as well as the bank’s employees who were funneling $40,000 to $80,000 in hard cash each month to Epstein for over a decade while the bank failed to file the legally-mandated Suspicious Activity Reports. It’s a sweet deal for lawyers and a sweet deal for a recidivist money laundering bank. (See JPMorgan/Jeffrey Epstein Cases Are a Cross Between the Bank’s Chinese Princeling Scandal and Madoff Fraud, Using Sex with Minors as a Bribe.) But it’s a very bad deal for the public interest. The lawyer who drafted and signed WilmerHale’s response to the objections of the state Attorneys General was law partner, Felicia Ellsworth, the Vice Chair of WilmerHale’s Litigation/Controversy Department. Ellsworth goes for the jugular with this in her response:“Standing between the victims and this compensation are the Attorneys General of New Mexico, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, and Vermont. These Attorneys General have no stake in this matter: they do not articulate any reason why the settlement would harm their states or their citizens. Just the opposite, their objection undermines the settlement and the victims they claim to support.“First, there is no procedural mechanism for the Attorneys General—who are neither parties to the case, nor members of the certified class—to object to the proposed settlement.“Second, the Attorneys General identify no legal or equitable flaw in the proposed settlement, whether to their respective States or to their citizens. With no stake in this case, the Court should decline the Attorneys General’s invitation to issue an advisory opinion.” In reality, the challenge from the Attorneys General very specifically identified the legal flaw in the settlement and cited to numerous examples of case law that backed up their arguments.

JPMorgan Chase nears historic $4 trillion of assets. Is that good? --America's biggest bank is on the verge of $4 trillion of assets, a threshold yet to be crossed by any U.S. bank. Assets at JPMorgan Chase totaled $3.9 trillion at the end of the third quarter, almost 24% higher than those of the bank's next closest competitor, Bank of America. JPMorgan reached $3 trillion of assets less than four years ago.The bank is nearing the $4 trillion milestone at a time when regulators are reassessing the capital requirements they will apply across the banking industry. The capital reform measures being floated by a trio of federal banking regulators would have the most pronounced impact on global systemically important banks, according to regulators. JPMorgan's growth also could reinvigorate long-held concerns that a large majority of the industry's assets are concentrated in a handful of banks and that these institutions are "too big to fail.""The scale [of JPMorgan] has some advantages, but the escalating complexity of managing such a bank has disadvantages," said Peter Nerby, a senior vice president at Moody's Investors Service who covers the bank. "There are a lot of banks that are becoming big and hard to manage, and JPMorgan so far, for the most part, is proving to be the exception."A surge in deposits, a resilient U.S. economy and JPMorgan's surprise rescue of First Republic Bank last spring have driven much of JPMorgan's explosion in assets over the past four years. Big banks like JPMorgan benefited more than their smaller counterparts when consumers and companies alike started stashing excess cash in their bank accounts during the COVID-19 pandemic. JPMorgan and other large banks quickly turned those deposits into loans or placed them into government Treasuries, and the returns from those investments further boosted big-bank asset levels.JPMorgan has grown its assets at a faster rate than the rest of its big-bank counterparts over the past four years. Total assets at JPMorgan have risen 45% since the third quarter of 2019. At Bank of America and Citigroup, assets rose 30% and 21%, respectively, over the same period. Wells Fargo, the country's fourth-largest bank, has been under an asset cap imposed by the Federal Reserve since early 2018. The cap prohibits Wells from surpassing $2 trillion of assets and stems from the bank's numerous compliance issues, including its well-publicized fake-accounts scandal.

Citigroup May Slash 24,000 Jobs; Its Stock Has Lost 92 Percent Since January 2007 - By Pam and Russ Martens: November 7, 2023 ~ On the first day of trading in January 2007 (the year prior to the Wall Street financial crisis in 2008 that saw century-old iconic financial firms explode one after another), Citigroup closed the trading day at $55.25. Yesterday, Citigroup’s common stock closed at an effective share price of $4.20. Citigroup did a 1-for-10 reverse stock split on May 9, 2011. That means that investors holding 100 shares of Citigroup back in January 2007 saw their position shrink to 10 shares after May 9, 2011. So yesterday’s closing price of $42.04 for Citigroup is effectively $4.20 for long-term shareholders, adjusting it for the reverse stock split. To put that in even starker terms, investors who have held onto this dog for almost 17 years have watched 92 percent of its share price vanish.More dire news on Citigroup came yesterday with a report at CNBC indicating that Citigroup may cut as many as 24,000 employees, or 10 percent of its workforce of 240,000.The big question is, what on earth is Citigroup doing with that many workers in the first place?According to data from the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Citigroup’s federally-insured bank, Citibank, ranks as the third largest U.S. bank by assets. As of June 30, according to the Fed, Citibank had just 660 domestic bank branches versus 3,803 domestic bank branches for the second largest bank by assets, Bank of America. (See the Fed data at this link.)According to Bank of America’s 10-K (Annual Report) for year-end 2022, it employed 217,000 workers, almost 10 percent less than Citigroup’s Citibank while having 5.76 times the number of domestic bank branches.In addition, Bank of America owns the giant retail brokerage firm, Merrill Lynch, which as of August of 2022 was staffing 560 separate branch offices according to AdvisorHub. Citigroup sold its retail brokerage operation (Smith Barney) to Morgan Stanley following the financial crisis in 2008.Federal regulators are likely carefully monitoring the situation at Citigroup because the bank blew itself up in 2008 with toxic subprime debt bombs residing off its balance sheet and complex derivatives. Citigroup’s stock traded at 99 cents in March 2009. It took $2.5 trillion in secret cumulative loans from the Fed from December 2007 to July 2010 to resuscitate Citigroup’s sinking hulk. (An audit of the Fed’s secret emergency bailout facilities by the Government Accountability Office revealed this information to the American people in July 2011.)One of the key factors that may be making Citigroup’s federal regulators nervous today is its massive amount of uninsured deposits.In a speech delivered by FDIC Chairman Martin Gruenberg on October 4, he made it very clear that the FDIC is concerned about both the total amount of uninsured deposits in the U.S. banking system and the concentration of those uninsured deposits among a handful of mega banks.Gruenberg noted in his speech that year-end data for the three banks that failed this past spring showed that anywhere from 90 percent to 70 percent of their deposits were uninsured. (During a banking panic, uninsured deposits usually make the fastest beeline for the exits.)According to federal banking reports filed with regulators for the quarter ending June 30 (call reports), the four largest U.S. banks by assets (JPMorgan Chase Bank, Bank of America, Citibank and Wells Fargo) accounted for $4.185 trillion of uninsured deposits, or 59 percent of all uninsured deposits at all 4,645 federally-insured institutions.Citibank indicates in its call report for June 30 that 85.5 percent of its $1.338 trillion in total deposits are uninsured. The breakdown is as follows: It has $548.33 billion in uninsured deposits in its domestic offices plus $595.4 billion in deposits in foreign offices. (The FDIC does not insure deposits on foreign soil.) Those two figures tally up to $1.144 trillion in deposits lacking FDIC insurance out of a total deposit base of $1.338 trillion. The breakdown for the other three mega banks as of June 30 are as follows: 59 percent of JPMorgan Chase’s deposits lack FDIC insurance; 49 percent at Bank of America; and 51 percent at Wells Fargo.Deposits in domestic bank offices in the U.S. that exceed $250,000 per depositor/per bank are not insured by the FDIC. The staggering amount of uninsured deposits at the mega banks is not a problem for the vast majority of federally-insured banks in the U.S. according to Gruenberg. In his speech on October 4, he said that “As of December 2022, more than 99 percent of deposit accounts were under the $250,000 deposit insurance limit.”

Citi will pay $26M to settle CFPB claims of bias against Armenian Americans -Citigroup has settled allegations by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau of discrimination against Armenian Americans in California — activity the bank says was limited to a small number of employees who sought to prevent criminals from committing fraud. Citi agreed to pay a $26 million fine without admitting wrongdoing to settle claims that employees at the third-largest U.S. bank by assets wrongfully denied access to credit for applicants profiled as being of Armenian origin, according to a consent order the regulator issued on Wednesday. Between 2015 and 2021, Citi employees "negatively" assessed applications for Citi-branded credit cards at retail stores by people "suspected" of being Armenian Americans from Southern California, the order states. Citi employees applied "extra scrutiny" to credit card applications submitted by people with last names ending in "-ian" or "-yan," the CFPB states in the consent order. Such applicants were considered "more likely to commit fraud" and "bust outs" who would leave the country, according to the consent order, which cites internal communications among Citi employees. Some employees referred to applicants as "Armenian bad guys" or the "Southern California Armenian Mafia," the consent order states. "The CFPB found that Citi purposefully discriminated against applicants of Armenian descent, primarily based on the spelling of their last name," CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a statement. "Citi stereotyped Armenians as prone to crime and fraud. In reality, Citi illegally fabricated documents to cover up its discrimination," Chopra said. A small number of bank employees took "impermissible actions" as part of an effort to "thwart" an Armenian fraud ring operating throughout California, Karen Kearns, a spokesperson for Citi, said in an emailed statement. "While we prioritize protecting our bank and our customers from fraud, it is unacceptable to base credit decisions on national origin," Kearns said in the statement. "We sincerely apologize to any applicant who was evaluated unfairly," Kearns said in the statement. Citi has taken measures to prevent a recurrence of this conduct, according to Kearns.

Bankers sound alarm on more inflation, new financial crisis at Hong Kong summit -As more than 300 banking and investment executives gathered in Hong Kong to discuss “living with complexity” in the financial world, they ended up trading trepidations about an uncertain future. “My biggest fear is there’s one more geopolitical escalation and there’s a market event,” Christian Sewing, chief executive officer of Deutsche Bank, said Tuesday at the Global Financial Leaders’ Investment Summit in Hong Kong. The event was one of the first gatherings of financial executives since the start of the Israel-Hamas war last month, and executives weren’t shy about sharing concerns of renewed inflation or another crisis. Markets are “under-discounting” how long high interest rates will last in the U.S. and Europe in the fight to bring inflation back down, Bridgewater Associates Co-Chief Investment Officer Bob Prince said. Citadel founder Ken Griffin warned world leaders are already risking renewed inflation as deglobalization sentiment takes hold. Griffin said investors have “got to be watching and investing here in China,” calling deglobalization a “giant wild card.” Peace and globalization have largely benefited economies, and “we don’t know what a world looks like that involves deglobalization,” Griffin added. Unknowns include “how much that increases inflation systemically.” Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon also called attention to the ballooning national debt in the United States. “We absolutely have to worry about what’s happening with deficits in the U.S.,” Solomon said. Ultimately, however, unforeseen forces often cause the biggest disruptions, said Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman, noting “nobody in this room predicted COVID.”

Fed: Supervisory problems on the rise for banks of all sizes --The number of outstanding supervisory findings — for large, regional and community banks alike — have continued to climb in recent months, according to the Federal Reserve's latestsupervision and regulation report. The semiannual report was released Thursday and noted that only about half of large financial institutions — those with total assets of $100 billion or more — had satisfactory ratings based on the Fed's three-pronged rating system, which considers capital planning, liquidity management and governance and controls. Large banks with satisfactory ratings have hovered between 50% and 60% during the past several years, according to the report, but the share has steadily declined since 2019. The report notes that large banks were generally well capitalized, and the 23 institutions examined in this year's stress test had sufficient capital and liquidity to withstand a severe economic downturn. Meanwhile, governance issues plagued the large banks, accounting for two-thirds of the findings by Fed examiners. Liquidity and interest rate risk management issues were also on the rise. Smaller and medium-size banks — those in the community and regional bank supervisory portfolios — also saw supervisory issues jump from last year. The report attributes this rise to adverse financial conditions. Overall, the vast majority of community and regional banks were on sound supervisory footing, the report notes, highlighting the fact that more than 90% received satisfactory ratings in the CAMELs rating system, which examines capital adequacy, asset quality, management, earnings, liquidity and sensitivity to market risks. Even so, those smaller and regional banks struggled to manage certain risks. Information technology and operational risks were the most cited issues among both regional banks, those with between $10 billion and $100 billion of assets, and community banks, those with less than $10 billion of assets.

The Fed’s Bank Capital Three-Card Monte: Undermines Tighter Rules by Allowing Synthetic Risk Transfers to Famed Hedge Fund Bad Actors Like Magnetar, Ares - by Yves Smith - The Fed isn’t acting as if its heart is in taking regulation bank regulation seriously. Not that that is any surprise.Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal described how banks are sidestepping the more stringent capital requirements regulators plan to implement after Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank failed early this year. SVB, as it is often called, took the bone-headed action of loading up on low interest rate mortgages. The bank’s funding was skewed towards very large deposits, and then by wealthy individuals, as opposed to businesses. Keep in mind that quite a few venture capital funds who were investors in SVB required other investee companies to bank at SVB, so the prospect of those companies being unable to make payroll¹ because they’d lose their uninsured balances became the rallying cry for Doing Something.The denouement was that both banks had all their deposits guaranteed, and that the Fed created yet another emergency facility, the Bank Term Funding Facility, to provide relief to similarly-situated players, as in potentially a lot of banks. This was a more permissive way than the discount window to allow banks to access emergency funds, by virtue of not haircutting the collateral pledged for the loan. Remember that while SVB was an extreme case of wrong-footing the Fed’s interest rate increases, nearly all banks are sitting on losses on loans and portfolio investments due to their price going down as interest rates rise. There could be an argument for regulatory forbearance, as in looking the other way and/or finding ways to finesse the paper losses, on the assumption that the central bank will relent in the not-too-distant future and those interest-rate-induced losses will prove to be largely temporary.This long-winded intro is to establish that the crisis this spring, and the Fed’s combo of relief but tighter capital rules was to solve a problem created by the central bank itself, that of having kept interest rates too low for far too long, and then reversing them though very aggressive rate increase. We’d heard in 2011 or 2012 from Fed-connected sources that the central bank realized its super low interest rate experiment had been a failure and they needed to unwind it. Bernanke talked the prospect of Fed tightening up in 2014, but lost his nerve in the market revolt that came to be called the Taper Tantrum.Congress and the Fed exacerbated this underlying problem, of an excessively-low-interest rate time bomb that would eventually go off, with Congress voting through laxer rules in 2018 on the cutoff for being a large bank. Nevertheless, the Fed remained the primary regulator for SVB and even released a report on why the bank failed and admitted it had become too hands off with the mid sized banks under the new law.So now, not at all far past the March upheaval, with new capital rules expected but not implement, the Fed going the other way, of being more permissive. It is allowing big banks to get relief from current rules, while enriching some notorious bad actor hedge funds and less unsavory private equity firms. From the Wall Street Journal:U.S. banks have found a new way to unload risk as they scramble to adapt to tighter regulations and rising interest rates.JPMorgan Chase JPM 0.49%increase; green up pointing triangle, Morgan Stanley MS 0.61%increase; green up pointing triangle, U.S. Bank and others are selling complex debt instruments to private-fund managers as a way to reduce regulatory capital charges on the loans they make, people familiar with the transactions said.These so-called synthetic risk transfers are expensive for banks but less costly than taking the full capital charges on the underlying assets. They are lucrative for the investors, who can typically get returns of around 15% or more…U.S. banks have found a new way to unload risk as they scramble to adapt to tighter regulations and rising interest rates.JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, U.S. Bank and others are selling complex debt instruments to private-fund managers as a way to reduce regulatory capital charges on the loans they make, people familiar with the transactions said.These so-called synthetic risk transfers are expensive for banks but less costly than taking the full capital charges on the underlying assets. They are lucrative for the investors, who can typically get returns of around 15% or more, according to the people familiar with the transactions….The deals function somewhat like an insurance policy, with the banks paying interest instead of premiums. By lowering potential loss exposure, the transfers reduce the amount of capital banks are required to hold against their loans….

BankThink: New Basel capital plan deal violates the Administrative Procedure Act | American Banker -- The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision is an informal organization consisting of the bank regulatory authorities and central banks from the world's leading economies. In the 1980s, the Basel Committee recognized that bank capital standards were not uniform among member countries, and that this created a competitive advantage to internationally active banks that were subject to lower capital requirements. The Basel Committee also recognized that the existing standards were not based on the risk inherent in a bank's portfolio, and, therefore, a bank with a low risk profile would be required to have the same minimum capital as a bank engaging in speculative ventures.In 1988, the Basel Committee addressed both problems by approving a "risk-based capital framework" that established minimum capital requirements adjusted for the perceived risk of various types of bank assets. Thus, for example, more capital is required for a commercial loan than for a first mortgage loan, and more capital is required for a first mortgage loan than for a Treasury security. Since 1988, the Basel Committee has revised the risk-based capital framework several times, most recently in 2017, when the capital framework was substantially modified.The Basel Committee does not have the authority to impose binding capital standards on U.S. banking organizations. Nevertheless, the governing body of the Basel Committee has unanimously stated that it expects full, timely and consistent implementation "of all elements" of the new 2017 Basel capital framework. U.S. banking regulators also have stated that they are committed to adopting capital regulations that will require at least as much capital as would be required under the Basel framework. In a joint press release dated September 9, 2022, all of the U.S. banking regulators, including the Federal Reserve, "reaffirmed their commitment to implementing enhanced regulatory capital requirements that align with the 2017 revision to the Basel capital framework. Furthermore, the Basel Committee warned that country-specific implementation of the Basel accord should not be used to revisit the policy decisions made by the committee in 2017.However, constraining the discretion of the U.S. bank regulatory agencies in this manner is the antithesis of the statutorily mandated rulemaking process designed to ensure that agencies issue legally binding regulations only after considering all relevant comments. The governing statute, the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), requires regulatory agencies to publish notice of a proposed rule and "give interested parties an opportunity to participate through submission of written data, views, or arguments." Federal courts have consistently held that this opportunity for comment must be meaningful, and to satisfy this requirement that the agency must be open-minded. The courts have made it clear that if an agency predetermined the outcome of a rulemaking, the agency has effectively negated the right of the public to make meaningful comments on the proposal. Predetermination makes a mockery of the agency's obligation to conduct an open and fair rulemaking.The banking agencies entered into an agreement with third parties when they committed to abide by the Basel capital framework, and essentially promised to use the Basel framework as the minimum capital requirements for U.S. banking institutions. This is exactly the type of predetermination that has been found by the courts to violate the APA.

As funding showdown looms, GOP targets international bank regulation — House Republicans targeted the international Basel Committee and their role in developing increased capital requirements for U.S. banks, a new front in GOP criticism of the Biden administration's financial regulators and their capital rules. Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., chairman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy, said that he, as well as the full panel's chairman, Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., have sent a letter to the Government Accountability Office requesting information on federal banking agencies' role in the development of international standards for Basel III endgame. The report, Barr said, will help in "exposing international governance groups' activist pursuits across the global economic system and the control over U.S. regulatory frameworks by unelected bureaucrats. "Staff from the Federal Reserve, FDIC, OCC and Treasury work with those bodies to develop regulatory standards, write policy papers and promote the goals of those global governance bodies," he said. "Some federal banking officials sometimes even receive compensation from global governance bodies for their work in those bodies. U.S. federal banking agencies are held to abide by commitments that those bodies require of members in their self-constructed and sometimes dynamically changing mandates." Republicans and bank groups are pushing back hard against the financial regulators' Basel III endgame proposal, which could raise capital requirements by 16 percent for some banks. Particularly, bank groups and Republican lawmakers have targeted Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michael Barr. The Basel III endgame proposal is part of a broader international accord that arose from the 2008 financial crisis and is designed to codify international standards for bank capital and liquidity so as to prevent regulatory arbitrage. Republicans have, in the past, said that the U.S. banking regulators superseded those minimum standards and have instead "gold-plated" them to make them even more stringent.

BankThink: Financial regulation could be the linchpin of Congressional budget negotiations | American Banker — One of the benefits of writing about banking for a living is that it's specialized. There's a finite universe of things that I have to know and care about, and while that may seem limiting at first, there are infinities within the confines of bank-related topics that can be profitably explored for years, or even a lifetime.But the downside is that those banking issues only occasionally break through to the public consciousness or the wider public discourse, and when they do it's usually because something has gone spectacularly wrong. The banking crisis earlier this year was one example of this; the 2008 global financial crisis is another, though taken to an uncommon extreme. So when the House of Representatives unveiled its opening bid for budget negotiations to keep the government funded, it was with some surprise that we learned that the big news of the day was actually quite intertwined with the financial regulatory issues we talk about all the time. Among the many stipulations in the budget proposal, the House bill would slash the Treasury Department's budget by $1.2 billion, subject the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to Congressional appropriations, cut the budget for community development financial institutions and anti-money laundering rules, and crack down on the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement powers. That Congressional Republicans want these things is not surprising — many of those provisions have been sought before in various forms — and in a negotiation it is common to start by asking for everything you can possibly want with the expectation that most of what you ask Santa for won't be under the tree on Christmas Day. But by including all of these provisions in the budget proposal, Republicans raise the possibility that one or more of these big-ticket items will end up being the axis on which these negotiations turn — and that one of those provisions will be traded off to protect another. Perhaps Republicans will come to accept that the administration will not agree to subject CFPB to appropriations — but will the administration agree to, say, cut the CDFI fund as a concession? I don't know the answer to that question — nobody does — and something as sprawling as a budget bill leaves its own infinities of possibility on what might ultimately make the cut and what won't. But the fact that these issues and programs are on the block means that there is a distinct possibility that one or more of them could make their way into law. Take for example the 2017 budget reconciliation package that opened the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve in Alaska to oil drilling — that's a similarly intractable issue that made its way into law through a very similar route, albeit under very different political circumstances.

New York now requires banks to report ransom payments - Banks and other financial companies regulated by New York's top financial regulator have six months to implement new governance, reporting and training requirements designed to improve their cybersecurity postures. Among the New York State Department of Financial Services' new requirements, regulated entities including banks will soon have 24 hours to report extortion payments made in connection with a ransomware event and 30 days to provide an explanation of why the bank made the payment. Under the new regulations, banks must also implement multifactor authentication for anyone with access to any of the bank's information systems, with limited exceptions. This means both bank employees and bank customers will need to use multifactor authentication to log in. The new rules are designed to ensure financial institutions "have the safeguards in place to protect vital customer data and maintain the integrity of our financial system," according to Governor Kathy Hochul. The new regulations respond to rising numbers of cyberattacks, according to New York State Superintendent of Financial Services Adrienne Harris. "Expanded use of proven protections such as multifactor authentication will be required while maintaining the risk-based flexibility of the landmark cybersecurity regulations," Harris said. In a document responding to numerous public comments reacting to previous drafts of the new rules, NYDFS said that it aimed to harmonize its new regulations with existing ones from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, other federal agencies, other states and other countries. "Where relevant and appropriate given its mission, the department harmonized its requirements with other regulations and frameworks," the NYDFS document said. "For example, the Cybersecurity Regulation emphasizes governance controls in alignment with NIST CSF 2.0."

Fincen rolls out rule to simplify beneficial ownership identifiers — The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network issued a final rule Tuesday that will allow reporting companies to use an existing Fincen identifier to meet the agency's beneficial ownership reporting requirements, albeit only under certain circumstances. The rule would allow companies subject to the rule to use their Fincen identifier — a unique alphanumeric code that firms can obtain from Fincen after receiving required information from an individual or legal entity — in lieu of the entire set of data pertaining to beneficial owners and company applicants that reporting companies will otherwise be required to report. The agency said the final rule responds to comments on the proposed rule that the use of Fincen identifiers could obscure the identities of beneficial owners, resulting in greater secrecy or incomplete or misleading disclosures. "This final rule is another concrete step toward implementing a beneficial ownership information reporting regime that will enhance corporate transparency in the United States," said Fincen Director Andrea Gacki. This rule change amends the beneficial ownership information, or BOI, reporting regime the agency initially established after the passage of Corporate Transparency Act in 2020, which amended the Anti-Money Laundering Act to require companies doing business in the United States and their financial partners — namely banks — to report their true owners, thereby stopping shell companies from facilitating money laundering and the financing of terrorism. Reporting companies are obligated to report identifying information about their beneficial owners, the individuals who ultimately own or control the company, and the company applicants who create or register them. The companies are required to begin reporting January 1.

CFPB proposes to treat digital wallets more like banks - Meta, Apple, Alphabet and other companies that offer digital wallets and payment apps would fall under U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau supervision under a newly proposed rule aimed at treating nonbanks more like traditional counterparts. Companies handling more than 5 million transactions per year would be regulated like banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions already under the CFPB's supervision, the agency said in a statement Tuesday. CFPB examiners would be able to monitor payment apps for compliance with federal money-transfer laws, as well as for unfair, deceptive, or abusive conduct, should the rule be finalized. The agency can already step in if nonbanks act unlawfully, but it can't regularly supervise their operations under current rules. "Today's rule would crack down on one avenue for regulatory arbitrage by ensuring large technology firms and other nonbank payments companies are subjected to appropriate oversight," CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in the statement. The use of digital payments to store and send money — services such as PayPal's Venmo and Block's Cash App — has boomed in recent years as consumers use their phones and other electronic devices for transactions. While banks have largely facilitated these services in the past, technology companies have now stepped in, according to the CFPB, and safeguards that consumers tend to take for granted, including deposit insurance, may not apply. The CFPB doesn't have authority over deposit insurance, so it wouldn't be able to enforce those types of protections even if additional oversight is approved, but the agency would be able to know if companies are making false claims. The proposal is aimed squarely at Apple Pay and Google Pay. The CFPB already supervises PayPal and Block, so the agency likely has at least has some visibility on activity for Venmo and Cash App.

Fintechs weigh in on the White House's executive order on AI -As experts across the fintech industry closely monitor the ripple effects of the White House's executive order on artificial intelligence, leaders remain confident in their firms' abilities to adapt to changes in an already highly regulated environment.The scope of President Biden's order is wide. The order asks the creators of qualifying AI models that are trained on broad datasets, are self-supervised and exhibit high performance levels at tasks "that pose a serious risk to security, national economic security [or] national public health or safety" to provide the government with records of training sessions and cybersecurity test results for the systems.This level of scrutiny extends to the buyers of the models, who are required to report their purchase as well as "the existence and location of these clusters and the amount of total computing power available in each cluster." Users will also need to adhere to new standards on cybersecurity, consumer data privacy, bias and discrimination.Lawmakers remain divided on how to effectively govern the evolving landscape of generative AI and its novel applications, pushing those at the helm of tech-savvy institutions to test individual use cases and build governance frameworks of their own. But in addition to the banks and credit unions integrating AI-powered tools into operations, fintech providers that develop the products are no strangers to the growing number ofcompliance hurdles impeding adoption across the industry.

Given regulatory uncertainty, banks will take tentative steps to embrace AI — Experts say the ever-evolving use cases for generative artificial intelligence could spur banks to ramp up their adoption of the technology exponentially in the coming years. But vague regulatory concerns about the technology may hamper that adoption, experts say, until there is some clarity about what is permitted and what is not. Federal Reserve Vice Chair for Supervision Michael Barr noted in remarks at the DC Fintech Week conference Tuesday that the Fed is watching generative AI used in trading at financial institutions and deliberating over its potential trade-offs. "Today, most algorithmic trading is very widespread and as a form of using machine learning to engage in trading activities," he said. "That can generate, again, benefits in terms of efficiencies, but also risks in terms of fairness, in terms of concerns about market manipulation and in terms of efficiency on the other side, so we just have to watch — in a very long-term way — the potential risks and benefits of artificial intelligence." Acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu also spoke at the conference, and said he believes the lively public discussion of AI in the financial industry may be getting ahead of the effective reality on the ground at banks. "To the extent that banks are engaging or have been engaged — especially on machine learning — it's really been a crawl, walk, run approach, with good controls, really focused on use cases that make sense and that meet the safety and soundness and fairness standards that we have," he said. "We expect banks to continue to take that approach because it seems like the right one."

Fed SLOOS Survey: Banks reported Tighter Standards, Weaker Demand for All Loan Types -From the Federal Reserve: The October 2023 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices The October 2023 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices (SLOOS) addressed changes in the standards and terms on, and demand for, bank loans to businesses and households over the past three months, which generally correspond to the third quarter of 2023.Regarding loans to businesses, survey respondents, on balance, reported tighter standards and weaker demand for commercial and industrial (C&I) loans to firms of all sizes over the third quarter. Furthermore, banks reported tighter standards and weaker demand for all commercial real estate (CRE) loan categories.For loans to households, banks reported that lending standards tightened across all categories of residential real estate (RRE) loans other than government residential mortgages, for which standards remained basically unchanged. Meanwhile, demand weakened for all RRE loan categories. In addition, banks reported tighter standards and weaker demand for home equity lines of credit (HELOCs). Moreover, for credit card, auto, and other consumer loans, standards reportedly tightened, and demand weakened on balance.This graph on Residential Real Estate demand is from the Senior Loan Officer Survey Charts.This shows that demand has declined. The left graph is 1990 to 2014. The right graph is 2015 to Q3 2023.

CFPB report takes deep dive at state Community Reinvestment Act laws - Seven states and the District of Columbia have adopted laws similar to the federal Community Reinvestment Act that require lenders to make investments in the communities in which they do business. While the federal Community Reinvestment Act law applies strictly to banks, some state laws apply to a wider range of financial institutions including nonbank mortgage companies. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a report last week examining state CRA laws and community reinvestment standards. Several states — including Illinois, Massachusetts and New York — have laws that specifically cover nonbank mortgage lenders even though the companies are not federally chartered and do not take deposits. Those three states currently conduct standalone CRA exams that assess mortgage, small-business, and small farm lending. The report is part of an ongoing discussion of whether the nonbank mortgage companies should be subject to CRA requirements given their increased market share compared to banks. "The financial market has changed considerably since the passage of the Community Reinvestment Act, and nonbanks are now capturing a large share of the mortgage market," CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a press release. In 2021, banks originated just 25% of home loans compared with 28% in 2007 and 74% when the federal CRA was passed in 1977. By contrast, nonbank mortgage lenders originated 64% of conventional home purchase mortgage loans in 2021, the CFPB said in the report. Due to such changes, "states have responded by creating reinvestment obligations for mortgage companies and have tailored state reinvestment requirements to meet the needs of their local communities," Chopra said. The CFPB said in its report that none of the state CRA laws explicitly provide for states to issue civil monetary penalties or structural remedies when a company fails to meet state CRA requirements.

Report: During Spring Banking Crisis, Banks Borrowed Over $1 Trillion from Federal Home Loan Banks — $100 Billion More than During the Crash of 2008 -By Pam and Russ Martens: November 8, 2023 ~ Yesterday, the regulator of the Federal Home Loan Bank system, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), released a report on its recommended changes going forward. The report was in response to the questionable conduct of the Federal Home Loan Banks in the leadup to the banking crisis this past spring.The core mission of the 11 regional Federal Home Loan Banks is to “provide liquidity to their members to support housing finance and community development through all economic cycles.” In short, the Federal Home Loan Banks are supposed to make it possible for banks to provide home mortgages to low-income folks. The banks that failed this spring were engaged in crypto (Silvergate and Signature Bank), providing loans to the super wealthy (First Republic Bank), and in the case of Silicon Valley Bank, it was more of a Wall Street IPO pipeline. (See our report: Silicon Valley Bank Was a Wall Street IPO Pipeline in Drag as a Federally-Insured Bank; FHLB of San Francisco Was Quietly Bailing It Out.)As the chart above, from the report, indicates, one of the shockers is that commercial banks were in such desperate need for cash this past spring that they borrowed more from the Federal Home Loan Banks than they did during the financial crash of 2008 – which was the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. This suggests that perhaps the severity of this spring’s bank run has been downplayed by federal regulators. Another troubling revelation in the report is that JPMorgan Chase, the largest bank by both assets and deposits in the U.S., has not repaid the money that First Republic Bank had borrowed from the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco. JPMorgan Chase (with much controversy because it is already the riskiest bank in the U.S.) was allowed by regulators to acquire First Republic Bank when it failed on May 1. The FHFA report notes the following: “On May 1, 2023, the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation closed First Republic Bank, which was acquired by JPMorgan Chase. Of the FHLBank advances to First Republic Bank at the time of its acquisition, $26.4 billion remained outstanding as of September 29, 2023.” JPMorgan Chase’s 10-Q report for the quarter ending September 30 that it filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission indicated that it had $37.88 billion in outstanding advances from Federal Home Loan Banks as of the end of the third quarter. It reported that $26.2 billion of that was related to its acquisition of First Republic Bank. That would mean that the largest bank in the United States – which has the ability to borrow from the Federal Reserve’s Discount Window or the Fed’s $500 billion Standing Repo Facility – elected instead to tap almost $12 billion from a government mortgage program for low income families and not repay another $26 billion owed in relation to its acquisition of First Republic Bank. JPMorgan Chase is an unreformed, serial recidivist bank that has admitted to five criminal felony counts brought by the U.S. Department of Justice since 2014. Just this year it has agreed to settle charges in two federal lawsuits for $365 million that credibly alleged the bank had actively participated in the late Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking of minors. Throughout its crime spree, the chummy Board of Directors at the bank has voted to keep the same man at the helm of the bank, Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO.JPMorgan Chase’s questionable use of advances from the Federal Home Loan Banks dates back to at least 2013. On September 18, 2013 we reported that the largest borrower from Federal Home Loan Banks was JPMorgan Chase, which had $61.840 billion in advances outstanding as of June 30, 2013.We also reported that as of June 30, 2013, JPMorgan Chase wasn’t just borrowing from one Federal Home Loan Bank, it was borrowing from three separate ones. We found that it had grabbed 65.8 percent of all advances made at the time by the Federal Home Loan Bank of Cincinnati, which services Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee.In addition to being the largest borrower from the Federal Home Loan Banks as of the second quarter of 2013, JPMorgan was also being sued for fraud by the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh. According to a 2013 financial filing, on September 23, 2009, the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh had filed two complaints in state court for the recovery of the Bank’s losses relating to nine private label mortgage-backed securities (MBS) purchased from J.P. Morgan Securities, Inc. in an aggregate principal amount of approximately $1.68 billion. According to the filing, some claims had been dismissed but there remained claims against JPMorgan “for fraud, negligent misrepresentation and state and federal securities law claims….” JPMorgan Chase ended up paying the staggering sum of $13 billion to settle charges with the Justice Department and other regulators for selling toxic mortgage products. Instead of promoting a financially stable housing market, Jamie Dimon’s bank was a major participant in causing the worst housing price collapse since the Great Depression.

FHFA: Federal Home Loan Banks can't be a lender of last resort — U.S. officials will try to shift the Federal Home Loan Banks back to their housing finance roots, rather than having the Great Depression-era program serve as a lender of last resort to imperiled financial institutions, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said in a long-awaited report. The Home Loan Bank system came under scrutiny amid the banking turmoil of March 2023. In the leadup to the bank failures, the government-chartered lender lent large sums to Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and First Republic, calling into question the FHLB's practice of doling out billions of dollars to fill the short-term liquidity needs of banks that sometimes had very little activity in the housing space. Although the FHFA, which oversees the FHLBs, had already announced their 100-year review of the program at the time of the March 2023 banking turmoil, the role of the FHLBs in meeting the liquidity needs of the banks that failed in that time prompted inquiries from Congress and affordable housing advocates. The agency's report Tuesday said the FHFA plans to increase federal oversight of how banks are using the FHLBs and steer more banks toward the Federal Reserve's discount window for liquidity needs in the future. The FHFA will propose a rule that would force many banks to hold at least 10% of their assets in mortgage loans to continue using the FHLBs for liquidity. The agency will also explore other options for tougher oversight of which banks are using the FHLBs, and look into additional rules and guidance to incentivize housing finance, such as discounted advance rates or differential dividends on capital stock, to members with a strong connection to the housing mission. The FHFA could also undergo a structural retooling of the home loan bank system, including reducing the total number of institutions. Currently, there are 11 home loan banks, but the FHFA could slash that to eight without legislation from Congress, the report points out. Ryan Donovan, who serves as the public voice for the FHLBs as the president and CEO of the Council of the Federal Home Loan Banks, said in a statement that the report "represents the beginning of what we anticipate will be a long process." "Our members know they can count on us through all market conditions, and the overwhelming sentiment from FHFA's review was that stakeholders want more, not less, from the FHLBank System," he said. "Rather than waiting for FHFA to publish its report, the FHLBanks have already begun responding to stakeholder feedback and have voluntarily increased their commitment to affordable housing and community development by 50% above the statutory minimum. Donovan said that the FHLBs "plan to work with FHFA on ways to enhance the positive impact the System has for its members, the communities they serve, and the broader financial system. We will continue to work with our members, primary regulators, and other stakeholders to ensure that any changes in policy will not negatively impact our clear mission of providing essential liquidity and critical affordable housing and community development funding where it is needed."

FHFA sets March deadline for community programs at Home Loan banks -The Federal Housing Finance Agency is wasting no time in demanding changes at the Federal Home Loan banks. After proposing major reforms in a highly anticipated report early in the week, the FHFA has issued guidance on how the system that provides liquidity to financial institutions can do more to help underserved communities with pilot and voluntary programs.The FHFA said Thursday in an advisory bulletin that it expects the board of each of the 11 Home Loan banks to create a framework to implement pilot and voluntary programs by March 29, 2024. The FHFA wants the banks to formalize governance and operational standards to better evaluate the programs. By immediately issuing guidance after the long-awaited report — the first review of the Home Loan Bank System in 90 years — FHFA Director Sandra Thompson is signaling that changes need to be made quickly. The FHFA has long used pilot programs as a way to make changes at government-sponsored enterprises that ultimately become more permanent. The FHFA's guidance is part of a broad effort to get Home Loan banks to deliver public benefits beyond the system's core business of providing liquidity to its members."FHFA believes that the FHLBanks should develop innovative pilot programs, and offer voluntary programs, to increase prudently their support for affordable housing, equity advancement, and community development for underserved and financially vulnerable populations in their districts and other initiatives, including through the FHLBanks' core business activities," the advisory bulletin states. "Pilot programs or voluntary programs could be designed, for example, to support increases in the supply of affordable single-family and multifamily housing, help close racial homeownership gaps, address residential climate-resiliency improvements, or address other needs," the bulletin states. Separately, the FHFA released a 66-page report this week detailing the Home Loan banks' mission-focused activities that include the statutorily mandated Affordable Housing Program and Community Investment Program. The report found that the banks contributed roughly $40 million to voluntary programs in 2022 that were not mandatory.

Will the FHFA's vision for the Federal Home Loan Banks work? - The Federal Housing Finance Agency wants to more closely tie the liquidity that the Federal Home Loan Banks provide to financial institutions to the system's mission of promoting housing and community development, but bringing those dual missions in line may be easier said than done. A main takeaway of the 115-page report released Tuesday is that FHFA plans to issue a proposed rule that would clarify the mission of the Federal Home Loan Bank System while providing metrics and thresholds for measuring how each of the 11 FHLBs advance that mission. FHFA also is considering how to incorporate what it calls "mission achievement" in its exam processes, and may potentially include a stand-alone "mission examination" rating for each of the banks. But one key concern about such a proposal is whether the Home Loan Banks will embrace the FHFA's suggestions, given that the Home Loan Banks have been championing their role of providing liquidity and thus financial stability to member institutions, and the possibility that many of the proposed changes would cut into profits that members receive in the form of hefty dividends. "There are ways to make this work, but at the end of the day none of this will work if the FHLBs don't get engaged," said Peter Knight, the cofounder of Policy Kinetics, who worked for 19 years as a director of government relations at the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh. Experts who have followed the FHLBs for decades called the report and its suggestions an ambitious undertaking. The FHFA's recommendations are the beginning of a multi-year effort to encourage the government-sponsored enterprise to do more to promote liquidity alongside housing and community development. Most of the changes will be implemented through ongoing supervision, guidance and rules. But some of the more sweeping changes — such as increasing the amount of liquidity steered toward affordable housing and oversight of executive compensation — would require Congressional action. Former FHFA Director Mark Calabria, a senior advisor at the Cato Institute, said the report's findings and recommendations were in line with what he expected, and were reasonable given the lack of specificity in the Federal Home Loan Bank Act of 1932 about membership eligibility and other key provisions. Calabria said the FHFA was justified in seeking congressional input on whether there should be a renewed focus on housing finance, one that could put stricter limits on the types of institutions that can access FHLB advances or the types of activities they can engage in. But he urged his former agency not to wait for Congress to take action, noting that some changes are already well within its reach. "It would be great if Congress would come in and clarify some of these things, and FHFA is not without justification in asking if there should be a refocus of purpose," Calabria said. "But there are aspects, like limiting the exposure of any one member, that FHFA can do on its own."

MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increase in the Third Quarter of 2023 -From the MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increase in the Third Quarter of 2023 : The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential properties increased to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.62 percent of all loans outstanding at the end of the third quarter of 2023, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) National Delinquency Survey. The delinquency rate was up 25 basis points from the second quarter of 2023 and up 17 basis points from one year ago. The percentage of loans on which foreclosure actions were started in the third quarter rose by 1 basis point to 0.14 percent. “The national mortgage delinquency rate increased in the third quarterfrom the record survey low reached in the second quarter of this year, with an uptick in delinquencies across all loan types – conventional, FHA, and VA,” said Marina Walsh, CMB, MBA’s Vice President of Industry Analysis. “The increase was driven entirely by a rise in earliest-stage delinquencies – those 30-days and 60-days past due. Later-stage delinquencies – those 90 days or more past due – declined to the lowest level since the first quarter of 2020.” Added Walsh, “The decline in later-stage delinquencies, along with a foreclosure starts rate of 0.14 percent – which is well below the historical quarterly average of 0.40 percent – suggest that distressed homeowners may be utilizing available loss mitigation options that prevent a foreclosure start. Additionally, accumulated home equity may also be enabling some homeowners to sell their homes well before foreclosure becomes a possibility.” This graph shows the percent of loans delinquent by days past due. Overall delinquencies increased in Q3. From the MBA:Compared to last quarter, the seasonally adjusted mortgage delinquency rate increased for all loans outstanding. By stage, the 30-day delinquency rate increased 28 basis points to 2.03 percent, the 60-day delinquency rate increased 7 basis points to 0.62 percent, and the 90-day delinquency bucket decreased 9 basis points to 0.98 percent. ... The delinquency rate includes loans that are at least one payment past due but does not include loans in the process of foreclosure. The percentage of loans in the foreclosure process at the end of the third quarter was 0.49 percent, down 4 basis points from the second quarter of 2023 and down 7 basis points lower than one year ago. This is the lowest foreclosure inventory rate since fourth-quarter 2021. The sharp increase in 2020 in the 90-day bucket was due to loans in forbearance (included as delinquent, but not reported to the credit bureaus). The percent of loans in the foreclosure process decreased year-over-year in Q3 even with the end of the foreclosure moratoriums and are historically low.

Mortgage & HELOC Balances, Delinquencies, Foreclosures: How Are our Drunken Sailors Holding Up? by Wolf Richter • Mortgage balances outstanding ticked up 1.0% in Q3 from Q2, to a new record of $12.1 trillion, after having dipped in Q2, according to data from the New York Fed’s Household Debt and Credit Report. This increase is less than half the pace than the big jumps during the era of the 3% mortgages, when mortgage balances had soared quarter-to-quarter by as much as 2.8% in Q2 2021.Year-over-year, mortgage balances rose 4.0%, down by over half from the year-over-year increases in 2021 and 2022 that had reached 10%. In a moment, we’ll look at what could cause an uptick in mortgage balances even as home sales have plunged and as mortgage applications to purchase a home have collapsed. Mortgage balances rise or fall based on diverging dynamics, on the plus side and on the minus side.What adds to mortgage balances:

• The growing total inventory of homes (it constantly increases due to new construction) owned by a growing population.
• Prices rise over the years (newly purchased homes are financed with bigger mortgages). Price soared in 2020-2022, dictating today’s big mortgages.
• A boom in cash-out refis (nope, not now).

What subtracts from mortgage balances:

• Regular mortgage principal payments.
• Mortgage payoffs — and people with 3% mortgages are clinging to them.
• Falling home prices mixed with a wave of foreclosures – which caused mortgage balances to fall during the housing bust.

