Former FBI, CIA Director William Webster dies at 101
The FBI confirmed his death in a statement Friday.
Webster, who was the only person to have led both agencies, "was a dedicated public servant who spent over 60 years in service to our country, including in the U.S. Navy, as a federal judge, director of the CIA, and his term as our Director from 1978-1987," the FBI statement said.
As FBI director, Webster served under presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.
He then served as CIA director from 1987 to 1991 under Reagan and President George H.W. Bush.
"As the only individual to have led both the FBI and the CIA, Judge Webster's unwavering integrity and dedication to public service set a standard for leadership in federal law enforcement," the FBI Agents Association said in a statement.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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The Hill
a minute ago
- The Hill
CIA must pull its weight to free Mahmood Habibi in Afghanistan
For many people, August is a fun time to enjoy summer vacation. But for our family, each Aug. 10 reminds us that another year has passed and my brother, Mahmood Habibi, remains in Taliban custody. My brother is a U.S. citizen who obtained citizenship after working on civil aviation issues in support of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. After the U.S. left Afghanistan, he returned to work as a contractor for Asia Consultancy Group, which manages the air traffic control system at Kabul's airport and the cell towers in downtown Kabul. Shortly after the July 2022 drone strike that killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, my brother was arrested along with 30 other employees of his company. They were taken to the headquarters of the General Directorate of Intelligence, the Taliban's feared secret police, and interrogated about the company's involvement in the strike. It became apparent that the Taliban believed the CIA used cameras atop the company's cell towers to target its strike against Zawahiri. Indeed, the missile they used had to be guided to its target by sight, as it used blades rather than a warhead. Eventually, almost all the 31 people were let go, but not my brother — the only U.S. citizen they have. We have been fighting for three years now to get the Taliban to admit they are holding Mahmood so that he can be traded for. Other Americans — Ryan Corbett, George Glezmann, Faye Hall, and William McKenty — were arrested and released in that time, but the Taliban denies they ever had my brother. This denial comes in the face of overwhelming witness testimonies and technical evidence affirming that they arrested him. The Taliban even claimed that they never heard of him — that they looked in their jails and did not find him. As a result, they asserted that he must be dead. In contrast, people held with my brother by the secret police testified that they saw him. One person detained with my brother later reported: 'Even though we were kept in separate rooms next to each other, I could hear Mahmood's voice when he talked. At one point I personally saw Mahmood and one more [Asia Consultancy Group] employee in this … facility.' Congress has been supportive of our efforts. Parallel House and Senate resolutions are being submitted by Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Sen. Corey Booker (D-N.J.). The State Department and FBI have been incredibly supportive of my family, and their efforts under the Trump administration are so much more effective than under the Biden Administration. Whereas the Biden Administration politely asked for the Taliban's help, the Trump administration is now demanding that they hand my brother over. My family feels like we finally have someone fighting for us. Both the FBI and State Department worked together with us to offer a $5 million reward for my brother under the Rewards for Justice program. The National Security Council has also been working to create the conditions to bring Mahmood home and we are grateful to the Trump Administration for their advocacy. Unfortunately, the CIA has not been doing all it can to bring my brother home. They are the outlier in the U.S. government. Should my brother die in Taliban custody, I will consider his blood to be on their hands. Aside from its apparent inaction now, the CIA's first sin was that it failed to warn ACG to direct my brother, who was in the United Arab Emirates at the time of the drone strike, not to go back to Kabul. If the agency's collaboration with the company got my brother arrested, they had a duty of care to tell the company to warn employees against returning so soon after the strike. The best evidence that my brother had nothing to do with it was the fact that he returned to Kabul so soon afterward. At a time when the U.S. has cut off most of our funding to Afghanistan, we believe the CIA is still providing Title 50 support to its General Directorate for Intelligence — the same entity that arrested my brother and now denies having ever heard of him. We believe that the CIA has not leveraged this counter-terrorism relationship to encourage them to free my brother. We believe the CIA is ignoring an American citizen it could help, and who is only in a horrible situation because of its failure to warn him, in favor of a desire to play whack-a-mole with the Taliban against ISIS fighters in Afghanistan. I'm saying 'we believe' this because the CIA has refused every request we have made for a meeting — through the State Department, through the National Security Council and directly — for the last three years. If the CIA wants to be left alone in its efforts to work with Afghan authorities, we have no objection. We are taxpayers and we hate terrorists too. But the only way either the Taliban or the CIA will get peace from us is if the CIA leverages its relationship to encourage the Taliban to let my brother go. In the meantime, we hope the House and Senate Intelligence committees will look into this issue for us.
