
The American coup: From Jim Crow to digital authoritarians
US President Trump's relentless attacks on institutions, the rule of law and the press have left many fearing for the future of American democracy. So is the United States sliding into authoritarianism?
This week on UpFront, Marc Lamont Hill speaks to one of the pre-eminent historians of fascism, Professor of History and Italian Studies at New York University, Ruth Ben-Ghiat.
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Qatar Tribune
2 hours ago
- Qatar Tribune
Iran threatens to strike US bases if conflict erupts over nuclear programme
TehrancTypeface:> Iran's defence minister has said his country would target US military bases in the region if conflict breaks out with the United States, as President Donald Trump said he was losing confidence that a nuclear deal would be agreed. Washington and Tehran have held five rounds of talks since April as Trump seeks an agreement that would place constraints on Iran's uranium enrichment. He has threatened to attack Iran if no deal can be agreed. Trump said that he was growing less confident that a nuclear deal would be reached, in comments in a podcast released on Wednesday. 'I don't know,' the US leader told the podcast Pod Force One on Monday, when asked whether he thought he could strike a deal with Iran. 'I'm less confident now than I would have been a couple of months ago. Something happened to them, but I am much less confident of a deal being made,' he said. (Agencies)


Qatar Tribune
2 hours ago
- Qatar Tribune
China deal ‘done,' Beijing to supply rare earths: Trump
Agencies U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that the U.S. deal with China is 'done,' with Beijing to supply magnets and rare earth minerals while Washington will allow Chinese students in its colleges and universities. 'we are getting a total of 55% tariffs, china is getting 10%. relationship is excellent!' trump wrote on truth social using his trademark capitalization. 'full magnets, and any necessary rare earths, will be supplied, up front, by china. likewise, we will provide to china what was agreed to, including chinese students using our colleges and universities (which has always been good with me!),' trump said. Trump's statement came as China and the U.S., the world's two largest economies, said that they have agreed on a framework to get their trade negotiations back on track after a series of disputes that threatened to derail them. The two sides on Tuesday wrapped up two days of talks in London that appeared to focus on finding a way to resolve disputes over mineral and technology exports that had shaken a fragile truce on trade reached in Geneva last month. The Geneva deal had faltered over China's curbs on critical minerals exports, prompting the Trump administration to respond with export controls of its own, preventing shipments of semiconductor design software, aircraft and other goods to China. Trump's shifting tariff policies have roiled global markets, sparked congestion and confusion in major ports, and cost companies tens of billions of dollars in lost sales and higher costs. 'First, we had to get sort of the negativity out and now we can go forward,' U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told reporters after the London meetings. Asian stock markets rose Wednesday after the agreement was announced. The talks followed a phone call last week between Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to try to calm the waters. Li Chenggang, a vice minister of commerce and China's international trade representative, said the two sides had agreed in principle on a framework for implementing the consensus reached on the phone call and at the talks in Geneva, the official Xinhua News Agency said. Further details, including any plans for a potential next round of talks, were not immediately available. Li and Wang Wentao, China's commerce minister, were part of the delegation led by Vice Premier He Lifeng. They met with Lutnick, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Trade Representative Jamieson Greer at Lancaster House, a 200-year-old mansion near Buckingham Palace. Wendy Cutler, a former U.S. trade negotiator, said the disputes had frittered away 30 of the 90 days the two sides have to try to resolve their disputes. They agreed in Geneva to a 90-day suspension of most of the 100%-plus tariffs they had imposed on each other in an escalating trade war that sparked fears of recession. The World Bank, citing a rise in trade barriers, cut its projections for U.S. and global economic growth on Tuesday. 'The U.S. and China lost valuable time in restoring their Geneva agreements,' said Cutler, now vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute. 'Now, only sixty days remain to address issues of concern, including unfair trade practices, excess capacity, transshipment and fentanyl.' Since the Geneva talks, the U.S. and China have exchanged angry words over advanced semiconductors that power artificial intelligence, visas for Chinese students at American universities and rare earth minerals that are vital to carmakers and other industries. China, the world's biggest producer of rare earths, has signaled it may speed up issuing export licenses for the elements. Beijing, in turn, wants the U.S. to lift restrictions on Chinese access to the technology used to make advanced semiconductors. Lutnick said that resolving the rare earths issue is a fundamental part of the agreed-upon framework and that the U.S. will remove measures it had imposed in response. He did not specify which measures. 'When they approve the licenses, then you should expect that our export implementation will come down as well,' he said. Cutler said it would be unprecedented for the U.S. to negotiate on its export controls, which she described as an irritant that China has been raising for nearly 20 years. 'By doing so, the U.S. has opened a door for China to insist on adding export controls to future negotiating agendas,' she said. In Washington, a federal appeals court agreed Tuesday to let the government keep collecting tariffs that Trump has imposed not just on China but also on other countries worldwide while the administration appeals a ruling against his signature trade policy. Trump said earlier that he wants to 'open up China,' the world's dominant manufacturer, to U.S. products. 'If we don't open up China, maybe we won't do anything,' Trump said at the White House. 'But we want to open up China.'