HELOC balances have been rising for four quarters from historic lows. Homeowners with 3% mortgages can no longer cash-out-refi their homes without causing a catastrophic increase of their mortgage payment, as the entire 3% mortgage would be replaced with a 7%-plus mortgage. A HELOC accomplishes the same thing but the 3% mortgage stays in place, and only the HELOC portion comes with a 7%-plus price tag. HELOC balances rose by $9 billion, or by 2.6% in Q3 from Q2, to $349 billion. They remain extremely low, considering the increase in home prices over the 20-year period, as homeowners used refis, instead of HELOCs, to draw out cash over the past decade:The burden of mortgage debt. Homes are lot more expensive today than they were 20 years ago, but consumers make a lot more money too, and there are lot more homes and a lot more consumers owning them. Turns out, after massive gyrations, overall mortgage debt as a percent of disposable income is roughly where it had been in 2003.Disposable income is income from all sources except capital gains, minus taxes and social insurance payments. This is the cash that consumers have left to spend on housing, food, cars, etc.Note the impact of the pandemic-era funds that consumers got (stimulus payments, PPP loans, etc.) that caused disposable income to spike, and therefore the burden ratio to fall. And note the impact in recent quarters of the biggest pay increases in 40 years, even as mortgage debt barely increased.Transitioning into delinquency: 30+ days. Mortgage balances that were newly delinquent by 30 days or more at the end of the quarter ticked up to 2.8% of total balances, which is still lower than anytime before the pandemic and down from the 3.5% range during the Good Times in 2017-2019 (red line in the chart below).For HELOCs, the 30-plus-day delinquency rate rose to 1.8% in Q3, after having dropped to 1.5% in the prior quarter and remains ultra-low (green line).Serious delinquency: 90+ days. Mortgage balances that were 90 days or more delinquent by the end of the quarter edged up to 0.50% in Q3 from 0.46% in the prior quarter, about half the rate from the Good Times before the pandemic and from the Good Times before the housing bust (red line in the chart below).For HELOCs, the 90+ day delinquency rate inched up to 0.74% in Q3, from 0.64% in the prior quarter, which had been the lowest since before the Housing Bust (green line).Foreclosures in a frying-pan pattern. The number of consumers with foreclosures fell by 7% quarter-to-quarter to 36,100 in Q3, down by about 45% from the Good Times before the pandemic in 2017-2019, and down by 75% from the Good Times in 2003-2004 when the housing market was approaching the peak of the prior housing bubble.The fiscal and monetary excesses during the pandemic, the forbearance programs, and foreclosure bans reduced foreclosures to near zero. Now they’ve come up a little from these lows but remain ultra-low.So sure, someone clever could come up with a clickbait-title about foreclosures “exploding by 345%,” OMG, from Q2 2021. And we’ll just laugh about it and move on.

MBA: Mortgage Applications Increased in Weekly Survey - From the MBA: Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey - Mortgage applications increased 2.5 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending November 3, 2023. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, increased 2.5 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 1 percent compared with the previous week. The Refinance Index increased 2 percent from the previous week and was 7 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 3 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 1 percent compared with the previous week and was 20 percent lower than the same week one year ago. “The 30-year fixed mortgage rate dropped by 25 basis points to 7.61 percent, the largest single week decline since July 2022,” . “Last week’s decrease in rates was driven by the U.S. Treasury’s issuance update, the Fed striking a dovish tone in the November FOMC statement, and data indicating a slower job market. Applications for both purchase and refinance loans were up over the week but remained at low levels. The purchase index is still more than 20 percent behind last year’s pace, as many homebuyers remain on the sidelines until more for-sale inventory becomes available.” The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($726,200 or less) decreased to 7.61 percent from 7.86 percent, with points decreasing to 0.69 from 0.73 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value ratio (LTV) loans. The first graph shows the MBA mortgage purchase index.According to the MBA, purchase activity is down 20% year-over-year unadjusted. Red is a four-week average (blue is weekly). The previous week the purchase index was at the lowest level since 1995.

Housing November 6th Weekly Update: Inventory Still Increasing, Up 0.8% Week-over-week --Altos reports that active single-family inventory was up 0.8% week-over-week. This is the latest in the year that inventory was still increasing!. This inventory graph is courtesy of Altos Research. As of November 3rd, inventory was at 567 thousand (7-day average), compared to 563 thousand the prior week. Year-to-date, inventory is up 15.5%. And inventory is up 39.6% from the seasonal bottom 29 weeks ago.The second graph shows the seasonal pattern for active single-family inventory since 2015. The red line is for 2023. The black line is for 2019. Note that inventory is up from the record low for the same week in 2021, but below last year and still well below normal levels.Inventory was down 1.5% compared to the same week in 2022 (last week it was down 2.7%), and down 37.1% compared to the same week in 2019 (last week down 39.4%). In 2022, inventory peaked at the end of October (the latest in the year inventory had peaked until this year). I now expect inventory to be up YoY soon.Inventory is now 4.4% above the same week in 2020 levels (dark blue line).Mike Simonsen discusses this data regularly on Youtube.

Update: Lumber Prices Down Slightly YoY - Here is another monthly update on lumber prices.NOTE: The CME group discontinued the Random Length Lumber Futures contract on May 16th. I've now switched to a new physically-delivered Lumber Futures contract that was started in August 2022. Unfortunately, this impacts long term price comparisons since the new contract was priced about 24% higher than the old random length contract for the period both contracts were available. This graph shows CME random length framing futures through last August (blue), and the new physically-delivered Lumber Futures (LBR) contract starting in August 2022 (Red). LBR is currently at $530.50 per 1000 board feet, down 1% from $535.00 a year ago.There is somewhat of a seasonal demand for lumber, and lumber prices usually peak in April or May.We didn't see a significant runup in prices this Spring due to the housing slowdown.

Leading Index for Commercial Real Estate Increased in October, Down 8% YoY --From Dodge Data Analytics: Dodge Momentum Index Inches Up 1% in October The Dodge Momentum Index (DMI), issued by Dodge Construction Network, increased 1% in October to 181.7 (2000=100) from the revised September reading of 180.3. Over the month, the commercial component of the DMI rose 2.0%, while the institutional component retreated 1.4%.“Heightened momentum in warehouse planning activity supported thecommercial side of the Index this month, while muted education planning activity slowed the institutional portion,” stated Sarah Martin, associate director of forecasting for Dodge Construction Network. “Overall levels of planning activity remain robust and will support construction spending over the next 12 to 18 months.”Improvements in warehouse planning helped support commercial growth, but despite strong progress in September, education and healthcare activity slowed down this month. Year over year, the DMI was 8% lower than in October 2022. The commercial segment was down 14%, while the institutional segment was up 7%....The DMI is a monthly measure of the initial report for nonresidential building projects in planning, shown to lead construction spending for nonresidential buildings by a full year. This graph shows the Dodge Momentum Index since 2002. The index was at 181.7 in October, up from 180.3 the previous month.According to Dodge, this index leads "construction spending for nonresidential buildings by a full year". This index suggests some slowdown towards the end of 2023 and in 2024. Commercial construction is typically a lagging economic indicator.

Not Sure How Long It’ll Last: Spending on Factory Construction Does a Historic Spike, after Years of Going Nowhere – by Wolf Richter - This is amazing, and I’m not sure how long it will last, but spending on construction projects for manufacturing facilities in the US continues to spike in a historic manner. In September, $17.5 billion, up by about 150% from the stagnation range before the pandemic. For the first nine months of 2023, spending on factory construction jumped to $140 billion, up by 131% from $60 billion in the same period in 2019 and $59 billion in 2021. Since January 2021, roughly when this boom started, spending has nearly tripled. The rate of spending over the past five months exceeds $200 billion annualized (not seasonally adjusted). Factory construction announcements continue. For example, just this week, German industrial giant Siemens announced that it will invest $510 million in the US to build factories: $150 million for a factory in Texas to manufacture electrical equipment for data centers; $220 million for a factory in North Carolina to manufacture passenger rail cars and offer overhauls of railcars and locomotives (Siemens diesel-electric locomotives are used by Amtrak, Brightline, and other passenger railroads); and $140 million for factories in Texas and California to manufacture electrical products. Part was inflation, but construction costs have cooled. Over the 33 months since January 2021, the Producer Price Index for nonresidential construction has surged by 35%. Over the same period, spending on factory construction has spiked by 195%. But the PPI has actually declined a little so far this year. And the huge year-over-year gains have been whittled down to just 3.8% by September. And there are lot more dollars involved. Construction spending just covers the buildings. Companies invest in factories in the US to make high-value technologically advanced products such as semiconductors and vehicles. They use highly automated factories full of industrial robots. Then there is other investment activity to support the factory, including infrastructure construction. The whole package counts as investments in GDP. What’s even more important for the economy is what comes later when the factory starts producing, creating its own ecosystem of economic activity.What is new is the disruption experienced by global supply chains – they practically all run through China – during the pandemic that led to shortages of all kinds. In addition, there are all kinds of frictions, disputes, uncertainties, and tariffs between the US and China. US manufacturers have to toe the line in China. Even Musk, a big defender of free speech, is mouse-quiet in China about free speech. His gigafactory in Shanghai is worth a lot more than free speech, that’s for sure. What’s also new are huge federal subsidies for semiconductor manufacturing plants, EV battery plants, and EV assembly plants, and subsidies for purchases of EVs that conform to geographic production limitations. Makers of computer, electronic, and electrical equipment are also big drivers behind the surge of factory construction, according to an analysis by the Treasury Department.

Hotels: Occupancy Rate Increased 0.7% Year-over-year - From STR: U.S. hotel results for week ending 28 October - U.S. hotel performance decreased from the previous week but showed positive year-over-year comparisons, according to CoStar’s latest data through 28 October.22-28 October 2023 (percentage change from comparable week in 2022):
• Occupancy: 66.0% (+0.7%)
• Average daily rate (ADR): US$160.89 (+3.9%)
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): US$106.16 (+4.6%)
The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four-week average. The red line is for 2023, black is 2020, blue is the median, and dashed light blue is for 2022. Dashed purple is for 2018, the record year for hotel occupancy. The 4-week average of the occupancy rate is tracking close to last year, and above the median rate for the period 2000 through 2022 (Blue).

NY Fed Q3 Report: Household Debt Increased --From the NY Fed: Household Debt Rises to $17.29 Trillion Led by Mortgage, Credit Card, and Student Loan Balances The Federal Reserve Bank of New York's Center for Microeconomic Data today issued its Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit. The Report shows total household debt increased by $228 billion (1.3%) in the third quarter of 2023, to $17.29 trillion. The report is based on data from the New York Fed’s nationally representative Consumer Credit Panel. Mortgage balances rose by $126 billion from the previous quarter and stood at $12.14 trillion at the end of September. Credit card balances increased by $48 billion to $1.08 trillion in Q3 2023, representing a 4.7% quarterly increase. Auto loan balances rose by $13 billion, consistent with the upward trajectory seen since 2011, and now stand at $1.6 trillion. Student loan balances increased by $30 billion and now stand at $1.6 trillion. Other balances, which include retail cards and other consumer loans, increased by $2 billion.Mortgage originations modestly declined to $386 billion in Q3 2023 and are well below the robust quarterly origination volumes observed between 2020 and 2021. The volume of newly originated auto loans, which includes leases, slightly increased and now stands at $179.3 billion. Aggregate limits on credit card accounts increased by $113 billion, a 2.46% increase from the previous quarter.Aggregate delinquency rates increased in Q3 2023, with 3% of outstanding debt in some stage of delinquency at the end of September. Delinquency transition rates increased for most debt types except student loans and home equity lines of credit. The increases in credit card delinquency were the sharpest among borrowers between the ages of 30 and 39. “Credit card balances experienced a large jump in the third quarter, consistent with strong consumer spending and real GDP growth,” “The continued rise in credit card delinquency rates is broad based across area income and region, but particularly pronounced among millennials and those with auto loans or student loans.” Here are three graphs from the report:The first graph shows household debt increased in Q3. Household debt previously peaked in 2008 and bottomed in Q3 2013. Unlike following the great recession, there wasn't a decline in debt during the pandemic.From the NY Fed:Aggregate household debt balances increased by $228 billion in the third quarter of 2023, a 1.3% rise from 2023Q2. Balances now stand at $17.29 trillion and have increased by $3.1 trillion since the end of 2019, just before the pandemic recession. second graph shows the percent of debt in delinquency.The overall delinquency rate increased in Q3. From the NY Fed: Aggregate delinquency rates were increased in the third quarter of 2023. As of September, 3.0% of outstanding debt was in some stage of delinquency, up by 0.4 percentage points from the second quarter yet 1.7 percentage points lower than the fourth quarter of 2019.The third graph shows Mortgage Originations by Credit Score.From the NY Fed: Mortgage originations, measured as appearances of new mortgages on consumer credit reports and including both refinance and purchase originations, were at $386 billion in 2023Q3, a modest decline from the previous quarter and well below the trillion-dollar-plus quarterly origination volumes observed between 2020 and 2021 ... The median credit score for newly originated mortgages was flat at 770. There is much more in the report.

American household debt increases by $78 billion: report - A new report found that American households increased their total debt by $78 billion in the third quarter of 2023. The study, released Tuesday by WalletHub, found the average amount of total debt owed by U.S. households at $145,319 at the end of the third quarter. It is $13,631 below the all-time high, set back in the fourth quarter of 2008. “Consumers typically rack up the most debt during the fourth quarter of the year as we spend excessively on holiday gifts and travel, so it’s not a good sign when we enter the final few months of the year with a lot of new debt,” John Kiernan, the Managing Editor at WalletHub, said in a statement emailed to The Hill. “Given how Q3 played out, WalletHub is now projecting that U.S. households will end the year with $350+ billion more debt than they started with,” Kiernan continued. The collective debt owed by U.S. households heading into the fourth quarter of 2023 is $17.3 trillion, the report said. The report also looked at different types of debt owed. It found that household mortgage debt increased by around $20 billion in the third quarter, a drastic change from the quarter before, in which it increased by around $273 billion. It also found total credit card debt increased to around $1.08 trillion in the third quarter of 2023, up from about $1.04 billion in the second quarter. This quarter’s total credit card debt is down $189 billion from the all-time high set back in the fourth quarter of 2008.

Credit Cards, the Biggest Payment Method: Balances, Burden, Delinquencies, Available Credit: How Are our Drunken Sailors Holding Up? by Wolf Richter - Credit card balances are among the most misreported data points out there. They’re largely a measure of spending rather than borrowing. Credit cards are the dominant consumer payments method in the US. Credit cards were used for $5.8 trillion in consumer transactions in 2022, up 18% year-over-year due to a surge in spending on travels and other services, and due to the surge in inflation at the time. Banks charged merchants $126 billion in credit card processing fees in 2022, according to Nielsen’s annual report on merchants’ processing fees. That $126 billion in fee income is why banks love credit cards, and why they push credit-card kickbacks such as 1.5% cash-back, so people will use their credit cards to buy stuff so banks can get their cut from every purchase, often around 3% from the merchant. Most people pay off the card every month by the due date. But reported credit card balances are statement balances and show all balances, including those that will be paid off a couple of weeks later and will never accrue interest. Credit card balances (red line in the chart below) rose by $48 billion in Q3 from Q2, to $1.08 trillion, according to the New York Fed’s Household Debt and Credit report. Year-over-year, credit card balances rose 16.6% on higher spending for services such as travels, restaurants, and entertainments, and on higher prices. “Other” consumer loans (green line), such as personal loans, payday loans, and Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) loans, were essentially flat in Q3. Unlike credit card balances, most of these “other” balances are interest bearing, but not all. BNPL loans are interest-free for the consumer and are subsidized by retailers. This data is not adjusted for inflation. Consumer spending, even adjusted for inflation, has been on a crazy growth binge despite high interest rates, and we call them Drunken Sailors for that reason. But a record number of people are working, and they have received the biggest wage increases in four decades, and they’re making more money than ever before, and they’re spending some of it, and they’re still able to save a portion of their income. Below is consumer spending, adjusted for inflation (via 2017 dollars), in the GDP release that caused Powell to tear out his hair. By contrast, credit card balances above are not adjusted for inflation..

Auto Loan Balances, Interest Rates, Subprime Delinquencies, Cash Buyers, Tight Credit: How Are our Drunken Sailors Holding Up? by Wolf Richter • The balance of auto loans and leases rose by 0.8% in Q3 from Q2, and by 4.7% year-over-year, to 1.60 trillion, driven by financing of new vehicles, according to data from the New York Fed’s Household Debt and Credit Report.New vehicles account for the bulk of the auto loans and leases. New-vehicle prices still rose in Q3, and new-vehicle unit sales jumped 20% year-over-year. So that’s where the increase in loans and leases came from.By contrast, used vehicle prices have been falling since the ridiculous spike through 2021, and retail sales of used vehicles in Q3 were roughly flat year-over-year. Used vehicles are not contributing to the increase in auto loan balances. More buyers pay cash. The much higher interest rates make borrowing unattractive. With new vehicles, automakers’ captive finance units are buying down interest rates to 1.9% or whatever. But this is an incentive in lieu of cash incentives, such as a big rebate, that cash buyers get. And so the percentage of cash buyers has risen this year for both new and used vehicles.About 20% of new-vehicle buyers and about 61% of used-vehicle buyers paid cash for their auto purchases, according to Experian’s Q2 report on auto finance, up from 16.5% and 58.5% respectively a year earlier. And these buyers have no debt burden associated with their vehicle.The debt burden fell this year. In terms of the aggregate debt burden, total auto loans and leases outstanding amounted to 7.9% of total disposable income, a tad below where they’d been during the Good Times before the pandemic.Disposable income is income from all sources except capital gains, minus taxes and social insurance payments. This is the cash that consumers have left to spend on, for example, cars.The fairly sharp drop in the debt burden ratio this year was due to the increased portion of cash buyers along with the biggest pay increases in 40 years: Credit has tightened substantially for subprime. The part of auto lending that is seeing tighter financial conditions is subprime lending. Loans are harder to get, some of the most aggressive lenders/dealers have filed for bankruptcy, and other lenders have tightened their subprime underwriting. Losses lead to more prudent underwriting, which eventually leads to fewer losses. This is part of the subprime cycle.So the share of subprime as a percent of total financing has dropped. According to Experian’s Q2 report, subprime’s share of total originations of loans and leases dropped to 15.0%, down from 16.8% a year ago, and down from 17.8% two years ago.Prime borrowers have no problems financing or leasing a vehicle, but the cheap money is gone.Borrowers pay out of their nose: According to data from commercial banks collected by the Federal Reserve, the average interest rate for 72-month new vehicle loans has spiked from 4.84% in February 2022, before the rate hikes started, to 8.12% in August 2023.But it’s less shocking than it seems. For example, for a $40,000 loan at 4.84% for 72 months, the payment was $642 per month; at 8.12%, the payment is $704. I can already hear it: “Just $62 a month more, and you get your dream.” And people want their dream.Delinquencies are driven by subprime. Subprime is always more or less in trouble. That’s why it’s subprime. In the auto-loan market, selling and lending to customers with subprime credit ratings is a high-risk high-profit specialized activity, largely limited to older used vehicles. It has attracted a bevvy of specialized lenders and dealers, often backed by PE firms. The system hinges on being able to securitize the subprime auto loans into Asset Backed Securities (ABS) and sell the investment-grade tranches of those ABS to pension funds and other yield-hungry institutional investors at relatively low yields, and that works until it doesn’t, and now it doesn’t.A number of those ABS deals got scuttled recently, and some got pulled off only after they’d been renegotiated, and several of those specialized operations have filed for bankruptcy, and we covered a couple of them here.There’s a peculiar subprime cycle, where low yields enticed specialized companies to get very aggressive and take huge risks, backed by yield-starved investors that buy the ABS. But after a while, because those deals were too aggressive, the risks come home to roost, and investors are taking losses, and they’re getting skittish, and the whole math sort of begins to unravel. That happened in 2018, and it’s happening again.But subprime is only a small part of the auto-lending business, and an even smaller part of the auto-sales business because lots of people pay cash. Of those buyers that finance new vehicles, only about 5% are subprime; and of those that finance used vehicles, 22% are subprime, according to Experian.And subprime loans that are at least 60 days delinquent spiked through September (red line). But prime loans are rock-solid with minuscule and stable delinquency rates that are below where they’d been before the pandemic, according to the auto loans backing the ABS that are tracked by Fitch Ratings:

Wholesale Used Car Prices Decreased 2.3% in October; Down 4.0% Year-over-year - From Manheim Consulting today: Wholesale Used-Vehicle Prices Decrease in October: Wholesale used-vehicle prices (on a mix, mileage, and seasonally adjusted basis) decreased 2.3% in October from September. The Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index (MUVVI) dropped to 209.4, down 4.0% from a year ago. “October revealed some not-so-spooky price moves, namely a reversal of the gains that were seen during the prior two months,” said Chris Frey, senior manager of Economic and Industry Insights for Cox Automotive. “This confirms the caution that was mentioned last month The UAW strike , avoiding one action that could have led to higher wholesale prices. October’s price decline is eerily similar to last October’s 2.2% drop, and this was not unexpected as the market remains balanced. Wholesale vehicle values typically experience some modest increases during the holiday season, and with two months remaining, we could see some upward price movements.” The seasonal adjustment reduced the October decrease. The non-adjusted price in October declined by 3.1% compared to September, moving the unadjusted average price down 6.3% year over year. This index from Manheim Consulting is based on all completed sales transactions at Manheim’s U.S. auctions. The Manheim index suggests used car prices decreased in October (seasonally adjusted) and were down 4.0% year-over-year (YoY).

Trade Deficit increased to $61.5 Billion in September - The Census Bureau and the Bureau of Economic Analysis reported: The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that the goods and services deficit was $61.5 billion in September, up $2.9 billion from $58.7 billion in August, revised. September exports were $261.1 billion, $5.7 billion more than August exports. September imports were $322.7 billion, $8.6 billion more than August imports Both exports and imports increased in September. Exports are up slightly year-over-year; imports are down 3% year-over-year. Both imports and exports decreased sharply due to COVID-19 and then bounced back - and both had been decreasing recently. The second graph shows the U.S. trade deficit, with and without petroleum. The blue line is the total deficit, and the black line is the petroleum deficit, and the red line is the trade deficit ex-petroleum products.Note that net, exports of petroleum products are positive. The trade deficit with China decreased to $28.3 billion from $37.4 billion a year ago.

Local leaders call for auto workers’ gains to spread to EV plants, Southern Black workers - Local Black elected leaders aligned with racial and economic justice groups want to build on the labor gains made through the United Auto Workers’ six-week strike. The union’s tentative deals with the big three automakers include major wins such as a 25% rise in pay and getting rid of the two-tier worker system. More than 60 Black political leaders, many of them city council members and mayors and school board members in Washington D.C. and 20 states, including North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and Michigan, wrote President Joe Biden this week asking him to use his political power to push for higher standards in the rapidly growing electric vehicle industry. A few weeks ago, GM also agreed to cover electric vehicle battery manufacturing under the contract.Biden, who spoke in support of the auto workers’ demands and marched in a UAW picket line during the strike, should continue to support changes in the industry, the letter says, by mediating conversations between workers, unions and automakers. The elected officials say standards of compensation, safety and health for workers should be a priority for those talks. The Biden administration has made investments in electric vehicles a big priority in its economic agenda and has stated that the federal dollars spent on these investments will benefit workers and “expand high-paying manufacturing jobs” and help them “capture the economic benefits of the clean energy transition.” Nearly $1.7 billion in funding from Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will be spent on electric buses, and organizers of the letter say they don’t want to see the money spent on plants that don’t provide good jobs for workers.Advocates say these efforts are needed to protect Black auto workers in the South, where pay is often lower and unions are not as strong. All three major automakers have established or are building electric vehicle manufacturing plants and battery plants in Southern states, with many of the facilities being placed in rural, Black communities.

WeWork files for bankruptcy - WeWork, an office-sharing company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Monday in New Jersey federal court months after the company expressed doubts about its ability to stay in business. WeWork announced the decision in a statement Monday, saying that filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy was part of a “comprehensive reorganization to strengthen its capital structure and financial performance.” WeWork said that holders that represent 92 percent of its debt have entered a restructuring support agreement with the company. “Now is the time for us to pull the future forward by aggressively addressing our legacy leases and dramatically improving our balance sheet,” WeWork CEO David Tolley said in a statement. “We defined a new category of working, and these steps will enable us to remain the global leader in flexible work.” This only affects WeWork’s U.S. and Canada-based locations, the press release noted. This comes after trading in shares of WeWork was halted on Monday as costs of its shares plummeted. The Associated Press reported that shares of WeWork could be had Monday for less than $1 — a shocking drop from when the shares cost more than $400 two years ago.

Ohio passes Issue 1 ballot measure enshrining abortion protections -- A ballot measure seeking to enshrine abortion protections into Ohio’s state constitution is projected to pass, according to Decision Desk HQ, delivering a major win for Democrats and abortion rights advocates ahead of 2024. The proposed constitutional amendment would protect access to abortion up until fetal viability, with exceptions for the life and health of the patient beyond that point. It’s the first time that abortion rights advocates have been able to pass abortion protections in a state that’s trended increasingly red in recent years. Abortion is legal up until 22 weeks, while the Ohio Supreme Court is weighing a six-week ban that is on hold right now. Ohio became a flashpoint after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year when a 10-year-old rape victim was forced to travel out of state to receive access to the medical procedure. Earlier in the summer, the state held an August special election where voters weighed a separate proposed constitutional amendment that would have required the threshold for voters to amend the state constitution to jump from a simple majority to 60 percent. The special election garnered bipartisan criticism and came just months ahead of the November election, but it was ultimately unsuccessful. Heading into the November election, Republicans sought to cast the abortion ballot measure as extreme and going too far for the state, while Democrats noted the looming six-week ban currently in litigation should the measure have failed to pass. Polling from the Institute for Civics and Public Policy (ICAPP) at Ohio Northern University released late last month suggested there was majority support for the abortion ballot measure, though more respondents – 68 percent – supported the measure as originally proposed compared to 52 percent that supported the certified text going before voters of the abortion measure. The certified text of the ballot measure includes several changes to the language that’s sparked criticism from Democrats and abortion rights advocates.

Ohio’s Issue 2 passes to legalize recreational marijuana - Ohio voters have voted to legalize recreational marijuana, making it the 24th state to do so, Decision Desk HQ projects. The measure, known as Issue 2, will allow adults aged 21 and older to possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana and grow up to six marijuana plants at home. It will also establish a 10-percent tax on marijuana sales. This comes after the state legalized medical marijuana years prior in 2016. Nearly half of all states, and Washington, D.C., have now legalized recreational marijuana, and a handful more have at least legalized medical marijuana or decriminalized recreational use. The measure seemed likely to pass in advance of the vote based on multiple polls leading up to Election Day, with one from last month showing57 percent saying they would support it and only 35 percent opposed. Supporters of the measure also significantly outraised that of a PAC that organized to oppose it. Voters previously defeated a measure that would have legalized recreational use and sale in 2015 with more than 60 percent voting against it.

Texas Senate passes measure making illegal border crossings a state crime -- The Texas Senate fast-tracked two measures Thursday to broaden the state’s jurisdiction over immigration enforcement.The bills — one which would make crossing the border from Mexico into Texas a crime and the other would appropriate more than $1.5 billion for border enforcement — crossed the chamber’s finish line just two days after the beginning of a special legislative session.The quick legislative action came as the Senate suspended its standard rules of procedure, according to a report by Texas Public Radio.The state criminalization of unauthorized border crossings is controversial both because the federal government is generally understood to have sole constitutional authority over immigration enforcement, and because policing those crimes can lead to abuses.The Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy in 2018 led to the separation of more than 2,000 children from their parents, and the process to reunite families is ongoing. Opponents of the Texas bills say the potential for abuse can also affect U.S. citizens.“My fear is these new state offenses are going to have a chilling effect on our state, a state that is minority-majority, 41 percent Latino,” state Sen. César Blanco (D) said on the Senate floor in opposition to the bill.“How many kids and adults are we going to risk wrongfully being deported or wrongfully being detained? That’s what our families, that’s what our communities along the border and across Texas, that’s what they’re worried about,” said Blanco, who opened his speech with criticism of the federal government for “not doing its job” on the border.The bills now head to the state House along with a school choice proposal that’s a cornerstone of Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) agenda.The Texas Legislature, which usually only meets for 140 days in odd-numbered years, is entering its fourth special session of the year, the first time a governor has called four special sessions in the same year, according to a report by The Texas Tribune.

Former Meta staffer’s allegations renew calls for kids online safety bill - A former Meta employee told a Senate panel Tuesday that the company’s top executives dismissed warnings about teens on Instagram facing unwanted sexual advances and widespread bullying. The allegations from Arturo Béjar, a former Facebook engineer who later returned to the company as a consultant, renewed a push for a bipartisan child online safety bill that would regulate Meta and other social media giants. The hearing highlighted the rare bipartisan support in the Senate for the issue of kids’ safety online. Senators on both sides of the aisle doubled down on the need for Congress to take urgent action, specifically rallying around the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA). “No parent or child can trust Facebook, or Meta, after this whistleblower’s powerful account, laying bare their denial and deception,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), chair of the subcommittee and a lead sponsor of KOSA. “Congress must act. It must pass the Kids Online Safety Act,” Blumenthal added. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), the ranking member of the subcommittee, said it was time for Congress to take action “years ago,” and joined Blumenthal in calls for the bill to be brought to the floor this year. Béjar, who revealed his allegations in a Wall Street Journal report last week, alleged Meta executives know about the harm to kids and potential mitigation solutions, but chose not to act.

Ohio students protest school's new transgender bathroom policy: 'School board hasn’t been listening' - Dozens of Elida High School students reportedly walked out on Monday to protest the school’s policy allowing transgender students to choose restrooms by preference rather than biology. The Lima News explained that students protesting the school’s restroom policy is the latest in a series of similar activism throughout the community. "Parents and community members have protested for months in hopes that the school board would rescind the policy, which critics say violates the privacy of female students who are uncomfortable sharing a restroom with members of the opposite sex," reporter Mackenzi Klemann wrote. "We’re upset about biological boys in the girls’ bathroom," said a freshman student who was among the first to walk out in the protest. "The school board hasn’t been listening." Klemann noted that the school allowing transgender students to choose a restroom is "part of the school district’s anti-discrimination policy, which permits transgender and non-binary students to use the restroom of their preferred gender identity on a case-by-case basis." The reporter summarized that Board President Brenda Stocker reportedly claimed that this policy keeps their school’s districts in "compliance with federal case law, established by the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals" and that "violating case law puts the district at risk of a lawsuit ‘that we would certainly lose,’ she said during a candidate forum in October."

Texas House’s new voucher bill offers funding bump for public schools |A revised education bill hoping to introduce school vouchers in Texas would offer more money to schools and create academic accountability measures for students in the program, representing voucher supporters' latest attempt to offer concessions to sway skeptics.Rep. Brad Buckley, R-Killeen, released Friday the reworked House Bill 1, which includes a plethora of increases to public school funding. Most notably, the basic allotment, which is the base amount of money the state gives a district for each student it’s educating, will increase from $6,160 to $6,700 and would be adjusted for inflation starting in 2026-2027.However, the bill doesn't raise the portion of the basic allotment that has to be devoted to teacher pay, like its previous version did. It also doesn't include additional funds for school safety like a standalone public education funding bill proposed by the Texas Senate last month. School officials have said funds the Texas Legislature allocated during the regular lawmaking session for school safety upgrades aren't enough to pay for the new requirements.With lawmakers unlikely to pass a voucher program before the end of the ongoing special legislative session, Buckley said he would file his new bill in an upcoming special session, which Gov. Greg Abbott is widely expected to announce soon.The Texas House and Abbott have been at odds over what sort of public school finance and vouchers bill to present. Buckley’s earlier version of HB 1 proposed modest increases to the basic allotment and a school voucher program that would’ve been open to only certain groups of students. Abbott has been adamant he wants a program that would be open to all students with no enrollment caps.Meanwhile, the Senate promptly passed its own school voucher proposal in early October. The program described in Senate Bill 1 would be open to all Texas students but give priority access to low-income students and students with disabilities if there were more applications than funds available. The House has not moved on that bill and it has been stuck without a House committee hearing.The new version of HB 1 also revolves around education savings accounts, a voucher-like instrument in the form of state-controlled accounts that would give parents access to taxpayer money to pay for private school and other educational expenses.

Third Texas Legislature special session ends with no vote on school vouchers – Houston Public Media During its third special session, Texas lawmakers couldn’t pass the much-discussed school vouchers. But compromises were made that could affect potential future bills. November 7 is Election Day in Houston. But it is also the last day of the latest special session in Austin, and the Texas Senate ran out of time to address border security. On Tuesday afternoon, Abbott announced that he would call a fourth special session on Wednesday. . "They’re coming away with a pretty paltry collection of bills," Goodman said. "They passed a new ban on COVID mandates that affect private businesses, even doctor’s offices and hospitals and stuff like that. And so that was something that a lot of conservatives had pushed for. It seemed like a pretty easy lift, and they got that done." They also passed part of a border security bill that would increase penalties for smuggling. It was already a law on the books, but has now been made tougher, Goodman said. But those weren’t the biggest priority for Abbott. School vouchers are still his biggest focus. "This session really is kind of ending in a whimper. I mean, this is something that started out all about school vouchers. This was going to be a time for the governor to finally press his case and get the legislature on board with this," he said. "And it didn’t happen. The House had never held any kind of hearings on it. They didn’t obviously hold a vote. And the Senate sort of moved on it. But it’s not going anywhere right now." "The governor, who had said he wouldn’t allow for any additional funding for public schools until there was a school voucher bill that reached his desk, he went back on that and essentially opened up the call for this session to allow the House to add school funding into its package." Among the items Abbott called for that were not taken up was prompted by conservative media, which claimed that a development north of Houston called Colony Ridge was a haven for undocumented people. Local officials refuted the claims at a House committee hearing and nothing happened.

"Apart from having a financing structure that allows people who are not citizens of the country to buy property there more easily, there's nothing illegal going on, at least as far as anyone could tell in law enforcement," Goodman said. "It’s a development, it’s for low-income Texans and people that have moved here from elsewhere, it does attract a significant undocumented population, and that’s everyone admits that that’s the case. It’s not illegal to sell your land to someone who’s not a citizen of this country."

Greg Abbott calls Legislature back for fourth session for vouchers, border - The third special legislative session ended with a whimper Tuesday morning without a deal on school vouchers — Gov. Greg Abbott’s top priority — as well as several border security bills he had asked for. The governor, undeterred, called lawmakers back for a fourth special session beginning the same day. "There is more work to be done," Abbott said in a statement. "I am immediately calling lawmakers back... to complete their critical work to empower Texas parents to choose the best education pathway for their child while providing billions more in funding for Texas public schools and continuing to boost safety measures in schools." Abbott's agenda for the new session includes four items: boosting funding for schools, including through the creation of a voucher program; school safety measures; legislation to create criminal offenses for crossing the Texas-Mexico border illegally; and funding for border walls and border security operations, including more police for the Liberty County community of Colony Ridge. All are left over from the third special session. Over 30 days of largely unproductive lawmaking, plagued by bitter Republican infighting between Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dade Phelan, the Legislature passed just two of the five items on the governor’s initial agenda from Oct. 5, and none of the five items he later added. Never in the Legislature’s 176-year history have lawmakers met for more than three special sessions in a year with a regular session. With the nominally part-time lawmakers away from their families and principal jobs for more than half of 2023, the mood inside the Capitol is dour. The Legislature granted Abbott’s request for a ban on employer COVID-19 vaccination mandates. The bill, shepherded by Sen. Mayes Middleton, R-Galveston and Rep. Jeff Leach, R-Plano, passed through the Republican-dominated chambers with ease. The biggest point of contention was Abbott’s request for a voucher bill that would allow parents to use taxpayer dollars to send their children to private and religious schools. An effort to do so in the regular session in the spring was defeated by a coalition of Democrats and rural Republicans. There’s been no public signaling that a majority of the two-dozen Republican holdouts have changed their minds, despite Abbott’s declaration on Oct. 31 that he had struck a deal with Phelan’s negotiating team. While the Senate passed its voucher bill on the sixth day of the session, the House never held a hearing on any voucher bill, let alone advance legislation to the floor for a vote.

Texas Senate passes legislation to create school voucher-like program — again -- The Texas Senate has once again passed legislation that could radically reshape the state’s education system by allowing families to use public funds towards the cost of private education.The full chamber advanced Senate Bill 1 Thursday afternoon, just hours after approving it in a last-minute committee hearing.SB 1 would divert public dollars into private schools through the creation of education savings accounts, or ESAs. Gov. Greg Abbott has tasked lawmakers with passing the controversial voucher-like program in the current special session, the state’s fourth round of legislative overtime this year.Unlike during usual legislative hearings, on Thursday the Senate Committee on Education didn’t meet in a traditional committee setting. Instead, the hearing took place quickly in a small room usually reserved for press conferences.Because of the last-minute decision to meet, no member of the public was able to register to testify on the bill before the committee.Sen. Brandon Creighton, a Republican who authored the bill, told reporters the Senate passed the exact same measurelast month during the third special session, but it stalled in the House.“We’ve had over 30 hours of testimony and hearings, inviting Texans from all over the state,” Creighton said, defending the Senate’s decision to hold the hearing on Thursday. “We decided to make all of the committees today have sort of a concerted effort to have the hearings, get the member input and get back to the Senate floor.”

Texas House committee advances school voucher bill -- A Texas House committee has advanced school voucher legislation that could be key to ending the protracted stalemate over the issue this year at the Capitol. By a vote of 10-4, the House Select Committee on Educational Opportunity and Enrichment approved House Bill 1 on Friday. It is a wide-ranging education bill that includes a voucher-like program known as education savings accounts that lets parents use taxpayer dollars to subsidize private schooling costs. Gov. Greg Abbott has pushed all year for the proposal, prompting four special sessions. The committee approval marks the furthest a voucher bill has gotten in the House in recent history. "We are excited to see a Texas House education committee pass school choice for the first time since 2005," Tommy Schultz, CEO of the American Federation for Children, said in a statement. "It's time to get this done." The legislation now goes to the House Calendars Committee, which is responsible for routing bills to the floor for votes in the full chamber. Abbott gave the legislation his blessing during an unrelated news conference Friday afternoon at the Capitol, calling it an "extraordinarily effective bill." He acknowledged the bill still has a number of major hurdles to clear, including approval on the House floor and then compromise with the Senate. He warned that if the House removed the voucher component on the floor — something Democrats are already preparing to fight to do — the Senate would likely balk and he would veto it if it reached his desk anyway. Then, he said, he'd just keep calling them back into session until it passed. "We’d be spending December here, maybe January here, maybe February here," Abbott said. "And I know one thing about both the House and Senate: They want to get out of here." The 10-4 committee vote fell along party lines. The four no votes were all Democrats, while the fifth Democrat on the committee, Rep. Oscar Longoria, D-Mission, was absent. House Bill 1 would establish an education savings account initiative that would set aside $10,500 every year per student for private school expenses. The program would prioritize students from low-income families and those with disabilities. Critics of the bill worry that it diverts funding away from public education. The bill’s other provisions include a bump in per-student spending by the state, from $6,160 to $6,700. It would also increase teacher pay.

Moms for Liberty Annihilated in School Board Elections -- Voters across the U.S. delivered a stinging rebuke to Moms for Liberty, rejecting the majority of the candidates endorsed by the conservative group in school board elections this week.In recent years, school boards have become political flashpoints—and conservatives have targeted public education, arguing that parents should have more control over what their children learn and experience at school.Moms for Liberty was founded in 2021, initially to oppose COVID-19 regulations in schools, but has since expanded to oppose teachings about race in schools, curb the rights of LGBTQ+ students and advocate for book bans. The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated it an extremist group.A year ago, the group celebrated a wave of school board victories, but in Tuesday's elections, the majority of the more than 130 candidates the group endorsed in school board elections across the country lost.Every single candidate endorsed by Moms for Liberty in Minnesota, Kansas, North Carolina and Washington lost their race.

First private university bans Students for Justice in Palestine as Middle East fallout spreads - A Massachusetts-based private university has banned a student chapter of the National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) on its campus amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, becoming the first U.S.-based private university to do so. A Brandeis University spokesperson confirmed to The Hill on Monday that the school had banned the student chapter of the national organization, saying the leading factor in their decision was the SJP’s support of militant group Hamas. Brandeis was founded as a nonsectarian Jewish university in 1948. “SJP has called on its chapters to engage in conduct that supports Hamas in its call for the elimination of the only Jewish state in the world and its people,” the school’s spokesperson said in its statement to The Hill. “Such expression is not protected by Brandeis’ principles of free speech.” “Students are welcome to express their support for Palestinians in a manner that complies with our rights and responsibilities,” the spokesperson concluded. The school also sent out a letter to SJP on their decision to ban its student chapter at its university, which was published and obtained by media outlet the Jewish Insider. “This decision was not made lightly, as Brandeis is dedicated to upholding free speech principles, which have been codified in Brandeis’ Principles of Free Speech and Free Expression,” the school’s letter reads,” according to Jewish Insider. “However, those Principles note that ‘The freedom to debate and discuss ideas does not mean that individuals may say whatever they wish, wherever they wish, or however they wish,’ and that, ‘…the university may restrict expression…that constitutes a genuine threat or harassment…or that is otherwise directly incompatible with the functioning of the university.’” The school’s letter also states that National SJP’s calls for its student chapters to support Hamas is not protected under its University’s Principles, noting that students who choose to participate in conduct supporting Hamas “will be considered to be in violation of the University’s student code of conduct.”

Tensions running high at New England campuses over protests around Israel-Hamas war | Arab News --Administrators of MIT suspended a number of students Thursday from the prestigious technology school after Israel-Hamas war protesters took over a prominent building for much of the day and then some refused to leave by a set deadline. It was far from the only disruption at college campuses in recent days over the war. Brandeis University banned a pro-Palestinian student group this week, while nearly two dozen students were arrested over a protest at Brown University. On Friday, Columbia University announced it was suspending Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace as official student groups through the end of the term. It accused both of repeatedly violating campus policies including an unauthorized event Thursday. The range of responses to these protests show that college administrators are struggling to address protests that have gotten heated and turned once-quiet spaces on campus into places where some students say they don’t feel safe. At MIT, Sally Kornbluth, the school’s president, sent a letter to all students outlining the “boundaries of protest on campus” during a pro-Palestinian demonstration that she described as “disruptive” and “loud.” The protest in the building called Lobby 7 lasted much of the day and attracted counterprotesters. When some protesters refused to leave after a deadline was set, the school said it would suspend them. But after hearing concerns including visa issues, Kornbluth said they would be “suspended from non-academic campus activities.” It was unclear how many students would be affected and when that would happen. “After exhausting all other avenues for de-escalating the situation, we informed all protesters that they must leave the lobby area within a set time, or they would be subject to suspension,” Kornbluth wrote. “Many chose to leave, and I appreciate their cooperation. Some did not.” People on both sides criticized the response. “Our love and fight for the people of Gaza will not be swayed by the administration’s fear tactics,” MIT-wide Coalition for Palestine organizer Mohamed Mohamed said in a statement. “While the administration may possess the means to send letters and emails to all students, staff, faculty, and workers, we possess something even more potent — a just cause and the collective voices of thousands in the MIT community who remain committed to advocating for an end to the genocide and an end to the occupation.” At the same time, the MIT Israel Alliance criticized the university for not academically suspending any of the protesters, whom they accused of preventing students from attending classes.

Exclusive-Google in talks to invest in AI startup Character.AI –sources (Reuters) - Alphabet's Google is in talks to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Character.AI, as the fast growing artificial intelligence chatbot startup seeks capital to train models and keep up with user demand, two sources briefed on the matter told Reuters. The investment, which could be structured as convertible notes, according to a third source, will deepen the existing partnership Character.AI already has with Google, in which it uses Google's cloud services and Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) to train models. Founded by former Google employees Noam Shazeer and Daniel De Freitas, Character.AI allows people to chat with virtual versions of celebrities like Billie Eilish or anime characters, while creating their own chatbots and AI assistants. It is free to use, but offers subscription model that charges $9.99 a month for users who want to skip the virtual line to access a chatbot. Character.AI's chatbots, with various roles and tones to choose from, have appealed to users ages 18 to 24, who contributed about 60% of its website traffic, according to data from Similarweb. The demographic is helping the company position itself as the purveyor of more fun personal AI companions, compared to other AI chatbots from OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Bard. The company previously said its website had attracted 100 million monthly visits in the first six months since its launch. Character.AI is also in talks to raise equity funding from venture capital investors, which could value the company at over $5 billion, sources said. In March, it raised $150 million in a funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz at $1 billion valuation. The talks with Google are ongoing and terms of the deal could change, said the sources, who requested anonymity as the discussions are private. Google has been investing in AI startups, including $2 billion for model maker Anthropic in the form of convertible notes, on top of its earlier equity investment. Anthropic uses Google's cloud services as well as its latest version of TPUs. That is part of a recent trend in which big tech cloud services providers are striking deals with AI companies to entice them to use certain cloud or hardware in the computer-intensive race to build models and serve consumers, including Microsoft investments in OpenAI and Google and Amazon's bets on Anthropic. U.S. Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan said at an event in San Francisco last week that the agency is looking into cloud provider investments in AI startups to examine any anti-competitive behaviors.