New York Times
2 minutes ago
- New York Times
Trump Administration Live Updates: Ukraine and Europe Project Unity Before President Meets With Putin
Harvard University and the White House are discussing a deal to end their legal battles. But Friday's moves suggested that the relationship remained contentious. The White House stepped up pressure against Harvard Friday, adding a new investigation into the university's patents and renewing a host of claims that the university is unfit to host international students. The two sides have been working to resolve their differences in recent weeks, but a court motion filed by the government on Friday in a dispute over international students suggested there is still deep acrimony. The motion accuses Harvard of failure to control crime, and claims that Harvard's leadership has 'shown itself to be incapable of properly hosting, monitoring, disciplining, and reporting on its foreign students.' On the same day, Commerce Secretary Howard W. Lutnick sent a letter to Alan M. Garber, Harvard's president, claiming that the university had not lived up to its obligations surrounding federally funded patents, which are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. According to the letter, the agency will begin a comprehensive review of Harvard's compliance with federal law. The additional pressures on Harvard come during a week when the government had also taken significant steps to bring other schools into line with its agenda. President Trump issued a directive that would require colleges and universities to submit reams of new data on students to check whether they are complying with a Supreme Court decision that ended race-based affirmative action. The White House also intensified its campaign against the University of California, Los Angeles, which it stripped of hundreds of millions in research funds over a list of issues. In the court case involving Harvard, the Justice Department was asking a judge to throw out one of two pending lawsuits filed by Harvard against the administration, this one involving the right of the nation's oldest university's right to host international students. Earlier in the year, Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, moved to end Harvard's right to host the students. Harvard sued. When Judge Allison Burroughs of federal court in Boston temporarily blocked the administration action, the White House countered in June by issuing a proclamation blocking international students that invoked a different provision of law. Judge Burroughs, who has expressed skepticism of the Trump administration's crusade against Harvard from the bench and also in written orders, also blocked that effort, issuing a preliminary injunction. On Friday, the government moved to dismiss the lawsuit entirely. (The government's motion on Friday applied only to the case involving international students. It has no effect on the university's lawsuit against the administration about research funding cuts, a case that focuses heavily on constitutional and procedural concerns.) The government's effort could have disrupted the lives of about 5,000 international students attending Harvard last spring, another 2,000 recent graduates, as well as a new cohort of students who plan to arrive this fall. 'Without its international students, Harvard is not Harvard,' the lawsuit said. The university has accused the government of retaliating against it for its refusal to bend to the White House's efforts to control the university's 'governance, curriculum and the ideology of faculty and students.' In its filing Friday, the administration denied that contention. Instead, it listed a number of accusations it has made in previous filings and statements about the school, including that violent crime has increased on campus. Harvard pointed to reporting showing its campus has very low-crime overall. The university's student newspaper, the Harvard Crimson, has reported that the campus police responded to nearly twice as many crimes on campus in 2023 as in 2021, mostly over reports of stolen electric bikes and scooters. There was no evidence that international students were involved in the crimes. In a statement, Harvard said the motion on Friday 'has no impact on Harvard's ability to enroll international students and scholars.' 'The university will continue to defend its rights — and the rights of its students and scholars,' the statement added. In a separate move on Friday, the administration added to its pressure campaign against Harvard when the Commerce Department said it would investigate whether the university was complying with federal laws and regulations around intellectual property that emerge from government-backed research. The investigation is expected to examine whether Harvard complied with myriad requirements related to how the university procures and maintains patents for its ideas and research. In his letter to Dr. Garber, Mr. Lutnick said that his department 'places immense value on the groundbreaking scientific and technological advancements from the government's partnerships with institutions like Harvard.' But, Mr. Lutnick warned, Harvard was also required to follow rules designed to maximize 'the benefits to the American public.' Mr. Lutnick did not include any evidence showing that Harvard, whose researchers generally secure scores of patents each year, had violated the law, but he said that the Commerce Department thought that the university had 'failed to live up to its obligations to the American taxpayer.' Patents can be extraordinarily lucrative for research universities, with their collective values climbing far into the millions of dollars. But if a university does not follow an array of regulatory requirements, the government can essentially dilute or strip a school of its financial stake. Mr. Lutnick said the government was 'initiating' that process. His department asked Harvard to provide a range of records to the government by Sept. 5. In a statement on Friday, Harvard blasted the Commerce Department's letter as 'unprecedented' and 'yet another retaliatory effort targeting Harvard for defending its rights and freedom.' 'Technologies and patents developed at Harvard are lifesaving and industry-redefining,' the university said, adding that it was 'fully committed' to complying with federal law. Michael C. Bender contributed reporting.
