Category: News Daypop

The stock market recovered from big early losses on Monday after investors jumped in before the closing bell. The Dow Jones Industrial Average swung 1,217 points and closed up 0.3% after dropping 1,000 points as investors worried over possible conflict between Russia and Ukraine, and anticipated inflation-fighting measures from the Federal Reserve.

The price of oil and bitcoin fell, and so did the yield on 10-year Treasury notes, a sign of investor concern about the economy. The decline in stock prices has come as the Fed has signaled its readiness to begin raising its benchmark short-term interest rate in 2022 to try to tame inflation, which is at its highest level in nearly four decades. By early afternoon on Monday, the selling lost momentum —  the Dow was down 598 points, or 1.8%, to 33,570 after falling more than 1,000 points earlier. The S&P 500 fell 2% to 4,310, and is now down about 10.1% from the closing high it set on Jan. 3. A close of 4,316.90 or lower will put it into a correction. The Nasdaq fell 1.8% after having been down 4.9% in the early going.

The market is waiting to hear from Federal Reserve policymakers after their latest meeting ends Wednesday. Economists have expressed concern that the Fed is already moving too late to combat high inflation, or say they worry that the Fed may act too aggressively.  Investors are also keeping an eye on the tension between Russia and the West over concerns that Moscow is planning to invade Ukraine, with NATO outlining potential troop and ship deployments.

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The Pentagon announced Monday it has put up to 8,500 U.S. troops on heightened alert to deploy to Eastern Europe amid escalating tensions over Russia’s build-up of troops on its border with Ukraine. Defense Department press secretary John Kirby told reporters that “prepare to deploy orders” had been issued by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to troops stationed at several installations, however, they have not yet been officially activated.

NATO also announced Monday that it was placing additional military forces on standby and sending ships and fighter jets to Eastern Europe to deter and guard against a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine.  Kirby also said: “In the event of NATO’s activation of the NRF or a deteriorating security environment, the United States would be in a position to rapidly deploy additional brigade combat teams, logistics, medical, aviation, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, transportation and additional capabilities into Europe.”

President Joe Biden conferred with European leaders in a secure video call to formulate a plan to handle new developments in the standoff.  Biden spoke with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, Polish President Andrzej Duda, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and European Council President Charles Michel.

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A Los Angeles area shooting at a house party early Sunday left four people dead and another injured.  According to local reports and city officials, the shooting took place in Inglewood — a city of about 100,000 people 10 miles southwest of downtown Los Angeles — around 1:30 a.m.

Three people were pronounced dead at the scene, and paramedics rushed two others to the hospital. One of them died en route to the hospital, and the other is expected to survive. The victims who died were reportedly two females and two males.

Inglewood Mayor James Butts spoke to reporters on Sunday and described the shooting as an “ambush” involving multiple shooters firing multiple weapons including a rifle and a handgun. The mayor said it was the largest number of single shooting victims in Inglewood since the 1990s.  Said Butts of the shooters: “These are sociopathic killers that have to be sequestered from society. Turn yourselves in. We will find you, and we will prosecute you.”

Police haven’t released a potential motive or said if any of the victims were targeted. The man who survived allegedly admitted to being a member of a street gang in another city, and investigators are trying to determine if the shooting was gang-related.

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The Chairman of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol said on Sunday that the panel has spoken with former U.S. Attorney General William Barr.

The Chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., told CBS News’ Face the Nation that the committee had spoken to Barr and Department of Defense officials about reports that former President Donald Trump had been presented a draft of an executive order directing the defense secretary to seize voting machines in battleground states in December 2020. Said Thompson:  “To be honest with you, we’ve had conversations with the former attorney general already. We have talked to Department of Defense individuals. We are concerned that our military was part of this big lie on promoting that the election was false. So, if you are using the military to potentially seize voting machines, even though it’s a discussion, the public needs to know, we’ve never had that before.”

Thompson also said on Sunday that the committee was “in the process of reviewing” 700 pages of Trump administration documents that were handed to the panel after the Supreme Court ruled to deny Trump’s request to block their release.  He said:  “We’ll see if that information leads us to additional individuals to make requests. But it’s so significant to our investigation to have the documents and executive privilege and other things obviously had no bearing and we’re just happy for the Supreme Court decision. We’ll look forward to reviewing it and based on the review, we’ll take next steps.”   Thompson added the committee still expected to hold public hearings for its investigation in the spring: “We are reviewing thousands of pages of documents, hundreds of witnesses,” he said. “It’s taken a good bit of time for the committee to put together. And hearings at this point, we expect to be sometime in the spring.”

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The chairman of the House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol said the panel will ask Ivanka Trump, former President Donald Trump’s eldest daughter who served as a top White house adviser, to testify voluntarily.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss. told reporters in the Capitol on Thursday: “You will anticipate the committee inviting some people to come talk to us. Not lawmakers right now — Ivanka Trump.”  The January 6th Committee said it has evidence that Ivanka Trump “was in direct contact with the former President on Jan 6th,” and she may have “direct knowledge of the former President’s attempt to persuade Vice President [Mike] Pence to take action to stop the counting of electoral votes.”

Thompson said in a letter to Ivanka Trump that rather than respecting court rulings or the outcome of the Electoral College vote, Trump planned to enlist Pence to “unilaterally reject certain states’ votes” to change the outcome of the 2020 election.

The panel was seeking her voluntary cooperation with the investigation in four specific areas, according to the letter. The letter proposed meeting with Ivanka Trump in early February to discuss these matters.