Psychedelic therapy may help with climate change anxiety - As our weekly therapy session drew to a close, my patient, a young woman in her early 20s approaching college graduation, said that she had been feeling a lack of motivation, but that it felt different from her usual depressive symptoms. A worrisome climate change report had recently been published, and she felt paralyzed by uncertainty of what the world is going to look like. She asked, “How can I decide where I want to go? Will it even be safe to live in California when I’m older?” Many of us are feeling a sense of powerlessness and despair over climate change and its harmful effects. As a psychiatrist, I have noticed a growing trend among patients in my private practice suffering from what mental health professionals are calling eco-anxiety and climate grief. Psychedelic therapies may have a growing role in supporting this unique trauma and grief. By exploring and utilizing these tools in our sessions, some of my patients have experienced a reduction of their anxiety symptoms, more acceptance and awareness of their emotions and increased energy and motivation toward environmental activism.

US trails dozens of developed nations for average life expectancy: research - The United States trails dozens of other developed nations when it comes to average life expectancy, new research shows. According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Health at a Glance report, the U.S. currently ranks worse than average for life expectancy, compared to other developed countries. As of 2021, the OECD’s average life expectancy rate was 80.3 years old. Switzerland had the highest life expectancy at 83.9 years of age, while Latvia had the lowest age at 73.1 years old. The United States ranked worse than several other countries, with 76.4 years as its life expectancy. “Japan, Switzerland and Korea lead a large group of 27 OECD countries in which life expectancy at birth exceeded 80 years in 2021,” the 2023 Health at a Glance report said. The U.S. ranked in the second group, the data showed, where average life expectancy was between 75 and 80 years of age. Colombia ranked slightly higher than the U.S., with 76.8 years as its average life expectancy. The organization found that between 2019 and 2021 the average life expectancy around the world fell by .7 years, with losses attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic. Provisional data for 2022 shows there was a recovery in some countries to pre-pandemic levels. “While life expectancy has increased in all OECD countries over the past half century, progress was stalling in the decade prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, and many countries experienced outright drops in life expectancy during the pandemic,” the report said. Even before the pandemic, life expectancy gains had been slowing down, particularly for women, the report found. Heart disease, stroke, obesity, diabetes and an aging population have made it difficult for the countries to maintain previous progress in keeping a high life expectancy. According to the report, smoking, alcohol consumption and obesity are the major risk factors for non-communicable diseases that contribute to the largest number of deaths worldwide. Air pollution is also a large determinant of health, the report found. The data shows that the U.S. ranks better than other countries in the percentage of daily smokers. It ranks around average compared to other developed nations with its alcohol consumption per capita and deaths due to pollution. The U.S. is one of five OECD countries where obesity is worse than average and a leading health risk.

Marijuana use increases risk of heart attacks, new studies suggest Two new studies suggest that regular use of marijuana could be linked to a higher risk of heart failure or heart attack, especially among older people. The preliminary findings of the studies, which have yet to be published, will be presented next week at the American Heart Association’s (AHA) Scientific Sessions 2023 in Philadelphia.The first study followed 156,999 people for 45 months, nearly four years. At the start of the study, all participants were free from heart failure and filled out a survey about their marijuana use, which was defined as “using marijuana when not prescribed for a health condition, or, if prescribed for medical purposes, using it beyond that purpose.” The study found that those who used marijuana daily had a 34 percent increased risk of developing heart failure, when compared with those who said they never used marijuana. Throughout the study, nearly 2 percent — 2,958 people — developed heart failure.When accounting for coronary artery disease, however, the risk dropped from 34 percent to 27 percent, which researchers said could reveal that “coronary artery disease is a pathway through which daily marijuana use may lead to heart failure.”The press release noted that research did not specify whether the marijuana was eaten or inhaled, which “may influence cardiovascular outcomes,” research said.

Childhood abuse linked to higher risk of adult COVID-19 death --A new study from researchers at the University of Pittsburgh shows adults who suffered childhood abuse or neglect were more likely to be hospitalized for COVID-19 or die from the virus in adulthood. The study was published last week in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.The study was based on information gleaned from the UK Biobank, which included health information on 151,200 adults of middle age or older who completed the Childhood Trauma Screen prior to the pandemic (January 2020) and were still active in the UK Biobank when hospitalization and mortality data were most recently updated in November 2021.People who said they had suffered "adversity" in childhood had a significant increased risk for adverse COVID-19 outcomes, including an odds ratio (OR) of 1.23 for COVID hospitalization (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.15 to 1.31) and an OR of 1.25 of a COVID-19–related death (95% CI, 1.11 to 1.42)."While this investigation was unable to speak to potential mechanisms, it is likely that higher levels of inflammation, as well as alterations in the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis, related to childhood adversity are connected to the increased mortality and hospitalization observed here,” the authors wrote, noting that childhood adversity has been previously linked to increased rates of cancer, alcoholism, and heart disease."These findings highlight how trauma early in life can have long-lasting impacts on health decades later," said Jamie L. Hanson, PhD, lead study author said in a University of Pittsburgh press release. "We know that COVID-19 is related to excessive hospitalization and death in the UK and in the United States. And there’s emerging research finding that facing adversity, abuse or neglect, early in life, could have sizeable effects on physical health."

Poverty and Long COVID Go Together -- When the COVID-19 pandemic fully reached California in early 2020, experts in the fields of low-wage work and poverty braced for the worst. Their fear: The state’s poorest residents, often living in crowded conditions with inferior access to both information and adequate health care, were likely to suffer from the virus disproportionately. That concern was prescient. Poorer communities in the state were wracked by dramatically outsized rates of infection and death in the pandemic’s first year. Workers in low-paying but “essential” jobs — in agriculture, food service, sanitation, public transportation — continued to be called into work, sometimes in unsafe conditions that further prompted disease spread. It was an ugly picture. And its effects are still being drawn. New information from UCLA’s Center for Health Policy Research shows that among California adults who tested positive for COVID, those with the lowest incomes were more than twice as likely as those with the highest incomes to have experienced long COVID — in this case, symptoms of the virus that last for two months or more. The long COVID figure for those at the lowest income levels was a staggering 50%, versus a 29% average for all adults and 22% for those at the highest income levels. Such rates of lingering symptoms have corrosive effects down the line. Those suffering from long COVID symptoms were three times more likely to quit their jobs in order to care for themselves or a family member than were those whose symptoms lasted less than two months, said CHIS director Todd Hughes.Further, Hughes said, 9% of those who experienced long COVID symptoms are currently unemployed and looking for work. The figure was only 6% among those who’d reported symptoms lasting less than two months.“And a lower rate of those with long COVID symptoms are considered fully or full-time employed — 54%, versus 61% among those who had symptoms of less than two months,” Hughes said. “So there appears to be a current impact on employment situations.”The full scope and effects of long COVID are some of the final frontiers for scientists and others studying the pandemic. In September, the National Center for Health Statistics estimated that in 2022, 7% of American adults had experienced long COVID, which it defined as self-reporting symptoms for at least three months after contracting the virus. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) defines long COVID as symptoms that last more than a month.In an August report, the CDC noted that long COVID in U.S. adults has been associated with “lower likelihood of working full time and higher likelihood of being unemployed.” It also referred to datafrom the New York State Insurance Fund, which found that 18% of claimants with long COVID could not return to work for more than a year.

Study finds prenatal vaccination protects infants from COVID -Infants as old as 6 months were protected from COVID-19 infections only when mothers were vaccinated prenatally, and not before pregnancy, according to a new study in JAMA Network Open.The study is one of the largest to compare outcomes among infants whose mothers were vaccinated before pregnancy, during pregnancy, or were unvaccinated at the time of birth.Infants younger than 6 months are at an increased risk for severe COVID-19, and accounted for 44% of all pediatric COVID hospitalizations during the Omicron dominant period beginning in December 2021. Infants younger than 6 months remain the only group ineligible for COVID vaccination in the United States.The present study was based on outcomes seen among all infants born to registered Singapore citizens and permanent residents between January 1, 2022, and September 30, 2022. Only infants whose parents had a confirmed case of COVID-19 during their first 6 months were included in the study."By selecting only infants with definite infant exposure to the virus due to the close contact between parents and newborn infants, we limited the possibility of the healthy vaccinee bias and overestimation of estimated vaccine effectiveness for infants," the authors explained.

Partial recall: Personal beliefs may skew pandemic memories, deepen polarization -Personal motivations color people's memories of the COVID-19 pandemic, biasing their assessment of past political actions and complicating emergency-preparedness planning, suggests an analysis of four empirical studies.For the review, published last week in Nature, a team led by researchers from the University of Bamberg in Germany and the University of Chicago evaluated the results of surveys of 10,776 vaccinated and unvaccinated German and Austrian adults about pandemic-related risk perceptions, protective behaviors, and trust in government and science.Participants were surveyed in 2020 or early 2021 and again in late 2022 or 2023, when they were also asked to recollect their 2020 or 2021 perceptions and behaviors and offered monetary incentives for greater recall. The researchers then generalized the results to 10 countries, again parsing data from vaccinated and unvaccinated participants.The 10 countries were Australia, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States."Beyond simple forgetting, recall and ex-post evaluation are prone to various forms of bias, reflecting differences in motivation and purpose (for example, a wish to conform with one's own or the prevailing opinion)," the study authors wrote. "For instance, people are more likely to remember true or false information from the past depending on pre-existing beliefs or previous behaviours in the context of vaccination, political campaigns, or political riots."Both vaccinated and unvaccinated respondents remembered their 2020 or 2021 answers inaccurately but in opposite ways. For example, vaccinated participants tended to overestimate their past risk perceptions and trust in science, while unvaccinated respondents underestimated them. The more strongly respondents identified with their vaccination status, the greater distortion in their recall. "Because the magnitudes of these effects partly decreased when participants were offered money as an incentive for accurate recall, the distortions seem to be motivated by vaccination-related attitudes, and cannot be explained merely by people forgetting the past," the researchers wrote.Underestimating past risks, behaviors, and trust was related to beliefs about the appropriateness of past political actions and tied to a desire to punish politicians and scientists for their pandemic responses and even to dismantle the political order altogether.

Loss of smell, taste after mild COVID improves within 3 years, study shows Mild COVID-19 infections can cause a loss of tase and smell, but a study today in JAMA Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery suggests that almost all cases resolve within 3 years of initial infection.In the small cohort study, 88 patients with loss of smell and taste were compared to 88 controls. All participants had tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 infection by polymerase chain reaction during March and April of 2020 in Trieste, Italy, and were enrolled in the study from March to June 2021.The prevalence of self-reported smell or taste dysfunction was 64.8% (57/88), 31.8% (28/88), 20.5% (18/88), and 15.9% (17/88), during the acute phase of COVID-19, at 1-year, 2-year, and 3-year follow-up, respectively, the authors noted. If participants were age 50 or younger at the time of enrollment, they were less likely to report long-lasting loss of taste or smell.By year 3, there were no statistically significant excess of olfactory dysfunction (OD) between cases and controls (13.6% vs 10.2%; absolute difference, 3.4%; 95% confidence interval, −7.3% to 14.1%).

Study suggests mass vaccination programs cut COVID cases in Japan 65% The population benefit of COVID-19 vaccination via direct and indirect effects was substantial in Tokyo in early 2022 during Omicron, with an estimated 65% reduction in the number of SARS-CoV-2 infections, according to a new model that compared risks between unvaccinated and vaccinated individuals.The study is published in BMC Infectious Diseases and used data from the sixth wave of COVID-19 cases seen in Tokyo caused by the BA.1 and BA.2 Omicron subvariants from January to May 2022.To create the statistical model that measured impact, researchers examined data on primary series and booster vaccination coverages and the confirmed cases stratified by vaccination history. Direct effect was how receiving the vaccine prevented illness, hospitalization, or death, and indirect effect was how much the vaccine prevented viral spread among the total population.The investigators calculated that mass vaccination campaigns directly prevented 640,000 COVID-19 cases during the sixth wave, and indirectly prevented as many as 8.5 million infections.The absolute number of people who benefited from vaccination was highest for adults aged 30 to 39 years in the primary series program, and those 80 years and older in the booster program, with estimates of 86,181 people (95% confidence interval [CI], 84,743 to 87,503) and 37,101 people (95% CI, 35,649 to 38,780), respectively, the authors said."Although the sixth wave from January to May 2022 was the largest in Japan by the end of the study period, we found that the population benefited from both direct and, more importantly, indirect protection," the authors concluded. "Although the Omicron variant was challenging to control, vaccination was a critical public health tool for mitigating COVID-19."

Vaccine exemptions among US kindergarteners increase post-pandemic --The number of kindergarteners with vaccine exemptions increased 0.4 percentage points to 3.0% during the 2022–23 school year compared with the 2019-2020 school year, according to a new study in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.Exemptions increased in 41 states, and exceeded 5% in 10 states, which increases the risk for outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases. The findings come from national- and state-level estimates for complete vaccination with measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine (MMR); diphtheria, tetanus, and acellular pertussis vaccine (DTaP); poliovirus vaccine (polio); and varicella vaccine (VAR); and exemptions from vaccination reported by 49 states and the District of Columbia (DC) for the 2022–23 school year.Children who started kindergarten this year were first eligible for these vaccines during the height of the pandemic, and researchers have worried gaps in routine care and increased vaccine hesitancy have impacted vaccine coverage.In the present study, 3.0% of kindergartners had an exemption (0.2% medical and 2.8% non-medical), with a range of less than 0.1% in West Virginia to 12.1% in Idaho, compared with 2.6% reported during the 2021–22 school year."To achieve the Healthy People 2030 target of 95% MMR coverage, exemptions cannot exceed 5%. State-level exemption rates in excess of 5% prevent 10 states from potentially achieving ≥95% MMR coverage even if all nonexempt kindergartners in 2022–23 were vaccinated, up from four states in 2021–22," the authors said.The authors said it was not clear from the study if parents were opting out of childhood vaccination because of true hesitancy, barriers to standard care, or a combination of the two.

New pandemic-era stress scale aims to help identify at-risk adults, kids -- A new study from researchers at Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes Program (ECHO) at the National Institutes of Health shows how a stress scale developed to identify who was most at-risk of needing mental health support during the pandemic has the potential to evaluate traumatic stress reactions to ongoing large-scale threats.The study, which describes the Pandemic-Related Traumatic Stress Scale (PTSS), is published in the journal Psychological Assessment. Researchers conducted the study at 47 ECHO cohort study cites across the United States, Puerto Rico, and Washington D.C. The study included 17,839 adults and children.The nearly 18,000 participants were split into four groups: 1,656 pregnant or postpartum individuals; 11,483 adult caregivers; 1,795 adolescents ages 13 to 21; and 2,896 children ages 3 to 12. The participants were given surveys on pandemic-related stress, depression and anxiety symptoms, and life satisfaction between April 2020 and August 2021.The adult caregiver population, which was 98.7% female, had the highest measures of pandemic-related stress, followed by adolescents, pregnant and postpartum participants, and children.“All subgroup distributions were slightly positively skewed, and parent-reported child scores had the highest skewness,” the authors said. “This was further reflected by 27.6% (n = 800) of 3- to 12-year-olds having the lowest possible score.” There were substantial geographic differences seen in survey responses, with individuals in the South and Midwest reporting lower traumatic stress, and individuals in the Northeast and West reporting higher levels.

RSV-preventing injection in shortage as respiratory virus season begins - Respiratory virus season is only starting, and demand has already outstripped supply for the newly approved and potentially lifesaving monoclonal antibody injection for preventing respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in children.David Margraf, PharmD, PhD, pharmaceutical research scientist at the Resilient Drug Supply Project (RDSP), said the nirsevimab-alip (Beyfortus) shortage is reminiscent of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout. RDSP is part of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP), publisher of CIDRAP News."Wealthier nations secured most early vaccine supplies, which led to delayed vaccine rollouts in many low- and middle-income countries," he said. "Even in the United States, wealthier communities had better access to vaccines, and rural areas also faced challenges due to distance and scarce resources." The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the long-acting drug in July, and in August the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended the prescription drug to protect all infants up to 8 months old entering their first RSV season and for high-risk children up to 24 months in their second season. RSV is the No. 1 cause of hospitalization among US infants.On September 5, the CDC warned that RSV activity was picking up in the southeastern United States, often a bellwether for the rest of the country."Despite an aggressive supply plan built to outperform past pediatric immunization launches, demand for this product, especially for the 100 mg doses used primarily for babies born before the RSV season, has been higher than anticipated," Beyfortus co-developer Sanofi said in an October 26 statement. Margraf said that while the FDA evaluates the manufacturing processes and facilities, the capacity of the manufacturer to meet demand is not a major consideration in the approval process. "However, the FDA does work with pharmaceutical companies post-approval to address issues related to shortages, especially with critical drugs," he said. "It may be time for the FDA to assess manufacturing capacity in the drug approval process."

CDC to expand testing for respiratory viruses at airports - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced yesterday that it will expand testing of international air travelers beyond COVID-19 to provide early detection of other respiratory viruses.The Traveler-based Genomic Surveillance (TGS) program, which covers flights from more than 135 countries and has been implemented at seven airports nationwide, collects and analyzes nasal samples from arriving international travelers on a voluntary basis, along with aircraft wastewater samples, to test for and track new SARS-CoV-2 variants. The CDC said TGS recently provided early detection of the BA.2.86 variant in a traveler from Japan.Under a pilot program that will last several months, TGS will expand testing to analyze samples for flu, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and other select respiratory viruses. Samples that test positive for these viruses will be sequenced and uploaded to public databases."The expansion of the Traveler-based Genomic Surveillance program to flu, RSV, and other pathogens is essential as we head into fall respiratory season," Cindy Friedman, chief of the CDC's Travelers' Health Branch, said in a press release. "The TGS program, which began during the COVID-19 pandemic, acted as an early-warning system to detect new and rare variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and will do the same for other respiratory viruses going forward."As of September 2023, TGS has enrolled more than 360,000 air travelers.

Study shows link between global warming, deaths from respiratory illness -- A mathematical modeling study today from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) suggests that the risk of hospital death from respiratory illness is higher in warmer, summer months, which may have implications for how hospitals will need to adjust to climate change.The study is published in The Lancet Regional Health - Europe and is based on data on ambient temperature and in-hospital mortality from respiratory diseases in Madrid and Barcelona from 2006 through 2019.In Spain, respiratory illness has a winter peak and a summer low. But, the authors wrote, there is little known about seasonal variation in inpatient mortality, a surrogate for hospital performance in relation to severe respiratory events. The study used data on daily hospital admissions, weather, and common air pollutants to compare ambient temperature associations and in-patient mortality. The investigators found that summer temperatures accounted for 16.2% and 22.3% of overall fatal hospitalizations from respiratory diseases in Madrid and Barcelona, respectively. Though hospital admissions for respiratory illnesses were highest in cold weather months, case-fatality rates (CFR) peaked in August."We saw that the higher CFR in the warm season was mainly driven by pneumonia, acute bronchitis and bronchiolitis, COPD, and, especially, respiratory failure," the authors wrote.The authors said this finding could be consequential in the face of warming daily temperatures.The increase in acute respiratory outcomes during heat is more related to the aggravation of chronic and infectious respiratory diseases than to the spread of new respiratory infection."This suggests that the increase in acute respiratory outcomes during heat is more related to the aggravation of chronic and infectious respiratory diseases than to the spread of new respiratory infections, which usually take several days to cause symptoms," said Hicham Achebak, PhD, first author of the study in an ISGLOBAL press release. "Unless effective adaptation measures are taken in hospital facilities, climate warming could exacerbate the burden of inpatient mortality from respiratory diseases during the warm season."

CDC reports spike in infections caused by multidrug-resistant Salmonella - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported today that human infections caused by a strain of multidrug-resistant (MDR) Salmonella linked to Mexico rose significantly in 2021 and 2022. In a report published today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, investigators with the CDC, the US Department of Agriculture, and several state and local public health departments said the number of clinical isolates of an MDR strain of Salmonella enterica Newport doubled in 2021 compared with the 2018 to 2020 baseline and remained high in 2022. The strain, which was first identified in the United States in 2016, is linked to travel to Mexico, consumption of cheese obtained in Mexico, and beef from Mexico and the United States. The strain—named REPJJP01— has now been detected in all 50 states and the District of Columbia and has caused several multistate outbreaks.From June 2018 to March 2019, a multistate outbreak caused by the REPJJP01 strain led to 255 infections and 60 hospitalizations. Investigation of that outbreak revealed that the infections, 43% of which involved people who had traveled to Mexico, were linked to Mexican-style soft cheese obtained in Mexico.But the investigators also found links to beef products from Mexico and the United States, suggesting the strain was present in cattle from both countries.The authors of today's report said an increase in reports of REPJJP01 to the CDC's PulseNet database—the national subtyping network for foodborne bacterial disease surveillance—in 2021 prompted another investigation, which involved whole-genome sequencing of clinical isolates and interviews with case-patients to obtain travel and food-exposure information.The 641 human isolates obtained in 2021 and 2022 were more than twice the annual baseline number of cases detected from 2018 through 2020 (315). But the authors say the number of illnesses is likely higher, with an estimated 29 cases of Salmonella for each culture-confirmed case.

CDC warns about Salmonella outbreak linked to recalled dry pet food -The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) yesterday issued a food safety alert about SalmonellaKiambu illnesses, mainly affecting babies, linked to dry dog food. So far, seven illnesses involving the outbreak strain have been reported from seven states. Epidemiologic and lab studies suggest that the source is a specific lot of the Victor brand Hi-Pro Plus dry dog food made by Mid America Pet Food. The company has recalled it and other brands. In a November 9 recall notice, the company said it recalled products made at its Mount Pleasant, Texas, facility including Victor, Wayne Feeds, Eagle Mountain, and some Member's Mark varieties. They were distributed throughout the United States and include some varieties of dry cat food.The CDC said illness onsets ranged from January 14 to August 19. One patient was hospitalized, and no deaths were reported. Six patients are children younger than 1 year. A sample of the dog food collected and tested by the South Carolina State Department of Agriculture yielded the outbreak strain, and genetic sequencing shows that the strain is closely related to the one that infected people. "This means that people likely got sick by touching this dog food, touching things like dog bowls that contained this dog food, or touching the poop or saliva of dogs that were fed this dog food," the CDC said.

New Jersey probes Legionnaires' rise in 2 counties --The New Jersey Department of Health (NJDOH) said yesterday that is investigating a rise in Legionnaires' disease cases from Middlesex County and neighboring Union County.In a statement, it said since August 3, 21 cases have been reported from Middlesex County, and 20 cases have been reported from Union County. No deaths have been reported. The two counties each averaged about six to eight Legionnaires' disease cases from August to October.Middlesex County, with New Brunswick as its county seat, is part of the New York metropolitan area. Union County on its northern border includes Elizabethtown as its county seat.NJDOH said it is working with local health departments to investigate the cases and identify potential infection sources. So far, no common exposure among the confirmed cases has been identified. Kaitlan Baston, MD, NJDOH's acting health commissioner, said in the statement that early diagnosis is key to treating the disease. "Although the risk of contracting Legionnaires' disease if you live in or have recently visited Middlesex or Union counties remains low, individuals who develop pneumonia-like respiratory symptoms should visit their health care provider immediately to be evaluated," she said.Infections are caused by exposure to Legionella bacteria, and past outbreaks have been linked to plumbing systems that can harbor the organism. Sources can include cooling towers, whirlpool spas, hot tubs, humidifiers, hot water tanks, and condensers of large air conditioning systems.Symptoms can mimic other respiratory diseases such as COVID and flu. Older or middle-aged people, as well as smokers and those with chronic health conditions, are at higher risk of contracting Legionnaires' disease.

Newborn syphilis cases spike in US amid gaps in maternal screening, treatment -Syphilis infections passed from mothers to their newborns are at a 30-year high and have risen tenfold since 2012, and a fresh data analysis from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggests that lack of timely testing and adequate treatment are the two biggest drivers and played a role in 90% of cases in 2022.The CDC detailed its findings today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report alongside a Vital Signs report designed to focus attention on the importance of identifying the infections, which can lead to miscarriages, stillbirths, and developmental disabilities.At a briefing today, CDC officials said syphilis rates in the general population are increasing alongside other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and that the rise in congenital syphilis affects all age-groups and regions of the country.They added, however, that congenital syphilis is eight times more common in people who are Black, Hispanic, Native American, or Alaskan Native.Officials also said that congenital syphilis cases have been rising against a backdrop of deteriorating public health infrastructure and staffing.Laura Bachmann, MD, MPH, chief medical officer in the CDC’s STI division, said though the CDC recommends screening at the first prenatal visit, the new study suggests nearly 40% of women who gave birth to babies with syphilis never received prenatal care.Preventing congenital syphilis doesn't end at rapid testing, Bachmann said, noting that quick treatment is key and that healthcare providers don't need to wait for the results of confirmatory blood tests to start treatment, which needs to be done more than 30 days before delivery.Of 3,761 congenital syphilis cases recorded in 2022, 57.9% of patients had timely testing, but, of those, nearly 69% had inadequate treatment and nearly 20% had no or nondocumented treatment.The team also found geographic differences in the missed opportunities for testing and treatment. For example, no testing or untimely testing played a role in about half of the cases in the West and Northeast, and inadequate treatment was noted in nearly 55% of missed opportunities in the South.One factor that didn’t play a role is a shortage of Bicillin (benzathine penicillin G) prefilled syringes. CDC officials said the Bicillin doses, the only treatment recommended for use during pregnancy, have been prioritized for pregnant women and that there are other syphilis treatment options for patients who aren’t pregnant. Also, officials noted that not every region of the country is experiencing a shortage.

Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever infects health workers in Pakistan outbreak - A Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever (CCHF) outbreak in Pakistan’s Balochistan province has now infected hospital workers, one of them fatally, infectious disease news tracking groups reported over the weekend, based on their monitoring of local media reports and posts on official social media accounts.CCHF, a viral hemorrhagic fever transmitted through ticks, is endemic in Africa, the Balkans, the Middle East, and Asia. The disease is most common in people who are bitten by Hyalommaticks or exposed to tissues from sick cattle, such as during slaughter. However, the virus—known for its high case-fatality rate—can lead to epidemics in people exposed to infected body fluids and has triggered past outbreaks in health facilities.Since August, FluTrackers, an infectious disease news message board, has been picking up reports of ongoing CCHF hospitalizations in Quetta, Balochistan’s capital, with 41 cases, 15 of them fatal, as of the middle of October.In a new development on November 4, local media reported eight new cases in the outbreak, five of them reportedly in doctors. And the following day, FluTrackers flagged a report that Balochistan’s government had declared a red alert in the wake of 16 CCHF deaths, including a doctor, in the province.Yesterday Avian Flu Diary (AFD), an infectious disease news blog, flagged a Twitter post from Pakistan’s health ministry that confirmed the doctor’s death from CCHF, and today AFD identified an official report from the Balochistan government’s Facebook page that detailed the results of a high-level meeting of health officials who discussed the situation. The report suggests that the outbreak in health workers followed the October 22 hospitalization of a patient at Quetta’s Civil Hospital who tested positive for CCHF 3 days later. Officials said two more affected health workers were airlifted to a hospital in Karachi. At the outbreak hospital, officials have sealed the affected ward and have taken extra steps to disinfect all cattle markets in the province and have banned private-animal slaughter in public areas for 2 weeks.

Quick takes: H5N1 strikes more Finnish fur farms, UK vaccine advisors weigh in on mpox and gonorrhea vaccination, polio in Guinea | CIDRAP

• As part of ongoing surveillance for H5N1 avian influenza at fur farms in Finland, officials reported detections at 10 more farms, raising the number of affected facilities since July to 42. In a statement, theFinnish Food Agency said the new detections are in provinces that reported the virus at fur farms in the past and that the newly affected locations mainly raise fox, but a few also have raccoon dogs. In US avian flu developments, two states—Montana and South Dakota—reported more outbreaks in poultry flocks, according to updates from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). Montana reported the virus in backyard birds in Sweet Grass County and at a commercial farm in Wheatland County. South Dakota reported two more outbreaks at turkey farms in McPherson and Roberts counties.
• The United Kingdom's vaccine advisory group today recommended that governments consider routine vaccination of high-risk groups against mpox and gonorrhea. In a statement, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization (JCVI) said targeted vaccination against gonorrhea should use the 4CMenB vaccine, given that meningococcal disease (Neisseria meningitidis) and gonorrhea (Neisseria gonorrhoeae) are closely genetically related and that evidence suggests some cross-protection from the MenB vaccine. They also said more regular use of the mpox vaccine in those at highest risk could help prevent major outbreaks. The JCVI said both programs should be offered at sexual health clinics that have experience with assessing and identifying people at increased risk.
• In its weekly update, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative said one country has reported a new polio case, Guinea, which reported another illness involving circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2). The infection involves a patient from Kankan province and brings the country's total to eight for the year.

Quick takes: Worrying disease trends in Gaza, avian flu expansion, more dengue in Florida | CIDRAP

• Worrying trends are already emerging regarding the rapid spread of infectious diseases in Gaza, owing to intensifying hostilities, intense overcrowding, and disruptions in healthcare, water, and sanitation, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today. Since mid October, 33,551 cases of diarrhea have been reported, more than half in young children, a steep rise compared to the 2,000 monthly cases typically reported in Gaza in the age-group over the past 2 years. Nearly 9,000 cases of scabies and lice have been reported, about 12,600 cases of rash, and nearly 55,000 upper respiratory infections, the group said. Other problems include disruptions in vaccination and disease surveillance and struggles to maintain infection prevention and control practices in healthcare facilities. The WHO repeated calls to ramp up humanitarian aid and for all parties in the conflict to abide by humanitarian law.
• In the latest US avian flu developments, Missouri reported an outbreak at a broiler breeder farm in Benton County that houses 16,600 birds, according to an update from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). Also, officials reported 21 more highly pathogenic H5N1 avian flu detections in wild birds, mostly from the Midwest and West. Species range from American white pelicans in Iowa to a few captive birds in Arizona.
• Florida reported 12 more locally acquired dengue infections, raising the year’s total to 110, the Florida Department of Health said in its latest update. Most cases this year were in Miami-Dade County, but a few other cases were in Broward, Hardee, Palm Beach, and Polk counties.

Avian flu strikes more US poultry as Falklands Islands reports first detection -Part of a spike in activity that began in early October, five states—Alabama, Iowa, Minnesota, Oklahoma, and South Dakota—reported more highly pathogenic avian influenza outbreaks, mostly on commercial farms, according to the latest updates from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS).Alabama’s outbreak occurred at a commercial boiler breeder farm in Marshall County that houses 47,900 birds. Iowa’s Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship reported four more outbreaks, including three farms in Clay County that produce game bird ducks. The fourth is a commercial chicken breeding farm in Hamilton County.Elsewhere, Oklahoma reported another event involving a backyard flock, this time in Grady County.In Minnesota, where turkey farms have been hit hard, the virus has struck a layer farm in Wright County that has 940,000 birds. In South Dakota, an outbreak was confirmed at a commercial turkey breeding farm in Mcpherson County. The record outbreaks have now led to the loss of 61.23 million birds across 47 states since early 2022.In overseas developments, the Falkland Islands reported its first avian flu detection, which involved a southern fulmar found dead on a property in Stanley, its capital city. The detection is part of the continued southward spread of the virus, which was recently reported in the Antarctica region for the first time.

Avian flu strikes more commercial farms in 3 states --More highly pathogenic avian flu outbreaks have been confirmed on commercial poultry farms in three states, Iowa, Minnesota, and South Dakota, as well as in backyard flocks in other states, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) said in its latest updates today. The events are part of ramped-up activity that began in early October. Iowa's latest outbreak involved a farm in Kossuth County that has 8,600 birds. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship said the farm has game bird pheasants, peafowl, and commercial layers. Minnesota reported another outbreak at a turkey producer, this time at a location in Stearns County that houses 71,000 birds.South Dakota reported two outbreaks, one at a commercial turkey farm in Charles Mix County that has 74,100 birds and one at a game bird producer in Clark County.APHIS also reported events involving backyard flocks, one in Alaska's Matanuska Susitna County and Utah's Utah County.Since early 2022, H5N1 outbreaks have led to the loss of a record 61.26 million birds across 47 states. Fifteen states have reported outbreaks in the past month.In other avian flu developments, Mexico reported highly pathogenic H5N1 detections in wild ducks at a nature park on Isla de Lobos and in different locations in Jalisco and Guanajuato states, according to anotification from the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH).Elsewhere, Hungary reported an outbreak on a poultry farm, its first since May, and Portugal reported the first in a wild bird, the first since last November.

CWD confirmed on another Wisconsin deer farm - in Oneida County in the northern part of the state, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection (DATCP) said in a November 8 statement.The positive result came from a 4-year-old buck, and the test result was confirmed by the National Veterinary Services Laboratories in Ames, Iowa. Officials said the farm will be placed in quarantine while an investigation is under way.CWD has been detected in wild deer before in Oneida County, as well as at a county deer-shooting preserve. Over the past year, the disease was detected on deer farms in five of the state's counties: Dodge, Lincoln,Rock, Sauk, and WashburnA fatal prion disease similar to bovine spongiform encephalopathy ("mad cow disease"), CWD affects deer and other cervids. The disease can spread among animals through direct contact and from exposure to contaminated saliva, blood, feces, or urine.The disease isn't known to infect people, but health officials urge people to avoid eating infected meat and to use precautions when field dressing, butchering, and disposing of infected animals.

“Stop hurting us:” Protestors plead for their health outside a Pittsburgh gathering of coal and steel execs - —“Will your grandkids forgive you?” “Stop hurting us,” “Asthma is not generational,” and “Cancer is not normal” were just a few of the messages delivered by protestors outside a meeting of steel industry executives on Wednesday afternoon. The MetCoke World Summit is an annual gathering for leaders in the coke, coal and steel industries. Coke is a key ingredient in steelmaking that involves heating coal to extremely high temperatures. The Pittsburgh region is home to a network of steelmaking facilities, including U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works, which is the largest coke-generating facility in the country. Emissions from the coke and steel manufacturing process are toxic, and southwestern Pennsylvania communities near these facilities have long suffered from health issues associated with exposure to this type of pollution, including elevated rates of childhood asthma, COPD and otherrespiratory diseases, heart disease and cancer. Around 45 protesters gathered outside the hotel where the MetCoke World Summit took place, including residents who live near the region’s steel plants and residents of East Palestine, Ohio, the site of a catastrophic train derailment and environmental health disaster last year that was caused by Norfolk Southern, one of MetCoke World Summit’s 11 corporate sponsors. A series of speakers delivered messages to the crowd and the executives meeting in the hotel suites above. “Today we’re here to serve notice on all of you that we are here to stay,” said Archbishop Marcia Dinkins, founder of theBlack Appalachian Coalition. “We are here to fight… and it’s not just going to be some of us. It’s going to be all of us, and then some.” Several protestors from East Palestine, Ohio, held posters with enlarged photos of wounds on their childrens’ arms, legs and faces that they say resulted from Norfolk Southern’s toxic chemical disaster. Hilary Flint, a former resident of East Palestine, Ohio and a member of the community advocacy group Unity Council East Palestine, said her great grandparents originally purchased her family’s land and she was the fourth generation to live in the family home. She said that after the spill she was told her home was safe, but paid for independent testing that found toxic chemicals including vinyl chloride, ethyl hexyl acetate and dioxins. She had to take a second job to afford relocating her family. A spokesperson for Smithers, the company that hosts the MetCoke conference, said “we don’t have a position” on the concerns raised by the protesters and declined to comment further.

Heaps of pharmaceuticals, toxic chemicals found in recycled plastics - While the use of recycled plastics is normally considered a noble endeavor, a new study says it's time to think twice. In an analysis of the material from more than 10 different countries, hundreds of potentially harmful chemicals were uncovered. The study, led by scientists at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, looked at recycled plastic pellets from 13 nations in Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. By using a range of chemical analysis tools, it was found that the pellets all contained a mind-boggling array of compounds, many of which are considered highly toxic. The largest class of chemicals found were pesticides, with 162 chemical compounds coming from this category. Second in the list were 89 different pharmaceuticals. Third place went to 65 different industrial chemicals. These were followed by other classes of chemicals including surfactants, stimulants, fragrances, dyes, repellents, corrosion inhibitors, and more. In all, the researchers say that "491 organic compounds were detected and quantified, with an additional 170 compounds tentatively annotated." Some of these chemicals come from the manufacturing of plastics themselves, while others are introduced during the recycling stage, and still others find their ways into the plastics through the process of adsorption, a process in which atoms of certain substances form a film that adheres to various surfaces. Because of the range of compounds found, the researchers say that they believe recycled plastics are unfit for most uses and that they don't contribute to a circular material lifecycle. "Plastic recycling has been touted as a solution to the plastics pollution crisis, but toxic chemicals in plastics complicate their reuse and disposal and hinder recycling," says Prof. Bethanie Carney Almroth, of the University of Gothenburg. The researchers point out that there are currently no monitoring programs in place to analyze the chemicals in recycled plastics and that only 1% of plastics chemicals are subject to international regulation. They add that no policies exist regarding the reporting of chemicals used in the recycling process, and call for this to change. "The hazardous chemicals present risks to recycling workers and consumers, as well as to the wider society and environment," write the research team in correspondence published in Science this month. "Chemical additives known to cause harm to human health and the environment must be rapidly phased out, and non-intentionally added substances must be identified and limited."

PFAS & The Chemistry of Concealment -- For decades, weak regulations in the U.S. have allowed multi-billion dollar chemical corporations to conceal the dangers of the toxic compounds they have polluted the world with.¹ This includes per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), termed “forever chemicals” since they do not readily break down in the environment.² PFAS are today found virtually everywhere — including in the blood of 97 percent of U.S. residents³ — and economic analyses estimate cleanup costs to be in the billions.⁴As the dangers of PFAS became public and legislative efforts to regulate PFAS and fund remediation grew, so too did lobbying by the chemical industry. Food & Water Watch (FWW) reviewed PFAS-related legislation introduced between 2019 and 2022, along with lobbying disclosures from clients of major PFAS manufacturers and users covering the same time period (see Methodology). We found:

• Congress introduced more than 60 bills related to PFAS during the 116th Congress (2019 to 2020), and over 70 during the 117th Congress (2021 to 2022). Just four bills became law, along with the four annual National Defense Authorization Acts that included PFAS amendments. None of these addresses the underlying responsibility of industry or provides close to sufficient funding.
• During the same time period, PFAS bills and issues appear in reports from lobbyists representing six major PFAS manufacturers, along with historic manufacturers Dow and DuPont. These lobbying reports collectively total $55.7 million in expenditures spent on PFAS and other issues.⁵
• One key target of major PFAS manufacturers was the PFAS Action Act of 2019 and 2021 — a comprehensive bill that would have designated two PFAS as hazardous substances under the Superfund program. The eight PFAS manufacturers paid a combined total of 28 lobbyists to work the 2019 version of the bill.
• The American Chemistry Council, the lobbying arm of the chemical industry, has publicly opposed PFAS regulation and actively lobbied on PFAS each year we reviewed (2019 to 2022). Reports from ACC lobbyists mention numerous bills including those that target environmental and drinking water standards, and total $58.7 million in expenditures.
• Big Oil and Gas (which has used PFAS in fracking fluids) is another major player, as well as the American Petroleum Institute, which sent lobbyists to Congress and federal agencies each year as well to lobby on PFAS.
• The comprehensive PFAS Action Act managed to pass the House but died in the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Two-thirds of current committee members received campaign contributions from the PFAS manufacturers we reviewed. More than half received contributions from the American Chemistry Council, and nearly half received contributions from top oil and gas companies. The current Republican minority took in 84 percent of these contributions.

There is much yet to accomplish in regulating PFAS and reining in the chemical industry’s campaign of concealment. This includes adopting a general definition of PFAS, finalizing regulations targeting PFAS as a class of chemicals, banning non-essential uses of PFAS, investing in research and monitoring of PFAS in the environment, and supporting the Water Affordability, Transparency, Equity, and Reliability (WATER) Act as a pillar for funding water access for all. These goals face the intense headwinds of immense corporate spending and influence on federal lawmakers and agency officials.

Forever chemicals: New report claims PFAS are sprayed onto fields and food in pesticides | Euronews --A new report exposes the ‘urgent’ threat of forever chemicals in pesticides, as it calls for tighter EU regulation. Dozens of substances used in pesticides in Europe are ‘forever chemicals’, a new investigation reveals.The stable door is slowly closing on PFAS - man-made per- or poly-fluorinated alkyl substances which persist in the environment for an incredibly long time.The EU is set to restrict their use and phase them out with a review of its REACH regulation that governs chemicals. It is part of a promised ‘great detox’ on dangerous substances.But this won’t apply to pesticides - and that’s a big problem, according to the NGOs Générations Futures and Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Europe.“It is shocking to find that PFAS, with their long-lasting environmental impacts, are intentionally sprayed on fields and food,” says Angeliki Lysimachou, head of science and policy at PAN Europe. “Given all the identified risks, their use should stop immediately.”A new joint report from the two NGOs has found that 37 active substances currently approved for use in pesticides are PFAS. That equates to 12 per cent of all approved synthetic substances.PFAS are a growing cause for public concern. Recent research has revealed shocking findings - such as the news that rainwater almost everywhere on Earth has unsafe levels of forever chemicals.This pollution has many potential sources, from chemical manufacturing plants to firefighting foams.Pesticides, however, appear to have gone under the radar. Many people are unaware that active ingredients in pesticides can be PFAS where they are used to keep them effective for longer.The investigation dug deep into their use in France, where it found that 30 active substances currently authorised for use in pesticides were PFAS. The sales of these substances have more than tripled since 2008, reaching 2,332 tonnes in 2021.

The chemical industry may have killed a landmark EU chemical policy. Here’s what that means for the US. - Improvements to a pivotal European chemical policy may have permanently stalled after political pressure and industry interference in what many European environmental advocates say is a step backward for public health. REACH, which stands for Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals, was enacted in the European Union 2007. Unlike chemical regulation in the U.S., REACH requires chemical companies to research the safety of their chemicals — such as those used in pesticides, cleaners, personal care products and plastics — before those chemicals can be sold. In the U.S., laws require the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to prove that a chemical is hazardous before imposing any bans or restrictions on its sale.REACH, which applies to all chemical substances in products sold in the EU, is meant to protect the public from adverse health effects caused by hazardous chemicals. Higher standards in the EU tend to drive up standards globally, Tatiana Santos, the head of chemicals policy at the European Environmental Bureau, a network of environmental advocacy organizations in the EU, told Environmental Health News (EHN). “Many parts of the world benefit actually from REACH, not only Europeans.” As part of the 2020 European Green Deal, the European Commission (the EU’s executive branch) promised to propose a revised version of REACH that would improve its effectiveness, particularly by requiring stricter data collection in research done by chemical companies. The European Parliament would then vote on the revised version, deciding to either pass or reject the law. The European Commission originally promised to release a proposed revision by the end of 2022, then delayed their goal to December 2023. But now, a leaked copy of the commission’s 2024 agenda and sources with inside knowledge of the political process indicate it’s unlikely the proposed revision will be released this year or released at all, dashing environmental advocates’ hopes that REACH will be revised before the 2024 European Parliament elections. Without a REACH revision, chemical companies that sell products in both the U.S. and EU will have one less reason to commit to safer chemistry, and U.S. consumers could pay the price. Advocates say the delay of the revision is largely due to corporate and political pressure – last year, chemical companies and trade associations spent $33.5 million lobbying EU institutions. “Hazardous chemicals will continue to be managed ineffectively and have an impact on human health and the environment,” Hazardous chemicals pose a wide range of health harms, from certain cancers to developmental problems and neurological illnesses. For example, endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs)such as bisphenol-A (BPA), phthalates and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), cause harm to the human hormone system, resulting in problems with growth and development, sleep, digestion and reproduction. EDCs and other hazardous chemicals are common in many household goods, including cleaners, pesticides, paints, plastics, personal care products, clothing and furniture.