Associated Press
2 minutes ago
- Associated Press
A Congolese refugee's 8-year struggle to reunite with her family in the US
BOISE, Idaho (AP) — The Congolese woman's search for safety sent her on a terrifying trek of nearly 2,300 miles (3,700 kilometers) through southern Africa on foot when she was just 15. Reuniting with her family has been a more difficult journey. For eight years, she clung to hope through delays and setbacks as she navigated a U.S. program that reconnects refugees with family members already in the country, and her dream of seeing them again seemed close to becoming a reality. But President Donald Trump signed an executive order halting the refugee program just hours after he took office on Jan. 20, leaving her and thousands of other refugees stranded. 'It was horrible. I would never wish for anyone to go through that, ever. When I think about it, I just ...' she said, pausing to take a long breath. 'Honestly, I had given up. I told my mom maybe it was just not meant for us to see each other again.' During a brief block on the order, the woman made it into the U.S., one of only about 70 refugees to arrive in the country since Trump took office. She asked that her name not be used because she fears retaliation. 'It's been a really devastating roller coaster for those families, to be stuck in this limbo of not knowing whether their hope of being resettled in the United States will ever come true,' said Melissa Keaney, an attorney with the International Refugee Assistance Project. The woman was an infant when her mother fled the Democratic Republic of Congo's civil war in 1997, seeking shelter at Tanzania's Nyarugusu refugee camp. When the camp grew too dangerous, she fled for South Africa. She built a modest life there, always hoping she would rejoin her family, even after they were resettled in the U.S. For a time, that seemed likely, thanks to the 'follow to join' program. The refugee program had bipartisan support for decades, allowing people displaced by war, natural disaster or persecution to legally migrate to the U.S. and providing a pathway to citizenship. But Trump's executive order halting the program said communities didn't have the ability to 'absorb large numbers of migrants, and in particular, refugees.' Organizations like the International Refugee Assistance Project and some refugees, including the Congolese woman and her mother, sued over Trump's order in February. They said resettlement agencies were forced to lay off hundreds of workers and some refugees were left in dangerous places. 'I had a small business and told everyone, 'I'm out now,'' she said. 'It felt like this door had just been opened, and I was running toward it when — boom! — they push it shut right in front of me.' A difficult choice: Family or safety? Looking back on her time in the Nyarugusu refugee camp, she remembers teaching her little brother to ride a bike and whispering with her sister late at night. She remembers hunger and fear as attacks on refugees foraging outside the camp increased. 'You see someone hanged, and that brings fear,' she said. 'You don't know if you'll be next. You don't know if they're waiting for you.' By 2012, the camp was especially dangerous for teen girls, who were at risk of being kidnapped or assaulted. With little hope of a viable future, her mother made a plan: The 15-year-old would walk to South Africa, where she would have a better chance of finishing school and building a life. Her siblings were too young to make the journey, so she would have to go alone. She didn't know the way, so joined other travelers, often going without food during the six-week journey. The crossing from Mozambique into Zimbabwe was deep in a forest. The group she was following had hired a guide, but he abandoned them in the middle of the night. Under the thin moonlight, the group walked toward a cellphone tower in the distance, hoping to find civilization. 'How we made it to the other side was only God,' she said. A family, worlds apart In Durban, South Africa, she finished school, started a tailoring business, joined a church and volunteered helping homeless people. Then in 2016, the 19-year-old got unexpected news: Her family was being resettled in the United States, without her. 'It happened so fast,' she said. 'When I left, the idea of them going to be resettled was never in the mind at all.' Her family settled in Boise, Idaho, and her mother signed her up for the 'follow to join' program in 2017. The program often takes years and requires strict vetting with interviews, medical exams and documentation. At the start of 2020, the woman was asked to provide a DNA sample, typically one of the final steps. Then the COVID pandemic hit. For the next several years, her case foundered. A social worker would send her to the local consulate, where she'd be told to go back to the social worker. 'It went on and on,' she said. Last year, her case was handed over to lawyers volunteering their time 'and that's when we started seeing some light.' A roller coaster of hope and despair By January, she had her travel documents and gave up her home. But her plane ticket wasn't issued before Trump took office. Within hours, he suspended the refugee program, and the consulate told the woman she could no longer have her passport and visa. 'That was the worst moment of my life,' she said. Nearly 130,000 refugees had conditional approval to enter the U.S. when Trump halted the program, the administration said in court documents. At least 12,000 of them were about to travel. The aid groups' lawsuit asks a judge to declare Trump's executive order illegal. A federal judge granted a nationwide injunction temporarily blocking the order in late February. An appeals court blocked most of the injunction weeks later. But that brief legal window was enough: A group of refugee advocates donated funds to cover the woman's flight to the U.S. Her family met her at the airport in March — a joyful reunion more than a dozen years in the making. 'They made a feast, and there were drinks and songs and we'd dance,' she said, smiling. The appeals court ordered the government to admit thousands more conditionally accepted refugees, but the administration has created new roadblocks, Keaney said, including decreasing the time refugees' security screenings are valid to 30 days —- down from three years. 'It causes cascades in delays, setting people back months or more,' Keaney said. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit are waiting for the courts to decide what the government must do to comply with the ruling. Rebuilding relationships The Congolese woman, now 28, is still getting to know her youngest brothers, who were children when she left for South Africa. One is now a father. 'It's been a long time and a lot has changed, you know, on my side and on their side,' she said. 'I'm still on that learning journey. We are getting to bond again.' Boise is friendly, but she hasn't escaped the worries she hoped to leave behind. She fears being exposed as the plaintiff in a lawsuit against the Trump administration will turn her family into targets for harassment. 'Home is where my family is. If me being known can bring any kind of negative impact ... I don't want to even imagine that happening,' she said.