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On Thursday, President Joe Biden attempted to clarify his stance on a potential Russian incursion into Ukraine, this after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky took issue with comments Biden made during a U.S. presidential briefing. Biden said Thursday that Russia will “pay a heavy price” for any invasion of neighboring Ukraine.

Biden addressed the military buildup Wednesday during a news conference, drawing a distinction between a potential “minor incursion” and a stronger invasion, saying:  “I think what you’re going to see is that Russia will be held accountable if it invades and it depends on what it does. It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and then we end up having to fight about what to do and not do, etc., but if they actually do what they’re capable of doing with the forces they’ve amassed on the border it is going to be a disaster for Russia if they further invade Ukraine and our allies and partners are ready to impose severe cost and significant harm on Russia and the Russian economy.”

However Ukrainian President Zelensky said Thursday that no invasion into Ukraine would be considered minor, tweeting: “We want to remind the great powers that there are no minor incursions and small nations. Just as there are no minor casualties and little grief from the loss of loved ones. I say this as the President of a great power.”  In response, Biden attempted to clarify that no matter the size of a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine, the United States and its allies would stand against Moscow, explaining: “I’ve been absolutely clear with President [Vladimir] Putin. He has no misunderstanding. If any — any — assembled Russian units move across Ukrainian border, that is an invasion. But it will be met with severe and coordinated economic response that I’ve discussed in detail with our allies, as well as laid out very clearly for President Putin. Let there be no doubt at all: If Putin makes this choice, Russia will pay a heavy price.”

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Two Marines were killed Wednesday in an accident outside Camp LeJeune in Jacksonville, North Carolina, after a military vehicle rolled over.  The unit confirmed in a tweet that the seven-ton truck was carrying members of the 2nd Marine Logistics Group, which is headquartered at Camp LeJeune: “We are working closely with @camp_lejeune and Onslow County officials to gather details regarding this incident. We will release more information as it becomes available.”

Sen. Thom Tillis, of North Carolina, wrote on social media that he and wife Susan “are praying for the families of the Marines who were tragically killed in an accident at Camp Lejeune, & we are praying for the full recovery of the Marines who were injured. God Bless our service members who put their lives at risk every day to protect our nation.”

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President Joe Biden held a formal news conference at the White House on Wednesday, the eve of the one-year anniversary of his inauguration.  Wednesday’s session marked just the second time Biden has held a solo formal press conference at the White House; the first such news conference was held March 25, 2021.

Biden took questions from reporters on his handling of the pandemic, the economy and legislative agenda, and characterizing the country as unified.  Before fielding questions from reporters, Biden said: “It’s been a year of challenges, but it’s also many years of enormous progress.” 

Biden touted wins over the year, including administering more than 200 million COVID-19 vaccine doses and hitting record-low unemployment rates in many states — despite Biden’s approval rating in polls hitting an all-time low. In his opening remarks, Biden acknowledged: “Should we have done more testing earlier? Yes. But we’re doing more now. We’ve gone from zero at-home tests a year ago to 375 million tests on the market just this month.” On the subject of COVID-19, Biden said the country is “in a better place than we’ve been and have been thus far” and reiterated his position not to go back to lockdowns and school closures.

When Biden was questioned as to whether he overpromised to the American public what his administration could achieve in office one year in, the President replied:  “Look, I didn’t overpromise. I have probably outperformed what anybody thought would happen. The fact of the matter is that we’re in a situation where we have made enormous progress.”  He then acknowledged: “One thing I haven’t been able to do so far, is get my Republican friends to get in the game of making things better in this country. I did not anticipate that there’d be such a stalwart effort to make sure that the most important thing was that President Biden didn’t get anything done.”

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On Tuesday, the House select committee investigating the January 6 assault on U.S. Capitol issued subpoenas to former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and three others – Jenna Ellis and Sidney Powell, two lawyers who worked to promote the president’s false claims about the election, as well as Boris Epshteyn, a former Trump White House aide.

The committee is demanding documents and testimony from Giuliani, Ellis, Powell, and Boris Epshteyn, who all challenged the 2020 election results. The panel’s chairman Bennie Thompson said in a statement: “the four individuals we’ve subpoenaed today advanced unsupported theories about election fraud, pushed efforts to overturn the election results, or were in direct contact with the former President about attempts to stop the counting of electoral votes.”

Giuliani, Ellis, Powell, and Boris Epshteyn participated in a November 19, 2020 press conference that featured outlandish claims the election had been stolen and that Trump had won in a “landslide.”

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One day ahead of the scheduled rollout of free COVID-19 tests distributed by the Biden administration, Americans are able to place orders for their free test kits through a form posted by the U.S. Postal Service. The White House announced last week that it would publicly launch the site covidtests.gov on Wednesday, 1/19. However, by Tuesday morning the site was up and running.  By early Tuesday afternoon, more than 500,000 users were visiting the test website. Every household is eligible to order four rapid antigen COVID-19 tests for free, to be delivered by the Postal Service, which will begin shipping tests in late January.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Tuesday: “It will officially launch tomorrow morning. It’s in the beta testing phase right now.”   A White House official said in a statement that the website is running at “limited capacity” as the government works to troubleshoot potential issues ahead of its formal launch Wednesday. An announcement was added to the webpage on Tuesday afternoon, saying that the administration has “tests for every residential address in the U.S.” and urged Americans to “check back tomorrow if you run into any unexpected issues.”

The White House also says it plans to launch a hotline that will allow Americans to order their own tests over the phone, if they have difficulty ordering on the website. Orders of the COVID-19 tests will be delivered for free via first-class mail. .

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