House GOP approves cutting EPA budget by nearly 40 percent - House Republicans approved legislation Friday that would slash nearly 40 percent of the budget for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The funding bill, passed by a 213-203 vote, cuts 39 percent of the EPA’s budget and would be the smallest budget the agency has had in three decades. Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), Mike Lawler (N.Y.) and Marc Molinaro (N.Y.) voted against the bill, while Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (Texas) was recorded as voting for it. Republicans have had longstanding complaints about the agency, which takes on pollution, contamination and climate change, arguing that it overreaches. Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho), who chairs the subcommittee that wrote the bill, characterized the funding reductions it would deliver as necessary to curtail Inflation and the national debt. “Cutting funding is never easy or pretty, but with the national debt in excess of $33 trillion and inflation at an unacceptable level, we had to make tough choices to rein in federal spending,” Simpson said on the floor Thursday. The massive funding cut proposed by the GOP has virtually no chance of becoming law in this year’s budget but marks a starting point in negotiations for Republicans as they look to negotiate with Democrats in the Senate on funding the government. The bill is one of 12 annual government funding bills Republicans hoped to have passed by a Nov. 17 deadline to prevent a shutdown. However, Republicans face a challenge in staying unified on spending as they look to approve the remaining five bills in the tight window. In addition to the top-line EPA cuts, the GOP bill would also rescind provisions from the climate, tax and health care bill that Democrats passed last year. It targets funding aimed at helping underserved communities combat climate change and pollution. It additionally seeks to defund the EPA’s efforts to curtail toxic pollution and planet-warming emissions, preventing the agency from using funding to enforce its rules on power plants. The bill would also deliver cuts, albeit less dramatic ones, to the Interior Department, reducing its funding by about 4.5 percent. It delivers a steeper cut of 13 percent to the National Park Service. The legislation would also require the Biden administration pursue drilling off the coast of Alaska, where the administration does not currently plan to offer new oil lease sales. It would require the administration to auction off the right to drill for oil there at least twice a year and would also require twice-a-year-oil lease sales in regions of the Gulf of Mexico. The bill looks drastically different from its counterpart in the Senate, which calls for $7 billion more in total funding than the legislation passed in the House and was approved with overwhelming bipartisan support in committee earlier this year.

Rising death toll as floods wreak havoc in Ethiopia and Kenya - Over 20 individuals have died and upwards of 12 000 families have been evacuated due to severe flooding in the Somali region of Ethiopia, the regional government reported on November 4, 2023, adding that flooding also caused significant destruction to infrastructure, hindering aid to those affected. The Ethiopian Somali region has been struck by devastating flash floods over the past 4 days, resulting in the loss of over 20 lives and the displacement of more than 12 000 families. On November 4, 2023, the regional administration confirmed the calamity, emphasizing the difficulty in reaching the affected populations due to demolished bridges and roads. The continued rainfall poses an ongoing threat, with forecasts predicting the possibility of further flooding. The Somali Regional State Communication Bureau detailed the extensive damage to livestock, crops, and property, painting a dire picture of the flood’s impact on the local economy and sustenance of the community. Heavy rainfall and flooding have also been affecting neighboring Kenya since November 2. In Mandera County, the northeasternmost region of Kenya, bordering Ethiopia and Somalia, torrential rains have caused the Dawa River to overflow, leading to substantial flooding throughout the area. As of November 6, reports have confirmed five fatalities within the county, with three of these deaths occurring in the Mandera South Constituency. The impact of the flooding has been considerable, with media sources indicating that upwards of 1 800 families have been displaced. The deluge has affected nearly 5 000 homes and directly impacted over 4 900 residents across the county. The situation remains critical as forecasts predict continued heavy rainfall over the next three days, which is expected to affect most parts of Kenya, including Mandera County. These conditions threaten to exacerbate the already dire circumstances, raising concerns about further casualties, displacements, and infrastructural damage. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) had anticipated such events, citing the El Niño phenomenon’s influence on the region’s October-December weather patterns. According to OCHA’s recent situation report, the monsoon season has already affected over 405 652 individuals in Somalia, with a death toll of 14. Additionally, approximately 47 100 people have been compelled to seek refuge on higher ground, escaping the imminent threat of flooding. The inundation has severed access to essential resources, including markets and farmland, exacerbating the plight of those in the Horn of Africa. The ongoing crisis echoes the severe drought that has plagued Somalia, Ethiopia, and parts of Kenya since late 2020, considered the worst in four decades. In stark contrast, towards the end of 2019, the region was battered by persistent heavy rainfall that led to the deaths of at least 265 people and the displacement of tens of thousands across several East African nations.

Over 300 Japanese weather stations report hottest November day in history - Japan observed its hottest November day on record on November 3, 2023, with over 300 weather stations reporting record-breaking temperatures for this time of year. The heatwave affected one-third of the country, including Hakodate where 22.7 °C (72.9 °F) was recorded — 9.3 °C (16.7 °F) above average and a new November record. Weather records in Hakodate have been maintained since 1872. Tottori recorded 28.1 °C (82.6 °F) on the same day; this is 8.8 °C (15.8 °F) above normal, Toyooka 27.4 °C (81.3 °F) or 8.3 °C (14.9 °F) above normal, Itoigawa 28.1 °C (82.6 °F) or 10.6 °C (19.1 °F) above normal, Suttsu 22.5 °C (72.5 °​F) or 10.6 °C (19.1 °F) above normal — all are new November records for highest temperature.​

‘Strong’ El Niño winter coming: Here’s where we could see more snow - – In these uncertain times, we know at least one thing for sure: El Niño is here. There’s 100% certainty El Niño will last through early winter, the Climate Prediction Center, a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, recently said, and a 90% or higher chance it lasts into spring. El Niño typically divides the country in half, but where the dividing line falls varies from year to year. The southern third to half of the United States, including California, is likely to be wetter during an El Niño winter. The Pacific Northwest and Ohio Valley are usually dry and warm. While El Niño’s impacts are never a guarantee, the climate pattern tends to influence weather across the U.S. as it reaches peak strength in the winter. Does that mean El Niño will bring winter storms and feet of snow? Not everywhere and not necessarily, explains Michelle L’Heureux, a meteorologist with the Climate Prediction Center, in an article last week. “In fact, El Niño appears to be the great snowfall suppressor over most of North America.” El Niño may bring extra precipitation to the southern half of the country, but it’s not always cold enough there to turn that moisture into snow. You do see some extra snow during El Niño winters in the mountainous regions of the West, like the Sierra Nevada mountain in California and the southern part of the Rocky Mountains. Meanwhile, the Great Lakes, some of New England, the northern Rockies and the Pacific Northwest typically see less snow during an El Niño winter, L’Heureux says. During a strong El Niño, like we are expecting to see this year, the effects are even more pronounced. More snow starts to show up in Northern California, the Four Corners states, the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles, and the southern Appalachia region. ‘Historically strong’ El Niño possible: What it means for winter The suppression of snow up north is also stronger during a powerful El Niño. States like Oregon, Washington, New York and Pennsylvania are the most likely to see below-average snowfall. Snowfall during moderate-to-strong El Niño winters (January-March) compared to the 1991-2020 average (after the long-term trend has been removed). (NOAA Climate.gov map, based on ERA5 data from 1959-2023 analyzed by Michelle L’Heureux.) But before you pack away the snow gear, L’Heureux cautions against reading the data averages as a promise. “El Niño nudges the odds in favor of certain climate outcomes, but never ensures them,” writes L’Heureux. There’s also the impact of climate change, which has meant less snowy winters over time for much of the U.S. On the other hand, a freak snowstorm can always defy the odds, even during an El Niño year. In its most recent outlook, the Climate Prediction Center said there is a 75% to 85% chance that we see a “strong” El Niño this winter. There’s a 30% chance it ends up being one of the strongest ever recorded.

Asteroid 2023 VB2 flew past Earth at 0.085 LD - A newly-discovered asteroid designated 2023 VB2 flew past Earth at a distance of 0.085 LD / 0.00022 AU (32 769 km / 20 362 miles) from the center of our planet at 07:00 UTC on November 7, 2023. This is one of 3 asteroids to fly past Earth within 1 lunar distance today — the others are 2023 VS at 01:18 UTC and 2023 VD2 at 12:53 UTC. Since the beginning of the year, our space observatories have identified a total of 93 asteroids whose orbits come within 1 lunar distance from Earth’s center. Of those, VB2 is the 6th closest. Asteroid 2023 VB2 was first observed at Nanshan Station, Xinjian Observatory, China on November 5 — two days before its close approach to our planet. It belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids and has an estimated diameter between 6 and 13 m (19.6 – 42.6 feet). Asteroid 2023 VS flew past Earth at 01:18 UTC at a distance of 0.957 LD / 0.00246 AU (367 959 km / 228 639 miles). Asteroid 2023 VD2 will fly past us at 12:53 UTC at a distance of 0.146 LD / 0.00038 AU (56 177 km / 34 882 miles).

Asteroid 2023 VA flew past Earth at just 0.07 LD - A newly-discovered asteroid designated 2023 VA flew past Earth at a distance of 0.07 LD / 0.00018 AU (26 760 km / 16 628 miles) from the center of our planet at 05:37 UTC on November 2, 2023. Since the beginning of the year, our space observatories have identified a total of 91 asteroids whose orbits come within 1 lunar distance from Earth’s center. Asteroid 2023 VA was first observed at Steward Observatory, Mt. Lemmon Station, Arizona, U.S. It belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids and has an estimated diameter between 5.1 and 11 m (16.7 – 36 feet).

New island emerges near Iwo Jima in Ogasawara chain, Japan - On November 1, 2023, military personnel located on Iwoto Island witnessed the birth of a new island following intense volcanic activity. The eruption, which occurred 1 km (0.62 miles) off the island’s southern coast, was preceded by frequent volcanic tremors since October 21. An undersea volcanic eruption has led to the creation of a new island within the Ogasawara island chain, situated more than 1 000 kilometers (620 miles) to the south of Tokyo. This natural occurrence was confirmed by the Maritime Self-Defense Force’s (MSDF) base on the nearby Iwoto (Ioto) island, historically known as Iwo Jima, on November 1. The personnel at the MSDF base were alerted to the event by significant noise and the sight of soil and debris being propelled into the sky. According to the Global Volcanism Program, the eruption that created it occurred at a vent located about 1 km (0.6 miles) off the coast of Okinahama, on the SE side of the island. During an overflight on October 30, observers recorded explosions every few minutes that ejected dark material about 20 m (65 feet) above the surface of the ocean. Ejecta from the vent built a black-colored island and floating pumice was present around the island. A satellite image acquired by Sentinel-2 on November 2 shows the island is approximately 230 m (754 feet) long and 200 m (656 feet) wide: The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) has been monitoring the area and reported persistent volcanic tremors on Iwoto island, occurring at intervals of a few minutes, since approximately October 21. These tremors culminated in the underwater eruptions that have now resulted in the formation of new land. Situated close to the undersea volcano’s crater, the nascent island was formed as a consequence of the accumulated rocks and ejected material from the ocean floor. The JMA has suggested that the considerable ejection of rocks and stones from the crater contributed to the accumulation that formed the islet. The creation of the island follows a pattern of geological change in the region, as Iwoto island itself has been experiencing a rise in elevation attributed to ongoing volcanic activity. Earlier in June, pumice stones, believed to be from the same volcanic activity, were found floating in the waters near the island, signaling the dynamic nature of the earth’s geological processes in the area.

Emergency declared as record-high magma accumulation and intense earthquake swarm force Grindavík evacuation, Iceland - In response to a significant escalation in seismo-volcanic activity on the Reykjanes Peninsula in Iceland, characterized by an exceptional accumulation of magma, the intrusion of a substantial dike, and an intense earthquake swarm, the Icelandic Meteorological Office (IMO) and Civil Defense authorities have implemented critical safety protocols on November 10, 2023. These measures include the mandatory evacuation of Grindavík and the proclamation of a state of emergency. Key takeaways:

1. There is an ongoing intense seismic swarm north of Grindavík with increasing activity since 15:00 yesterday. The largest earthquake in the swarm was M5.0 at 18:00 UTC on October 10. It occurred 1 km (0.6 miles) east of Mt. Þorbjörn.
2. The newest information from GPS and satellite images confirm a dike intrusion from Sundhnjúkagig through Grindavík and to the Southwest.
3. The rate of ground deformation is much higher than has been measured previously on the Reykjanes Peninsula.
4. The volume of magma that has accumulated has surpassed that of the previous three eruptions in the area.
5. The data indicates that the magma intrusion extends from Stóra-Skógsfell in the north to Grindavík in the south, where it extends beneath the sea.
6. The shallowest depth of the top of the magma intrusion north of Grindavík is 1.5 km (0.9 miles).
7. Instruments show clear signs of magma movement towards the surface.
8. Civil Defense declared a state of emergency on October 11 and ordered the evacuation of the city of Grindavik (population 2 856).

Since 15:00 UTC yesterday, a seismic swarm north of Grindavík has intensified, culminating in a magnitude 5.0 earthquake at 18:00 on November 10, just 1 km (0.6 miles) east of Mt. Þorbjörn. This seismic activity, the largest in recent memory for the area, has led to increased monitoring and analysis by geologists and seismologists. Most of the recent earthquakes have occurred close to Grindavík, where the southwest end of the magmatic dyke is estimated to be located. Recent GPS and satellite imagery have confirmed a significant dike intrusion, stretching from Sundhnjúkagíg through Grindavík, and extending southwest. Remarkably, the rate of ground deformation observed is unprecedented for the Reykjanes Peninsula, indicating a much more extensive magma intrusion than previously experienced in the region. The accumulated volume of magma has now surpassed the totals of the last three eruptions in this area. Additionally, IMO instruments have detected clear indications of magma moving toward the surface, a worrying sign that heightens the possibility of an imminent eruption. The magma intrusion is believed to extend from Stóra-Skógsfell in the north, passing through Grindavík, and reaching beneath the sea. Preliminary models suggest the shallowest depth of the magma’s top is currently at 1.5 km (0.9 miles) north of Grindavík. In response to these developments, the Civil Defense declared a state of emergency on November 10 and ordered the complete evacuation of Grindavík, a town of 2 856 residents. This move follows the detection of an intense seismic swarm, with about 800 earthquakes recorded from midnight to noon. The seismic activity, though slightly diminished, remains high, emphasizing the seriousness of the situation. During a press conference after 23:00 UTC on November 10, Víðir Reynisson, Head of the Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management, reminded residents that the evacuation was mandatory and was being carried out with the safety of the residents in mind. “It is clear that we are dealing with events that we Icelanders have not experienced before, at least not since the eruption in the Westman Islands [1973. VEI 3]. We faced that together, we will face this together, and we will not be disheartened,” Víðir said. Grindavíkurvegur, a road leading to Grindavík from Reykjanesbrautin, was also closed last night due to a large crack that formed in the middle of it. The Road Administration has completed emergency repairs, but the road will remain closed, Iceland Review reported. The town of Grindavík had been successfully evacuated by 01:00 UTC on November 11, with the Red Cross establishing three emergency relief centers in response to the emergency phase declared by the Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management. In addition to the mandatory evacuation, a residential facility for disabled individuals and a nursing home were evacuated last night, following significant damage from recent earthquakes.

Large filament eruption produces partial-halo CME, impact to Earth expected on November 5 - (video) A large filament eruption centered near N30W30 was observed in H-alpha imagery around 05:00 UTC on November 3, 2023. A G1 – Minor geomagnetic storm watch is in effect for November 5 and G2 – Moderate for November 6.The eruption was associated with a partial-halo coronal mass ejection, expected to hit Earth by mid-day November 5.The geomagnetic field is expected to be mostly quiet through the majority of Saturday, November 4. Late Saturday through Sunday, glancing blow effects from the October 31 CME are possible with unsettled to active levels, coupled with unsettled to active levels on November 6 from possible effects from the November 3. Direct Hit at long last! A #solarstorm launches while in the Earth-strike zone today. NASA prediction shows impact by mid-day November 5. This storm will be sandwiched by glancing blows before & fast solar wind after, making #aurora possible to mid-latitudes until November 10!pic.twitter.com/wMAYTy2Rdn — Dr. Tamitha Skov (@TamithaSkov) November 4, 2023A G1 – Minor geomagnetic storm watch is in effect for November 5 and G2 – Moderate for November 6. Potential Impacts:

• Area of impact primarily poleward of 55 degrees Geomagnetic Latitude.
• Induced Currents – Power grid fluctuations can occur. High-latitude power systems may experience voltage alarms.
• Spacecraft – Satellite orientation irregularities may occur; increased drag on low Earth-orbit satellites is possible.
• Radio – HF (high frequency) radio propagation can fade at higher latitudes.
• Aurora – Aurora may be seen as low as New York to Wisconsin to Washington state.

“Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) and a Coronal Hole High Speed Stream (CH HSS) are now in the forecast,” SWPC forecasters said.“Recent CMEs have departed the Sun and may reach Earth with at least glancing blows. Earliest influences may be as soon as late on November 4. The most recent CME is more likely to have an Earth-directed component and may reach Earth afterward. Additionally, a CH HSS will likely affect Earth as soon as November 8 with effects possibly lasting through November 10. All of this activity makes for an interesting forecast challenge and expected conditions are still being evaluated, but geomagnetic disturbances are becoming more likely from November 4 – 10.” Continue to visit our webpage for the latest information and forecast updates.”

Geomagnetic storm reaches G3 - Strong level after dual CME impact - (video) A G3 – Strong geomagnetic storming was observed on Sunday, November 5, 2023, as a result of the impact of two successive coronal mass ejections (CMEs) from the Sun. The storm produced auroras extending into the lower latitudes such as Colorado and Texas in the United States and Greece in Europe, which is unusual for such regions. Many people across both hemispheres have also recorded and captured rare red aurora. A G3 – Strong geomagnetic storm was observed on Sunday, November 5, due to the impact of two CMEs that erupted on November 2 and 3. The initial signs of solar wind enhancement were detected at 08:10 UTC on November 5, where instruments recorded a significant increase in the solar wind’s total field strength to 34 nanoteslas (nT). The southward deflection of the magnetic field, known as the Bz component, reached a notable low of -27 nT. Despite this initial shock, solar wind velocities were recorded at a peak of 434 km/s, which is relatively moderate in terms of solar wind speed enhancements. The subsequent shock, more powerful than the first, was logged beginning at 11:46 UTC on the same day. A sharp rise in the total field strength to 45 nT was observed, followed by a gradual decrease. Notably, the Bz component rotated southward in the hours following this second impact, registering strongly negative values between -15 and -20 nT from 13:50 to 18:00 UTC. The solar wind speed peaked at 517 km/s at 12:33 UTC, before tapering off to approximately 460 – 480 km/s. A continuation of the enhanced solar wind conditions is forecast until approximately midday on November 6, owing to the lingering effects of the CMEs. However, a subsequent increase in solar wind strength could occur late on November 7 through 8 due to the anticipated impact of a co-rotating interaction region (CIR) and a high-speed stream (HSS) from a negative polarity coronal hole. For November 6, the prediction is for G1 – G2 (Minor – Moderate) geomagnetic storm levels as a response to the sustained CME activity and potential for substorms. On November 7 and 8, periods of active geomagnetic conditions are anticipated due to the influence of the CIR and the negative polarity CH HSS. Solar activity was at moderate levels over the past 36 hours, with two impulsive M1 flares detected at 11:43 and 14:32 UTC. Over the next 3 days, solar activity is expected to be low, with a chance for isolated R1 – R2 (Minor – Moderate) events (25%).

Global SAR arc outbreak: Geomagnetic storm leads to rare SAR arc sightings across the globe - Initial reports suggested these lights were auroras, but a closer examination revealed a different story. The red glows captured in images were identified as “SAR arcs,” a term dating back to their discovery in 1956. Dr. Tony Philipps of SpaceWeather.com highlighted this misnomer, emphasizing that SAR arcs are neither stable nor true auroras. Unlike auroras, which are created by charged particles from space interacting with the Earth’s atmosphere, SAR arcs originate from a different process. They signal the presence of heat energy escaping into the upper atmosphere from the Earth’s ring current system. This system, shaped like a doughnut, encircles our planet, carrying a current measured in millions of amperes. The recent geomagnetic storm energized the ring current, leading to the widespread appearance of SAR arcs. Jeff Baumgardner from the Center for Space Physics at Boston University noted that the event was truly global, with their equipment detecting SAR arc activity stretching from Italy to New Zealand. SAR arcs have an unexpected link to another phenomenon known as STEVE (Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement), which, like SAR arcs, is not an aurora. In a notable observation from 2015, a red SAR arc in New Zealand was seen transforming into STEVE, suggesting a metamorphosis similar to a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. This transformation was seemingly echoed on November 5 over Northumberland, UK, when Mark Savage observed STEVE emerge from a SAR arc in a matter of minutes, a timeline consistent with another observed transition in Canada in April 2022. The G3 – Strong geomagnetic storm that occurred on Sunday, November 5, 2023, was the result of a one-two punch from two coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that had left the Sun on November 2 and 3.. The initial CME set the stage, but it was the compounded effect of the two that led to the geomagnetic storm classified as G3, indicating strong effects that can have impacts on satellite operations, power grids, and navigation systems on Earth. The early indications of the storm’s potential were evident when solar wind enhancement was first detected at 08:10 UTC on November 5, with instruments measuring a substantial rise in the solar wind’s total field strength to 34 nT. The significant southward deflection of the magnetic field, or the Bz component, dipped to -27 nT, signaling a strong interaction was underway. Though this initial phase did not exhibit extremely high velocities, peaking at 434 km/s, the conditions were set for a more intense second shock. This subsequent jolt, arriving at 11:46 UTC, brought a notable increase in total field strength to 45 nT. Over the following hours, the Bz component remained strongly negative, fluctuating between -15 and -20 nT, indicative of a robust geomagnetic disturbance. The solar wind speed surged to 517 km/s, then settled into a faster-than-average stream of 460 – 480 km/s, sustaining the storm conditions and facilitating the remarkable global display of SAR arcs and the potential observation of the SAR to STEVE transformation.

Another incoming CME, impact expected on November 11 - A long-duration C-Class solar flare near the Sun’s center disk produced a full halo coronal mass ejection (CME) shortly after 11:15 UTC on November 9, 2023. The CME is anticipated to impact Earth around 18:00 UTC on November 11, potentially triggering a G2 – Moderate geomagnetic storm. Concurrently, a minor polar cap absorption event is affecting shortwave radio transmissions in polar regions. Solar activity in 24 hours to 00:30 UTC on November 10 was at low levels, primarily characterized by C-class flare activity. However, the Sun managed to produce a halo CME, with impact to Earth expected around 18:00 UTC on November 11. During the period, Regions 3477, 3481, and 3483 showed growth, while others remained stable or in decay. The forecast predicts continued low solar activity with a slight chance of minor to moderate radio blackouts from November 10 to 12. During the last 24 hours, the greater than 2 MeV electron flux peaked at 2 560 pfu at 15:10 UTC on November 9, indicating high levels. The greater than 10 MeV proton flux rose above background levels after 16:30 UTC, reaching around 2 pfu. Over the next few days, high electron flux levels are expected, normalizing by November 12. There is also a possibility of a minor proton event reaching the S1 – Minor threshold on November 10.

World Bank poised to host climate loss and damage fund, despite concerns - Countries moved a step closer on Saturday to getting a fund off the ground to help poor states damaged by climate disasters, despite reservations from developing nations and the United States. The deal to create a "loss and damage" fund was hailed as a breakthrough for developing country negotiators at United Nations climate talks in Egypt last year, overcoming years of resistance from wealthy nations. But in the past 11 months, governments have struggled to reach consensus on the details of the fund, such as who will pay and where the fund will be located. A special U.N. committee tasked with implementing the fund met for a fifth time in Abu Dhabi this week - following a deadlock in Egypt last month - to finalise recommendations that will be put to governments when they meet for the annual climate summit COP28 in Dubai in less than four weeks' time. The goal is to get the fund up and running by 2024. The committee, representing a geographically diverse group of countries, resolved to recommend the World Bank serve as trustee and host of the fund - a tension point that has fuelled divisions between developed and developing nations. Housing a fund at the World Bank, whose presidents are appointed by the U.S., would give donor countries outsized influence over the fund and result in high fees for recipient countries, developing countries have argued. To get all countries on board, it was agreed the World Bank would serve as interim trustee and host of the fund for a four-year period. Jennifer Morgan, Germany's special climate envoy, said in a post on X that Berlin "stands ready to fulfil its responsibility - we're actively working towards contributing to the new fund and assessing options for more structural sources of financing". Others were less optimistic. “It is a sombre day for climate justice, as rich countries turn their backs on vulnerable communities," said Harjeet Singh, head of global political strategy at nonprofit Climate Action Network International. "Rich countries ... have not only coerced developing nations into accepting the World Bank as the host of the Loss and Damage Fund but have also evaded their duty to lead in providing financial assistance to those communities and countries." The committee also recommended that developed countries be urged to continue to provide support to the fund, but failed to resolve whether wealthy nations would be under strict financial obligation to do chip in.

US invests $2 billion for lower-carbon construction at federal buildings (Reuters) - The Biden administration on Monday said it will invest $2 billion in 150 federal building projects across 39 states that use materials that minimize carbon emissions, its latest effort to tackle climate change through government purchasing power. The General Services Administration will prioritize the purchase of asphalt, concrete, glass and steel produced and disposed of with lower levels of associated greenhouse gas emissions that meet a standard for environmental products. "The U.S. government has a huge share of the market -particularly of concrete and asphalt- and that I think helps drive the industry towards meeting an ever increasing level of innovation when it comes to decarbonizing," John Podesta, senior adviser to President Joe Biden, told Reuters. Podesta oversees the implementation of the administration's Inflation Reduction Act, which provides over $3 billion to the GSA to invest in buildings to reduce carbon emissions. He said the investments will help to tackle emissions from sectors that are among the hardest to decarbonize. Podesta and GSA Administrator Robin Carnahan announced the investments during a visit to Topeka, Kansas, where a federal building and courthouse will receive $25 million of the $2 billion in planned investments to retrofit the facility to make it more energy efficient. Asphalt, concrete, glass and steel are among the most carbon-intensive construction materials. They account for nearly half of all U.S. manufacturing greenhouse gas emissions, according to the GSA. The administration has a goal to have a net-zero emissions federal building portfolio by 2045 and net-zero emissions in government procurement by 2050.

Neighbors call for greater scrutiny of Lake Maurepas carbon capture project--A new state task force on carbon capture and storage projects met Monday for the first time and got an earful from opponents of a proposal to store CO2 emissions under Lake Maurepas. While members tried to sort out exactly what they will do on the advisory panel, they heard from neighbors and officials who want to stop Air Products’ plan to store CO2 below the lake bottom. Some 30 carbon sequestration projects have been proposed in Louisiana, where Gov. John Bel Edwards has made the technology a key part of his climate agenda. Proponents say it’s the best way to contain industry emissions that would otherwise contribute to climate change. Skeptics have questioned industry safety claims about storing CO2 underground and point out that the energy needed to manifest capture and storage would more than offset any carbon removed. The most vocal opposition at Monday’s hearing came from residents of Livingston Parish, whose swampy southeastern corner reaches into Lake Maurepas. Starting last fall, Air Products spent months conducting a seismic survey of areas in the lake to determine the area best suited for carbon sequestration. The explosive charges needed for the survey were met with scorn from recreational and commercial anglers as well as recreational boaters. The most eye-raising accusation came from Randy Delatte, the incoming president of Livingston Parish who was elected in October with 71% support. He said fishers checking traps were kept from the areas being surveyed by security personnel armed with assault-style weapons. Livingston residents have also reported their water wells are no longer working after the seismic survey, according to Delatte. Air Products promised it would test such wells, he said, but has yet to do so. “Carbon capture needs to slow down until the people can catch up,” Delatte said. Bill Whittington, a founder of the nonprofit Lake Maurepas Preservation Society, pointed out the existence of a fault line under the lake, which he said could become compromised if carbon is stored beneath it. Opponents warned of the potential consequences, citing a 2020 incident when a pipeline carrying liquefied carbon dioxide ruptured near Satartia, Mississippi — about 30 miles east of Lake Providence. Two days of heavy rain caused earth around the pipeline to shift, causing a weld to rupture. A CO2 cloud moved toward Satartia, forcing the evacuation of 200 people and hospitalizing 45.

Texas Sees ‘Bonanza’ in Carbon Storage Market - With the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in 2021 and the Inflation Reduction Act last year, Congress and the administration of President Joe Biden made a colossal bet on nascent massive-scale technological solutions to the climate change crisis. Together, the laws dedicated more than $100 billion to atmospheric carbon reduction, including grants, loans and tax credits for renewable energy projects; hydrogen hubs; electric vehicle fleets; and carbon capture, utilization and sequestration, or CCUS. (Some prefer a simpler phrase: carbon capture, use and storage.) It’s that last category that has excited politicians in hydrocarbon-rich Texas because it involves cashing in on a new round of federal subsidies to scale up an activity that oil producers have already been doing for a long time: pumping liquefied carbon gas into the ground. With expanded federal tax credits for CCUS up for grabs, Texas wants to become the “global leader in carbon capture and sequestration,” in the words of state Sen. Kelly Hancock, a Republican who represents Tarrant County. But environmental advocates say the motivation of politicians like Hancock has nothing to do with fighting global warming and everything to do with harnessing federal incentives to drive a boom in industrial growth. For decades, producers have been injecting liquefied carbon gas and other fluids deep underground in order to re-pressurize aging oil wells. The practice is called secondary recovery, or enhanced oil recovery, which enables a company to squeeze the last drops out of a nearly depleted well — like pumping up a nearly empty Super Soaker. Enhanced oil recovery is the primary “U” in the CCUS acronym. Producers claim that hydrocarbons produced using the technique are “net zero,” based on the controversial assumption that the carbon going into the ground — and, theoretically, remaining trapped there — cancels out whatever carbon emissions result from burning the extracted fuels. The new federal incentives prioritize CCUS projects that would remove carbon gases from ambient air in an as-yet-unproven process called direct air capture and from major emissions sources, including power plants and industrial facilities, known as point-source capture. In either case, beneficiaries will need to guarantee permanent geological storage of captured carbon, either through enhanced oil recovery or through sequestration in special injection wells bored into saline formations thousands of feet under the Earth’s surface. The scale of the Biden administration’s investment in CCUS is historic, but federal subsidies for the industry have been around for well over a decade. Congress created the 45Q tax credit in 2008 to spur investment in carbon storage as part of a multipronged effort to combat man-made climate change. Projects eligible for 45Q credits include Class VI wells — the ones used for carbon dioxide injection and permanent geologic storage in deep underground saline formations — and Class II wells used for enhanced oil recovery. In the first decade of the 45Q program, the CCUS industry struggled to get off the ground. Congress boosted the dollar-per-ton amount of the 45Q credit in 2018, and then, in 2022, the program received a major shot in the arm with the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act. Along with hiking up the value of the 45Q credit, the act drastically lowered eligibility requirements — reducing the volume of captured carbon at a qualifying facility by as much as 96%. Expansion of the 45Q credit and lowering the bar to entry triggered “a bonanza around carbon removal,” according to Tara Righetti, Occidental Chair of Energy and Environmental Policy at the University of Wyoming. The act also gave billions to the Department of Energy to use for loans for CCUS projects and other clean energy initiatives. “Project developers are clamouring to respond to U.S. Department of Energy Funding Opportunity Announcements, tie up injection rights, and secure injection permits,” Righetti said in a January 2023 blog post. “In response, states have moved forward with efforts to assume regulatory authority for carbon sequestration and secure primacy for Class VI injection wells.”

Heirloom Opens First U.S. Direct Air Capture Plant - In an open-air warehouse in California’s Central Valley, 40-foot-tall racks hold hundreds of trays filled with a white powder that turns crusty as it absorbs carbon dioxide from the sky.The start-up that built the facility, Heirloom Carbon Technologies, calls it the first commercial plant in the United States to use direct air capture, which involves vacuuming greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. Another plant is operating in Iceland, and some scientists say the technique could be crucial for fighting climate change.Heirloom will take the carbon dioxide it pulls from the air and have the gas sealed permanently in concrete, where it can’t heat the planet. To earn revenue, the company is selling carbon removal credits to companies paying a premium to offset their own emissions. Microsoft has already signed a deal with Heirloom to remove 315,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The company’s first facility in Tracy, Calif., which opens Thursday, is fairly small. The plant can absorb a maximum of 1,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year, equal to the exhaust from about 200 cars. But Heirloom hopes to expand quickly.“We want to get to millions of tons per year,” said Shashank Samala, the company’s chief executive. “That means copying and pasting this basic design over and over.”The idea of using technology to suck carbon dioxide from the sky has gone from science fiction to big business. Hundreds of start-upshave emerged. The Biden administration in August awarded $1.2 billion to help several companies, including Heirloom, build larger direct air capture plants in Texas and Louisiana. Companies likeAirbus and JPMorgan Chase are spending millions to buy carbon removal credits in order to fulfill corporate climate pledges.Critics point out that many artificial methods of removing carbon dioxide from the air are wildly expensive, in the range of $600 per ton or higher, and some fear they could distract from efforts to reduce emissions. Environmentalists are wary of oil companies investing in the technology, fearing it could be used to prolong the use of fossil fuels.Others say it’s essential to try. Nations have delayed cutting greenhouse gas emissions for so long, scientists say, that it is almost impossible to keep global warming at relatively tolerable levels unless countries both cut emissions sharply and also remove billions of tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by midcentury, far more than can be achieved by simply planting trees.“The science is clear: Cutting back carbon emissions through renewable energy alone won’t stop the damage from climate change,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, who planned to attend the opening of Heirloom’s facility, said. “Direct air capture technology is a game-changing tool that gives us a shot at removing the carbon pollution that has been building in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution.”Heirloom won’t disclose its exact costs, but experts estimate that direct air capture currently costs around $600 to $1,000 per ton of carbon dioxide, making it by far the most expensive way to curb emissions, even after new federal tax credits worth up to $180 per ton.Finding enough clean power for the energy-intensive process could be a challenge. In California, Heirloom paid a local provider to add more renewable electricity to the grid. But experts say care is needed to ensure that direct air capture plants don’t inadvertently cause emissions from the electricity sector to rise by diverting wind or solar power from elsewhere.

BlackRock to invest $550 mln in Occidental's carbon capture project (Reuters) - BlackRock Inc, the world's biggest money manager, will invest $550 million in Occidental Petroleum Corp’s direct air capture (DAC) plant in West Texas, the two companies announced on Tuesday. Occidental has been shopping for investors since last year for its Stratos project in Ector County, Texas, the largest project designed to suck up carbon dioxide directly from the air, as it plans about another 100 plants of the kind. Occidental’s first large-scale DAC facility is a crucial test of economics for a technology that the International Energy Agency says will play a key role in decarbonizing the global industry, but which has been too costly in early test efforts. BlackRock's investment shows support for Occidental's ambitious plans on DAC, despite Stratos' repeated construction delays and cost increases in the past couple of years. DAC strips CO2 from the atmosphere to bury underground or for use in making products such as concrete and aviation fuel. Both Occidental and Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) estimate DAC could be a multi-trillion market for oil producers by 2050, as scale brings costs down. “This joint venture demonstrates that direct air capture is becoming an investable technology," Occidental's chief executive, Vicki Hollub, said in a statement. "BlackRock’s commitment in Stratos underscores its importance and potential for the world." Occidental on Tuesday increased project costs to $1.3 billion, the second price increase this year. The project was estimated between $800 million and $1 billion in 2022. Its start-up is planned for 2025, from 2024 previously. Stratos is designed to capture up to 500,000 tonnes of CO2 per year, with construction works expected to employ more than 1,000 people about 30% complete, Occidental said. BlackRock has signed a definitive agreement to form a joint venture with Occidental through its subsidiary 1PointFive that will own Stratos. Berkshire Hathaway (BRKa.N), the conglomerate run by billionaire Warren Buffett, has been endorsing Occidental's plans indirectly, by buying shares and increasing its participation in the company. It currently owns a 25.8% stake worth about $14 billion.

Occidental, Blackrock Form JV for Texas DAC Facility | Rigzone - Occidental Petroleum Corp subsidiary 1PointFive and Blackrock Inc, through a fund managed by its Diversified Infrastructure business, are forming a joint venture that will own Stratos, a Direct Air Capture (DAC) facility in Ector County, Texas. Blackrock will invest $550 million on behalf of clients in the development of Stratos, “the world’s largest DAC facility”, Occidental said in a statement Tuesday. The facility is designed to capture up to 500,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. Construction activities for STRATOS are approximately 30 percent complete, Occidental noted, with the facility expected to be commercially operational in mid-2025. DAC is a technology that captures and removes large volumes of carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere and then stores it deep underground in geologic formations. Stratos is expected to provide cost-effective solutions that companies in hard-to-decarbonize industries can use in conjunction with their own emissions reduction programs, Occidental said. To date, 1PointFive has signed carbon dioxide removal credit purchase agreements with several customers, including Amazon, Airbus, All Nippon Airways (ANA), TD Bank Group, the Houston Astros, and the Houston Texans, according to the statement. Earlier in the month, 1PointFive and TD Bank Group (TD) announced a purchase of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) credits from Stratos. Under the terms of the agreement, and subject to STRATOS becoming operational, TD Securities agreed to purchase 27,500 metric tons of DAC CDR credits over four years, representing “one of the largest purchases of DAC CDR credits by a financial institution and demonstrates TD's continuing strategic focus on energy transition”, Occidental said in a separate news release. With the transaction, TD Securities expects to add to its portfolio of voluntary carbon offsets, as it continues to build out its carbon advisory and trading capabilities in the voluntary and compliance carbon markets. Further, TD intends to use a portion of the credits from this transaction to offset its own operational emissions, according to the release. "As the need to move from climate commitments to action intensifies, corporations across all sectors are looking for tangible ways to achieve their net zero goals", TD Securities Global Head for ESG Solutions Amy West said. “Carbon removal credits from Direct Air Capture will be measurable, transparent, and durable, with the goal of providing a solution for organizations to address their emissions”. "The transition to a low-carbon economy is complex and relies on transformative action across sectors and economies, including the adoption of new technologies", TD SVP for Sustainability and Corporate Citizenship Janice Farrell Jones said. "Direct Air Capture holds enormous promise as a tool to drive progress on this journey and we are proud to play a role, helping to scale innovation and support this growing business opportunity”. In October, 1PointFive, and ADNOC signed an agreement to start a jointly funded preliminary engineering study for a similar DAC facility in the United Arab Emirates, with a capacity of one million tons per year.

How Midwest Landowners Helped to Derail One of the Biggest CO2 Pipelines Ever Proposed - After half a decade of failed attempts, Kathleen Campbell thought 2021 would finally be the year she retired. That is—until she received a letter in December from Navigator CO2 Ventures.The company wanted to build part of its carbon dioxide pipeline through her property, about 1,000 feet from her rural Illinois home, just south of Springfield, which she had shared with her husband for more than 30 years. The massive project would ultimately span five Midwestern states, and Navigator was threatening to seize her property through eminent domain if she didn’t grant them an easement.“This has absolutely ruined my retirement,” Campbell remembers thinking. Anxiety gave way to anger as she imagined a backhoe tearing up the beets, peppers and other vegetables growing in the quarter-acre garden that she and her husband had spent years cultivating. Later, she would learn a CO2 pipeline in rural Mississippi had ruptured just a year prior, sending at least 45 people to the hospital.But Navigator’s executives couldn’t have known who they were dealing with. A distinguished research professor at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, Campbell had spent her life combing through complex health studies and thwarting deep-pocketed pharmaceutical companies from bringing potentially dangerous drugs to market. Within months, she had helped birth a formidable opposition campaign to the pipeline.About two weeks ago, Navigator finally capitulated and canceled its project. The company officially cited “unpredictable nature of the regulatory and government processes involved” as its reason for the decision. But truth be known, it was landowners like Campbell whose opposition wore them down and proved decisive. “I think that I feel safe in my own home now,” Campbell said in a phone interview on the day of Navigator’s announcement. Now, her retirement notwithstanding, Campbell has agreed to help another group of Illinois landowners fight yet another CO2 pipeline being proposed between Iowa and Illinois. Her fight, it seems, has only just begun. And the lessons she learned fighting Navigator may be more valuable than ever.

Federal Register :: Land Uses; Special Uses; Carbon Capture and Storage Exemption - A Proposed Rule by the Forest Service on 11/03/2023 -- The United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service (Forest Service or Agency), is proposing to amend its special use regulations, which prohibit authorizing exclusive and perpetual use and occupancy of National Forest System lands, to provide an exemption for carbon capture and storage.

Thousands Oppose Industrial Carbon Waste Dumping in National Forests — More than 9,000 people today urged the U.S. Forest Service to halt plans to allow carbon waste from industrial sources like fossil fuel power plants to be dumped in national forests. In June the Forest Service announced it would issue a rule as early as this month giving “perpetual right of use” for carbon waste injection in national forests. Today’s petition, signed by people and groups across the country, says a leak at a carbon waste site could suffocate or even kill people and wildlife.“This proposal is nothing short of ludicrous,” said Laura Haight, U.S. policy director for the Partnership for Policy Integrity. “Our national forests are already home to the most viable carbon capture and storage technology on Earth — they’re called trees.”Carbon dioxide waste injection would require building massive amounts of infrastructure, including pipelines, injection wells and well pads. Road building, construction and logging would cause additional harm to forest ecosystems and recreation.“Turning our national forests into industrial dumping grounds is outrageous and completely wrongheaded,” said Victoria Bogdan Tejeda, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute. “There’s no place in our national forests for carbon capture scams that only benefit polluting industries. The administration should scrap this rule and enact one that protects mature and old-growth forests and trees.”National forests provide habitat for a diverse range of plants and wildlife and offer low-cost, healthy recreation for millions of people. They’re also essential for watershed health and play a key role in fighting climate change by absorbing and storing tons of carbon.“Carbon capture and storage is a snake oil climate solution with no upsides for anyone but the industry that created the climate crisis,” said Karen Feridun, co-founder of Better Path Coalition in Pennsylvania, home of the Allegheny National Forest. “The Forest Service must refuse to become its accomplice by scrapping the proposed rule.”Creating carbon waste involves compressing large amounts of highly pressurized carbon dioxide, turning it into a deadly asphyxiant. First responders may not be able to get to victims of a pipeline rupture, well blowout or leak because vehicles can’t safely operate in a dense carbon dioxide plume. In addition, emergency response could be difficult since many national forests are in remote areas.

Opinion | Don’t Offer Up Our National Forests for Industrial Carbon Waste Dumping - In my 34-year career at the U.S. Forest Service, the agency worked to support American industry while also maintaining public lands and the renewable resources they foster. That’s why I am shocked to learn thatthe agency plans to make a fundamental change to how it manages our public lands: allowing private parties to permanently dump industrial pollution in national forests.While I was serving as Siuslaw National Forest Supervisor in Oregon, and deputy chief for all U.S. national forests, the agency updated its Special Use permit rules in 1998. At that time, the agency was adamant that no industry—no matter how useful to society—had the right to permanently use or occupy national forest lands. The agency was clearthat it opposed “an exclusive and perpetual use of Federal land.” To do otherwise would undermine longstanding policy meant to protect national forest ecosystems and recreational uses.Now, in an alarming contradiction, the Forest Service proposes to blow a pipeline-sized hole in its regulations, quoting here “to allow exclusive or perpetual right of use or occupancy... of National Forest System (NFS) lands” for carbon waste injection and storage. This carbon waste, in addition to requiring pipelines and injection wells, can cause people and animals to suffocate or even die. This I know: Once gases are piped underground, there are no do-overs. What’s done is done. And I wouldn’t want to be a Forest Service ranger working anywhere near these dangerous operations.The agency has a golden opportunity to elevate the value of carbon sequestration by protecting mature and old-growth forests. Why the abrupt change? Nothing in laws establishing our national forests has changed since the rule was updated in the 1990s, but the Forest Service now seems to think that it can throw away decades of policy preventing “forever” permits that privatize forests for corporate use.Maybe the answer comes—as it often does—from following the money. The carbon would likely come from smokestacks of facilities like coal-fired power plants. Fossil fuel companies are eager to adopt carbon capture and storage as a way perpetuate business as usual in the face of our need to transition to renewable energy. After capturing their pollution, these industries have to put it somewhere. Sending the waste through pipelines to national forests is surely more appealing than dealing with landowner opposition to carbon pipeline companies’ efforts to take private property by eminent domain. To add icing to the cake: the federal government is offering companies massive tax subsidies to dispose of their carbon waste, even though research has shown this program is wrought with fraud.Some national forests will be targeted sooner based on their geology, but this rule change puts all of them at risk of future applicants’ desire to make quick profits and spoil public lands permanently. Impacts of this rule change could spread across our landscape: National forests are widely distributed throughout America, and highly valued for recreation, domestic water sources, crucial fish and wildlife habitat, and outstanding scenery.Ultimately, policy questions turn on values. Forests store tremendous amounts of carbon–naturally! The agency has a golden opportunity to elevate the value of carbon sequestration by protecting mature and old-growth forests. Isn’t this a better values choice than chasing tired polluting industry practices that are squarely opposite where our climate change battle should be heading?The Forest Service should abandon its proposal to permanently privatize the public’s land and endanger our shared renewable resources and ecosystems, which only benefits a small group of rich companies and investors. National forests have a huge role to play in protecting biodiversity and storing carbon in forested landscapes. Allowing polluters to permanently industrialize these lands will only rob the public of real climate solutions in order to chase after fraught, false ones.

