US lawmakers look to boost Ukraine, sanction Russia, sources say
WASHINGTON, April 14 (Reuters) - Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced legislation on Monday to bolster Ukraine in its war with Russia, another effort to pressure the Trump administration to back the Kyiv government, sources familiar with the effort said.
Representative Greg Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced the Ukraine Support Act, which would provide security and reconstruction funding for Ukraine and impose steep sanctions on Russia, according to a copy of the bill seen by Reuters.
The bill, which has not yet been made public, was filed two weeks after Republicans and Democrats in the Senate introduced stiff sanctions that would be imposed on Russia if it refuses to engage in good-faith peace negotiations with Ukraine.
The efforts in Congress reflect increasing concern among lawmakers from both parties about Ukraine's fate, as Republican President Donald Trump has taken a more conciliatory stance toward Moscow since starting his second term on January 20.
Trump, who is trying to broker a peace agreement, has repeatedly blamed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for the three-year-old conflict even though it began with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He did so again on Monday, with a complaint about Kyiv asking for missiles.
Congressional aides who helped write the House bill said their goal was to influence negotiations on any Ukraine-related legislation eventually passed by Congress. Parts of the bill were expected to appear in any final broad Ukraine package even if the measure itself cannot find a way forward in the Republican-majority House.
"This bill obviously will be part of the legislative conversation," one said.
The effort was given additional urgency on Sunday, when two Russian ballistic missiles hit the center of the northern Ukrainian city of Sumy as residents attended Palm Sunday church services. Kyiv said the attack killed 34 people and wounded 117, dozens of them civilians.
Russia's defence ministry said it had targeted a gathering of Ukrainian commanding officers in the city.
ADMINISTRATION AT ODDS?
Trump administration officials have been increasingly at odds over how to settle the Ukraine-Russia conflict, Reuters has reported, with some suggesting Ukraine should cede territory to Russia and others favoring more direct support to Ukraine.
The House bill is divided into three sections and would provide more support than the Ukraine legislation in the Senate.
The first affirms support for Ukraine and NATO and includes measures to help Ukraine rebuild, including creating the position of a special coordinator for Ukraine reconstruction.
The second provides security assistance for Kyiv, including direct loans and military financing, and the third would impose stiff sanctions and export controls on Russia, including on financial institutions, oil and mining and Russian officials.
While many members of Congress from both parties have strongly supported Ukraine during the three-year conflict, many of Trump's closest Republican allies have grown cooler since his party took control of the House two years ago, and then the White House and Senate in January.
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Los Angeles protests news: Trump feuds with Newsom as marines arrive
Greg Abbott, the Republican governor of Texas, has said that more than a dozen protesters were arrested in his state during clashes on Monday. Protests against the federal government's crackdown on illegal immigration broke out in several major cities, including Austin, Houston and Dallas. 'Peaceful protesting is legal,' Abbott said in a post on X. 'But once you cross the line, you will be arrested.' Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, has defended the decision to deploy marines to Los Angeles, where they were sent yesterday to assist the National Guard in tackling the protests. Addressing a congressional committee, Hegseth said that the troops were needed to support ICE operations rounding up illegal migrants in the city. 'We believe ICE agents should be safe in doing their operations, and we have deployed National Guard and the marines to protect them in the execution of their duties,' Hegseth told the House appropriations committee on defence. 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They shouldn't be deployed on American soil facing their own countrymen to fulfil the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial president.' However, Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, announced the marines' deployment and said the government had 'an obligation to defend federal law-enforcement officers, even if Gavin Newsom will not'. • Read in full: Is Trump's deployment of marines 'un-American' or necessary? Protests over recent weeks in some sanctuary cities — those where laws restrict local and state law enforcement assisting federal immigration authorities — have remained largely peaceful. In Seattle, several demonstrators gathered outside City Hall to protest against the arrest of the California trade union leader David Huerta. Protesters rallied in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on Monday. David McMahon, an activist, told NBC that at least 20 migrants had been arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the neighbouring city Norristown. 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A small group of protesters also gathered inside Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan, holding signs describing the migrant arrests and deportations as 'kidnappings' and demanding that the Trump administration 'brings them home'. Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, is to appear before both the House of Representatives and the Senate today, where he will be asked about the deployment of US Marines to Los Angeles. The sessions, ostensibly to discuss the Pentagon's budget — which is expected to climb to $1 trillion for the first time — will be the first time Congress has been able to question a leading member of the administration about the deployment. Hegseth will defend the move but he is likely to come under pressure from Democrats and moderate Republicans. President Trump is due to speak this afternoon at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, which is one of the largest military bases in the world. His schedule reports that he will watch a 'military demonstration' before speaking at 4pm local time (9pm BST). It comes before a full military parade in Washington on Saturday, which happens to also be his 79th birthday, but the timing is notable given the president's deployment of troops to quell the anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles. Los Angeles would be 'burning to the ground right now' if federal troops had not been sent in, President Trump has said. Writing on his Truth Social platform, the president compared the unrest in 'that once beautiful and great city' to the destruction wreaked by the Los Angeles wildfires in January, saying '25,000 houses burnt to the ground in LA do [sic] to an incompetent governor and mayor'. Trump criticised Gavin Newsom, the state governor, and Karen Bass, the mayor, for a 'bungled' permitting system that he claimed meant people were unable to rebuild their homes. Keep up to date with the latest news, politics and analysis from America in our weekly newsletter After the public standoff between the Republican president and the Democratic governor of California, opposition to the immigration crackdown appears to spread as protests erupt in other cities. With volatility rising, how popular is Trump's administration across America? Polls aggregated by The Times data team show the president's approval rating sits at 45 per cent, marginally higher compared with his first term but notably below that of an equivalent period during Joe Biden's presidency. Some 52 per cent of voters disapprove of Trump's performance in office. • Trump's approval rating: tracking the latest opinion polls While Trump faced criticism for railing against the sanctuary city policy in Los Angeles and other cities, before the protests a majority of Americans had supported his programme to deport immigrants illegally in the US, according to a YouGov poll for CBS. Some 54 per cent of respondents approved of the policy, against 46 per cent opposed. The California governor has suggested that Trump's deployment of US Marines to Los Angeles is a political stunt ahead of the president's planned military parade on Saturday. In a post on X late on Monday, Gavin Newsom wrote: 'US Marines serve a valuable purpose for this country — defending democracy. They are not political pawns. 'The secretary of defence is illegally deploying them onto American streets so Trump can have a talking point at his parade this weekend. It's a blatant abuse of power. We will sue to stop this.' • Read the full report on Trump's parade here: Inside Trump's birthday military parade President Trump called for the arrest of the California governor and said that 'a civil war would happen if you left it to people like him'. The standoff between Gavin Newsom and the president escalated after the Democratic governor filed legal proceedings against Trump over the decision to deploy troops in Los Angeles. The head of immigration enforcement previously warned that city and state officials could face arrest were they to obstruct federal agents' work. • Read in full: Trump calls for arrest of 'grossly incompetent' governor An association of Korean Americans in Los Angeles has criticised Donald Trump Jr, the son of the president, for comments on social media and urged him not to exploit a riot that devastated their community 33 years ago. Trump posted a photograph of a man with a rifle on a rooftop on X with a message: 'Make Rooftop Koreans Great Again!' It was a reference to the 1992 race riots in the city during which members of the community had taken up positions on store rooftops and were reported to have fired on looters. The Korean American Federation of Los Angeles expressed concern over the developments in Los Angeles over the past week and said their businesses had been seriously affected by the crackdown and arrests. The organisation said the president's son showed 'recklessness' in a post 'mocking the current unrest by mentioning the 'Rooftop Korean' from the LA riots 33 years ago'. It added: 'As the eldest son of the current president and an influencer with approximately 15 million followers, his actions could pose a huge risk in these icy times and we strongly urge the past trauma of the Korean people be never, ever exploited for any purpose.' Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. The arrest of a trade union leader while protesting in Los Angeles has become a cause célèbre among some of those demonstrating against the government. David Huerta, 58, the president of the Service Employees International Union California, was detained on Friday and accused of having 'deliberately obstructed' federal agents who were carrying out a raid. Huerta, whose union represents thousands of the state's janitors, security officers and other workers, was later released on a $50,000 bond. A crowd gathered at City Hall to celebrate on Monday. The International Federation of Transport Workers (ITF) was among the unions that criticised a 'disgraceful act of agression' against the union leader. 'It is part of a wider, dangerous trend: weaponising immigration enforcement to silence the voices of the most marginalised and anyone who dares to speak out against injustice,' the ITF president, Paddy Crumlin, said. A convoy of 10 to 15 buses with blacked-out windows, believed to be carrying marines, left the base at Twentynine Palms in the desert east of Los Angeles late Monday and headed toward the city. The vehicles stopped at about 1am local time at Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach, 20 miles (35 km) south of downtown LA. The Pentagon has said about 700 of the troops could be deployed in the city at the President's request. Some 4,000 National Guard, who are reservists based in every state, had been called up on Trump's orders and started arriving on Sunday. Trump has claimed that the city would have been 'completely obliterated' if he had not deployed the Guard. Despite their presence, there has been limited engagement so far between the guardsmen and protesters, as police have largely been dealing with crowd control during the protests and sporadic instances of violence. Community leaders and the families of immigrants detained by federal law enforcement in Los Angeles have called on California officials to honour pledges to protect migrant residents. The Trump administration says those who have been arrested are criminals or in the United States illegally. However, the California Values Act designated California as a 'sanctuary state' in 2017. The law ensures that public resources, such as local police, are not used to assist federal immigration enforcement. The Los Angeles police chief, Jim McDonnell, has repeatedly refuted claims that the department aided raids by the agency ICE. But Elena Jung Jee Vermeulen, of the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice, accused police of suppressing the ensuing protests. 