Al Jazeera
2 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
National Guard ‘expecting a ramp-up' in immigration protests, says official
The National Guard members deployed to the protests in Los Angeles have been trained to temporarily detain civilians if necessary, according to the troops' commander. Nevertheless, as of Wednesday, Major General Scott Sherman clarified that no troops have detained any protester, despite an earlier statement that suggested otherwise. The National Guard's deployment came in response to protests against United States President Donald Trump's push for mass deportation, which recently targeted hardware stores and other businesses in southern California, prompting outrage. Protesters flooded the streets starting on Friday to denounce the immigration raids. Trump responded by sending the military to the scene, denouncing what he considered 'third-world lawlessness' in the city. Since then, however, the protests have spread beyond Los Angeles, to major cities in other parts of the country. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Sherman said authorities 'are expecting a ramp-up' in national unrest in the coming days. 'I'm focused right here in LA, what's going on right here. But you know, I think we're very concerned,' he said. Sherman explained that 500 of the more than 4,000 National Guard members deployed to Los Angeles have also received training to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the immigration raids. His remarks came as condemnation continues to grow over Trump's decision to deploy the National Guard to California without the permission of the state's governor, Gavin Newsom. Since the National Guard arrived on Sunday, Trump has sent nearly 700 Marines to the Los Angeles area as well. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass on Wednesday accused the Trump administration of using the military to escalate tensions in the city, where the protests first broke out on Friday. 'We started off by hearing the administration wanted to go after violent felons, gang members, drug dealers,' Bass said of Trump's deportation push. 'But when you raid Home Depots and workplaces, when you tear parents and children apart, and when you run armoured caravans through our streets, you are not trying to keep anyone safe. You're trying to cause fear and panic. 'And when you start deploying federalised troops on the heels of these raids, it is a drastic and chaotic escalation and completely unnecessary.' Newsom, meanwhile, filed an emergency motion on Tuesday to block Trump from expanding the military presence in Los Angeles beyond federal buildings, with a court hearing set for Thursday. Bass and Governor Newsom have maintained that local law enforcement were able to handle the situation before Trump intervened and that the military presence prompted more unrest, not less. Speaking alongside 30 other California mayors and city leaders on Wednesday, Bass questioned if Trump was seeing how far he could push his presidential power. 'This was provoked by the White House. The reason why? We don't know,' said Bass. 'I posit that maybe we are part of a national experiment to determine how far the federal government can go in reaching in and taking over power from a governor, power from a local jurisdiction.' So far, Trump has maintained that the soldiers' deployment was needed to protect federal property and agents — and was therefore within his executive authority. He has not yet invoked the Insurrection Act of 1807, a federal law that would suspend prohibitions against the military directly taking part in domestic law enforcement. Until that happens, the troops are generally barred from making arrests. Speaking during a news conference on Wednesday, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt repeated Trump's claims that sending in the National Guard and Marines had prevented Los Angeles from spiralling into chaos. She charged that Bass and Newsom had 'shamefully failed to meet their sworn obligations to their citizens'. 'They're attempting to use a violent mob as a weapon against their own constituents to prevent the enforcement of immigration law,' she said. 'This is deeply un-American and morally reprehensible.' Amid the unrest, the Trump administration has pledged to continue its aggressive immigration raids, with officials last month setting a quota of 3,000 arrests a day. Advocates say the pressure has motivated ICE agents to take increasingly drastic measures, targeting anyone in the country without documentation, even those who have not committed criminal offences and those with deep community ties. Reporting from Los Angeles, Al Jazeera's Phil Lavelle said authorities have been conducting blanket raids at Home Depot hardware stores, where undocumented day labourers often gather to find work. At one location, labourers told Lavelle 'that they will continue to come even though they know that these stores are being targeted – even though they know that they will be targets – because quite simply, they've got to work'. 'These are people who are communicating by WhatsApp and other methods,' Lavelle added. 'If anybody is seen in the area who looks like an ICE agent, straight away, there are reports so that people know that they have to leave.' So far, 61 Mexican nationals had been detained in Los Angeles during the recent raids, according to Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum. Trump has repeatedly claimed that the influx of migrants into the US constitutes an 'invasion', which in turn necessitates emergency actions. Speaking on Tuesday from the Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina, he called the protests in California a 'full-blown assault on peace, on public order and our national sovereignty carried out by rioters bearing foreign flags with the aim of continuing a foreign invasion of our country'. But during a congressional hearing on Wednesday, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine was asked whether he believed the US was being invaded by a foreign power. His answer appeared to contradict Trump. 'I don't see any foreign state-sponsored folks invading, but I'll be mindful of the fact that there have been some border issues,' he said.