"They Can’t Breathe" -Two wood pellet biomass processing plants have sought air permits in Adel, and by its own assessment, the one proposed by Spectrum Energy Georgia LLC could be the largest in the world. If built, it will produce 1.3 million tons of pellets per year for export, and Gear is certain folks in Adel will take the health and environmental hits first.“But ultimately,” she said, “everyone will pay a price.”Each individual pellet is made from forests felled by clear-cutting,more than 900,000 acres in the South in the last decade, the trees dried, shredded and, in a heavily chemical-dependent process, ground into capsules, according to a report by the Dogwood Alliance, an environmental justice group. The process affects largely poor, Black communities, which endure around-the-clock noise, truck exhaust in their neighborhoods and waves of sawdust that leave many residents coughing and wheezing with debilitating respiratory disease, according to industry critics. The NAACP adopted a resolution in 2021 opposing the industry.The pellets are manufactured for export to be burned in European and Asian electricity generation plants far away from their source and collateral damage, critics s aid.“These industries are killing us,” Gear said.The U.S. Industrial Pellet Association has issued reports that emphasize the role of wood pellet production in climate mitigation and forest stewardship, but do not address the health impacts on those who live near the plants’ wood chippers and smokestacks.Spectrum’s processing plant would be built on the site of a defunct particleboard mill, so this is not Adel’s first experience with apolluting wood products industry. But it is the first time the town finds itself up against an industry being touted as a climate change solution. President Trump’s administration designated biomass as “carbon neutral” and “renewable,” comparable to solar or wind power. The designation gave the wood pellet industry the aura of being environmentally friendly and opened the door for it to apply for federal tax credits available to providers of clean energy for which it had not previously been considered.Neither Spectrum nor Renewable Biomass Group, the second company hoping to bring a wood mill to Adel, responded to Capital & Main’s request for comment on claims that the process is neither “carbon neutral” nor “renewable,” and that companies should not be eligible for tax credits predicated on such designations. Industry critics dispute the carbon-neutral status of the wood pellet trade and insist it’s dirtier in terms of air toxics and particulate matter and emits more greenhouse gases than burning coal.

New Report Issues Damning Verdict on Food’s Fossil Fuel Addiction -Food systems are responsible for at least 15 percent of all global fossil fuel consumption, according to a major report launched ahead of the COP28 climate summit.The analysis shows that the production, transport, and storage of food are driving greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to those of the EU and Russia combined. Ultra processed foods like snacks, drinks and ready meals, along with chemical fertilisers made from natural gas, are singled out as major sources of pollution.Published today (Thursday), the research comes weeks before global leaders gather in Dubai to discuss ways to limit catastrophic global heating. Food is set to be a major focus at this year’s annual climate conference, which is hosted by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) from November 30. The Global Alliance for the Future of Food, a coalition of philanthropic organisations, and consultancy firm Dalberg Advisors published the report, which is titled: “Power Shift: Why We Need to Wean Industrial Food Systems Off Fossil Fuels”.Its authors found that even if governments delivered on their 2030 climate pledges, by 2037 food-related fossil fuel use alone would blow the remaining portion of the 1.5C carbon budget, an estimate of the maximum amount of carbon dioxide emissions that can be emitted before tipping the planet into dangerous levels of global heating. A third of the world’s food production is at risk from climate breakdown, and climate disasters are already increasing malnutrition in some parts of the world, according to UN scientists at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). At the same time, food systems are also a major contributor to global warming, accounting for over a third of total emissions worldwide.Scientists and campaigners have raised major concerns about the lack of global action ahead of the COP28 summit, in a year of devastating impacts from climate-related weather events. The UAE is one of the world’s 10 largest producers of oil, and is also investing heavily in petrochemicals. Patty Fong, programme director of climate and health & well-being at the Global Alliance for the Future of Food, and contributor to the report, told DeSmog that phasing out fossil fuels was crucial to the food industry’s green transition. “Industrial food systems have a fossil fuel problem,” she said. “We cannot transform food systems and make them climate friendly until we have weaned our food systems — alongside other economic sectors — off oil and gas.”The meat and dairy industry’s high methane emissions are increasingly well known. But this is the first time that the food systems’ dependency on fossil fuels have been calculated in this way. The report identifies multiple drivers for the fossil fuel dependency – from energy-intensive ultra processed foods like snacks, drinks and ready meals in high income countries, to the global reliance on fossil fuel-based chemicals for crop production.It finds that the majority of fossil fuel consumption is in the processing and packaging stage (42 percent), and in retail consumption and waste (38 percent). Agriculture production accounts for 20 percent of energy use in food systems, with fossil fuel use to produce fertilisers expected to increase substantially through 2050.Natural gas is the basis for chemical fertilisers and pesticides, which are used to increase the growth of crops and kill off pests. Plastic packaging is produced from natural gas and crude oil.The International Energy Agency (IEA), the global energy watchdog, warns that petrochemicals could drive a third of all growth in oil demand by 2030 and half by 2050.In the United States alone, the fossil fuel industry planned investments of over $164 billion in petrochemicals between 2016 and 2023. Forty percent of petrochemicals – which are produced from fossil fuels – are used in food-related plastics and fertilisers. Fong said that the fossil fuel sector was heavily investing in these industries in the face of the increasing demands for a transition away from oil, gas and coal for energy.“We know that this is where the petrochemical industry is placing their bets,” she said. “Decarbonisation of energy is shifting overtime. But synthetic fertiliser use is growing. We have to head off this growth.” “This is not just about decarbonising chemical fertilisers. It’s about transitioning to regenerative and agroecological practices.”

California scientists suggest a strategy to ‘eat our way’ out of the climate crisis -Commercializing the production of synthetic dietary fats could relieve pressure on a global agricultural sector that is struggling to decarbonize, a new study has found.The widespread manufacture of farm-free food could yield numerous environmental and societal benefits — enabling people to “eat our way” out of a burgeoning climate crisis, according to the study authors, who published their findings Monday in Nature Sustainability.Some benefits would include reductions in water use and pollution, greater local control over food production and decreases in weather-related shortage risks, per the study. Such a shift could also lessen the need for low-paying and physically taxing labor, while returning farmlands to their natural state and enhancing biodiversity.“Large-scale synthesis of edible molecules through chemical and biological means without agricultural feedstocks is a very real possibility,” lead author Steven Davis, a professor of Earth system science at the University of California, Irvine, said in a statement.“Such ‘food without the farm’ could avoid enormous quantities of climate-warming emissions while also safeguarding biodiverse lands that might otherwise be cleared for farms,” Davis added.The raw materials for the farm-free synthesis of fats would be the same as those used by plants: hydrogen in water and carbon dioxide from the air, the researchers explained.The authors said they focused their attention on fats, rather than carbohydrates or proteins, as they are the “simplest nutrients to synthesize thermochemically.”Doing so, they explained, would be comparable to the processes that underly large-scale soaps-making and polymer chemistry.Agriculturally derived fats generate about 1 to 3 grams of emitted carbon dioxide per thousand calories, the authors determined.Molecularly identical synthetic fats — created using natural gas feedstock — would generate less than a gram of equivalent emissions, according to the authors. And if renewable resources powered that process, that number would be nearly zero.To evaluate the potential of a widescale switch to synthetics, the scientists focused on the emissions generated and farmland consumed by two dominant oil crops: soy and oil palm.They calculated that about half of soy and oil palm calories account for about three-quarters of both the greenhouse gas emissions and land usages that are linked to soy and oil agriculture.While the importance of soy protein might limit the replacement of soybean oil for synthetic alternatives, oil palm has no critical co-products alongside its oil, according to the study.Substituting synthetic fats for palm oil alone would help producing countries cumulatively reduce about 29 percent of the emissions they generate and about 15 percent of the biodiverse tropical land they consume, the researchers found.

AI: The information economy becomes ever more energy and resource intensive - Back in 2009 I wrote a piece entitled "The unbearable lightness of information." Since then the information economy has become ever more resource intensive. Examples include Bitcoin, the widely recognized digital-only currency, which, as it turns out, consumes about as much electricity as the nation of Norway each year. (Why a currency with no physical bills should weigh so heavily on the energy system is explained in the same linked piece.) Data centers and data transmission networks account for between 2 and 3 percent of global electricity consumption. Think of all the things in the world which use electricity, and you'll see why this share for this one facet of society is such a large chunk. While the telecommunications industry is becoming more efficient in its energy use, total energy use continues to expand. The emerging 5G system uses three times more energy than 4G. Between 2020 and 2026 network energy needs are expected to increase 150 to 170 percent. So much for the information economy being light on resources! Now come reports that Microsoft is planning on building small modular nuclear reactors to power its artificial intelligence (AI) plans. That might be better than burning more fossil fuels. But the energy for AI is currently being provided primarily by fossil fuels because that's where the world continues to get the vast majority of its energy. It turns out that new nuclear power dedicated to AI development is for now just a dream and unlikely to become a reality anytime soon. I know proponents of AI are telling us how it is going to revolutionize our life by, among other things, making diagnosis and treatment of disease easier; spotting all manner of trends to help businesses, government, educational institutions and individuals make better decisions; and generating text for myriad purposes both mundane (think: instruction manual) and creative (think: movie script). In between all that other work I hope AI can solve global warming and the polycrises accompanying it including energy, resource, soil and water depletion; toxic chemical pollution; and biodiversity loss. I don't actually think AI will be much used for such purposes as it will be more profitable to use it to increase the production of all sorts of consumer goods; think of new toxic chemicals to introduce into commerce; and increase the exploitation of all sorts of natural resources needed to expand the aforementioned production of consumer goods including new toxic chemicals. The one thing that AI will almost certainly NOT do is bring about a fair, orderly and dramatic reduction in resource use by human society—an absolute necessity if we are going to avoid the seemingly inevitable society-wide collapse in store for us as we continue our exponential economic growth and the resource depletion and climate change that will accompany it. Meanwhile, AI will devour ever more resources for itself. I called the weight of the information economy on the physical world "unbearable" 14 years ago. Now that weight is becoming crushing. We are on a trajectory to make ourselves capable of downloading and sending vastly larger amounts of data wirelessly using our cellphones for fun and profit—wired networks are 10 times more efficient at sending data—while it becomes harder and harder to supply clean water, adequate food and basic services because of both climate change and resource depletion. AI will almost certainly on balance aggravate these negative trends and likely make them much worse.

Biden administration moves to speed up clean energy projects out West -The Biden administration has aimed high when it comes to the nation’s clean energy buildout, but a string of setbacks has slowed momentum. Auctions for offshore wind projects have ended in failure and massive carbon storage projects have been canceled, all despite massive subsidies and tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act. Companies in turn have blamed high construction and shipping costs, high interest rates, and in particular, a lack of transmission availability. But as some offshore goals falter, the administration is focusing on alternative energy buildout onshore, on its sprawling public lands in the West. Today, the Department of the Interior announced an additional 15 projects to its portfolio of clean energy initiatives, raising the number of approved projects on public lands to 46 since 2021. These latest are scattered throughout Nevada, Wyoming, Arizona, Utah, and Southern California, making for a total of 16 solar and 10 geothermal projects that will be bolstered by 20 new transmission lines, indicating an interest in solving a major clean energy problem — that is, the issue of how to get all the energy generated in remote areas out to the cities that need it. The new transmission lines will bring electricity across the vast deserts and mountains to the region’s widely dispersed population centers, just as energy costs have skyrocketed. It’s an attempt to move forward on what’s been called one of the biggest roadblocks to the administration’s hoped-for clean energy buildout. At the end of October, the Department of Energy published the National Transmission Needs Study, a report that analyzed the nation’s energy grid capacity through the year 2040. The study found that between climate change impacts and a surge in electric vehicles and alternative energy sources, the grid would need a massive increase in the nation’s capacity to get electricity from one place to the other, with particular growth needed in the Southeast and Mountain West. In its estimation of both a high energy load and a high clean-energy-adoption scenario, the study estimated that the nation’s grid would need to grow by one and a half times its current size and capacity. There is currently no central grid-planning authority in the United States, so the problem of regulating that growth could get chaotic, dependent on states’ and utilities’ goodwill and commitment to bringing clean energy to the local level.

Texas Could Expand Highways With Federal Climate Money: - Texas may be angling to use federal funds supplied to the state to cut carbon emissions to instead create even more highways for cars, the Texas Tribune reported. A draft carbon reduction plan drawn up by the Texas Department of Transportation notes that funds provided to the state by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, passed in 2021, could be used to expand highways under the argument that larger highways help cut down on congestion, and thus reduce emissions from idling cars. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act requires all states to create a draft carbon reduction plan like the one TDOT drew up; Texas is set to receive $641 million over the next five years for transportation projects—more than any other state. Critics of the plan point out that the draft doesn’t even contain the words “climate change,” nor does it emphasize the need to change transportation patterns to draw down emissions.

Biden administration announces 15 new renewable energy projects on public lands Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced the advancement of 15 new renewable energy projects in the western U.S. as the Biden administration seeks to tout its record on energy. The projects include a 500-megawatt photovoltaic facility in Riverside County, Calif., that the Bureau of Land Management said was fully operational Friday, as well as another solar energy facility in Riverside County set to generate 364 megawatts. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is also expected to announce approval of 500 kilovolts worth of transmission lines across 60 miles of public lands west of Phoenix. The administration has set a goal of 25 gigawatts of onshore renewables on public lands by 2025. In a call with reporters Friday, officials said that since 2021, the BLM has approved 46 renewable projects on public lands, which are collectively expected to generate up to 11,236 megawatts. “The advancement of these projects reflects significant progress across the West to decarbonize our economy, create jobs and help address the climate crisis,” Haaland said on the call. “They also build on the tremendous momentum we’ve seen throughout this administration to [break] ground on transmission lines that will deliver this clean energy across the West.” “The BLM’s work to responsibly and quickly develop renewable energy projects is crucial to achieving the Biden-Harris administration’s goal of a carbon pollution-free power sector by 2035,” added BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning. “Investing in clean and reliable renewable energy represents the BLM’s commitment to addressing climate change and supports direction from the president and Congress to permit 25 gigawatts of solar, wind and geothermal production on public lands no later than 2025.” The administration has also set a broader target of a fully renewable grid by 2035. The announcement comes weeks after the administration also announced $7 billion toward regional hubs for hydrogen energy production, with sites in the Appalachian region, California, the Gulf Coast, the mid-Atlantic, the Midwest, the Pacific Northwest and North Dakota and Minnesota.

Heat Pump Installations Slow, Impeding Biden’s Climate Goals - More Americans are buying heat pumps, an environmentally friendly alternative to furnaces and air-conditioners that can significantly lower monthly energy bills. But the pace of installations has slowed in the past year, posing an obstacle to the Biden administration’s climate plans.Rising interest rates and inflation combined with a slow and confusing rollout of federal government incentives for the purchase of heat pumps are largely responsible for the recent drop in sales, energy analysts said. These headwinds, if they persist, could jeopardize President Biden’s goals of effectively eliminating U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050.Mr. Biden’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, offers tax credits of up to $2,000 a year for the purchase of heat pumps, devices that can heat and cool homes and are significantly more efficient than oil and gas heaters. Those incentives defray only a small portion of the $16,000 an average heat pump installation costs, according to Rewiring America, a nonprofit group that is working to increase the use of cleaner forms of energy.A much more generous program that would provide rebates of up to $8,000 for heat pump purchases, which Mr. Biden’s climate law also authorized, is not expected to be up and running until sometime next year; the timing will vary by state. That program is taking longer to set up because it will be run by state governments, which have to devise a system for dispensing the money and then submit those plans for approval by federal officials.“We’re not on track,” said Alexander Gard-Murray, director of the Greenhouse Institute, a climate think tank. “We need to speed up adoption dramatically.”Nick Bender, left, delivering and installing a heat pump. “If you’re really trying to put in a heat pump that’s going to heat well in Minnesota, you need an inverter heat pump,” he said.Credit...Tim Gruber for The New York TimesInstallations have slowed recently because the cost of installing a new heat pump is significant enough that many homeowners need to borrow money to buy one. That is not something many people are eager to do, given that mortgage and other lending rates are at or near their highest levels in decades.“The level of incentive for heat pumps in the Inflation Reduction Act is not large enough to overcome the effect of higher interest rates on HVAC installations,” said Trevor Houser, a partner at the Rhodium Group, an independent research firm, referring to heating, ventilation and air-conditioning systems. Other people, including most lower-income Americans, cannot take advantage of the credits because they do not owe enough in taxes.

Michigan Senate votes to override local decisions on wind, solar energy - Michigan lawmakers approved another major change to the state’s energy policy on Wednesday, passing a two-bill package that would let state regulators override local decisions about where to allow large-scale wind and solar arrays. The bills, which pitted environmentalists against local government advocates, passed narrowly along party lines, 20 to 18, with unanimous support from the Senate Democratic majority. The measures will soon head to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s desk, where she is expected to sign them. “We are setting an example for the rest of the nation on how to navigate the deeply complex realm of energy policy in a way that promotes affordability and reliability, drives job creation and honors the role we must play in mitigating climate change,” Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks, D-Grand Rapids, said just before the vote. Proponents call the measures essential to another controversial policy the Legislature passed this week: A requirement for utilities to deliver 100 percent clean energy by 2040. But opponents fear that restricting local governments’ ability to block renewable energy projects will leave some rural communities overrun with wind and solar arrays. “So many of you constantly, persistently tell everyone how much you love the U.P. or other rural Michigan areas,” said Sen. Ed McBroom, R-Vulcan. “Yet the very things that make you appreciate the economy, culture, natural and picturesque landscapes … will be stripped away.” The state’s two largest utilities, DTE Energy and Consumers Energy, have vowed to become net-zero by midcentury. But Dan Scripps, chair of the Michigan Public Service Commission, which regulates DTE and Consumers, said the companies are struggling to stay on track as local opposition scuttles wind and solar projects. “Its difficult to see how we meet these commitments or our broader renewable energy goals without meaningful siting reform,” Scripps said Tuesday during a Senate committee hearing on the bills.The permitting reform package, House Bills 5120 and 5121, is part of a massive energy policy rewrite that aims to speedily wean the state off fossil fuels. To do so, Michigan utilities must build out power sources that don’t emit greenhouse gasses, such as wind, solar and nuclear. To meet the energy standard that Whitmer is expected to sign into law in the coming days, Michigan needs up to 209,000 acres of wind and solar developments in addition to those already built or in the works, Scripps said. “That’s a big number,” he said, “But in context, it represents about 0.55 percent of Michigan's total area.” Republican representatives accused Scripps of downplaying the bills’ impact on rural areas, which will host most of that acreage because large projects require vast open spaces. McBroom, an Upper Peninsula dairy farmer, said he fears a “mass loss of valuable farmland.” Without the new legislation, utilities have needed the blessing of local governments to build large wind and solar developments. But from Montcalm County to the Thumb, fights over these efforts have pitted neighbors against neighbors, leading to recall votes and canceled projects. If Whitmer approves the changes, the Michigan Public Service Commission will have ultimate permitting authority. The bills also set criteria governing how much noise and light the projects can emit, how far they must be from neighboring buildings, and other particulars. Neighbors who oppose rural renewable energy developments say they fear losing tillable land and property values as idyllic views are replaced with vast solar fields and towering turbines. Local government advocates say the bills are an affront to Michigan’s long tradition of local control over land use. “These bills are not about whether or not we need clean energy in Michigan,” said Judy Allen, director of government relations for the Michigan Townships Association. “This is about who is best equipped to make those decisions.”

Fear of Chinese dominance looms over Biden Treasury Department’s next rule on electric car tax credits - The Treasury Department is about to impose rules that could make it even harder to persuade Americans to buy electric cars — and already has Republicans primed to accuse President Joe Biden of aiding China. The department is expected to set rules in the coming weeks spelling out how hard a line it’s taking against electric vehicle batteries that contain ingredients from adversaries like China — a key issue for the EV tax breaks in Biden’s signature climate law. The tax credit — worth up to $7,500 per vehicle — is a major part of the administration’s strategy to get more electric vehicles on the road. But the law forbids offering the incentives for vehicles whose batteries have parts or minerals from hostile nations, in an attempt to counter China’s dominance of the industry and encourage the growth of a home-grown supply chain. The administration is well aware of the high stakes in how it opts to interpret that prohibition, both for the success of Biden’s climate ambitions and for his ability to persuade voters that his policies will bring jobs and prosperity. Setting a super strict bar against Chinese content could mean that virtually no electric cars and trucks qualify for the tax break, advocates for the auto industry say. But other industries, including domestic miners, have warned the administration that their own prospects would wither if Treasury leaves a wide-open door to battery ingredients from China. No matter what the department decides, Republicans including former President Donald Trump are already wielding the soft-on-China hammer against Biden, especially in must-win Michigan. Meanwhile, uncertainty over Treasury’s decision is freezing private investment in electric vehicle manufacturing in the United States, automakers say — at a time when the growth of EV sales is also slowing below what some manufacturers had expected.

Senators urge US to take steps to boost battery production, citing China (Reuters) - Two influential Democratic U.S. senators urged the Energy Department to take steps to boost U.S. battery manufacturing and next-generation battery research, citing China's dominance and export controls, according to a letter seen by Reuters. Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner and Energy Committee Chair Joe Manchin cited experts saying that the United States is "ten to twenty years behind Asia in commercialization of battery technology," and noted that China accounts for more than 75% of battery cell production. "The U.S. must become a leader in manufacturing batteries and battery components, while securing our supply chains for the materials that make up those components," the senators wrote in a previously unreported letter seen by Reuters, citing China's decision last month to restrict exports of graphite, critical to manufacturing battery anodes. China dominates the global EV battery supply chain including production of graphite - the single largest component. The letter noted in 2022 the United States produced less than 10% of lithium-ion batteries in 2022 and said demand is expected to grow over seven times by 2035. The letter wants a committee briefing by Dec. 1 "on ongoing research and development of next-generation battery technologies." Lithium-ion batteries, the Pentagon has said, are crucial to thousands of military systems from "handheld radios, to unmanned submersibles and to future capabilities like lasers, directed energy weapons and hybrid electric tactical vehicles," the letter noted. China accounts for 70% of the global production of lithium-ion batteries, the letter said, noting of five critical minerals required for most lithium-ion batteries, China "controls between 60-100% of the mining or refining for these minerals." The letter also said "it is critical that the U.S. lead in next-generation battery technology and alternative chemistries" and coordinate with the Department of Defense and other national security agencies "to support procurement of innovative, U.S.-developed energy storage technologies." A spokesperson for Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Senate votes in favor of rescinding Biden waiver of ‘Buy America’ requirements for steel, iron in EV chargers The Senate on Wednesday voted in favor of getting rid of the Biden administration’s exemption from “buy America” requirements for electric vehicle (EV) charger components. The vote was 50-48. Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Jon Tester (Mont.), as well as Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) voted with more Republicans in favor of removing the exemption. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) was the only Republican to vote “no.” It was intended to overturn a waiver issued by the Biden administration in February that exempted steel, iron and construction materials used to make electric vehicle chargers from the “Buy America” restrictions. The waiver allows the administration to fund chargers made with foreign materials through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. It will only apply if the final assembly of the chargers occurs in the U.S. The administration has a broader goal of building out a network of electric vehicle chargers to support the transition to electric vehicles and mitigate climate change. Adequate charging infrastructure is seen as a major hurdle in this shift. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who sponsored the resolution to get rid of the waiver, said in a written statement ahead of the vote that the administration is “directing taxpayer dollars toward foreign-made EV chargers.” Ahead of the vote, the White House threatened to veto it, arguing that the resolution would actually undermine domestic manufacturing for the chargers. This is because without the waiver, chargers would fall under a general Reagan-era waiver exempting most manufactured products from the “Buy America” requirements, the White House said. “The Administration’s policy immediately requires that EV chargers purchased through FHWA grants be manufactured in the United States,” the White House said. “The policy is also phasing in additional Buy America domestic content requirements for EV chargers over the next year to align with the thresholds set forth by Congress,” it added. Supporters of the administration’s policy also pointed to investments that have recently been made in domestic electric vehicle charging. “Since enacting the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law nearly two years ago, the electric vehicle charging industry has announced investments of over $500 million in more than 40 plants for assembling American-made EV chargers,” said Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) in a floor speech.“ These plants — in states like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, North Carolina and other states — are bringing more manufacturing jobs back to the U.S.”

Has solution to climate change been buried deep in Earth all along? - That is the possibility posed by increasing discoveries of vast, underground deposits of white hydrogen around the world. Burning hydrogen produces only heat and water, and it’s attracting billions of dollars in investment as countries race to wean themselves off fossil fuels. But not all hydrogen is created equal, and the energy industry uses a colour-coded, sliding scale to indicate its sustainability. Most common is “gray hydrogen”, made using the fossil fuel, natural gas. “Blue hydrogen” is created the same way but captures the carbon emissions; “green hydrogen” is produced by using clean energy to split water. As the name suggests, green hydrogen is the “greenest” but expensive and produced in smaller quantities. Then there’s white hydrogen – also known as natural, gold or geologic hydrogen – which doesn’t need to be freed from other elements like oxygen by using vast amounts of electricity. For a long time, many scientists thought large deposits of white hydrogen weren’t possible – but now, millions of megatons of hydrogen are thought to be lodged in Earth’s crust. This has the potential to supply global hydrogen demand for thousands of years, said USGS research geologist Geoffrey Ellis, a leading expert on white hydrogen.Pioneers in white hydrogen also claim it could be produced for much lower costs than its cousins. It will be twice as cheap as the cheapest green hydrogen, according to Natural Hydrogen Energy, a US-based startup.Inevitably, there’s a catch – and the hapless smoker in Bourakébougou provides the first clue. Hydrogen is a lot more flammable than natural gas, and can cause fires and explosions if not handled properly. Because the gas is so light, no known odorants can be added to alert people to potential leaks, just as a sulfur-containing smell raises the alarm on natural gas and propane. Another unknown quantity of hydrogen, in general, is what impact it has on heating our already overcooked planet.Hydrogen’s floaty quality means it easily leaks, warned a recent study by the Environmental Defense Fund, so the gas’ warming impact is “both widely overlooked and underestimated”.“Therefore, the effectiveness of hydrogen as a decarbonization strategy, especially over timescales of several decades, remains unclear,” the researchers noted.These aren’t the only challenges to overcome. Next comes finding the stuff, as many of the large deposits discovered so far have been hit upon by accident.

Climate Benefits of Hydrogen Are at Risk as Fossil Fuel Industry Pressures Mount - Scientific American - Hydrogen can play a critical role in the clean energy transition. However, hydrogen is not, and never will be, the core of the clean energy economy. Despite that, the littlest molecule has lately claimed the largest space in seemingly every climate conversation—and is increasingly grabbing an outsized share of climate funding, too. One headline policy, the Regional Clean Hydrogen Hubs program, or “H2Hubs,” is a $7 billion Bipartisan Infrastructure Law initiative charged with concurrently developing clean hydrogen production, transport, storage and use. A second, the clean hydrogen production tax credit, or “45V,” is a lucrative Inflation Reduction Act incentive that could add up to tens of billions of dollars—or more—to shift the economics away from carbon-intensive hydrogen to low-carbon hydrogen.Targeted support to enable hydrogen as a clean energy solution is valuable; unbridled hydrogen enthusiasm is not. The risks are twofold: First, that it distracts from the pressing priority of directly displacing fossil fuels with renewable electricity throughout the economy; and second, that it fails to tailor hydrogen production processes and end uses to those that are truly beneficial and climate-aligned. Severe consequences will follow from a reckless start to the clean hydrogen economy. That’s because missing on hydrogen by a little actually means missing by a lot, quickly flipping the gas from a valuable tool for climate progress to an outright reverser of climate gains. As the Biden administration finalizes the details for these two policies, which could fundamentally shape whether and how hydrogen contributes to the clean energy transition in the time ahead, it must get them right.If it does, hydrogen can slot in as a real and true contributor to climate progress. That’s because when cleanly produced, hydrogen enables the decarbonization of those tricky corners of the economy short on clean energy alternatives. They run the gamut from industrial processes such as steelmaking, to transportation applications such as long-haul aviation.But if they get it wrong, people and the environment will suffer numerous and consequential harms, including to climate, to health and to the perpetuation of environmental injustices that disproportionately impact communities of color and low-income communities across the country.Here’s why. Today, hydrogen is nearly exclusively produced from natural gas in a heavily polluting process called steam methane reforming. But hydrogen’s climate credentials require its low-carbon production. Today’s fossil fuel–based approach could be coupled with systems to capture and store some of the resulting climate pollution. Or, to fully sidestep carbon emissions, renewable electricity could split water into hydrogen and oxygen through a process called electrolysis.The catch is, it’s not enough to just evaluate the production process to determine whether the produced hydrogen is low carbon. There can still be wide differences in total resulting emissions across projects—so much so, in fact, that what might superficially appear to be cleanly produced hydrogen can actually generate even higher levels of carbon emissions than today’s heavily polluting approach.

As Midwest 'hydrogen hub' plans move ahead, concerns persist - At a virtual event held on Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, leaders with the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen discussed details of “hydrogen hub” projects across the region that stand to receive up to $1 billion in federal investment. MachH2, which brings together over 60 public and private entities across Indiana, Illinois and Michigan, was one of seven funding recipients announced in October, alongside partnerships based in the Pacific Northwest, the mid-Atlantic, Appalachia, California, the Texas Gulf Coast and the Upper Midwest. The 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act set aside $7 billion for the hubs with the goal of fighting climate change. MachH2 chief integration officer Neil Banwart, who also serves as managing director of the Indianapolis-based nonprofit Energy Systems Network, unveiled a map that included the locations of eight of the hydrogen hub’s nine planned projects during the Wednesday meeting, and fielded a range of questions from community members. When burned, fossil fuels produce carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that has played a large role in the warming of the planet. Burning hydrogen, by contrast, bonds hydrogen atoms with oxygen to produce only water as a byproduct. Hydrogen’s advocates, industry leaders and elected officials among them, say that replacing fossil fuels with hydrogen in energy-intensive industrial processes can help lower their carbon footprint.However, as the hydrogen hubs’ critics have been quick to point out, creating hydrogen requires energy, and the source of the energy used affects the process’s overall environmental impact. Hydrogen can be separated from the oxygen atoms in water using electricity through a process called electrolysis.If the process uses energy from wind, solar or other renewable sources, then this so-called “green” hydrogen can be produced and burned without carbon emissions. “Pink” hydrogen is produced using energy from a nuclear reactor, which does not involve direct carbon emissions. “Blue” hydrogen — the cheapest and most widespread method of production today, according to the Department of Energy — is produced by reacting natural gas with steam, producing carbon dioxide as a byproduct.Banwart said that MachH2 will take an “all of the above hydrogen production approach,” including green, pink and blue hydrogen production. A hydrogen production node planned for Northwest Indiana to be operated by the energy giant BP — the only MachH2 project planned for the Hoosier state — will produce blue hydrogen and offset the process’s environmental impact using carbon capture and storage. In his presentation, Banwart acknowledged that blue hydrogen is a controversial component of the hub’s plans.
“I don’t think we’re gonna settle the debate tonight, but by taking this approach to pursue multiple forms of clean hydrogen including blue, pink and green, we can move more quickly, we can scale the production and the distribution of these molecules all across the Midwest, and that will allow us to decarbonize difficult to decarbonize sectors.”BP explained its carbon storage plans, which involve building pipelines to move liquid carbon dioxide from its hydrogen production node to suitable injection sites south of Lake County, at a series of public meetings earlier this autumn. The company was met with a mixed reaction from community members, some of whom voiced concerns over possible negative environmental impacts stemming from failures in pipelines or injection wells.The 2020 rupture of a carbon dioxide pipeline in Satartia, Mississippi, which resulted in 45 hospitalizations, has stoked public fears about the prospect of more CO2 pipelines. While carbon dioxide is neither combustible nor poisonous, it is denser than air and can cause asphyxiation by displacing oxygen near the ground.

Why blue hydrogen is a big mistake - The federal government has announced its preliminary plan to release billions of dollars in funding for seven hydrogen development efforts. At least three of the seven projects plan to produce blue hydrogen. This would be a mistake. Unlike green hydrogen, which is produced from water using electrolysis powered by renewable energy, blue hydrogen is generated from the methane in natural gas. The Department of Energy’s unwise decision to include proposed blue hydrogen projects among its selections for federal funding is a waste of money and precious time. It makes no sense to boost production of a fuel that has little chance of success and cannot be economically produced. Instead, the tax dollars targeted for blue hydrogen will serve primarily as a subsidy for oil and natural gas companies to continue producing greenhouse gas emissions that accelerate climate change. One of the projects appears to be based heavily, if not solely, on blue hydrogen, and the other two apparently plan to include both blue and green hydrogen. Blue hydrogen is touted as a replacement for climate-altering hydrocarbon fuels, but a recent Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) report shows that blue hydrogen would likely exacerbate the effects of climate change. The report finds the justification for supporting blue hydrogen is based on a model that includes overly optimistic emissions assumptions. The DOE’s model seriously underestimates methane emissions associated with the production and transport of natural gas used to produce blue hydrogen. Current peer-reviewed publications report U.S. average upstream emissions rates are more than two times as high as assumed in the model. With 3 million miles of pipeline in the U.S., tracking and regulating methane emissions remains a significant, uncontrolled problem. The impact of methane emissions increases dramatically if they are viewed in the short term. The global warming potential (GWP) for methane is more than 80 times the carbon dioxide figure over 20 years, but the federal model uses a 100-year horizon, which downplays the climate impact of this potent greenhouse gas. The model also assumes blue hydrogen production facilities will capture 95 percent or more of the carbon dioxide they produce. But no commercial-scale hydrogen production facility has demonstrated the ability to annually capture emissions at a range higher than 75 percent to 83 percent. Questions also remain about transporting millions of tons of captured carbon dioxide and storing it underground. Finally, the model ignores emissions from the compression, transportation and storage of the hydrogen being produced. It also ignores the effects of hydrogen emissions, even though hydrogen is a powerful indirect greenhouse gas with a GWP more than 30 times that of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. Beyond the flawed assumptions in the emissions model, the development of a hydrogen economy would take years and cost hundreds of billions — if not trillions — of dollars, even while proven technologies such as solar and wind power and battery storage exist and have been shown to work. They are less costly and have already made significant advances in the marketplace. The planet does not have decades to recover from the damage created by more than a century of heavy fossil fuel use. Instead of attempting to maintain a business-as-usual approach that encourages the fossil fuel industry to produce even more climate-altering fuels for a market that will not exist for decades (if at all), tax dollars should be used to boost renewable energy, strengthen the electrical grid, and take other actions that can decarbonize our economy in far less time than blue hydrogen. Blue hydrogen is not the future. Federal decision-makers must not waste time sinking taxpayer dollars into attempts to bolster speculative ventures for blue hydrogen, a fuel that is not clean and not a solution. Time is running out.

U.S. Natural Gas Utilities Paving Long Road to Hydrogen Blending - Forecasts suggest that it would take time before U.S. hydrogen production is up to speed to match burgeoning demand, and before pilot projects produce conclusive results for blending the fuel in natural gas infrastructure. Natural gas and electric utilities, nonetheless, are eager to leverage the fuel to lower emissions in existing infrastructure and electricity generation. U.S. hydrogen production in 2022 reached about 10 million metric tons/year (mmty), nearly all of which was produced using natural gas feedstock, according to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). The U.S. government under the Biden administration is, however, aiming to ramp up clean hydrogen production – hydrogen produced using low- or zero-emissions energy – to 10 mmty by 2030, followed by 20 mmty by 2040...

11 Democrats push for loose rules for hydrogen energy, breaking with climate hawk colleagues - A group of 11 Democratic senators are pushing the Biden administration to approach hydrogen energy with leniency, breaking with colleagues who want strict climate rules for the nascent energy technology. The senators wrote to key Biden administration officials asking them not to require projects to follow certain climate-related stipulations in order to qualify for a lucrative tax credit. They argue that such stipulations would be overly burdensome for the emerging hydrogen energy industry and that they would raise costs and delay projects. “In the long term, this may hamper the development of a robust clean hydrogen market, undermine … production and price-parity goals, reduce the positive effects of scaling up … investment, and prevent clean hydrogen from fulfilling vital roles in hard to decarbonize sectors.” Hydrogen energy is created by separating hydrogen from oxygen in water molecules. Some see this type of energy as a potential climate solution, since it can be used in sectors like aviation and steel manufacturing that are otherwise difficult to cut emissions from. The lawmakers’ letter is dated Tuesday and was obtained by The Hill on Wednesday after it was shared with trade groups working on the issue. The letter pushing for loose requirements was signed by Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Gary Peters (D-Mich.). It comes after a group of eight senators wrote their own letter pushing for strict climate rules last month. These lawmakers argued that without such rules, even hydrogen powered by clean energy may indirectly boost demand for planet-warming fossil fuels by taking existing energy from the grid. They wrote that in such a scenario, “the program would undermine climate progress and lead to the production of hydrogen with a true emissions intensity higher than even its conventional fossil fuel-derived counterpart.” Last month’s letter pushing for stricter requirements was signed by Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.). The dueling letters represent a tough choice ahead for the Biden administration as it weighs whether to put stipulations on hydrogen producers who want to qualify for tax credits passed in the Democrats’ climate, tax and healthcare bill. In particular, the requirements lawmakers are debating would require that hydrogen producers come alongside their own clean energy sources instead of pulling from otherwise available energy sources. Other principles up for debate are whether hydrogen energy should be required to use energy from its same geographic region and produced within the same hour as its use.

Dominion’s Proposed Virginia Power Plant Casts Doubt on Its Commitments to Clean Energy - In 2020, the Virginia Assembly passed the Virginia Clean Economy Act, a law that required the state’s largest utility provider, Dominion Energy, to generate all of its power using only renewable energy by 2045. But this summer, with a little over two decades to transition away from fossil fuels, the company revived previously shelved plans to build a large natural gas power plant in Chesterfield, Virginia, raising alarms with residents, environmental activists and climate scientists. In its permit filing for the project, Dominion noted that renewable energy sources like wind and solar reduced greenhouse gas emissions, but called them “operationally unreliable.” The utility said that fossil-fuel-powered plants are necessary to “respond rapidly to changes in generation from both the renewable sources and normal changes in power demand.”Dominion has called the new Chesterfield plant a “peaker,” ostensibly meaning it would only operate during periods of high electrical demand. In its 2023 Integrated Resource Plan, which is awaiting approval by the State Corporation Commission (SCC), Dominion said it expects a large increase in energy demand driven by a concentration of data centers in Northern Virginia, America’s most important hub for internet traffic and infrastructure. The company’s permit application shows the plant could run for over 3,000 hours a year—almost five months.“I was already concerned about Dominion’s plans,” said Glen Besa, a Chesterfield resident and the retired director of the Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club. “This just confirmed their down payment on climate chaos.”Besa’s assessment of Dominion’s commitment to renewable energy was echoed by other environmentalists and Chesterfield residents who were frustrated by the company’s continued investment in fossil fuels, and its decision to site this plant in Chesterfield—a community that has lived in the shadow of a coal-powered Dominion plant for nearly three quarters of a century.Some who follow the impacts of data centers on Virginia’s grid called the proposed emissions from this plan significant, and suggested that Dominion may be able to meet its energy needs by investing in more renewable infrastructure. Spokespeople from some of the largest tech companies in the world underscored their companies’ commitment to powering their data centers in Virginia with renewables, but did not offer concrete timelines for when this would happen.

PG&E files application to keep Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant operating until 2045 - Tuesday, PG&E submitted an application to keep the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant running 20 years after its scheduled closure date, meaning the plant could operate until 2045. The application was submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). Originally PG&E planned to shut down its two reactors in 2024 and 2025. In a prepared statement to KCBX, PG&E said the utility is committed to answering the state’s call to ensure the continued operation of the facility and safely deliver affordable, reliable and clean energy for California. Right now Diablo Canyon provides about 9% of the state’s electricity supply. Meanwhile, anti-nuclear groups including San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth and the Environmental Working Group have filed numerous lawsuits opposing the plant's extension. The organizations have also filed petitions to the NRC this year requesting the power plant be shut down due to safety concerns. They are worried about the risk of large earthquakes and the possibility of cracking equipment. Next, the NRC will determine whether PG&E's application is sufficient for a full review. That should be determined in 30-60 days.

UN report calls out "doubling down" on fossil fuel production instead of climate goals --A major new United Nations report finds oil, gas and coal production plans by the top 20 largest energy-producing countries would boost greenhouse gas emissions and keep them high enough to blow past the Paris targets. The "production gap" identifies the distance between levels that would hit Paris Agreement goalsand what is actually planned by major energy-producing countries.The analysis breaks down energy policies and projections for the U.S., Australia, Canada, Saudi Arabia, China and the other nations that make up the world's top 20 energy producers. "Governments are literally doubling down on fossil fuel production," said UN Secretary-General António Guterres, in a statement."We cannot address climate catastrophe without tackling its root cause: fossil fuel dependence."The report contains stark warnings about trends and plans for carbon-heavy energy sources.Overall, it finds that key nations are imperiling the prospect of a "well-managed and equitable energy transition," with plans to churn out more than twice the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 compared to what's consistent with Paris goals. The report found that government plans and projections would lead to an increase in coal production until 2030 and would boost global oil and gas production until at least 2050. This goes against scenarios that would meet the Paris Agreement's most ambitious goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels through 2100, the UN finds. It also runs counter to expectations that global demand for coal, oil and gas will peak within this decade even without new policies, as recently predicted by the International Energy Agency. Although most major energy producers have committed to lofty goals like reaching net zero emissions by 2050, none have pledged to cut fossil fuel production enough to meet the 1.5-degree target, the report said.

EOG: Emerging Ohio Utica Combo Play Competes with Premium Portfolio - EOG Resources continues to see promising results from its acreage in the Ohio Utica Shale—a region that could compete among the E&P’s premium developments going forward.So far this year, Houston-based EOG has added 25,000 net acres to its footprint in the Ohio Utica Combo play. The company now has around 430,000 net acres in the Ohio Utica, predominately in the volatile oil window of the play. EOG has around 430,000 net acres across the volatile oil window of the Ohio Utica Shale play.(Source: EOG investor presentation)EOG has also acquired 100% of the mineral rights across 135,000 acres of its Utica leasehold.The company’s leasehold entry cost in the play remains less than $600 per net acre. Meanwhile, comparable acreage in the Utica is now around $8,000 per acre, according to analysts at Truist Securities.EOG is seeing “strong and consistent well results” spanning across its Ohio Utica Combo position, Jeff Leitzell, EOG’s executive vice president of exploration and production, said during the company’s third-quarter earnings call.The company’s initial four-well Timberwolf package, drilled at 1,000-ft spacing, has been performing well above the general curve for the play: Each three-mile lateral delivered a 30-day IP average of 2,150 boe/d at an 85% liquid cut (55% oil).“With a large amount of liquids in the product mix, all of the wells we have drilled today support double premium potential across our acreage position,” Leitzell said.EOG has been fine-tuning a new completion design in the Wolfcamp Formation of the Delaware Basin; Leitzell said the company was able to implement its new completion design with the Timberwolf test wells in the Utica.EOG is tightening to an 800-ft spacing design with the Xavier well package, which is coming online during the fourth quarter.“With that application of new completion design, it's going to be tough to tell if that's really what the big mover is,” Leitzell said. “But, we’re extremely excited about the results that we’re seeing so far.”

EOG Uses Permian Completion Design on Utica Test Wells | Marcellus Drilling News - In 2020, EOG Resources, one of the largest oil and gas drillers in the U.S. (with international operations in Trinidad and China), sold all of its Marcellus assets, which were located in Bradford County, PA, to Tilden Resources for $130 million (see EOG Resources Sells Marcellus Assets for $130M, Exits Basin). EOG left the M-U building, so to speak. But the company couldn’t stay away. Last November, we told you that EOG admitted to stealthily amassing 395,000 net acres in the Ohio Utica for very little money (see EOG Resources Accumulates 395K Acres in Ohio Utica for Under $500M). EOG calls its position the “Ohio Utica combo play” and considers it among its “emerging plays.” EOG concentrates on oil drilling in the Utica. As part of its third quarter update, EOG said it is seeing promising results from test wells in the Utica, and that going forward, the Utica will compete with EOG’s foundational Delaware Basin (Permian) and Eagle Ford programs for drilling budget.

Why oil companies are worried about climate lawsuits from gas states - Pennsylvania and Ohio — two major fossil fuel-producing states — are emerging as unlikely battlegrounds in local governments’ sprawling legal fight to put the oil and gas industry on the hook for the costs of climate change.Research to estimate what local officials in the two states would spend to address planet-warming emissions, conducted by a group that supports climate litigation, has sparked interest from some lawmakers — and alarm from the oil industry and its allies.“It would be like a cherry on top,” Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity, said of the possibility of a climate liability lawsuit in Ohio or Pennsylvania. “It would be great if we could get a case in a fossil fuel-producing state.”Industry groups are assiduously tracking the center’s efforts, detailing every development on the website for Energy In Depth, a research and outreach campaign run by the Independent Petroleum Association of America. The group has accused the center of trotting out a familiar playbook in hopes of seeding climate lawsuits.“Pennsylvania and Ohio are home to prolific natural gas and oil development that benefits the entire Appalachian region and country, and we have decades of experience developing these resources safely and responsibly,” IPAA CEO and President Jeff Eshelman said in a statement. “Wealthy, foreign interests that seek to halt this progress through costly litigation on the taxpayer’s dime — and with it, eliminate thousands of jobs that are powered by these essential resources — are misinformed, hypocritical, and doomed to fail.”IPAA has accused the climate center of receiving $7 million from British investor Chris Hohn between 2018 and 2020. The center says the money was directed to its parent organization, the Institute For Governance & Sustainable Development, and that none of it was spent on litigation in the United States. Wiles said the effort to calculate climate change expenses — from planting trees to increasing storm drainage capacity — for municipal governments is aimed at educating local officials, as well as talking to them about ways to pay those bills. “It’s no secret that we go around and talk to elected officials about their damages and their options for recovering costs,” Wiles said. “One of the first questions is, ‘What are my damages?’ We’re trying to figure out if there is a systematic way to answer that question.”

"A Cherry On Top.” CCI Boasts About Targeting Energy States for Climate Lawsuits - Energy In Depth - The Center for Climate Integrity – the Rockefeller-funded activist group pushing climate litigation across the country – is openly boasting of targeting energy producing states with lawsuits in blatant attempt to undermine the U.S. oil and natural gas industry. In a new article from E&E News, Richard Wiles, president of the CCI spoke of his group’s focus on Ohio and Pennsylvania, two states that sit atop the Marcellus and Utica Shale, as if it’s a gameshow prize. “It would be like a cherry on top. It would be great if we could get a case in a fossil fuel-producing state.”Notably, Wiles appears completely unconcerned about how a climate lawsuit such as this would put thousands of workers in both states out of business, and openly talks about the partisan nature of these suits:“We’re not oblivious to the fact that it’s a major natural gas-, fossil fuel-producing state. But it’s a purple state, a state that hasn’t lost its mind completely.”Energy In Depth has discussed how CCI’s venture into oil- and natural gas-producing states like Ohio and Pennsylvania marks a distinct shift away from their usual recruiting strategy – and one that faces a steep uphill battle in both states. Read more on the latest at EIDClimate.org.

How the fossil-fuel lobby weaponized Julia Child’s gas stove - For years on her popular cooking show, The French Chef, Julia Child used a crude, makeshift kitchen that she and her husband would haul to the set for each filming. When she returned to the screen for a new, 13-episode series later in her career, she had one condition: She needed a kitchen that was her own to film in, one “that we could just walk into and work in and leave.”Child got her wish — thanks to a generous sponsorship from the American Gas Association (AGA), a powerful lobby for gas utilities, which paid for a new kitchen, complete with a four-burner commercial range and a gas oven rotisserie.Her new show, Julia Child & Company, aired in 1978. “We have a new set, and a new theme song,” she said at the time. And each episode that theme music reached its crescendo, a slide noted a “special thanks to The American Gas Association.”Child herself never endorsed products on her shows (regulations around public programming forbade it) and there’s no evidence to suggest that she was a willing shill of the AGA. But from the industry’s point of view, Child was potent product placement that could help establish the dominance of gas in the American home. “Millions of viewers week after week will be able to watch Julia Child as she stirs food simmering over a gas flame,” read an October 1978 article from the association’s monthly trade magazine.This was a continuation of a larger campaign called “Operation Attack.”Launched by the AGA in the late 1960s, it employed at the time some of the same experts and public relations firms as the tobacco industry to fend off growing threats to gas. The nation was becoming more environmentally conscious; the fossil-fuel industry feared heightened scrutiny from the newly formed Environmental Protection Agency, and energy price shocks had begun to make alternative fuels more appealing. To make matters worse, new research raised questions about gas stove emissions and impacts on public health. Gas was losing ground to electric competition, but the industry had plans to fight back.

Pennsylvania’s fracking boom is hurting its oldest residents -- In 1976, Mary Ellen McConnell, a “concrete city kid,” moved from Bethesda, Maryland, to the verdant hills and river valleys of Clearville, Pennsylvania. But that tranquility proved to be short-lived: A few decades later, the area would be overrun with big fracking rigs from natural gas companies drawn to the rich stores of methane gas trapped in the 500 million-year-old sedimentary rock below. The previous owners of McConnell’s home had signed a lease in perpetuity with Columbia Gas, a subsidiary of a major natural gas company. That meant that even though McConnell owned the farmhouse, she had no say in how the minerals below the surface were used. In return, she received an annual check of $248, or $2 per acre. McConnell spent years trying to cancel the lease, petitioning the company directly and even seeking legal counsel, but in 2010, Columbia Gas filed an injunction against McConnell and began seismic testing to use the area beneath her land for “storage” — of exactly what, McConnell does not know. Over the next few years after the injunction, she and her family experienced a barrage of severe health problems. McConnell developed breathing trouble, severe leg pain, and high blood pressure. She had two massive heart attacks. A 2012 test conducted by a private company, Martin Water Conditioning, revealed that her water contained more than twice the safe concentration of arsenic. A media representative from TC Energy, the parent company of Columbia Gas, said in an email that the reservoir formations beneath McConnell’s property are used to temporarily store natural gas beneath one mile of rock. “Up until 10 years ago, I was a pretty healthy bitch,” said McConnell, now 80. “And, unfortunately, I’m dying.” The fracking process uses over a thousand different chemicals and pollutants, some of which are considered proprietary trade secrets, meaning nearby residents don’t always know what they’re exposed to. Of the nearly 18 million Americans living near oil and gas wells, close to 3 million are 65 and older, many concentrated in Pennsylvania, the country’s second biggest producer of methane gas behind Texas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Living in an environmentally polluted area is dangerous for anyone, but for older adults like McConnell, exposure over many years has the potential for devastating, even life-ending, health problems. Compared to younger people, seniors are less able to excrete harmful substances, like arsenic and other heavy metals, as the liver and kidneys filter out toxins less effectively with age. And seniors are also more likely to have pre-existing conditions such as respiratory and cardiovascular problems that can amplify health risks.

Pennsylvania Governor’s Deal With Fracking Company Splits Environmentalists -- Environmentalists are split over a new deal struck by Pennsylvania’s governor with a natural gas producer — while some have applauded the effort to move forward amid a legislative deadlock on climate action, those on the front lines fear the agreement amounts to little more than PR, offering a model for the industry to regulate itself. On Nov. 2, Gov. Josh Shapiro and CNX Resources Corporation President and CEO Nicholas J. DeIuliis – a past vocal opponent of regulations on the energy industry, climate science and “the left,” broadly — signed an agreement in which the fracking company “[expressed] its intention” to adhere to a handful of health and safety reforms Shapiro once recommended as Attorney General.The company volunteered to extend no-drill safety zones between new wells and homes from the legal minimum of 500 feet to 600 feet, and to 2,500 feet for schools and hospitals; to monitor and publish data on harmful pollutants near its facilities; to publicly disclose the names of chemicals it uses for drilling, “subject to trade secret claims by chemical manufacturers”; and to work with the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to collect air quality data on two of its sites — all nonbinding steps as the statement is written.Buried in this announcement was news that the DEP would begin the process of promulgating new regulations around methane, drilling waste, chemical disclosures of fracking fluids and corrosion of gathering lines that transport natural gas. The partnership, which Shapiro’s office said in a press release added to “an already robust regulatory framework,” comes three-and-a-half years after Shapiro, as state attorney general, published a grand jury report that found the DEP had failed to protect Pennsylvanians from the health and safety risks of fracking. That report came with eight recommended reforms. CNX’s agreement adopts several of them, but fails to mention an enforcement mechanism. “This is a voluntary agreement,” Shapiro said in a press conference on November 2. Even so, he said, it’s one he’s taking as a sign of progress as the state Legislature stalls on climate action. “We’ve shown that energy production and environmental protection — they can coexist here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” Shapiro continued. “You can be profit-minded and you can meet your obligations to your shareholders and employees and also protect public health and public safety. CNX is proof of that.” And, while CNX’s agreement is voluntary, the regulations he directed the DEP to promulgate would not be, once they go into effect in some 18-24 months, a DEP spokesperson told Capital & Main. From the campaign trail, Shapiro has walked a tightrope on energy issues — and in office, has been criticized by some for both inactionon climate change and playing too far into the hands of industry.With this deal, the Shapiro administration is leaning on a strategy of consensus-building — one that some grassroots environmentalists swiftly rejected. “Governor Shapiro’s toothless monitoring scheme is outrageous and embarrassing,” Food and Water Watch Pennsylvania State Director Megan McDonough wrote in a statement on the day of the announcement. “Instead of taking real actions to rein in corporate polluters, he is striking bogus partnerships to give frackers a public relations victory.”

Sounding the Alarm: Harrisburg Considering Backdoor Ban on Natural Gas Development – Marcellus Shale Coalition --A dangerous legislative proposal discussed in Harrisburg this week would effectively ban natural gas development in Pennsylvania, destroy millions of jobs, jeopardize domestic energy security and take away a critical emission reducing tool, energy and labor leaders stressed in a series of hearings at the state capitol.The bill, House Bill 170, would arbitrarily and without any scientific data impose a half-mile setback and represents ”nothing but a backdoor ban” on development, Marcellus Shale Coalition President David Callahan warned legislators during the House Environmental Resources & Energy Committee hearing.If the bill were to become law, the vast majority of acreage in Pennsylvania would be off limits to natural gas development, a MSC whitepaper concluded. The maps of Susquehanna and Washington Counties, Pennsylvania’s top two producing counties, demonstrate the impact of the increased setbacks being proposed. Present setbacks eliminate activity from 30% and 40% of land in Susquehanna and Washington, respectively. The proposed setback, however, would essentially sterilize the counties from any development.Not justified or supported by any scientific or health data, this shortsighted policy will kill jobs and deprive hundreds of thousands of citizens of the ability to develop the natural gas resources they own.Pennsylvania’s natural gas sector employs over 123,000 direct jobs and contributes ~$40 billion in annual economic activity to the state, economic impact data shows. More than $6 billion was paid by the industry to government and private landowners in royalty payments last year – which would be erased should legislation like HB 170 take effect.“To state this development must be banned because it cannot be done safely is a slap in the face of the men and women we represent,” President Rob Bair of the PA Building & Construction Trades Council testified at the hearing.Indeed, our industry’s track record demonstrates Pennsylvania can be an energy powerhouse while safeguarding our environment and making significant progress on emissions reductions. In addition to the more than 40 laws, permit authorization packages and technical guidance documents within the DEP, Pennsylvania currently has the most stringent setback distances of any major energy-producing state in the nation.

Letter to the editor: Fracking is regulated | TribLIVE.com - Regarding the letter “Fracking needs to stop” (Oct. 17, TribLIVE): There could not be a worse policy for Pennsylvania. The writer utilized a summary of a University of Pittsburgh health study which didn’t acknowledge other environmental factors and didn’t directly connect the oil and gas industry with health impacts. As a geologic and environmental professional working as a third party with the oil/gas industry, I know firsthand the importance of this sector to my community and this region. This industry goes to great lengths to establish a high environmental compliance standard and protect our environment. It is also subject to regulatory reporting that is more transparent than any other Pennsylvania industry. The way natural gas is produced today is modern, efficient and poses minimal disruption to our environment and communities. If state lawmakers took the extreme step to immediately ban “fracking,” they’d instantly threaten the state economy and the livelihoods of 120,000 Pennsylvanians — not to mention drive up energy costs and threaten our national security. We must instead implement commonsense policies and regulations that uphold high standards for operators yet support the continued responsible development of energy that has contributed so positively to our region. Jeff Walentosky Kennedy The writer is president of Moody and Associates.

Numerous miles-long oil spills have been reported on the Monongahela River -— Oil sheens up to 18 miles long have repeatedly been reported by an environmental advocacy group on the Monongahela River over the last six months. The site of the recurring pollution is only a few miles from where the Monongahela River merges with the Ohio River, which provides drinking water to more than five million people. This type of oil sheen is typically the result of petroleum-based products in waterways. A single quart of oil can contaminate up to a quarter million gallons of drinking water. Oil on the surface of a body of water can disrupt ecosystems and food chains by harming birds, plants, animals and insects; make water unsafe for human consumption; and vaporize and contaminate the air. There are several industrial facilities with drainage outfalls in the oil-polluted sections of the Monongahela River, including U.S. Steel’s Irvin Works, which has been issued notices of violation for several of these oil spills by both the U.S. Environmental Agency (EPA) and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PA DEP). U.S. Steel spokesperson Amanda Malkowski told Environmental Health News (EHN) the company has worked and communicated with the state’s Department of Environmental Protection and “has thoroughly investigated every report” of oil spills tracked to its facilities. “We will continue to work with and communicate with the relevant agencies as appropriate. We continue to monitor our operations and the water conditions around our facilities. Environmental performance remains one of our top priorities.” Notices of violation instruct companies to investigate potential sources of pollution, report their findings to regulators, and fix the problem. They do not carry any fines. The oil spills are just the latest environmental insult for the waterway, which is one of Pittsburgh’s iconic three rivers, in addition to the Allegheny and the Ohio Rivers, which together make up the Ohio River basin. Among major watershed regions nationwide, the Ohio River basin received the largest volume of toxic chemical discharges by weight in 2020. The lower Monongahela watershed ranked fourth nationally for releases of chemicals that cause reproductive harm into waterways, with around 7,364 pounds of these chemicals dumped into the watershed’s rivers and streams that year. The way oil spills disperse creates a special headache for investigators in tracking down a source but health advocates say residents aren’t getting the answers — or action — they deserve. “It’s an unfair burden for these communities to be continually polluted by these industries with no penalty,” Heather Hulton VanTassel, executive director of Three Rivers Waterkeeper, the scientific and legal advocacy group that’s been documenting the oil spills, told EHN. “By now there should have been real penalties for this polluter to prevent continued pollution.”

Majority-Black Pennsylvania community fights back against proposed $6 billion LNG terminal – EHN -- Bonnie Waites remembers Chester years ago, before the incinerator came to town in 1992, bringing the seemingly endless rumble of waste trucks into this small city in southeastern Pennsylvania, just down the Delaware River from Philadelphia. “You could hang your clothes outside on the lines. The kids could play. We had a playground and a swimming pool. But you can’t sit outside now.” In what was once a proud and neighborly community where residents sat on their porches and looked after kids playing in the streets, the noxious smell and degraded air quality attributable to the Covanta waste incinerator — the largest in the country, burning as much as 3,500 tons of trash a day — have driven residents indoors or out of town. The city’s population, which is 72% Black, has dwindled by 20% in the past three decades, falling to about 33,000. Many who remain suffer from health problems linked to the incinerator and other industrial facilities, including the Delcora sewage treatment facility, a Kimberly Clark paper mill and a PQ Corp. chemical plant, all of which have a history of pollution. The Covanta facility alone emits as much as 200,000 pounds per year of particulate matter 2.5 (PM2.5), a pollutant that contributes to respiratory illness, diminished lung function and is even linked to cancer. Childhood asthma rates in the city are at least three times higher than the national average. In the same year the incinerator came to town, the community formed Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living, an organization advocating for clean air, community health and environmental justice. The organization has had its hands full for more than 30 years, fending off a range of efforts to heap more industrial weight upon Chester’s shoulders, including a soil remediation plant, a proposal to burn tires for energy and a Thermal Pure Systems facility treating infectious medical waste. Now, as Penn America Energy seeks to capitalize on Pennsylvania’s abundance of shale gas by building a $6.4 billion liquefied natural gas terminal on the city’s waterfront, residents are fighting back once more. Their impassioned pleas to keep the LNG plant out of Chester reflect fears of the potential disaster that follows a leak at such facilities and concerns about the assortment of pollutants they emit, from PM2.5 and particulate matter 10 (PM10) to nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and a host of volatile organic compounds.The final report of a state task force that examined the feasibility and impact of the proposed LNG facility is expected as soon as November, according to a spokesperson for state Rep. Martina White, the task force’s Republican chair, who declined to comment until the report is released. Penn America’s proposal projects $3 million in annual tax revenue for Chester during a four-year build-out phase and $13 million per year once the site is operational. The city, which is in bankruptcy, has an operating budget of $61 million. The proposal also projects nearly 8,000 jobs to be created during build-out and around 3,000 once operations start.Community members anticipate a report that supports Penn America’s ambitions, given White’s leadership of the bipartisan task force and the fact that it includesrepresentatives of the oil and gas industry and local unions that would benefit from its development. Rep. Joseph Hohenstein, a Democrat on the task force who is preparing a minority report, told EHN Chester residents’ refusal to accept the potential harms and hazards of yet another industrial facility is a “turning point” in the city’s history.“We are resilient people,” Zulene Mayfield, Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living’s leader, told EHN. “We are going to be the determining factors as to what’s going to happen in our community and to our people. Our biggest victory is that after 30 years we rise up every time for the fight. We’ve come up against multibillion-dollar corporations and we don’t back down. You cannot scare us and you cannot buy us.”

FERC, NERC Caution Against Closing Everett LNG Import Terminal in New England - The potential closure of the Everett LNG import terminal in New England next year could jeopardize the reliability and affordability of the region’s energy supplies, FERC and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) warned in a joint statement. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Willie Phillips and NERC CEO James Robb expressed concerns over the possible closure and what the absence of Everett could mean for New England in the event of another event like Winter Storm Elliott, which slammed the East Coast late last year. During the storm, Phillips and Robb pointed out that both electric and natural gas systems throughout much of the eastern half of the United States were subjected to significant stress. That resulted in unplanned generating unit...

15,000 gallons of heating oil spilled from paper mill’s tank in Putney into nearby waterways -An estimated 15,000 gallons of heating oil spilled from a tank at the Soundview Paper mill in Putney Thursday night, much of it entering Sacketts Brook, which flows into the Connecticut River. Authorities have thus far recovered more than 12,000 gallons of the sludgy No. 2 heating oil, according to Mike Nucci, an environmental analyst with the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation spill team. He said he expected authorities to discover more of the missing oil when they excavate the ground underneath the oil tank. Crews from the Putney Fire Department and Vermont HAZMAT Team responded to the spill, which the Brattleboro Reformer first reported, and installed spill booms to prevent the flow of oil and to absorb it. “Everything we were trying to do at that point was to contain the spill,” Nucci said. New Hampshire’s Department of Environmental Services installed a harbor boom, he said, to prevent more oil from escaping Sacketts Brook into the Connecticut River. “This one was just a bad set of circumstances,” Nucci said, “given the location of the tank and the volume” of oil, much larger than the residential basement heating oil spills that make up more of his work. He suspected that the environmental impact may be limited to vegetation damaged or killed along Sacketts Brook. He said he has not observed impacted wildlife. Andrew Madison, an investigator in oil remediation and compliance for New Hampshire’s Department of Environmental Services, said he had observed an oil sheen on the Connecticut River on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, but the sheen was not visible on Monday.

What Do PFAS Have to do With Fracking? | Food & Water Watch -Recent analyses by Physicians for Social Responsibility found evidence suggesting that PFAS and precursors (related chemicals that can break down into PFAS) have been used in fracking fluids in thousands of wells across several states. For instance, oil and gas companies injected at least 43,000 pounds of PTFE/Teflon across 73 Texas counties. However, the prevalence is likely understated, given disclosure loopholes that allow companies to withhold chemical identities as trade secrets.¹The use of PFAS in fracking creates additional avenues for potential human exposure through air and water contamination. Wastewater disposal poses another potential exposure route; various disposal practices include underground injection, land application, and road spreading to suppress dust or de-ice.² This is on top of the well-documented environmental and health impacts that fenceline communities already face from living near fracking facilities.³

'Doom to the Pipeline': Lone Grandfather Arrested for Blocking MVP Construction - A grandfather named Jerome was arrested and charged with four misdemeanors in West Virginia after locking himself to a Mountain Valley Pipeline drill, which shut down construction on the fracked gas project for over three hours on Thursday, according to a protest group. "Jerome's bail was set at $35,000—an astronomical amount for misdemeanor charges!" the anti-MVP group Appalachians Against Pipelines said on social media, also confirming he was released. "I am the father of three daughters and the grandfather—soon—of five grandsons," Jerome said in a statement. "I am horrified by what climate change is already doing to all life here on Earth. And I'm even more horrified that we still envision and construct projects like MVP which will only worsen the warming and deepen the chaos.""To me, this project marks a watershed moment—a tipping point. All the powers of the federal government (executive, congressional, and judiciary) are aligned to support the fossil fuel industry in this catastrophic project," he continued. "If we, as caring humans, let that effort prevail, we invite more ram-rodded fossil fuel projects and generations of continued entrenchment in global warming emissions and deepening social distress."The debt ceiling deal negotiated earlier this year by congressional Republicans and President Joe Biden—who campaigned on a pledge to tackle the climate emergency—included a section intended to thwartlegal challenges and fast-track construction of the MVP, which is set to cover over 300 miles in Virginia and West Virginia.One of the key congressional advocates of the project has been Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), a right-wing coal baron. "I am a retired white male with lots of privilege. Today, I am using that privilege to fight back," said Jerome. "Together, we say, 'Nope!' to Joe Manchin, the debt deal extortionist. 'No way!' to MVP and their doomed pipeline. 'Yay!' to the resistance." Armed with a "Doom to the Pipeline" banner, Jerome protested at Elk River, one of the hundreds of MVP water crossings.In addition to sounding the alarm about how MVP will contribute to the global climate emergency—pointing to scientists and industry experts'warnings that the world must rapidly shift away from fossil fuels—Appalachians have long expressed concerns about what its construction and operation will do to the region. "The destruction wrought by this pipeline on our planet and communities is President Biden's climate legacy," Russell Chisholm, an impacted community member and managing director of the Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights (POWHR) Coalition, said this summer, after federal regulators gave the project a green light."The gas from the pipeline is unnecessary, the permanent local jobs provided are minimal, the endangerment to precious species is irreversible, water sources will be polluted, and earthquake- and landslide-prone areas stand in its wake," he added. "We are devastated but we will never give up on protecting our home."

Top US gas producer says pipeline fights endanger industrial world - The largest US natural gas producer has lambasted a “war on infrastructure” that risks sparking a Europe-style energy crisis in parts of the US, days after the latest delay to a new pipeline fast-tracked for approval by Congress.EQT chief executive Toby Rice told the Financial Times that the US had “oceans of natural gas”, but companies like his in the prolific Appalachian shale region were struggling to add supplies because new pipeline capacity had been blocked.“The industrial world that we enjoy now is severely compromised because of the lawsuits, the pushback and the movement to cancel energy infrastructures and modern society. We’ve run out of flexibility,” said Rice, 41, who describes himself as a “shalennial”.His comments followed the announcement last month of another delay to the Mountain Valley Pipeline, a 303-mile gas project stretching between West Virginia and Virginia that is opposed by green campaigners and some landowners.When MVP was first announced in 2014 it was expected to be completed by 2018 and cost $3.5bn. It is now forecast to cost $7.2bn and begin operations next year.“The ramp-up of MVP’s contractor workforce has been slower and more challenging than expected, due to multiple crews electing not to work on the project based on the history of court-related construction stops,” Equitrans Midstream, one of the owners of MVP, said in a securities filing.In June, Congress passed a law specifically to fast-track construction of the MVP following the intervention of Joe Manchin, a West Virginia senator who holds the balance of power in the Senate. A month later the Supreme Court cleared the legal path for construction to resume.But several attempts to pass laws in Congress to streamline permitting processes more broadly, which were supported by both the fossil fuel and renewable energy lobbies, have failed over the past two years.Rice said the fact it now took an act of Congress to get a single pipeline built in the US “should scare the hell out people”, particularly when cities in New England have to import liquefied natural gas from abroad during winter freezes.He warned that parts of the US could face the kind of energy crisis that hit Europe after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Rice said Europe was vulnerable because it had “shut down building infrastructure”.

Southwestern New Drilling Drops by One-Third, Profits Down Too | Marcellus Drilling News -- Southwestern Energy, with major assets in the Marcellus/Utica and Louisiana Haynesville, issued its third quarter 2023 update last week. The company generated $45 million in net income for the quarter versus profiting $450 million in 3Q22. Southwestern reported total net production of 425 Bcfe (billion cubic feet equivalent), or 4.6 Bcfe per day, including 4.0 Bcf per day of gas (86% natgas, 12% NGLs, 2% oil). Southwestern invested $454 million of capital, using it to drill 24 wells, complete 25 wells, and place 23 wells online to sales, including 15 in the Marcellus/Utica and 8 in the Haynesville. New drilling fell (by our back-of-the-envelope estimate) about one-third from 2Q23.

Southwestern CEO Sees Haynesville Producer Discipline, LNG Demand Boosting Natural Gas Prices - The management team of Southwestern Energy Co. sees strengthening natural gas prices on the horizon, as U.S. producers tap the brakes on output and LNG exports continue to rise. CEO Bill Way hosted a conference call to discuss third quarter results for the natural gas-weighted independent, which operates in the Appalachian Basin and the Haynesville Shale. “We believe we have materially improved our capital efficiency and positioned the company for enhanced through-the-cycle price realizations with a more moderate go-forward hedging practice,” said Way. “Our progress on these priorities this year has further strengthened the business and positions us for differentiated value capture as we shift towards an improving macro environment...

US natural gas production and demand to rise in 2023 – report -- Natural gas production and demand will rise to record levels in 2023, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) in its Short Term Energy Outlook (STEO), which it published on Tuesday. Dry gas production will rise to 103.68 billion cubic feet per day (bcf/d) in 2023 and 105.12bcf/d in 2024, up from a record 99.60bcf/d in 2022, according to the EIA’s latest estimates. The agency has revised down its forecasts from October in which it predicted 103.72bcf/d for supply. It also predicts that domestic gas consumption will rise from a record 88.38bcf/d in 2022 to 89.42bcf/d in 2023, before falling to 89bcf/d in 2024. The October forecast for demand in 2023 was 89.17bcf/d. Should the predictions come to pass, it would be the first time output has risen for four years in a row since 2015, and 2023 would be the first time demand has risen for three consecutive years since 2016. The EIA also estimates that US exports of liquefied natural gas will rise to 11.80bcf/d in 2023, up from 10.59bcf/d in 2022. They will then continue to rise to 11.80bcf/d in 2023. This is up from the agency’s forecast of 11.62bcf/d in October. During the winter, natural gas prices are predicted to average around $3.40 per million British thermal units (MMBtu), peaking at more than $3.60/MMBtu in January. According to this forecast, prices will therefore be lower this winter compared with last winter as natural gas inventories are relatively full. Prices averaged $5.00/MMBtu in 2022.

Enbridge Bets Big on U.S. Natural Gas Demand, LNG Exports - Enbridge Inc.’s chief executive touted the Canadian company’s efforts to further expand in the United States – on the Gulf Coast and elsewhere – as part of a bid to capitalize on expected long-term natural gas demand in North America and overseas. The Calgary, AB-based company, already a major force in Canadian and American energy, said a string of previously announced agreements with Dominion Energy Inc. would bolster its gas utility operations throughout several U.S. states. Enbridge is buying East Ohio Gas Co., Public Service Co. of North Carolina Inc., as well as Questar Gas Co. and its Wexpro Co. affiliate. In all, the Dominion units on the sale block serve 3 million customers across 78,000 miles of pipelines with customers in Idaho, North Carolina, Ohio, Utah and...

TC Energy Touts Record NGTL Natural Gas Volumes, New Project Approvals - TC Energy Corp. is transporting record natural gas volumes on multiple pipeline systems in North America as it continues to advance various expansion projects, management said Wednesday. CEO Françios Poirier hosted a conference call to discuss the Calgary-based midstreamer’s third quarter earnings. “We continue to see strong, sustained demand for our services, and that’s maximizing the value of our assets through safety and operational efficiency,” Poirier told analysts..

Venture Global LNG wraps up $1 billion senior notes offering - US LNG exporter Venture Global LNG has closed its $1 billion offering of senior secured notes.The offering included a series of 9.5 percent senior secured notes due February 1, 2029 in an amount of $500 million and a series of 9.875 percent senior secured notes due February 1, 2032 in an amount of $500 million, according to Venture Global.The firm said that the 2029 notes offered are a reopening of the $2.5 billion 9.5 percent senior secured notes due 2029 and the 2032 notes offered are a reopening of the $1.5 billion 9.875 percent senior secured notes due 2032 issued by the company on October 24.Venture Global said the notes were not registered under the Securities Act of 1933, or the securities laws of any state or other jurisdictions, and the notes may not be offered or sold in the US.This offering takes Venture Global’s total year-to-date high yield debt raised to $9.5 billion, which marks the “largest US dollar high yield issuance by volume in a single year since 2015,” it said.In May, Venture Global closed its $4.5 billion inaugural offering of senior secured notes.The LNG exporter recently won approval to increase the peak workforce at the site of its Plaquemines LNG export plant in Louisiana.Earlier this year, the firm sanctioned the second phase of the Plaquemines LNG export plant in Louisiana.The full project, including the second stage, will have a capacity of 20 mtpa coming from 36 modular units, configured in 18 blocks.Together, phase one and phase two represent about $21 billion of investment. Once online, this will be Venture Global’s second LNG plant after the Calcasieu Pass plant in Louisiana.

Tellurian Warns of Insolvency as it Tries to Advance Driftwood LNG - Tellurian Inc. said it could soon be insolvent unless it raises more capital to pay off debt and fund its operations as plans to develop the Driftwood LNG export terminal in Louisiana haven’t become a reality. The company said in its quarterly report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that it faces borrowing costs of $391 million in addition to another $15 million of other debt due over the next year. The company said it has just $83 million in cash and accounts receivable, which it said likely won’t be enough to cover its expenses or debt covenants. “These conditions raise substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern within one year after the date that the financial statements are issued,” Tellurian said in the 10-Q...

Long-term LNG Contracting On the Rise, with Most Deals Indexed to Henry Hub Natural Gas Price - LNG buyers are signing long-term supply contracts at an unprecedented clip, and those contracts are increasingly being linked to U.S. natural gas benchmarks such as Henry Hub, according to NGI Senior LNG Editor Jamison Cocklin. Last year “was a record year” for the signing of these contracts, Cocklin said during a joint webinar with experts from NGI and the London Stock Exchange Group plc (LSEG). “Buyers sought cover from volatility on the spot market, and this was a marked shift from previous years,” he explained. Global supply concerns triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine caused a spike in prices and volatility, incentivizing long-term contracts linked to relatively cheap U.S. pricing.

Associated Natural Gas Production Surges in Permian Basin, Bolstering Supply and Taming Prices - Production of associated natural gas – fuel produced in concert with oil – surged in the prolific Permian Basin over the past five years, supporting strong total supplies and, for much of this year, helping to keep U.S. prices in check. Associated gas produced from the top three oil plays in the Permian region – Wolfcamp, Spraberry and Bone Spring – has nearly tripled since 2018, from an annual average of 4.7 Bcf/d to 13.7 Bcf/d in the first seven months of 2023, according to Energy Information Administration (EIA) researchers. They said such gas output swelled because of both rising crude production amid steady global demand and an increasing gas-to-oil ratio (GOR) among wells in the three leading plays. The GOR measures the volume of natural gas per barrel of oil that a well produces...

EIA Discovers More Oil Drilling Produces More Associated NatGas | Marcellus Drilling News - Long-time MDN readers will know what “associated gas” is — natural gas that comes out of the same hole that oil comes from. When shale oil drillers sink a hole with the intent to get oil (one hydrocarbon), natural gas (another hydrocarbon) comes out, too. Even more hydrocarbons may also come out, including ethane, propane, and butane (NGLs). It’s natural! It happens. The “problem” for oil drillers has been what to do with “associated” natgas, which is considered a waste product for an oil driller. With new regulations adopted in recent years in places like Texas, New Mexico, and North Dakota (big oil drilling states), drillers increasingly cannot flare (or burn off) the natural gas coming out of the borehole along with the oil. It creates too many CO2 molecules floating in the atmosphere, toasting Mom Earth (as the myth goes).

Excelerate seals 15-year LNG supply deal with Petrobangla - US FSRU player Excelerate Energy has signed a 15-year liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply deal with Bangladesh’s state-owned Petrobangla.Bangladesh recently approved this long-term LNG SPA. Under the SPA, Petrobangla has agreed to purchase 0.85 to 1 million tonnes per annum of LNG from Excelerate beginning January 2026. Excelerate will deliver 0.85 Mtpa of LNG in 2026 and 2027 and 1 Mtpa from 2028 to 2040, it said in a statement. Bangladesh currently imports LNG via its first LNG import facility, Moheshkhali Floating LNG or MLNG, operated by Petrobangla, and via Summit Group’s FSRU-based terminal. Both of these facilities feature Excelerate’s FSRUs. Today, these two FSRUs in Bangladesh deliver about 25 percent of the country’s natural gas supply, according to Excelerate. In addition to providing the FSRUs, Excelerate has also provided spot LNG cargoes to the country. This long-term SPA represents the next phase of Excelerate’s plan to integrate its business in Bangladesh, the firm said. “Bangladesh is one of the most dynamic LNG markets in the world, and Excelerate has been a key player since the country began importing LNG,” CEO Steven Kobos, said. “Long-term LNG offtake agreements like this SPA are an essential part of our integrated growth strategy. Our ability to secure long-term SPAs is expected to result in ratable economic uplift on our existing infrastructure and meaningful value creation for our shareholders,” he said. Earlier this year, Excelerate signed a 20-year deal to buy 0.7 mtpa of LNG on a free on board (FOB) basis from Venture Global’s Plaquemines LNG facility in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana.Exclerate currently operates ten FSRUs, one of the world’s largest fleets of such vessels, and these units are located around the globe, including in Europe and in Brazil.The firm also ordered one FSRU in South Korea last year.

NFE Expects Altamira LNG to Become First Operational Mexican Export Project By Year’s End - New Fortress Energy Inc. has started the flow of natural gas to its offshore Altamira LNG terminal, which could become the first Mexico export project to supply U.S. gas to the international market when production begins in the “next few weeks,” management said Wednesday. During a third quarter call with analysts, CFO Chris Guinta said crews opened the valve on Monday to the subsea pipeline feeding the first 1.4 million metric tons/year floating liquefied natural gas platform offshore Mexico’s east coast. The firm is now awaiting a floating storage unit, which Guinta said could arrive in the next 10 days, before LNG production begins. The technology, which NFE has dubbed Fast LNG (FLNG), utilizes jack-up rigs to house smaller, modular liquefaction trains that management...

Texans Vote ‘Yes’ to Fund More Natural Gas-Fired Power Generation - Texans on Tuesday cast ballots on a slate of constitutional amendments, with Proposition 7, which supplies state funds to add natural gas-fired power plants, resoundingly approved. Proposition 7, a constitutional amendment to create the Texas Energy Fund, passed with about 65% of the popular vote. With its passage, the Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) would have authority to issue low interest loans to power plant operators seeking to add generation capacity. Loans could be up to $7.2 billion for a single facility within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) grid territory, according to state Senate Bill (SB) 2627. The bill determined how state funds would be managed under the program. Power plant operators could also capture completion bonus grants for...

Kinder Morgan to buy $1.8bn Texas gas pipeline portfolio from NextEra Energy - Kinder Morgan is acquiring a Texas natural gas pipeline portfolio from NextEra Energy Partners for $1.82bn (€1.76bn).The energy infrastructure company said it has agreed to buy STX Midstream, a South Texas pipeline system that includes a set of integrated, large-diameter high-pressure natural gas pipelines that connect the Eagle Ford basin to key growing Mexico and Gulf Coast demand markets. The 462 miles of pipeline gas portfolio is primarily comprised of seven pipelines that provide natural gas to Mexico and power producers and municipalities in South Texas.The acquisition is expected to be initially funded with cash on hand and short-term borrowings, Kinder Morgan said.Sital Mody, president of natural gas pipelines at Kinder Morgan, said: “STX Midstream nicely complements our existing assets and will enable us to capture incremental opportunities serving LNG, power generation, LDC customers and exports to Mexico.”John Ketchum, chairman and CEO of NextEra Energy Partners said the agreement to sell the pipeline portfolio to Kinder Morgan is an “important next step in NextEra Energy Partners’ transition plans”.

Magnolia Steadily Growing Natural Gas, Oil Production in South Texas - Houston-based exploration and production outfit Magnolia Oil & Gas Corp. saw efficiency gains in the third quarter while also moderately boosting production from its Eagle Ford Shale and Austin Chalk assets in South Texas. Third quarter production grew 1% sequentially to 82,700 boe/d. The company operates two drilling rigs and one completion crew. One rig is drilling multi-well development pads in the Giddings field in the Austin Chalk with the second rig drilling a mix of wells in both the Karnes and Giddings areas, including some appraisal wells at Giddings.

EOG Holding Production Steady in 2024 as ‘Instrumental’ Dorado Natural Gas Pipeline Half Complete - Multi-basin exploration and production firm EOG Resources Inc. in the third quarter made steady progress toward completing a natural gas pipeline that would transport Eagle Ford Shale supply to Gulf Coast markets. EOG completed construction on a natural gas treatment facility, as well as the first phase of a 36-inch-diameter natural gas pipeline from the Dorado field. The pipeline connects the natural gas play situated in the Austin Chalk and Eagle Ford in South Texas to the Agua Dulce sales point near Corpus Christi, TX. The pipeline “will be instrumental in expanding our gas sales options for the 21 Tcf of net resource potential we’ve captured in Dorado,” Senior Vice President for Marketing Lance Terveen said during the company’s third quarter earnings conference...

Environmental Groups Look to Resume Fight Against Rio Grande LNG, Texas LNG Through DC Circuit - The fight to suspend authorization for the Rio Grande and Texas LNG export projects on the Gulf Coast is expected to continue in federal court after FERC’s decision late last month to deny requests for rehearings. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission reapproved the two Texas liquefied natural gas projects and the Rio Bravo pipeline earlier in the year after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ordered the Commission to review its authorizations for the South Texas projects. Late last month, Commissioners voted three to one in favor of denying requests from the Sierra Club and several other environmental groups for rehearings on the projects [Docket Nos. CP16-454-006; CP16-455-003; CP20-481-001].

U.S. Oil, Natural Gas Employers Add More Jobs in October, Maintain Steady Hiring Pace - - Employment in the U.S. oilfield services (OFS) and equipment sector rose by an estimated 1,736 jobs to 652,874 in October, according to an Energy Workforce & Technology Council analysis of federal data. During the past month, job availability across the sector increased by 0.3%. The market has added jobs for eight out of 11 months as companies across the oil and natural gas spectrum look to expand workforces amid enduring global demand for fossil fuels. Overall, hiring in the energy sector has been steady since 2021, when the job market recovered from the slowdown imposed by the pandemic, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

153,000 pound fracking equipment being removed from ditch north of Pierre — Moving a piece of equipment that weighs more than 11 African bush elephants is more than a daunting task. Last week, a rather large piece of Shell Oil’s fracking equipment, 153,000 pounds to be exact, was being transported en route to Canada. The right wheels of the truck’s trailer went off the right edge of the road about 20 miles north of Pierre on Highway 1804. The trailer and equipment broke away from the truck and rolled into the ditch. It has been lying there ever since. A-G-E Corporation of Fort Pierre was called to use their crane service on the recovery project. A road had to be built up into the ditch to provide a stable surface for the crane. The crane itself weighs 300,000 pounds and extends 224 feet. The equipment will be recovered and onto a trailer later Thursday. There was significant damage to the equipment load. No injuries were reported.

Chevron agrees to pay county $1.25M for cleanup of Talbert Channel oil leak - Chevron will pay Orange County $1.25 million for removing gallons of oil that leaked from a ruptured pipeline into the Talbert Channel in Huntington Beach last year, according to a settlement agreement reached Tuesday. A contractor crew working for the county’s Department of Public Works was enhancing the channel’s flood control capacity on Oct. 6, 2022, when a worker drove a segment of sheet piling into an abandoned pipeline near Indianapolis Avenue. Oil soon after began bubbling up into the waters of the channel, prompting immediate containment efforts. A unified command response comprising county staff, Chevron representatives and state and local agencies worked to prevent impacts to the Talbert Marsh downstream. Approximately 60 gallons of pollutants were ultimately recovered from the Talbert Channel, according to the agreement. Although the collaboration — coming one year after a ruptured underwater pipeline spilled 25,000 gallons of oil into the waters off Huntington Beach — was swift and effective, a dispute later arose in which Orange County and Chevron each alleged the leakage was the result of negligence on behalf of the other party. County officials claimed the oil company, which has owned the pipeline since the 1940s, failed to properly purge its contents when it was abandoned in the ’60s and was unable to provide record of its existence after the leakage occurred.

Vitus Energy says 203 gallons of diesel fuel leaked into Kuskokwim River in Steamboat Slough spill -- Vitus Energy, the company that owns a tugboat, the Frances Snow, now known to have leaked diesel fuel into the Kuskokwim River, told state authorities that the the boat spilled 203 gallons into the water. A large sheen was first observed on Oct. 30 in Steamboat Slough, roughly 3 miles upriver from Bethel. That same day, a strong fuel smell was reported at the Bethel seawall and as far downriver as Napaskiak, approximately 7 miles away. It wasn’t until the following day that Vitus was able to respond with a tugboat to dewater the vessel, deploy absorbent booms, and prepare the Frances Snow for haul-out at the Port of Bethel. On Nov. 2, the vessel was pulled out of the water and the company measured the fuel tanks. Vitus estimates that 250 to 300 gallons of diesel fuel were on board at the time the Frances Snow became partially submerged in Steamboat Slough. According to Vitus, the vessel sank due to a 1.5-inch crack in the hull. It is not clear when the crack developed, but it has now been patched. "The boat has been removed, the oil sheens are no longer visible on the water or the shore. The smell of fuel at the seawall is no longer evident," Bernie Nowicki, the Western Region on-scene coordinator for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, said. "I did inquire with Vitus Energy about downriver, and I was told through them that they did not notice any sheen downriver below Bethel as of [Nov. 1]," Nowicki said. According to Nowicki, Vitus, as the responsible party, will be handling the cleanup effort itself. He doesn’t foresee state or federal agencies stepping in to manage the response now. At a reported 203 gallons, the spill fails to even meet the threshold of 500 to 5,000 gallons the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) refers to as a “small” diesel spill. According to a NOAA factsheet, these types of fuel spills tend to naturally evaporate or disperse within a few days, leaving little if any fuel on the surface for responders to recover. The factsheet also notes that a significant amount of fuel can be trapped in sediments when spills occur very close to the shore, as was the case with the Frances Snow in Steamboat Slough. Diesel fuel is one of the most acutely toxic types of oil, and high mortality of plants and animals can occur when large amounts of fuel soak into wetland areas, according to NOAA.

Alaska judge upholds Biden’s approval of Willow oil-drilling project - (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday upheld the Biden administration’s approval of the massive Willow oil-drilling project on Alaska’s remote North Slope, a decision that environmental groups swiftly vowed to fight. U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason rejected requests by a grassroots Iñupiat group and environmentalists to vacate the project approval, and she dismissed their claims against Willow, which is in the federally designated National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. The administration’s approval of Willow in March drew the ire of environmentalists who accused the president of backpedaling on his pledge to combat climate change. The company behind the project, ConocoPhillips Alaska, has the right to develop its leases in the reserve “subject to reasonable restrictions and mitigation measures imposed by the federal government,” Gleason wrote. She added that the alternatives analyzed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management as part of its review were consistent with the policy objectives for the petroleum reserve and the stated purpose and need of the Willow project. The groups that sued over the project raised concerns about planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from Willow and argued that federal agencies failed to consider how increased emissions from the project could affect ice-reliant species such as the polar bear, Arctic ringed seals and bearded seals, which already are experiencing disruptions due to climate change. Gleason said an agency environmental review “appropriately analyzed the indirect and cumulative” greenhouse gas emissions impacts of the project. Erik Grafe, an attorney with Earthjustice, which represents several environmental groups in one of the cases, called the ruling disappointing and said an appeal was planned. Bridget Psarianos, an attorney with Trustees for Alaska, which represents Sovereign Iñupiat for a Living Arctic and environmental groups in the other lawsuit, called Gleason’s decision “bad news not just for our clients but for anyone who cares about the climate and future generations.”“There is too much at stake to gloss over the harm this project will do,” Psarianos said. “We will remain standfast in working with our clients to protect the Arctic from this devastating project today and in the weeks, months, and years ahead.” The project has widespread political support in Alaska. But climate activists said allowing it to go forward marked a major breach of President Joe Biden’s campaign promise to stop new oil drilling on federal lands. The administration’s action alienated and outraged some supporters, particularly young activists who launched a TikTok campaign to oppose the project ahead of its approval.

U.S. Crude Oil Exports Are Soaring To Record Highs U.S. crude oil exports continue to reshape the global market as America is pumping record volumes of oil and shipping record volumes of it overseas while the OPEC+ group withholds supply to "stabilize the market."These days, as many as 48 tankers are headed to the U.S. and expected to load crude in the next three months, the highest number of vessels in at least six years, according to tanker-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. Some of those tankers are en route to the U.S. Gulf Coast even with no cargo booked yet, London-based shipbroker EA Gibson told Bloomberg. The large fleet of supertankers bound for the United States highlights the increasingly growing role American crude plays on the global oil market. In less than a decade since the export ban was lifted in late 2015, U.S. oil has become so significant for the global market that WTI Midland was added in June this year to the Brent basket of crude oil grades that is used as a benchmark for pricing the world's most traded oil contract.The reason WTI Midland is becoming more and more important in the Dated Brent assessment is, again, the volume of U.S. crude being shipped abroad, which has averaged around 4 million barrels per day (bpd) since the start of the year.U.S. crude oil exports hit record highs in the first half of 2023, averaging 3.99 million bpd. That's up by nearly 20% compared to the first half of 2022, according to data from the Energy Information Administration. The largest share of U.S. crude oil that is exported made its way to Europe, at 1.75 million barrels per day—mostly to the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Asia was the second-largest destination, receiving 1.68 million bpd, with the largest portion heading to China and South Korea. Despite the record exports, the United States remained a net crude oil importer in the first half of the year, according to EIA data, even with increasing domestic production, importing 8.836 million bpd in June—nearly half of which came from Canada. Refineries in the United States are geared to process heavy, sour crude oil, while most of the oil produced in the United States is light, sweet crude. With record-high U.S. crude production, more light sweet crude makes its way overseas. "US slate-optimization is forcing further volumes of US light sweets to the waterborne market," Richard Price, an oil markets analyst at Energy Aspects, told Bloomberg. U.S. exports from the U.S. Gulf Coast are set to rise to 4.1 million bpd in December, 100,000 bpd higher compared to the same month last year, Price said. Rising U.S. production is pushing American exports to record highs at a time when Saudi Arabia, Russia, and other members of the OPEC+ pact are withholding some oil supply as they seek to rebalance the market and prop up prices. Despite the loss of active drilling rigs, U.S. shale firms are producing more oil and have even exceeded some skeptical projections from earlier this year. U.S. exploration and production companies are drilling longer laterals and deploying rigs to the most promising areas to get more bang for their buck.

USA Energy Dept Looking to Buy More Oil for Petroleum Reserve -- A statement posted on the U.S. Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response’s (CESER) website late Monday noted that the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Petroleum Reserve announced a supplemental solicitation for up to three million barrels of oil for delivery in January 2024. Bids for the solicitation are due no later than 10am Central Time on November 20 and the delivery will be received by the Big Hill storage facility, the statement highlighted, adding that the DOE will continue to release monthly solicitations for any available capacity through at least May 2024. “This is the second solicitation for January 2024 delivery as DOE aims to purchase oil when it can purchase at a good deal for taxpayers; a price of $79 dollars per barrel or below, far less than the average of about $95 per barrel DOE received for 2022 emergency SPR sales,” the statement said. “[The] announcement advances the President’s commitment to safeguard and replenish this critical energy security asset, following his historic release from the SPR to address the significant global supply disruption caused by Putin’s war on Ukraine and help keep the domestic market well supplied, which ultimately helps bring down prices for American consumers and businesses,” it added. “Analysis from the Department of the Treasury indicates that SPR releases last year, along with coordinated releases from international partners, reduced gasoline prices by as much as 40 cents per gallon,” the statement on the CESER site continued. The statement noted that the Administration’s ongoing three-part replenishment strategy to get the best deal for taxpayers while increasing SPR stocks includes:

• Direct purchases with revenues from emergency sales
• Exchange returns that include a premium to volume delivered
• Securing legislative solutions that avoid unnecessary sales unrelated to supply disruptions.

The statement highlighted that the DOE has already secured the cancellation of 140 million barrels in congressionally mandated sales scheduled for Fiscal Years 2024 through 2027.

Nikki Haley Attacks Ron DeSantis for Lying About Anti-Fracking PositionFormer South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s (R) campaign showcased an ad ahead of the third Republican primary debate claiming Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) “lied” about his position on fracking. The ad highlighted a key exchange between Haley and DeSantis from the second GOP primary debate. “What you don’t need is a president who is against energy independence. Ron DeSantis is against fracking. He’s against drilling. He’s been against… You did it,” Haley said at the time. “He always talks about what happens on day one. You better watch out because what happens on day two is when you’re in trouble; day two in Florida, you banned fracking, you banned offshore drilling,” she continued. “That is not true,” DeSantis said, denying the claims by saying Florida voters chose a constitutional amendment that banned offshore drilling. “You banned it before they voted,” Haley responded. DeSantis insisted Haley was “totally wrong.” “On shore, we do it in Florida. We don’t have as much as maybe West Texas, but we do it. But that was a constitution amendment, so that’s just wrong, and let’s just get real here,” he said. However, it is true that DeSantis openly supported banning fracking when he was running for governor. ABC News noted that “after DeSantis’ election victory, the website for the then-governor-elect included a pledge to ‘work to ban fracking in the state of Florida,’ according to a Nov. 25, 2018, screenshot of the website.” Haley’s ad highlights some DeSantis quotes, showing him openly opposing offshore drilling — including his opposition to former President Donald Trump. Some of the DeSantis quotes displayed in the ad include:

• “I’m opposed to offshore drilling here in Florida.”
• “When [the] president wanted to do offshore drilling, I opposed him on it.”
• “If you did offshore drilling, you may create some jobs in that industry, but I think you’d probably cost more jobs overall.”
• “We’re gonna be seeking $2.5 billion for water resource that represents a billion dollars more than the previous four years.”
• “We don’t need to do offshore drilling here.”
• “We have reached a deal to purchase 20,000 acres of land that is currently slated for oil production, so we’ll permanently save the land from oil production.”

Enbridge Posts Stronger Cash Flow, Announces More Acquisitions | Rigzone - Enbridge Inc. has seen earnings fall for the third quarter of 2023 by both quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year comparisons, but the energy producer and pipeline operator is intensifying capital deployment as cash generation during the first nine months more than doubled that of the same period last year. The Canadian company logged a post-tax profit of CAD 623 million ($453.89 million) for the July–September quarter. That was down from CAD 2 billion ($1.46 billion) for the prior three-month period and CAD 1.38 billion ($1.01 billion) for the third quarter of 2022, according to Enbridge’s quarterly filing with the USA Securities and Exchange Commission. Earnings before interest, income taxes and depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) rose year-over-year but declined quarter-on-quarter to CAD 2.25 billion ($1.64 billion). It attributed the year-on-year increase in EBITDA mainly to a lower loss of CAD 38 million ($27.68 million) this year “in the mark-to-market value of derivative financial instruments used to manage foreign exchange and commodity price risks”, the regulatory disclosure said. Losses from derivatives trading during the third quarter of 2022 stood at CAD 290 million ($211.28 million). Positive impacts also came from increased ownership in the Cactus II Pipeline and the Gray Oak Pipeline serving the USA Gulf Coast and Mid-continent, as well as higher exchange rates. These were offset by lower tolls on the Canada-USA Mainline oil pipeline that have taken effect since July and lesser volumes on the Illinois–Oklahoma Flanagan South Pipeline. In a press release, Enbridge said the Mainline system carried 2.998 million barrels per day (MMbpd) during the third quarter of 2023. The nearly 8,600-mile pipeline is North America’s biggest petroleum pipeline with a declared capacity of about 2.85 MMbpd.

Natural Gas Pipelines Serving Montney Shale Prepare to Expand in Advance of LNG Exports - Increased development in the natural gas-rich Montney Shale continues to foster northern British Columbia (BC) pipeline projects as production increases, including preparations for LNG exports to begin from the Pacific coast by 2025. After recommending final approval in October of NEBC Connector’s NorthRiver Midstream to transport natural gas liquids, the Canada Energy Regulator (CER) has been told to expect Enbridge Inc. to plan an expansion of its Westcoast gas network. According to an Enbridge filing to CER, the Aspen Point Program is planned in response to binding contracts for 535 MMcf/d of new Westcoast capacity. The contracts average more than 26 years and call for deliveries beginning in November 2025.

Venezuela could displace Canadian crude re-exports --Two key buyers of Canadian heavy crude exports from the US Gulf coast are poised to increase receipts of Venezuelan crude following a temporary lifting of sanctions, which could displace Canadian supplies.PetroChina's 400,000 b/d Jieyang refinery in south China's Guangdong province accounted for 23.1pc of Cold Lake, Access Western Blend, and Christina Dilbit exports from the US Gulf coast in January-August this year, according to analytics firm Vortexa. Repsol's 220,000 b/d Cartagena refinery in Spain accounted for 17.5pc.Both refineries have been in discussions to increase loadings of similar-quality heavy Venezuelan crude after the US temporarily lifted some sanctions targeting the oil and gas industry for six months ending on 18 April.PetroChina is likely to buy around 260,000-300,000 b/d of crude from Venezuela's state-owned PdV, according to traders, which could displace nearly all of the 319,000 b/d of Canadian heavy crude purchases that the Jieyang refinery averaged in the first eight months of this year.In the past, Petrochina preferred to run Venezuelan Merey at Jieyang, but turned to Canadian heavies following US sanctions on Venezuela starting in 2019.In Spain, Repsol is also working with PdV to increase oil and gas output at its joint ventures in Venezuela.The easing of US sanctions is expected to "increase the availability of heavy crude for our refineries," Repsol's chief executive Josu Jon Imaz said on 26 October, though it remains unclear how much such supplies could increase. The Cartagena refinery averaged 241,000 b/d in heavy Canadian crude imports between January and August.Repsol resumed heavy Venezuelan imports last year under an oil-for-debt deal between Respol and state-owned PdV. This year, most of Repsol's 22,000 b/d of Venezuelan imports to Spain have gone to the Cartagena refinery.Cold Lake Houston is averaging an $8.30/bl discount to the Nymex benchmark for December trade since the 26 October start of trading, compared with an average discount of about $5.80/bl in November trade.

Peru LNG terminal shipped four cargoes in October - Peru LNG’s liquefaction plant at Pampa Melchorita has shipped four liquefied natural gas cargoes in October, one shipment less compared to September. According to data by state-owned Perupetro, during September the LNG plant sent all off the shipments to the UK. The shipments loaded onboard the LNG carriers Methane Patricia Camila, Huelva Knutsen, Paris Knutsen, and Maran Gas Amphipolis equal about 252,309 tonnes, the data shows. These four LNG cargoes loaded at the Peru LNG plant in October compare to five cargoes in October last year, while Peru LNG shipped five cargoes (370,518 tonnes) in September this year. Peru LNG shipped 45 LNG cargoes during January-October, compared to 42 shipments during the same period last year, the Perupetro data shows. The 4.45 mtpa LNG plant has sent more than 742 LNG cargoes since 2010, according to the data. However, some of the same shipments in the list are included two or three times. US-based Hunt Oil holds a 50 percent operating stake in the Pampa Melchorita LNG plant, while SK and Marubeni have 20 percent and 10 percent, respectively. LNG giant Shell also holds a 20 percent stake and takes all the volumes produced at the facility.

Shell Sues Greenpeace For Boarding Oil Production Vessel - Shell is suing Greenpeace for millions of dollars in damages after the environmentalists boarded early this year a vessel in the Atlantic en route to a future oilfield in the UK North Sea. Shell has filed the lawsuit in London's High Court, demanding $2.1 million in damages, including legal costs, additional expenses for security, and costs incurred by shipping delays, a document seen byReuters showed on Thursday. Greenpeace claims Shell has hit the climate campaign group with an “intimidation lawsuit,” threatening an $8.6-million damages claim and a protest ban to silence climate demands.“Oil giant Shell has launched an intimidation lawsuit against Greenpeace UK and Greenpeace International – demanding Greenpeace stop protests at its infrastructure at sea or in port anywhere in the world, forever, or face an $8.6m damages claim and an injunction,” the campaign group said on Thursday.The lawsuit relates to Greenpeace’s stunt early this year when four Greenpeace International activists boardedthe White Marlin vessel at sea north of the Canary Islands and en route to the Penguins oil and gas field in the UK North Sea, where Shell plans to drill eight wells. The activists carried a banner bearing the message: “Stop Drilling. Start Paying”. “Shell and the wider fossil fuel industry are bringing the climate crisis into our homes, our families, our landscapes and oceans,” Yeb Saño, executive director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said at the time. “So we will take them on at sea, at shareholder meetings, in the courtroom, online, and at their headquarters. We won’t stop until we get climate justice. We will make polluters pay.” Shell, while acknowledging the fundamental right to protest, told Reuters in an email that boarding a moving vessel at sea was “unlawful and extremely dangerous.” The UK-based supermajor confirmed to Reuters it had initiated legal proceedings against Greenpeace, but declined to comment on the amount of the damages claim.

Flex LNG says Q3 revenue climbs, expects further increase in Q4 - Norwegian shipping firm Flex LNG, the owner of 13 liquefied natural gas carriers, reported higher revenue and lower net income in the third quarter compared to the same period last year. The firm expects a further increase in revenue in the fourth quarter.The shipping firm controlled by billionaire John Fredriksen said on Wednesday that vessel operating revenues were $94.6 million for the July-September period. This marks a rise from $91.3 million in the third quarter last year.Revenues also rose compared to $86.7 million in the prior quarter.However, the company’s third-quarter net income of $45.1 million dropped compared to $46.6 million in the same quarter last year but it rose compared to $39 million in the prior quarter.Average time charter equivalent (TCE) rate was $79,207 per day in the third quarter of 2023, compared to $77,218 per day for the second quarter and $75,941 per day in the third quarter last year.Flex LNG declared a dividend for the third quarter of $0.875 per share, consisting of a quarterly dividend of $0.75 per share and a special dividend of $0.125 per share.Flex LNG has 12 LNG carriers on fixed hire time charters, including to US LNG exporter Cheniere, and one ship, Flex Artemis, on a variable time charter.In March, Flex LNG completed its refinancing process, boosting the company’s cash position by $382.4 million.Flex LNG’s backlog for its time charters is for an aggregate of 51 years, which may increase to 77 years with declaration of charterer’s options, it said.“Higher vessel availability coupled with a stronger spot market, which positively impacted our single ship on a spot-market linked, variable rate time charter, resulted in quarterly revenues increasing by $7.9 million from $86.7 million in the second quarter to $94.6m in the third quarter,” he said.

France's Le Havre FSRU receives first LNG carrier - France’s first floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) in Le Havre, operated by TotalEnergies, has on Monday received its first liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier. The 2022-built 174,000-cbm, Minerva Amorgos, owned by Minerva and chartered by Equinor, arrived offshore Le Havre during the weekend, according to its AIS data provided by VesselsValue. Miverva Amorgos is carrying a cargo from Equinor’s Hammerfest LNG export plant in Norway, where TotalEnergies has a stake. The LNG carrier docked at the 2010-built 145,130-cbm FSRU, Cape Ann, on Monday, the data shows. TotalEnergies also confirmed the arrival of Minerva Amorgos at the FSRU. The French energy giant charters this 283 meters long FSRU from Hoegh LNG, which has a 50 percent stake in Cape Ann and Japan’s MOL, which owns a 48.5 percent stake. Tokyo LNG Tanker holds a 1.5 percent share in the unit. TotalEnergies announced on October 26 that the FSRU had started delivering natural gas supplies to the grid. A spokesperson for TotalEnergies told LNG Prime at the time that the terminal was ready to start commercial operations.

Peninsula wraps up its first LNG bunkering op in Gibraltar - Marine fuel supplier Peninsula has started delivering liquefied natural gas as fuel to vessels in Gibraltar with the 12,500-cbm Levante LNG. The first delivery took place in Gibraltar on November 4 and Levante LNG supplied Royal Caribbean’s cruise vessel Silver Nova, according to a statement by Peninsula. Germany’s Meyer Werft handed over the first LNG-powered Nova class cruise vessel to Silversea Cruises, the ultra-luxury brand of Royal Caribbean Group, in July, and the vessel took part in the first cruise ship LNG bunkering in Gibraltar in September. Silver Nova has a travel capacity of 728 guests and a gross tonnage of 54,700 tons. As per Levante LNG, this newbuild vessel arrived at its Mediterranean home at the end of September, while Penisula also won an LNG bunkering operator license by the government of Gibraltar and the Gibraltar Port Authority. Following the completion of the first operation, the vessel is now fully operational in the Strait of Gibraltar and Western Mediterranean ports, Peninsula said.

Egypt Can’t Ramp Up LNG Supply To Europe Due To The Hamas-Israel War - Europe shouldn’t count on Egypt for more LNG in the short to medium term amid tight natural gas balances in the Eastern Mediterranean after the Hamas-Israel war erupted, the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies (OIES) said in a new report.Following the Hamas attack on Israel in early October, Chevron, the operator of the Tamar gas field offshore southern Israel, shut down production at the field per instructions from the Israeli energy ministry. Subsequently, export flows of gas from southern Israel to Egypt through the offshore EMG pipeline were suspended, although some of those exports were re-routed through Jordan. “Israel’s gas exports to Egypt are part of Egypt’s supply mix and therefore support Egyptian LNG exports,” Julian Bowden, Senior Visiting Research Fellow, OIES, wrote in the report.In the aftermath of the Hamas attack on October 7, Egypt was evaluating whether the stoppage of gas production at the Tamar field would scupper its plans to resume LNG exports to Europe as planned.Egypt, which aims to become a regional gas hub, has been exporting LNG to Europe from its terminals on the Mediterranean with gas from domestic production and from fields offshore Israel.However, Egypt did not export any LNG in June, August, and September, due to high domestic power demand in the summer months.“Egyptian gas balances were already under pressure before the crisis erupted, due to falling gas production (mainly from problems at the Zohr field) and high summer demand,” Bowden noted.“With tight gas balances and reduced imports from Israel, the prospect of the EU receiving more LNG from Egypt in the short and medium term looks unachievable,” Bowden wrote. In addition, the Memorandum of Understanding which Egypt, Israel, and the EU signed in June 2022 committing to higher natural gas supply, “is now probably undeliverable,” the research fellow noted.

LNG Cargoes in Floating Storage Rise Again as Sellers Await Colder Weather - LNG cargoes in floating storage are stacking up to near-record levels once again ahead of the heating season as the spot market becomes a more crucial part of the early winter cycle.As natural gas marketers jockeyed for the highest price and ships congregated around congested import terminals last November, the volume of liquefied natural gas in floating storage hit what was then a record high of 0.75 million tons (Mt), according to data from Kpler. A cargo is typically considered floating storage if the vessel has been on the water 30 days or longer.That record was broken again the week of Oct. 29, when 0.80 Mt of LNG was recorded in floating storage around Europe and Asia. Since then, the amount of LNG in floating storage has held around 0.7 Mt and rose slightly to 0.74 Mt...

China boosts gas imports in October - China’s natural gas imports, including pipeline gas and LNG, rose in October compared to the same month last year, according to customs data. Natural gas imports during the last month reached about 8.79 million tonnes, rising 15.5 percent compared to 7.61 million tonnes in October 2022, the data from the General Administration of Customs shows. Imports dropped some 1.35 million tonnes compared to 10.14 million tonnes in the prior month. Moreover, the country’s gas imports rose by 8.8 percent year-on-year to 96.50 million tonnes in January-October. China paid about $51.1 billion for gas imports in this period, a drop of 7.3 percent compared to the last year. There is currently no official data for LNG imports in October. China’s LNG imports dropped in September after rising for seven months in a row, and the country imported 5.69 million tonnes in September, a drop of 2.8 percent year-on-year. The country imported 51.1 million tonnes of LNG during January-September, up by 10.1 percent compared to the same period last year However, Chinese LNG imports fell last year due to due to very high spot LNG prices and Covid lockdowns, which affected economic activity. LNG imports dropped compared to the January-September period in 2021 when China imported 58.48 million tonnes of LNG. China has overtaken Japan as the world’s largest LNG importer this year. During the January-September period, Japan imported some 48.9 million tonnes of LNG, down by about 2.2 million tonnes compared to China’s 51.1 million tonnes.

Top LNG importer China re-selling more cargoes, eyes trading gains (Reuters) - China, the world's top importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG), is increasingly re-selling some of the super-chilled fuel to other Asian buyers as it looks to profit from price swings. Armed with a growing portfolio of long-term supply deals recently struck with Qatar and U.S. exporters, as well as extensive terminal capacity, Chinese companies led by state giant PetroChina are more actively trading LNG, but still lag far behind global majors such as BP, Shell and TotalEnergies. Chinese customs data shows that China reloaded 617,000 metric tons of imported LNG during the first nine months of this year, compared with 576,000 tons in all of 2022, 26,000 tons in 2021 and 59,000 tons in 2020. China's LNG sales have increased along with rising Asian demand after the disruption in Russian exports to Europe from the Ukraine war sparked price volatility and tightened supplies globally. Asia spot prices soared to record highs of $70 per million British thermal units (mmBtu) last year. They have since eased to $17/mmBtu, encouraging demand from Asian buyers, but are still above single-digit levels seen before Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the COVID-19 pandemic. Top Chinese LNG trader PetroChina International (PCI) is spearheading the retrading, which is recorded by Chinese customs as exports from bonded storage tanks. South Korea has been the top buyer so far this year, taking 27% of China's reloads, followed by Thailand, Bangladesh, and Japan, as well as Kuwait, Chinese customs data showed. "We need to pull all levers when it comes to managing market swings," Zhang Yaoyu, PCI's global head of LNG, told Reuters. Re-selling LNG cargoes is one initiative among others - such as using financial derivatives products and developing infrastructure like regasification terminals and underground storage - to offset market volatility and improve overall supply security, he said. Still, the trading volume is a small fraction of PCI's supply portfolio, and fluctuates depending on market conditions, Zhang added. While Qatari contracts carry rigid destination clauses, most U.S. supplies and some purchases from global portfolio players are tradeable. China also receives some LNG from Australia and Indonesia with flexible destination clauses.

Gladstone LNG plants boost exports in October - Liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports from the Gladstone port in Australia’s Queensland increased in October compared to the same month last year, according to the monthly data by Gladstone Ports Corporation. Curtis Island is home to the Santos-operated GLNG plant, the ConocoPhillips-led APLNG terminal, and Shell’s QCLNG facility. These are the only LNG export facilities on Australia’s east coast. Last month, about 2,115 million tonnes of LNG or 32 cargoes left the three Gladstone terminals on Curtis Island. This compares to about 1,860 million tonnes of LNG or 29 cargoes in October 2022, the data shows. October LNG exports rose some 13.7 percent year-on-year and about 4.4 percent compared to the previous month when LNG exports reached some 2,025 million tonnes of LNG or 31 cargoes. Moreover, most of October LNG exports (1,369 million tonnes) landed in China, marking a rise of 24.9 percent compared to 1,096 million tonnes last year. Volumes to South Korea dropped to 239,985 tonnes from 277,141 tonnes last year, while volumes to Japan decreased to 190,354 tonnes last month from 307,071 tonnes last year. GPC also reported that 184,572 tonnes of LNG were sent to Malaysia, and 131,220 tonnes were sent to Singapore. Volumes to Singapore rose from 57,739 tonnes in September last year, while Malaysian volumes increased from 122,131 tonnes last year.

Queensland's Gas Exploration to Unlock Supply, Boost Economy - The International Energy Agency (IEA) has confirmed natural gas, carbon capture technology and all low-carbon hydrogen pathways will be needed if the world is to reach net zero by 2050. Australian Energy Producers Chief Executive Samantha McCulloch said the IEA's Net Zero Roadmap Update identified the importance of gas in providing affordable and reliable energy as we transform to net zero. The IEA analysis recognises that gas will play a long-term role in the global energy mix and that continued investment is required in existing gas assets and already approved projects. Total gas demand in 2050 under the net zero scenario is still many multiples of the volume of gas Australia produces today. "In Australia, new gas supply will provide a safety net for the energy system - avoiding blackouts and putting downward pressure on prices. The IEA highlights the importance of gas is amplified if renewables and other technologies are not able to be deployed at the scale and pace required under this ambitious global pathway," Ms McCulloch said. The IEA stated "some new sources of supply would need to be approved for development over the next few years" if we see delayed action elsewhere. Ms McCulloch said the IEA had always emphasised that every country had to chart its own path and the need for new gas supply in Australia and the region had only escalated since the original 2021 Net Zero report. "Australia's own energy market authorities, the Australian Energy Market Operator and the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, are repeatedly highlighting future shortfalls and the need for new gas supply," she said. Ms McCulloch called on governments to heed IEA warnings that carbon capture utilisation and storage (CCUS) and all low-carbon hydrogen pathways need more policy support to boost deployment. "The momentum for CCUS is growing in Australia and around the world but the IEA says rapid progress is needed by 2030 and hinges on cutting project lead times," she said. "Global CCUS deployment needs to increase by over 130 times by 2050, and low-carbon hydrogen by over 400 times, with action urgently needed from policy makers for both technologies."

Anti-fracking activists' Beetaloo court battle begins | The Border Mail | Wodonga, VIC - Anti-fracking protesters have mobilised across the nation as a landmark case challenging the Beetaloo Basin's environmental approvals began in the Northern Territory Supreme Court.

Chevron working to resume full Gorgon LNG production after electrical incident - Chevron’s unit in Australia is working to return to full production from its Gorgon LNG plant in Western Australia following an electrical incident affecting one of the plant’s three trains. The Gorgon LNG plant on Barrow Island has three trains and a production capacity of some 15.6 mtpa.“The incident occurred about 1.30am AWST on Tuesday, October 31, in a substation which provides power supply,” a Chevron Australia spokesperson told LNG Prime on Thursday.“Personnel were not in the substation at the time of the incident, and no one was harmed,” the spokesperson said.According to Chevron’s spokesperson, the production train is currently producing at “about 80 percent capacity.”“Domestic gas and the remaining two LNG production trains at Gorgon are unaffected and are producing at full rates,” the spokesperson said.Chevron and its workers at the Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG terminals recentlyagreed on new labor agreements following lengthy negotiations between Chevron and unions representing the workers. In September, Chevron also resumed full production at its 8.9 mtpa Wheatstone LNG terminal near Onslow after a fault reduced about 25 percent of the plant’s production.

Russia Says Baltic Telecoms Cable Was Damaged Just Before Nearby Gas Pipeline --A Russian fiber optic cable under the Baltic Sea was damaged last month only 28 km (17 miles) from where a gas pipeline linking Finland and Estonia was ruptured a couple of hours later.The details emerged in a statement on Tuesday from Russian state company Rostelecom, which publicly acknowledged the damage to its cable for the first time.Rostelecom called it an “accident” but did not specify the cause. However, it noted the proximity in time and distance to the Balticconnector gas pipeline, which Finnish investigators suspect was damaged by a Chinese container ship dragging its anchor along the seabed. The Russian company said the damage to its cable was recorded at 2330 Moscow time (2030 GMT) on Oct. 7. “The site of the cable damage is located 28 km from the section of the Baltic Connector gas pipeline damaged on October 8,” it said. Two other Baltic telecoms cables, connecting Estonia to Finland and Sweden, were also damaged on Oct. 7 and 8, local time. Estonia has said those incidents were “related” to the Balticconnector outage. Security of sub-sea cables and pipelines in the Baltic has become a top concern against the background of the Ukraine war, especially since Russia’s Nord Stream gas pipelines were blown up in an act of sabotage last year. Investigators have yet to establish who was responsible. Data from shipping intelligence firm MarineTraffic, reviewed by Reuters, showed that the Chinese container ship NewNew Polar Bear passed over the Swedish-Estonian telecoms cable at 1513 GMT on Oct. 7, then over the Russian cable at around 2020 GMT, the Balticconnector at 2220 GMT and the Finland-Estonia telecoms line at 2349 GMT. Finnish police leading the pipeline investigation have named the Hong Kong-flagged vessel as the prime suspect in damaging the Balticconnector. A large anchor was found nearby, and the investigators believe the pipe was broken as a ship dragged it across the sea bed.

Russian oil shaves India's import costs by about USD 2.7 bln --India saved roughly USD 2.7 billion by importing discounted Russian oil in the first nine months of this year, according to calculations based on government data, helping it support economic growth and easing pressure on its trade deficit. Crude oil accounts for about a third of India's overall imports by value. The world's third-biggest oil importer and consumer replaced Europe as the largest buyer of seaborne Russian crude this year after the West imposed sanctions on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine last year. Access to cheap Russian oil enabled India to cut imports from the Middle East, where prices strengthened following Saudi Arabia's voluntary additional supply cuts since July. India imported 69.06 million metric tons of Russian oil, equivalent to 1.85 million barrels per day (bpd), between January and September, commerce ministry data showed, including Russian oil imported from South Korea, Greece and Spain through transshipments. The average price for Russian oil delivered to Indian refiners was USD 525.60 per ton during that period, including shipping and insurance costs, Reuters calculations based on ministry data showed. By comparison, the average landed cost of Iraqi oil, which is of similar quality to the medium-sour Russian Urals crude that accounts for the bulk of India's purchases from Russia, was USD 564.46 per ton during the same period.

US working with allies over sanctions on Russian Arctic LNG project -State Dept (Reuters) - The U.S. is working closely with partner countries over sanctions on a Russian liquefied natural gas project in the Arctic as a January deadline looms on a wind-down of transactions with the plant, a State Department spokesperson said on Wednesday. President Joe Biden's administration imposed sanctions last week on the Arctic LNG-2 project in Russia as part of wide-ranging measures to punish Moscow for the war in Ukraine. The Office of Foreign Assets Control, part of the Treasury Department, also issued a general license that authorizes the wind down of transactions involving Arctic LNG-2, through Jan. 31, 2024. Novatek, Russia's largest LNG producer, has a 60% stake, and plans to start production by the end of this year. Arctic LNG-2 would be Russia's third large-scale LNG project and is designed to help Russia achieve a goal of gaining 20% of the global LNG market by 2035, up from around 8% currently. The sanctions are aimed at degrading Russia's future energy production and export capabilities, while maintaining the flow of energy to world markets, the State Department spokesperson said. "We do not have a strategic interest in reducing the global supply of energy, which would raise energy prices around the world and pad Putin's profits," said the State Department spokesperson, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The U.S. was the world's largest LNG exporter in the first six months of this year, according to the Energy Information Administration. "Through all of our sanctions designations we maintain close coordination with our partners on sanctions issues, and we will continue to do so," the spokesperson added. In 2021 the Treasury Department issued a sanctions review that said when possible the U.S. would coordinate with allies and engage with industry and other stakeholders while crafting sanctions. The sanctions and wind down have drawn the attention of France's TotalEnergies and Japan Arctic LNG - a consortium of Mitsui & Co and JOGMEC. They each hold a 10% stake in the project and are wary about the impact of the measures. It was unclear whether the French and Japanese companies need additional licenses or waivers from the U.S. government to stay with the project.

Oil Companies Want Kurdistan Payment Issue Settled Before Resuming Exports -- The international oil companies operating in Iraq’s semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan will not be producing oil for exports until they have clarity about overdue and future payments and sales terms, Norwegian firm DNO, one of the six members of the Association of the Petroleum Industry of Kurdistan (APIKUR), said on Thursday. Currently, Iraqi federal government officials and the Kurdistan region’s petroleum association are discussing the resumption of crude flows through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. Kurdistan’s crude oil exports were halted on March 25 by the federal government of Iraq. The halt came after the International Chamber of Commerce ruled in favor of Iraq against Turkey in a dispute over crude flows from Kurdistan. Iraq, OPEC’s second-largest producer after Saudi Arabia, is currently exporting oil only via its southern oil export terminals. Around 450,000 bpd of exports from the northern fields and from Kurdistan continue to be shut in due to the dispute. In a statement on Thursday, Norway’s DNO said: “According to a recent statement by the Prime Minister of Iraq, Baghdad and Ankara are prepared to recommence flows from Kurdistan as soon as certain unspecified agreements between the international oil companies and Iraq and Erbil are reached.” “In response, the Association of the Petroleum Industry of Kurdistan (APIKUR), of which DNO is one of six members, has stated that the member companies will not be in a position to produce oil for pipeline exports until it is clear how they will be paid for their contractual entitlements of oil already sold and delivered for export and for future sales of such oil for export.” The members of the association are owed nearly $1 billion in overdue and unpaid arrears, according to DNO.

Qatar signs 27-year gas supply deal with China’s Sinopec Qatar’s state-owned energy firm has entered into a 27-year sales and purchase agreement with China Petrochemical Corp., also known as Sinopec, to supply 3 million tons of liquefied natural gas annually. According to a press statement, QatarEnergy and Sinopec will collaborate on the second phase of the Gulf state’s North Field South expansion project. As part of the partnership agreement, QatarEnergy will transfer a 5 percent stake to Sinopec in a joint venture company that owns the equivalent of 6 million tons per annum of LNG production capacity in the NFS project, the press statement added. This marks the third long-term LNG supply deal between Qatari and Chinese firms. The two companies previously signed a 10-year LNG purchase and sales agreement in 2021 and a 27-year contract in 2022. Qatar’s Minister of State for Energy Affairs Sherida Al-Kaabi, said: “Qatar has firmly supported the role of natural gas as a central component of any energy mix on the road to a realistic energy transition. We are providing the world with the cleanest hydrocarbon source of energy, which enjoys both economic and environmental qualities to support sustainable growth and a better future.” He added: “In fact, by 2029, about 40 percent of all new LNG supplies will be provided by Qatar. Therefore, we believe a stronger relationship between the world’s largest LNG producer and the world’s largest energy consumer is a natural development of the realities shaping the energy map today.” In October, QatarEnergy also signed a 27-year LNG supply agreement with Eni to deliver 1 million tons of LNG annually to Italy. In the same month, the state-owned energy firm inked another deal with French firm TotalEnergies to supply up to 3.5 million tons per annum of LNG to France for 27 years. In a press statement, QatarEnergy revealed that LNG volumes to France will be sourced through their two joint ventures with TotalEnergies, which hold interests in the Gulf nation’s northeastern oil fields. In July, QatarEnergy reported a net profit of 154.6 billion Qatari riyals ($42.47 billion) in 2022, a 58 percent rise compared to 2021, driven by increased demand for LNG following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Qatar Raises Offtake LNG Supply for Sinopec to Seven MMtpa - QatarEnergy has signed another offtake deal with China Petrochemical Corp. (Sinopec) for three million metric tons per annum (MMtpa) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the two North Field expansion projects. The agreement inked in Shanghai increases China’s purchase commitment to the projects to seven MMtpa following a four MMtpa offtake pact signed November 21, 2022 between the state-owned companies for the North Field East expansion. Both agreements last 27 years. Simultaneous with the signing of the second offtake agreement, this time for the North Field South, QatarEnergy and Sinopec also penned an agreement transferring a five percent stake in the South project to the Chinese company. The farm-out is from a joint venture that owns the equivalent of six MMtpa of LNG production from the South project, QatarEnergy said in a press release announcing the offtake and partnership agreements. Sinopec had in April 12, 2023 already signed a definitive agreement to acquire a five percent interest in a joint venture that owns an equivalent of eight MMtpa in the East project, as announced by QatarEnergy at the time. China was the first to commit to buy from the expansion projects, according to QatarEnergy, which claimed the 27-year term is the longest in the history of the LNG industry. “These historic milestones are a testament to the excellent bilateral relations between the People’s Republic of China and the State of Qatar as well as between Sinopec and QatarEnergy”, the Qatari LNG giant said in the news release for the latest agreements. QatarEnergy has since won purchase commitments from Europe for the NorthField expansion projects as the region turned away from Russian energy following its invasion of Ukraine last year. The European Union targets to phase out Russian fossil fuels by 2027, according to a declaration by the 27-country bloc March 11, 2022. On October 23, 2023 QatarEnergy announced a 27-year agreement with Eni SPA to supply up to one MMtpa of LNG from the East project to Italy. Eni is a partner in the East project with a 3.125 percent share. On October 18, 2023 QatarEnergy announced two agreements with Shell for up to 3.5 MMtpa for 27 years. The supply is meant for the Netherlands and to be sourced from the East project, where the British energy major holds 6.25 percent ownership. Shell also holds 9.375 percent in the South project. On October 11, 2023 QatarEnergy bared two agreements to supply TotalEnergies with a maximum of 3.5 MMtpa for 27 years, to be sourced from the expansion project and for distribution in France. TotalEnergies holds a 6.25 percent share in the North Field East expansion project, planned to produce 32 MMtpa, and 9.375 percent in the North Field South expansion project, designed with a 16 MMtpa capacity. QatarEnergy will begin delivery for the LNG supply for France, Italy and the Netherlands in 2026, according to QatarEnergy’s announcements of the separate agreements.

Natural Gas Demand Suggests The IEA Got Peak Demand Wrong --Executives in the natural gas industry expect strong demand for the fuel in Asia through 2040 and 2050 as countries continue their coal-to-gas switch policy and look to meet emission reduction goals.Recent estimates and reports diverge from the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) peak fossil fuel demand projections announced in recent weeks. The IEA expects demand for all three fossil fuels – oil, coal, and natural gas – to peak before the end of this decade.The IEA said in its World Energy Outlook 2023 in October that global natural gas demand growth will slow down this decade compared to the decade to 2021 and peak by 2030, under its conservative Stated Policies scenario (STEPS).In this scenario, natural gas demand growth between 2022 and 2030 would be much lower than the 2.2% average rate of growth seen between 2010 and 2021, according to the IEA. Global gas demand is set to peak by 2030, maintaining a long plateau before gradually declining by around 100 bcm by 2050, the agency said.Weeks before the energy report, the IEA published its medium-term report on gas markets and demand, in which it said that demand growth globally would be structurally lower, with Asia and the Middle East driving consumption.Overall gas demand from mature markets in Asia Pacific – Australia, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, and Singapore, as well as Europe and North America – peaked in 2021, and is forecast to decline by 1% annually through to 2026, according to the report.Europe is headed for structurally lower gas demand amid energy savings, higher share of renewable sources in the power generation mix, and the EU’s decarbonization goals, analysts and industry officials have said.Gas demand in the EU was 12% lower in 2022 than the 2019-2021 average, driven by falling industrial and household gas demand, researchers at Brussels-based think tank Bruegel wrote in October.In 2023, the greater availability of alternative power generation helped with significant gas demand reduction in the power sector, too. Some of the lost European demand for natural gas due to the energy crisis and record-high prices could never return, Vitol Group’s chief executive Russel Hardy said earlier this month. “For gas, demand has plummeted in Europe, with double-digit percentage reductions. We expect some of the lost demand to be permanent,” Hardy told the Energy Intelligence Forum in London.While industry executives expect a part of Europe’s gas demand to have been lost for good during the energy crisis last year, they do not see demand in Asia slackening anytime soon, and certainly not before 2030.Gas industry delegates who attended earlier this month an LNG conference in Singapore organized by S&P Global expect natural gas demand in Asia to jump by more than 50% by 2050, Energy Intelligence’s Clara Tan reports.McKinsey & Co, a consultancy, sees global natural gas demand rising through 2040 in most scenarios in a report launched at the Energy Intelligence Forum. According to McKinsey & Co, gas will still have a key role to play in providing flexible power supply to balance the growing share of renewables until energy storage becomes mainstream to deal with the intermittency of solar and wind. Under most scenarios of how the world energy demand and mix will evolve, natural gas will be necessary, Meg O’Neill, chief executive of energy firm Woodside, said at the Energy Intelligence Forum.“If you look at the economic growth projections of China, South Asia and Southeast Asia that are likely to happen and the decarbonization objectives they have set, we absolutely believe LNG will be an important part of the mix,” O’Neill said.China, Southeast Asia, and south Asia will be the gas demand drivers in the coming decades, as the coal-to-gas switch will continue – albeit at a slower-paced rate – despite last year’s drop in LNG imports in the region.

OPEC Is Upbeat On Oil Demand Ahead Of Key Policy Meeting -Despite the ongoing concerns about the state of the global economy, OPEC continues to hold an upbeat view on world oil demand, OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais said on Tuesday. “The economy, despite the challenges, is still doing quite well,” Al Ghais told the Argus European Crude Conference in London, as carried by Bloomberg. “We are positive on demand, we’re still quite robust on demand.” Al Ghais was the keynote speaker at the conference and expressed optimism about global oil demand less than three weeks before the ministers of the oil producers in the OPEC+ alliance meet in the weekend of November 25-26 for a key production policy decision. Saudi Arabia and Russia have extended their voluntary production and export cuts, respectively, until the end of the year. The two leaders of the OPEC+ group could decide or announce at the OPEC+ ministerial meeting whether they would extend, deepen, wind down, or end their cuts in 2024. Saudi Arabia said on Sunday it would continue with its extra voluntary production cut of 1 million barrels per day (bpd) in December and will pump around 9 million bpd next month, as it has been doing since July. Russia also confirmed this weekend it would keep oil exports lower until 300,000 bpd by the end of the year. Commenting on the next OPEC+ ministerial meeting at the end of this month, OPEC’s Al Ghais said today, “All I can say for now is we continue to monitor supply and demand fundamentals on a daily basis.” “When the ministers meet in Vienna at the end of this month they will review all of this and take appropriate measures.”

Oil Futures Nosedives on Demand Concerns, Stronger USD - Oil futures settled Tuesday's session sharply lower under pressure from a stronger U.S. dollar and concern over slowing global oil demand following softer-than-expected data out of China and the United States. China's exports declined for the sixth consecutive month in October, dropping 6.4% from a year earlier as shipments into major trading partners in Europe and North America deteriorated further. China is an export-oriented economy that relies heavily on manufacturing exports. The decline in trade volumes underlined persistent external headwinds for Asia's economic growth and clouded the overall demand outlook for oil markets in the winter months. The data showed China imported 13.52% more crude in October than a year ago, but the figure was flattered by coronavirus restrictions that were in place in 2022. Weak macroeconomic data out of China offset pledges from Saudi Arabia and Russia to extend production cuts through the end of the year that gave an initial bounce to oil prices on Monday. In separate statements released Sunday, Saudi Arabia and Russia reaffirmed their commitment to continue with voluntary 1 million bpd production and 300,000 bpd export cuts, respectively, through the end of the year, adding that the "decision will be reviewed next month to consider extending the cut, deepening the cut, or increasing production." Those actions come on top of 3.7 million bpd in production cuts previously agreed to by OPEC+. At their 35th OPEC and non-OPEC Ministerial Meeting held June 4, OPEC+ agreed to production quotas for all of 2024. Further weighing on the oil complex, the U.S. dollar index rallied against a basket of foreign currencies to settle Tuesday's session at 105.373 as investors continued to reprice the path of the federal funds rate heading into next year. U.S. equities have rallied since last week's Federal Reserve decision to hold the federal funds rate in a 5.25%-5.5% target range for the second consecutive meeting as Chairman Jerome Powell appeared to suggest the end of the most aggressive monetary tightening campaign in two decades. This view was further supported by a softer-than-expected October employment report, which showed job growth slowed markedly last month while the unemployment rate climbed, suggesting the labor market has more slack than previously thought. At settlement, West Texas Intermediate December futures fell to $77.37 bbl, down $3.45, and the international crude benchmark Brent for January delivery declined $3.57 to $81.61 bbl. NYMEX December ULSD dropped back $0.1140 to $2.8384 gallon and front-month RBOB on NYMEX retreated to $2.1677 gallon, down $0.0682.

Oil drops to 3-month low as waning demand in US, China outweigh supply cuts; Brent crashes to $79/bbl - Oil prices declined more than $1 on Wednesday, November 8, to their lowest in more than three months on concern over waning demand in major oil consumers - United States and China. The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said earlier this week that crude production in the US will rise by slightly less than previously expected but demand will fall. Brent crude futures fell $1.68, or 2 per cent, to $79.93 a barrel, and US crude lost $1.78, or 2.3 per cent, to $75.59. Both benchmarks hit their lowest since late July, according to news agency Reuters. Crude is trading below its levels from before the Israel-Hamas war, which has failed to disrupt supplies from the Middle East.Back home, on the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX), crude oil futures due for a November 17 expiry, was last trading lower by 2.81 per cent at ₹6,324 per bbl, having swung between ₹6,306 and ₹6,481 per bbl during the session so far, against a previous close of ₹6,507 per barrel.
-The EIA now expects total US petroleum consumption to fall by 300,000 barrels per day (bpd) this year, reversing its previous forecast of a 100,000 bpd increase. US crude oil stocks rose by almost 12 million barrels last week, market sources said late on Tuesday, according to American Petroleum Institute figures.
-Data from China, the world's biggest crude oil importer, showed its total exports of goods and services contracted faster than expected, fueling worries about the energy demand outlook. In the euro zone, data showing falling retail sales also highlighted weak consumer demand and the prospect of recession.
-Still, China's October crude oil imports showed a strong growth and its central bank governor said on Wednesday that the world's second-biggest economy is expected to hit its gross domestic product growth target this year. Beijing has set a target of about 5 per cent growth.

Oil slumps nearly 3% to 3-month lows as demand concerns mount - Oil prices slid nearly 3% on Wednesday to their lowest in more than three months on concerns over waning demand in the U.S. and China. Brent crude futures fell $2.07, or 2.54%, to settle at $79.54 a barrel. U.S. crude lost $2.04, or 2.64%, to settle at $75.33. Both benchmarks hit their lowest since mid-July. “The market is clearly less concerned about the potential for Middle Eastern supply disruptions and is instead focused on an easing in the balance,” ING analysts Warren Patterson and Ewa Manthey said in a note to clients, referring to crude supply conditions. Also weighing on the market, U.S. crude oil stocks rose by almost 12 million barrels last week, market sources said late on Tuesday, citing the American Petroleum Institute’s figures. That would be biggest build since February, compared with government data. However, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) has delayedthe release of its weekly oil inventory data, usually on Wednesdays, until Nov. 15 to complete a planned systems upgrade. Meanwhile, U.S. crude production will rise this year by slightly less than previously expected but petroleum consumption will fall by 300,000 barrels per day (bpd), the EIA said on Tuesday, reversing its previous forecast of a 100,000-bpd increase. Data from China, the world’s biggest crude oil importer, showed its total exports of goods and services contracted faster than expected, feeding worries about the energy demand outlook. In the euro zone, data showing falling retail sales also highlighted weak consumer demand and the prospect of recession. “The meltdown we’ve seen in prices is reflecting two things: concerns about the global economy hitting a brick wall based on data out of China and also a sense of confidence that the war in Israel and the Gaza Strip is not going to impact supply,” said Phil Flynn, analyst at Price Futures Group. Still, China’s October crude oil imports showed robust growth and its central bank governor said that the world’s second-biggest economy is expected to hit its gross domestic product growth target this year. Beijing has set a target of about 5% growth. Analysts from Goldman Sachs estimated seaborne net oil exports by six countries from oil producer group OPEC will remain only 600,000 bpd below April levels. OPEC has announced cumulative production cuts amounting to 2 million bpd since April 2023. Russia, a part of the producer groups known as OPEC+, is considering lifting an export ban on some grades of gasoline, Interfax news agency quoted Energy Minister Nikolai Shulginov as saying. Moscow introduced a ban on fuel exports on Sept. 21 to tackle high domestic prices and shortages. The government eased restrictions on Oct. 6, allowing the export of diesel by pipeline, but kept measures on gasoline exports in place. Barclays lowered its 2024 Brent crude price forecast by $4 to $93 a barrel.

The Market, Which Lost About 7% in the Previous Two Sessions, Bounced Off its Lows | - The oil market on Thursday retraced some of its previous losses and posted an inside trading day. The market, which lost about 7% in the previous two sessions, bounced off its lows as it took a breather from further losses even as China reported a decline in inflation, a sign of weakening domestic demand. The market posted the day’s trading range by mid-morning as it traded to a low in overnight trading of $75.21, the lower boundary of its recent trading channel, and later rallied to a high of $77.16. However, the market erased some of its gains and traded sideways during the remainder of the session. The December WTI contract settled up 41 cents or 0.5% at $75.74 and the January Brent contract settled up 47 cents or 0.59% at $80.01. The product markets ended the session in mixed territory, with the heating oil market settling down 3.01 cents at $2.7191 and the RB market settling up 3.23 cents at $2.1608. UBS said it expects Brent crude prices to move back up towards the $90-$100/barrel range despite recent weakness, citing tight supplies and rising global demand. UBS analysts said global consumption of crude remains well supported despite the weaker official forecast from the U.S. and key oil producers have remained disciplined on production, keeping supply tight. It said the risk of disruption to oil production arising from the Israel-Hamas war has not gone away, adding "our base case is that the conflict will not escalate. However, events in the region remain fluid." Reuters estimated gasoline exports from Northwest Europe to the United States in October reached 510,000 tons down from the 724,000 tons shipped in September. It is estimating November shipments will fall to 488,000 tons. Hedge fund manager, Pierre Andurand, said better-than-expected oil supplies have been the trigger for crude market’s decline. He said “We had a lot less supply disruptions than in an average year.” He stated that Iranian and U.S. oil output have been higher than expected. He said “mobility data shows an acceleration in demand and demand growth,” suggesting consumption is not the cause. He said for a “substantial structural rally” in oil, there needs to be sustained inventory draws similar to those seen in July and August of more than 1.5 million bpd. Reuters reported Thursday that Russian fuel producers have been told by the government to prepare for the removal of all remaining restrictions on the export of diesel and gasoline. The Russian government had eased export restrictions on October 6th which had allowed the export of diesel by pipeline. Saudi Aramco notified at least four North Asian buyers that it will supply full contractual volumes of crude oil in December. On Sunday, Saudi Arabia said it would continue with its additional voluntary cut of 1 million bpd translating into production of around 9 million bpd for December. However, refiners in China have slightly cut their nominated volume for December, totaling around 46 million barrels, compared with about 47 million barrels for November and around 50 million barrels for October.

WTI, Brent Post 4% Weekly Losses as Sentiment Turns Bearish-- Oil futures nearest delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange and Brent crude traded on the Intercontinental Exchange settled Friday's session higher, although all petroleum contracts registered their third consecutive weekly losses as market sentiment turned increasingly bearish following softer-than-expected macroeconomic data out of major global economies while central banks doubled down on hawkish messaging of additional rate hikes to fight off persistent inflation. U.S. consumer sentiment fell for a fourth straight month in November, according to a survey released by the University of Michigan Friday morning, as households' expectations for inflation rose again for the short to medium term. Officials at the U.S. Federal Reserve pay close attention to consumers' expectations about inflation as these trends could determine expectations for a salary raise. During an Internal Monetary Fund-organized conference in Washington, D.C., Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell noted that the U.S. central bank would "not hesitate to execute another rate hike" should inflation fail to ease towards its 2% target in a timely manner. Powell further stressed financial conditions might not be restrictive enough for the central bank to be convinced consumer prices are indeed easing towards a set target. His comments triggered another rally in the U.S. dollar index earlier this week while further souring sentiment in the oil market. The risk of additional rate hikes from the central bank against an already slowing economy undercuts the outlook for fuel demand heading into the winter months. In China, high-frequency demand figures revealed flight throughput returned to its Spring 2023 levels after upward momentum over the summer months, while overall traffic volumes softened in October. Additionally, manufacturers in China and other Asian economies all reported worsening of business conditions at the start of the fourth quarter, undoing some of the gradual improvement between June and September. A combination of a softer growth outlook and unwinding of geopolitical risk-premium tied to the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israeli civilians pushed both West Texas Intermediate and Brent futures to their lowest levels since July earlier this week. NYMEX December WTI futures added $1.43 to settle at $77.17 bbl, with the January contract finishing the week at $77.15 bbl. ICE January Brent climbed above $81 bbl to $81.43, up $1.42 on the session, with next-month February contract settling at $81.13 bbl. NYMEX December RBOB futures moved up $0.0287 to $2.1895 gallon, reversing higher from Wednesday's $2.1220 gallon 11-month low on the spot continuous chart. RBOB basis in the underlying New York Harbor spot physical market, which strengthened to a 500-point premium to the December contract, lent upside price support. The New York Harbor market has tightened amid an extended turnaround at Monroe Energy LLC 195,000 bpd Trainer refinery in Pennsylvania, which began on Sept. 11. The turnaround is expected to be completed on Nov. 16. NYMEX December ULSD futures advanced $0.0240 to $2.7431 after setting at $2.7191 gallon on Thursday -- the lowest settlement on the spot continuous chart since July 20. A selloff in ULSD futures accelerated this week after the American Petroleum Institute reported an unexpected 1 million bbl build in U.S. distillate fuel inventory during the week-ended Nov. 3 Tuesday afternoon, with the EIA postponing their statistical report by a week due to system upgrades. Despite ending Friday's session higher, December ULSD futures settled below the 200-day moving average, now at $2.7947 gallon, for three consecutive sessions -- a bearish development

Iran’s Proposed Embargo Could Cause Chaos in Oil Markets - Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, last week called on the Islamic members of OPEC to halt oil exports to Israel immediately. Given that Israel buys virtually none of its oil from Islamic members of OPEC – purchasing mainly from Azerbaijan, the U.S., Brazil, Nigeria, and Angola instead – this would seem in and of itself a somewhat peculiar threat to make. But that is not the actual threat being made by Iran’s spiritual leader, with the full backing of the practical guardians of the 1979 Islamic Revolution – the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The real threat is that Iran is angling for a full oil embargo from all Islamic OPEC member states on countries that support Israel in its war against Islamic militant group Hamas. Saudi Arabia did exactly the same thing in 1973 for exactly the same reason – a war between Israel and Islam, as it also sought to portray it – with devastating results for oil prices, Western economies, and global geopolitical alliances for decades to come, as analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order. As global supplies of oil fell, the price of oil increased dramatically, exacerbated by incremental cuts to oil production by OPEC members over the period. Gas prices also rose, as historically around 70 percent of them are comprised of the price of oil. By the end of the embargo in March 1974, the price of oil had risen around 267 percent, from about US$3 per barrel (pb) to nearly US$11 pb. This, in turn, stoked the fire of a global economic slowdown, especially felt in the net oil importing countries of the West.Some later branded the embargo a failure, as it did not result in Israel giving back all the territory that it had gained in the Yom Kippur War. However, in a broader sense, as also analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order, the wider war had been won by Saudi Arabia, OPEC and other Arab states in shifting the balance of power in the global oil market from the big consumers of oil (mainly in the West at that time) to the big producers of oil (mainly in the Middle East at that point). This shift was accurately summed up by the then-Saudi Minister of Oil and Mineral Reserves, Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani, who was widely credited with formulating the embargo strategy. He highlighted that the effects on the global economy of the oil embargo marked a fundamental shift in the world balance of power between the developing nations that produced oil and the developed industrial nations that consumed it. As it now stands, there is every chance of a military or diplomatic misstep occurring in the Israel-Hamas War that may see a widening out of the conflict. That would be the perfect point for Iran to push for a simultaneous widening out of an oil embargo on Israel alone into a broader one covering all its supporters in the West. Already, on 16 October Iran’s Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir Abdollahian, warned that its regional network of militias would open “multiple fronts” against Israel if its attacks continue to kill civilians in Gaza. It seems highly likely that the first new front would be a full activation of Hezbollah in Lebanon, to Israel’s direct north – a 100,000-strong very well-equipped fighting force funded and trained by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) that dwarfs the fighting capabilities of Hamas in all respects. Israel has already stated that its mission is to “annihilate Hamas” and has launched ground operations into Palestine for as long as it takes to do so. Additionally, on 21 October, Israel’s Minister of Economy, Nir Barkat, said that if Hezbollah fully joins the war then Israel would “cut off the head of the snake” and launch a military attack against Iran. A third front could also be opened by Iran, using its own IRGC and proxy militant forces stationed in Syria, to Israel’s northeast. So, what would a broader oil embargo look like? According to the latest assessment by the World Bank, a loss in global crude oil supply of 6-8 million bpd – which it refers to as a “large disruption” scenario comparable to the 1973 Oil Crisis – would result in a 56-75 percent increase in prices to between $140 and $157 a barrel. However, a broadening out of the embargo on Israel by the Islamic members of OPEC, as called for by Iran, would likely lead to a much bigger loss of global oil supplies than the World Bank has calculated. The Islamic members of OPEC are Algeria, with an average crude oil production rate of around 1 million barrels (bpd), Iran (3.4 million bpd), Iraq (4.1 million bpd), Kuwait (2.5 million bpd), Libya (1.2 million bpd), Saudi Arabia (9 million bp), and the UAE (2.9 million bpd). This totals just over 24 million bpd – or about 30 percent – of the current average total global production of about 80 million bpd.

Pentagon confirms four new attacks on US bases after defensive airstrike - American troops were hit four times by Iranian-backed groups in the Middle East after a U.S. strike Wednesday on an Iranian facility in Syria. Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said Thursday the U.S. has now been attacked 46 times since Oct. 17, following the breakout of a major war between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas. That includes 24 attacks in Iraq and 22 in Syria, Singh said. The attacks have all involved explosive drones and rockets. “If these attacks continue against our personnel, we won’t hesitate at a time and place of our choosing to respond again,” Singh told reporters at a briefing. A total of 56 troops have been injured in the attacks, but most are minor injuries and every service member has since returned to duty, according to the Pentagon. The latest attacks follow a U.S. airstrike Wednesday, which took out a major weapons facility in Syria used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iranian-backed militants. Singh said the strike inflicted significant damage on the storage facility. “We were able to render that building pretty much non-usable,” she said. The Wednesday strike came after the Houthis, who are also backed by Iran, shot down an MQ-9 Reaper drone off the coast of Yemen. The U.S. has bolstered its presence in the Middle East following the Israel-Hamas war and also struck an Iranian-backed militant site in late October. But the ongoing conflict has sparked fury on Capitol Hill, where Republicans have blamed the Biden administration for failing to stop the attacks. “The message to terrorists must be clear: attacks on U.S. servicemembers, assets, and interests will not be tolerated,” Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of House Armed Services Committee, said in a statement. “Hitting a storage facility should not be the final response by the U.S.” Singh said the U.S. is carrying out “proportionate” responses but did not seek to escalate the conflict, while the primary mission was to ensure the Israel-Hamas war does not widen. “We want to make sure we can contain this conflict to Israel and Hamas and we have not seen this conflict widen,” she said. “We are sending a message and I think the message has been received.”

US drone shot down over Yemen - An American drone was shot down off the coast of Yemen on Wednesday by the Iranian-backed Houthis, according to a U.S. Defense official. The U.S. official said the drone was an MQ-9 Reaper, a surveillance drone that can be armed with missiles. The drone costs around $32 million. The attack is the latest on U.S. forces in the Middle East, where the Pentagon says Iranian-backed groups are seeking to take advantage of the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The U.S. has been assaulted in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed militants firing rockets and explosive drones around 40 times since the war began. The Pentagon said this week that 46 U.S. service members have been injured, including more than 20 with traumatic brain injuries. The Houthis are a faction in Yemen that have been fighting a major civil war against the country’s government for years. Houthi forces also fired rockets at a U.S. warship last month and have targeted positions in Israel.

What Did the Houthis’ Attempted Bombing of Israel Aim to Achieve? --Yemen’s Houthi rebels recently released footage purporting to show the drones and missiles that they claim to have launched at Israel. Their spokesman’s full-throated support for Hamas was wrongly interpreted by some social media users as a declaration of war against Israel by the Yemeni state, the perception of which was rubbished by its internationally recognized government’s Ambassador to Russia. The self-professed Jewish State also downplayed it too and said that it isn’t at war with Yemen.This group’s attempted bombing of Israel took place a few days after Beirut-based Al Mayadeen claimed without evidence that the Houthis had earlier attacked an alleged Israeli base in Eritrea, which the latter’s Minister of Information denied. This analysis here argues that the purpose behind that report was to boost the Iranian-led Axis of Resistance’s morale amidst Hezbollah’s reluctance to wage all-out war against Israel in support of Hamas by opening up a second front to distract it from Gaza.Since then, the Houthis actually did try to attack Israel, albeit directly instead of via third countries like Eritrea where there’s no credible reason to believe that it even has a base. In hindsight, Al Mayadeen’s report either pressured that group to do something tangible or it was designed to precondition their targeted audience of Resistance Axis supporters to expect the aforesaid after being tipped off about it. Speculation about that outlet’s motives aside, it’s now a fact that the Houthis have joined the fray. This naturally leads to the question of what they aimed to achieve by doing so. First and foremost, they likely wanted to signal to their ideological allies that they won’t sit aside while the latest Israeli-Hamas war rages in Gaza. At the very least, this group felt obligated to send a few projectiles towards the conflict zone out of solidarity. It’s unclear whether more will be forthcoming, but the point is that this attempted bombing sought to reinforce their credentials as reliable members of the Resistance Axis. Secondly, there’s no doubt that the Houthis also wanted to put pressure on Saudi Arabia seeing as how their projectiles had to have traveled through its airspace en route to the self-professed Jewish State. This risks ruining their ongoing peace talks, but the group seemingly calculated that showing solidarity with their allies takes precedence over all else, including the chance that this rekindles their mostly frozen conflict with the Kingdom, whether deliberately or by miscalculation. The abovementioned observation suggests that: 1) their peace talks might have stalled so the Houthis have stopped exercising self-restraint, possibly as a tactic for coercing concessions from Saudi Arabia; 2) they want to provoke the Saudis into intercepting those projectiles in Israel’s defense (whether on their own prerogative or at Israel’s request) and thus damaging their reputation in many Muslims’ eyes; and 3) the Chinese-brokered Iranian-Saudi rapprochement could be imperiled by this latest development. The last of these three observations leads to the final goal that the Houthis might have sought to achieve via their attempted bombing of Israel, which was either to unilaterally exacerbate the security dilemma between those two that’s improved over the past year or do so at their Iranian ally’s behest. Neither motive can be known for sure, but the first scenario suggests that this group is going rogue while the second suggests that Tehran is willing to risk its relations with Riyadh as part of opportunistic power play.The former is a lot less likely than the latter, however, which raises serious concerns for regional stability since any subsequent deterioration of bilateral ties would have far-reaching reverberations. Apart from the worst-case scenario of large-scale hostilities recommencing in Yemen, their restored rivalry could: 1) impede BRICS’ multilateral efforts to accelerate financial multipolarity processes; 2) pressure Russia and China to take one’s side at the other’s expense; and 3) see the return of proxy warfare between them.Considering the enormity of what’s at stake, it can therefore be concluded that the Houthis’ attempted bombing of Israel is a major move because it was arguably approved by Iran, which authorized this attack despite the risk that it could worsen relations with Saudi Arabia. This throws the Kingdom into a dilemma since intercepting these projectiles and/or militarily retailing against that group in Yemen might be exactly what those two want it to do but not responding at all also entails some risks to its interests too.

US Launches More Airstrikes in Eastern Syria Against IRGC Site - The Pentagon said on Wednesday night that the US launched more airstrikes in eastern Syria that targeted a facility used by “Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups.”“This strike was conducted by two US F-15s against a weapons storage facility,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a statement. He said the strike was “a response to a series of attacks against US personnel in Iraq and Syria by IRGC-Quds Force affiliates,” referring to the Shia militias that operate in both countries.The US launched similar airstrikes on October 27 in an attempt to “deter” further attacks on US forces in the region. But the rocket and drone fire on US bases has not stopped. At least 41 attacks have been reported since October 17, injuring at least 45 US troops.An umbrella group of Shia militias that calls itself the Islamic Resistance of Iraq has taken credit for many of the attacks on US bases. The militias receive support from Iran, but it’s unclear if Tehran is directing the attacks. The Pentagon previously acknowledged it had no evidence of direct Iranian involvement.For their part, Iran has denied any role in the attacks on US troops. Responding to US allegations, Iran’s representative to the UN said Tuesday that Tehran “has never been involved in any actions or attacks directed at the United States military forces in Syria and Iraq.”There are no reports of casualties yet in the US strikes. If IRGC personnel were hit, it would risk a huge escalation with Iran.Austin said the US urges against escalation, but it’s unlikely the Shia militias will back down as the US continues to support Israel’s onslaught on Gaza. “The United States is fully prepared to take further necessary measures to protect our people and our facilities. We urge against any escalation. US personnel will continue to conduct counter-ISIS missions in Iraq and Syria,” Austin said.Also on Wednesday, Israel launched airstrikes in southern Syria, and ISIS attacks were reported in desert regions, killing 26 members of a pro-government militia and four Syrian soldiers.

Gaza Death Toll Surpasses 10,000 - Gaza’s Health Ministry said Monday that, after 31 days of relentless Israeli airstrikes, the death toll in the besieged enclave has surpassed 10,000, a total that includes over 4,000 children.The US has cast doubt on the accuracy of the numbers coming from Gaza’s Health Ministry, but UN officials have said they believe the real death toll is significantly higher since it doesn’t include people stuck under rubble. The UN said Monday that about 2,260 people, including 1,270 children, are reported missing in the enclave, with most presumed to be trapped under the rubble.The Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot cited an Israeli security source who put the death toll much higher. The official claimed the Israeli military had killed 20,000 Palestinians in its onslaught, but so far, the number has not been backed up by another source.UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Monday called for an end to the onslaught on Gaza, saying the enclave has become a graveyard for children. “We must act now to find a way out of this brutal, awful, agonizing dead end of destruction,” he said.“Gaza is becoming a graveyard for children. Hundreds of girls and boys are reportedly being killed or injured every day,” Guterres said.The massive death toll and slaughter of children have not impacted US support for Israel’s campaign. US officials are paying lip service to the idea of limiting civilian casualties, but the Biden administration refuses to condition military aid. The Washington Post reported on Sunday that the US is not conditioning military aid or using other leverage it has over Israel because it “would be so politically unpopular in any administration and partly because, aides say, Biden himself has a personal attachment to Israel.”

Israeli Minister Says Dropping Nuke on Gaza Is an Option - Israel’s Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu on Sunday said that dropping a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip was an option for Israel and claimed there are no innocent civilians in the enclave. According to The Times of Israel, Eliyahu said in a radio interview that dropping a nuke is “one of the possibilities” and said there is no “such thing as uninvolved civilians in Gaza.” He also called for the expulsion of Palestinians from the enclave. “They can go to Ireland or deserts, the monsters in Gaza should find a solution by themselves,” he said. Eliyahu added that the Gaza Strip doesn’t have the right to exist and that anyone waving a Hamas or Palestinian flag “shouldn’t continue living on the face of the earth.” Eliyahu is a member of the extremist Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party, which is part of the coalition that formed the government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In response to Eliyahu’s comments,Netanyahu suspended him from cabinet meetings, resisting calls from opposition leader Yair Lapid to fire him. “Minister Amihai Eliyahu’s statements are not based in reality,” Netanyahu said, according to his office. Despite the massive child casualty rate in Gaza, the Israeli leader claimed Israel is “operating in accordance with the highest standards of international law to avoid harming innocents.” Besides being incredibly provocative and genocidal, Eliyahu’s comments also appear to confirm that Israel has nuclear weapons. Israel has a nuclear arsenal but has a policy of ambiguity, not officially recognizing that it exists. The US also maintains this policy regarding Israeli nukes.

Netanyahu Shows Map of 'New Middle East'—Without Palestine—to UN General Assembly -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu angered Palestinians and their defenders Friday after presenting a map of "The New Middle East" without Palestine during his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.Speaking to a largely empty chamber, Netanyahu—whose far-right government is widely considered the most extreme in Israeli history—showed a series of maps, including one that did not show the West Bank, East Jerusalem, or Gaza. These Palestinian territories have been illegally occupied by Israel since 1967, with the exception of Gaza—from which Israeli forces withdrew in 2005, while maintaining an economic stranglehold over the densely populated coastal strip.Middle East Eyereported Netanyahu also held up a map of "Israel in 1948"—the year the modern Jewish state was established, largely through the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000 Arabs—that erroneously included the Palestinian territories as part of Israel.Palestinian Ambassador to Germany Laith Arafeh said on social media that there is "no greater insult to every foundational principle of the United Nations than seeing Netanyahu display before the UNGA a 'map of Israel' that straddles the entire land from the river to the sea, negating Palestine and its people, then attempting to spin the audience with rhetoric about 'peace' in the region, all the while entrenching the longest ongoing belligerent occupation in today's world."

Gaza City in ruins as residents forced to flee -Streets in Gaza City lay in ruins as residents were forced to flee Friday, with gunfights between Israeli soldiers and Hamas militants raging and basic supplies severely depleted. Heavy gunfire, explosions and the buzz of Israeli military drones could be heard as night fell over Gaza City, where the only glow of light comes from Al-Shifa hospital, which is overwhelmed with casualties. “I wasn’t optimistic that any of my children or I would come out unharmed, given the intensity of the bombing and gunfire,” said resident Jawad Haruda. He described his journey fleeing the coastal Shati refugee camp as a “tragedy.” The Israeli military said its troops have reached the heart of the city, which before the war bustled with shoppers and drivers navigating dense traffic. “The situation is very difficult in Gaza. Bombing is hitting all areas, and there are many clashes, with the Israeli incursions,” veteran Al-Jazeera correspondent Wael Al-Dahdouh told AFP after leaving the city. After five weeks of relentless Israeli bombardment which has killed people in school shelters, hospitals and scores of homes, thousands of residents walked south for miles (kilometers) to escape the intensifying ground assault. Almost 1.6 million people have been internally displaced since October 7, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said -- nearly two thirds of Gaza’s population. Another resident of the Shati camp, Munir Al-Raii, said the area had been empty following “indiscriminate” Israeli strikes. “Houses collapse on their inhabitants, without sparing children or women, leaving nothing but human remains,” he said, a small child on his shoulders. Israel said it is routing out militants in densely populated Gaza, after Hamas attacks in southern Israel on October 7 killed more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli officials. Their military campaign has killed more than 11,000 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory. Those who have survived the war so far are now facing severe shortages of basic supplies. Mohammad al-Talbani, clutching a baby and wearing a small rucksack as he fled, said “nothing is available at all” in Gaza City. “There is a shortage of food and water. We go to the shops to buy diapers and milk, things like that for the child, there’s none,” he said. “There is even a shortage of food items, such as beans and canned goods,” added Talbani. There are no bakeries functioning across north Gaza, the United Nations humanitarian agency (OCHA) said Thursday. After Israeli strikes on rooftop solar panels put Gaza City’s largest bakery out of order, desperate residents took all the flour from its stores on Tuesday. “We don’t have food, should we die of hunger?” said one of them, Daoud.

Rate of civilian deaths from Israeli airstrikes surges in latest conflict | Arab News -Israel’s aerial bombardment of Gaza since Oct. 7 has caused a far higher civilian fatality rate than in previous aerial campaigns, The Guardian reported on Friday. Figures by Action on Armed Violence show that each recorded fatal Israeli airstrike on Gaza killed 10.1 civilians on average. Israel’s Operation Protective Edge, carried out during the 2014 Gaza war, saw an average airstrike civilian fatality rate of 2.5. During Israeli aerial campaigns in 2012 and 2021, the average airstrike civilian fatality rates were 1.3 and 1.7, respectively. There are mounting fears that the civilian death toll in the Palestinian enclave could be higher than reported. Barbara Leaf, US assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, this week said overall casualty figures in Gaza were “very high,” adding: “It could be that they’re even higher than are being cited.” The higher fatality rate implies a significant change in Israel’s targeting approach, AOAV warned. Iain Overton, its executive director, said: “This isn’t just a statistical concern, it’s a human one. The numbers suggest a potential shift in military strategy that has had devastating consequences for non-combatants.” He said the Gaza figures have raised concerns that Israel is operating in breach of international humanitarian law during its bombardment. AOAV derived the figures, which use the same methodology for every conflict, using media reports of civilian casualties caused by airstrikes. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday said “far too many” Palestinians had died since Israel began its bombardment on Oct. 7. A total of 11,078 Palestinians, including 4,500 children, have been killed since Oct. 7, Gaza’s Health Ministry has said.

Gaza’s health system ‘on its knees,’ WHO chief warns | Arab News --The health care system in the Gaza Strip is “on its knees,” the head of the World Health Organization warned Friday, noting that half of the territory’s 36 hospitals are no longer functioning. Speaking to the Security Council, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the situation on the ground as desperate: “Hospital corridors crammed with the injured, the sick, the dying; morgues overflowing; surgery without anesthesia; tens of thousands of displaced people sheltering at hospitals.” “The health system is on its knees, and yet somehow is continuing to deliver lifesaving care,” he said. Tedros said there had been more than 250 attacks on health care — such as strikes on hospitals, clinics, ambulances and patients — in Gaza and the West Bank, and 25 such attacks in Israel in the conflict triggered by Hamas’s shock October 7 assault. “The best way to support those health workers and the people they serve is by giving them the tools they need to deliver that care — medicines, medical equipment and fuel for hospital generators,” he said, calling for an increase in aid trickling in through the Rafah crossing with Egypt and repeating the UN’s call for a cease-fire. “I understand what the children of Gaza must be going through, because as a child, I went through the same thing,” said the WHO chief, who is from Ethiopia’s Tigray region. “The sound of gunfire and shells whistling through the air; the smell of smoke after they struck; tracer bullets in the night sky; the fear; the pain; the loss — these things have stayed with me throughout my life.” He also denounced the “horrific, barbaric and unjustifiable attacks” carried out by Hamas fighters, and demanded the release of hostages held by the militant group.

Israeli missile strike hits hospital in southern Lebanon | Arab News --Hostilities on the southern Lebanese front escalated on Friday, as Israeli shelling for the first time reached the Mays Al-Jabal Governmental Hospital, damaging it and injuring a doctor. Imran Riza, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Lebanon, called on “all parties to adhere to international humanitarian law throughout their military operations strictly, and to protect civilians, including humanitarian and medical workers, wherever they are.” Pleading for all civilian sites, including homes, farms and hospitals, to be protected, he urged all sides to “exercise restraint and avoid further escalation” and said further suffering among the civilian population must be avoided. The missile that hit the hospital did not explode but it caused damage to the emergency department and injured a doctor there, the hospital’s director, Dr. Hussein Yassin, said. The Lebanese Ministry of Public Health condemned the attack, describing it as “flagrant defiance of all the international laws and treaties.” It said it holds “Israeli authorities fully responsible for this unjustifiable act, which would have led to catastrophic results had the artillery shell targeting the hospital exploded,” and called for “a thorough and fair investigation to hold those behind these crimes accountable.” Elsewhere, Israeli warplanes were seen flying over Beirut. Meanwhile, a military source denied reports that the Lebanese army had cleared its position in the Bir Shuaib area close to the village of Blida near the southeastern border. The source said the army does not have an outpost in that region, only a mobile security point “where soldiers remain.” “We have recently witnessed alarming attacks killing and injuring civilians in south Lebanon, including women, children and media personnel,” he said. “Significant damage has also been inflicted upon private property, public infrastructure and agricultural land, forcing over 25,000 people to be displaced. Local farmers risk their lives to harvest olives and tobacco, crucial for sustaining their livelihoods and income.” The Israeli army said its aircraft had bombed Hezbollah infrastructure in Lebanon in response to the firing of guided missiles from Lebanese territory. The attacks “targeted Hezbollah compounds, observation points and technological equipment,” it added.

Attacks on Gaza civilians and facilities are ‘unjustifiable’: Saudi minister | Arab News --Saudi Arabia’s culture minister reiterated the Kingdom’s condemnation of the ongoing “unjustifiable” attacks on civilians in Gaza and facilities, the Saudi Press Agency reported. “We strongly condemn the continuous attacks on civilians and the destruction of schools, hospitals, and cultural properties in the Gaza Strip and the occupied Palestinian territories,” Prince Badr bin Farhan said in a speech at UNESCO’s General Conference in Paris. He described these actions as “unjustifiable violations that are contrary to international norms and laws.” The minister said the Kingdom’s condemnation of these practices are “based on the UNESCO’s founding charter, which promotes international understanding as a prerequisite for preventing the recurrence of crimes, genocides, racism, and wars.” “Hence, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia calls for intensified international efforts to protect the rights of civilians in a way that contributes to the achievement of global peace and stability,” the minister said.

Saudi ambassador and other Arab envoys discuss Gaza conflict with speaker of Irish Parliament | Arab News --Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Ireland, Nail Al-Jubeir, and other Arab envoys to the country met the speaker of the Irish Parliament, Sean O Fearghail, the Saudi Press Agency reported on Friday. Their discussions included the continuing Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, and the envoys called on Ireland, in keeping with the principles and norms of international humanitarian law, to join international efforts to halt the military operations, protect civilians, secure the release of hostages and prisoners, and end the forced displacement of Palestinians. The ambassadors also stressed the important need to enable the safe delivery of urgent relief aid and medical supplies, without restrictions, to the territory to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe that is claiming the lives of innocent people, including women and children, and could have grave consequences for security and stability in the wider region. More than 11,000 Palestinians, nearly half of them children, have been killed in the Gaza Strip as a result of the Israeli assaults since Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, according to figures from the Gazan Health Ministry. On Thursday, Al-Jubeir and his fellow Arab envoys held similar talks with Irish President Michael Higgins. During that meeting they told him the only way to ensure security and stability in the region is through a just and comprehensive peace that ensures all the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, the SPA reported. They also discussed the latest developments in the Gaza Strip and called on the international community to take effective, urgent and necessary measures to halt the Israeli aggression and lift the blockade on the besieged territory. They warned that the conflict could have dangerous consequences not only for the Palestinian people but for the wider region, and undermine the chances of achieving lasting peace.

Western Propaganda Gets More Desperate as World Majority Sides with China and Russia Against the US over Gaza - The New York Times, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Telegraph have all recently run pieces attempting to paint Russia and China as anti semitic and/or anti Israel. The propaganda comes as the US tries to discredit any attempts by Moscow and Beijing to lead more international involvement in the Palestine-Israel peace process.Let’s start with The New York Times, which has run at least two articles in recent days in which the argument basically boils down to the following: some people in Russia and China say bad things about Jews on the Internet; therefore the governments are anti-Israel.Here’s the New York Times in an Oct. 28 piece, “As China Looks to Broker Gaza Peace, Antisemitism Surges Online”:But even as China seeks to turn down the temperature diplomatically, a surge of antisemitism and anti-Israeli sentiment is proliferating across the Chinese internet and state media, undermining Beijing’s efforts to convey impartiality. China has already come under pressure from the United States and Israel for its refusal to condemn Hamas for its Oct. 7 attack that started the war.On China’s heavily censored internet, inflammatory speech critical of Israel is rampant, with commenters seemingly emboldened by that refusal. And China’s state-run media is seizing on the conflict to accuse the United States of turning a blind eye to Israeli aggression, while perpetuating tropes of Jewish control of American politics.China Daily, a state-run newspaper, ran an editorial on Monday declaring that the United States was on the “wrong side of history in Gaza.” It said Washington was exacerbating the conflict by “blindly backing Israel.” The piece goes on to mention other cases of private citizens making statements the Times deems questionable, such as an influencer with millions of followers who decided to call Hamas a “resistance organization” rather than a “terrorist organization.” The Times concludes:It is hard to say whether the anti-Israeli positions in state media and antisemitism on the Chinese internet are part of a coordinated campaign. But China’s state media rarely veers from the official position of the country’s Communist Party, and its hair-trigger internet censors are keenly attuned to the wishes of its leaders, quick to remove any content that sways public sentiment in an unwanted direction, especially on matters of such geopolitical importance.First off, I remember when news media outlets in the First Amendment-loving US used to criticize China for its lack of press freedom; but the New York Times is now accusing Beijing of not cracking down enough on its news media and online discourse in order to silence criticism of Israel and the US. Good luck with that.Inherent in this complaint from the Times is a belief that China should not try to take a balanced approach to the conflict, it must “condemn Hamas” and it cannot criticize the US approach to the conflict, nor the US’ decades-long failure to broker a peace agreement.What’s more is that the Times is in effect concluding that the comments of random private citizens (and the government’s inability or unwillingness to censor them) in a country of 1.4 billion people is therefore the official position of the Chinese government. If we apply that same standard to the US, how easy is it to go on Twitter, Facebook, etc. and find crazy comments by Americans? Is it fair to conclude that those rantings represent US policy? In many cases, they’re not far removed from Washington’s increasingly unhinged actions throughout the world, but that still doesn’t make them the official position of the state.

The Impossibility of Negotiated Settlements in the Gaza and Ukraine Conflicts - by Yves Smith -Although some analysts have given reasons why negotiated solutions to the wars in the Gaza and Ukraine are not in the cards, for the most part, they have also been hesitant to say that in a simple noun-verb sentence. Perhaps they hope against hope that a frame-breaking event will radically shift the current boundary conditions for the various parties. Or they hew to the “messaging can create realities” school of thought, and don’t want to legitimate very bad outcomes, no matter how likely they seem. Or it may be that as a matter of personal style, they are averse to being declarative.So let’s look at why, despite the new round of Western officials (and in the case of Gaza, what is coming to be called the Global Majority) and the press making noises about talks the Middle East and Russia-Ukraine, there are yawning chasms between what the two sides are willing to do, and no prospect of meaningful movement in their positions even if the key players change. If you parse down the problem to key considerations, it’s not hard to find the underlying rigidities.With Israel and Palestine, there is a widespread consensus, which includes many non-Zionist Jews, that the only route to a durable peace is the two state solution. But the current hard right government and an ever-more-powerful settler cohort are committed to a policy of securing Israel for Jews only, and on top of that, a “historical” Israel which means more territory. Existing conditions, such as the degree of balkanization of Palestinian living space, also render a two state solution untenable. And the Hamas October 7 attacks have radicalized some of the moderate Jews in Israel. A Palestinian state would have a military. Not hard in the current climate to scaremonger around that prospect. It is true that Prime Minister Netanyahu has powerful personal incentives to keep the crisis going as long as possible. The prospect of imprisonment wonderfully focuses the mind. Therefore US punditocracy too often depicts Netanyahu were the problem. The implication is f he could be removed, the situation would become more tractable. That’s false.While Netanyahu has been the lead architect of the anti-Palestinian policies and is an extremely cunning politician, those positions and practices are now very well embedded. The second problem is that the economic marginalization and cordoning of the Palestine population has become so advanced that it looks impossible to unwind it….tacitly, without costs to Israelis that they would not accept. Key sections from an article in Vox from February 2023 by Jonathan Guyer. Note his prescient call of the risk of a third Initifada:The third issue is despite the US in theory having leverage over Israel, in practice we don’t due to the power of the Israel lobby in the Beltway. Guyer’s article pointed out that when the Biden State Department top human rights appointee Sarah Margon had her confirmation held up for two years over a tweet that approved of AirBnB removing listings in settlements in the West Bank. Ranking member and gentile James Risch depicted Jewish Margon as an anti-Semitic. She eventually withdrew her candidacy.As Professor John Mearsheimer put it in his interview last Friday with Judge Napolitano (starting at 1:34): [...]Mearsheimer charitably depicts Biden and Blinken as interested in curbing Israel, ifnothing else for the benefit of Israel. But that’s hard to see. Alastair Crooke pointed out in (also in a Judge Napolitano interview) that Biden had done less than any recent president to advance the two state solution (I infer that means even Trump gave it more lip service).Biden also has the established habit of saying things that are expedient at the time that have no relationship to his policy aims, like telling China’s President Xi that the US supports the China one-state policy, then turning around and continuing to escalate in Taiwan. So he and Blinken are mouthing the two state remedy because even though it is no answer, it at least makes them appear responsible and fair-minded when they are anything but.So one has to wonder what the latest Blinken round of visits to the Middle East was supposed to accomplish, since all it did was expose our impotence. Even the Financial Times could not hide that the meetings with Netanyahu and then Arab leaders were a train wreck. Netanyahu rejected even any itty bitty ceasefire, branded a humanitarian pause, to get relief in, demanding that Hamas release all hostages first.¹ The fact that Israel has welched or underperformed on its past begrudging promises to let trucks from Egypt in, would make that a non-starter even before getting to Hamas being sure to stick to its position of wanting to trade hostages for Palestinian prisoners. And of course the Arab states are not about to budge. Blinken got a more pointed version of what he was told before. From the pink paper:

France’s Macron urges Israel to stop bombing Gaza - Israel must stop bombing Gaza and killing civilians, French President Emmanuel Macron told the BBC in an interview published late on Friday. Macron said there was “no justification” for the bombing and saying a cease-fire would benefit Israel. He said that France “clearly condemns” the “terrorist” actions of Hamas, but that while recognizing Israel’s right to protect itself, “we do urge them to stop this bombing” in Gaza. When asked if he wanted other leaders — including in the United Sates and Britain — to join his calls for a cease-fire, Macron said: “I hope they will.” Israel has faced growing calls for restraint in its month-long war with Hamas but says the Gaza-based militants, who attacked Israel on Oct. 7 and took hostages, would exploit a truce to regroup. In a statement responding to Macron’s comments, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that world leaders should be condemning Hamas, and not Israel. “These crimes that Hamas (is) committing today in Gaza will be committed tomorrow in Paris, New York and anywhere in the world,” Netanyahu said. Macron’s interview to the BBC aired a day after a humanitarian conference on Gaza was held in Paris. Macron said the “clear conclusion” of all governments and agencies present at that summit was “that there is no other solution than first a humanitarian pause, going to a cease-fire, which will allow to protect... all civilians having nothing to do with terrorists.” “De facto — today, civilians are bombed — de facto. These babies, these ladies, these old people are bombed and killed. So there is no reason for that and no legitimacy. So we do urge Israel to stop,” he said.

Israel agrees to 4-hour pauses every day in Gaza -- The four-hour humanitarian pauses will begin on Thursday, according to the White House. National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said Israel will announce each humanitarian pause at least three hours in advance. Kirby said the pauses could also help to secure the release of the some 240 hostages held by Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that conducted the Oct. 7 attack in Israel. The hostages include Americans. “We believe these pauses are a step in the right direction, particularly to help ensure that civilians have an opportunity to reach safer areas away from the act of fighting,” Kirby said. Israel will also open up a second corridor on the coast to allow Palestinians fleeing northern Gaza to head south. President Biden has pushed for longer humanitarian pauses — as much as three days — but Israel appears resistant to the idea. “It’s taking a little longer than I hoped,” Biden told reporters when asked if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was listening to him. The war in Gaza has killed more than 10,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza, and the war is expected to get more intense as Israel fights in Gaza City, a Hamas stronghold.

Ukraine Takes Credit for Car Bombing That Killed Politician in Luhansk - Ukraine’s CIA-backed military intelligence has taken credit for a car bombing that killed a politician in Russian-controlled eastern Ukraine on Wednesday. Mikhail Filiponenko, a member of the local Russian-backed legislature in Luhansk and former police chief, was killed in his car outside of his house. He was born in the Ukrainian oblast and joined the separatists who declared the creation of the Luhansk People’s Republic in 2014 following the coup that ousted former President Viktor Yanukovych.According to AP, Filiponenko had survived a previous car bombing on February 21, 2022, three days before Russia invaded Ukraine. Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Directorate, known as the GUR, claimed that Filiponenko was involved in torture camps in Luhansk.Andriy Cherniak, a representative for the GUR, told POLITICO that the Wednesday killing of Filiponenko was “our operation.” The GUR said in a statement that it had the addresses of all “traitors” and warned that “all war criminals and collaborators will receive a fair retribution! The hunt continues!”A recent report from The Washington Post detailed how the CIA helped build up the GUR and the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), including tens of millions of dollars in funding since 2015. A former US intelligence official described the GUR as “our little baby” and said the US provided “all new equipment and training.”