'Instead of upholding the constitutional rights of those detained, [law enforcement] prepared to repress those rising up against these atrocities,' she told CBS News. Protesters in Mexico City staged a demonstration outside the US embassy on Monday, calling for an end to sweeping immigration raids across the border. Video from Reuters showed people waving Mexican and American flags and burning an effigy resembling President Trump. 'We cannot remain silent as the Trump administration escalates its war on our communities in the United States,' said the activist Alejandro Marinero from the migrant organisation Aztlan. 'Immigration policy is not a party issue but a class issue. It is the tool of a system that seeks to divide us, exploit us and keep us in the shadows to ensure its profits at the expense of our humanity,' he said. Los Angeles witnessed a series of co-ordinated immigration raids by US law enforcement officials on Friday, resulting in the arrest of dozens and igniting widespread protests. Many undocumented immigrants who went to their ICE check-in appointments at a federal building in Los Angeles last week were taken into custody, brought to the basement and held there, some overnight, according to immigration lawyers and family members. Los Angeles is a so-called sanctuary city, meaning the city has policies in place to protect undocumented immigrants from federal immigration enforcement. • Read in full: Five things to know about the LA protests By David Charter, Washington Protests against President Trump's immigration crackdown have given him the perfect opportunity to burnish his credentials as a law-and-order leader and see how far he can assert his will over a Democratic-run state. Not only is Los Angeles a 'sanctuary city' but California is a 'sanctuary state', designations that instruct local authorities to limit co-operation with federal agents seeking to arrest and deport illegal migrants leading otherwise law-abiding lives. Trump has repeatedly railed against the sanctuary city policy, adopted by more than 500 cities in the US, some of which have become the most likely places for the spread of unrest against raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement backed up by the threat of further troops. • Read in full: Crackdown offers Trump two victories — and one big risk The state of California filed on Monday a lawsuit against the Trump administration, alleging that the president violated the constitution in overriding Gavin Newsom's authority by sending the California National Guard. The governor accused the administration in the lawsuit of an 'unprecedented power grab' in deploying the troops in Los Angeles. 'Defendants have overstepped the bounds of law and are intent on going as far as they can to use the military in unprecedented, unlawful ways,' the lawsuit stated. It also asked for the court to stop future deployments. The Los Angeles mayor has said her city is being 'used for an experiment' by the federal government as they bring in military forces and a 'test case' for taking power away from local authorities. Karen Bass pushed back against President Trump's comments that the city was being 'invaded and occupied by illegal aliens and criminals,' saying that things had been peaceful until the federal government intervened. A television news crew was removed by police from a protest zone in downtown Los Angeles on Monday night. One officer told the CNN reporter Jason Carroll and other crew members to put their hands behind their backs before escorting them away. 'We're going to take them all out, one at a time,' police said. One officer took down the details of the individuals. 'You're not under arrest because you're press,' the officer added. Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. The Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has described video of a journalist being shot by a rubber bullet while covering the protests as 'horrific'. Lauren Tomasi, a US correspondent for Nine News, was broadcasting live from Los Angeles when an officer was seen in the background aiming and firing at her, hitting her in the leg. 'She was clearly identified. There was no ambiguity,' Albanese told reporters at the National Press Club on Tuesday. Albanese said he had raised the issue with the Trump administration. The prime minister said he spoke with Tomasi earlier in the day, who assured that she was 'sore but otherwise unharmed,' Nine News reported. There is a sentiment among some protesters in Los Angeles that Donald Trump has betrayed them. Many of those gathered in the downtown district are Latino, a demographic which swung heavily towards Trump in the past election. Francisco, a 32-year-old man born in Guatemala, said the president had 'lied' to people like him. 'He had an agenda to get Latinos to vote for him. He promised he'd look out for them. But look what he's doing to us,' he said as he marched through Little Tokyo earlier this evening. 'Trump wants to deport us. 'It used to be black people 30, 40 years ago. Now ICE agents are targeting brown people.' Francisco added that he did not have the right to vote in American elections. A spokeswoman for the US Northern Command confirmed earlier that a battalion of roughly 700 US Marines were set to arrive overnight from their base in Twentynine Palms, near the Joshua Tree National Park and the Mojave Desert region. The troops will be tasked with protecting federal property and buildings. A persistent, small minority of demonstrators remain in downtown Los Angeles after midnight local time, with police doing what they can to respond to disturbances. In one confrontation, armed troops gathered underneath a building fired non-lethal projectiles at a masked man who was standing in the centre of an intersection attempting to slow a convoy of passing police cars. He quickly fled but not before sticking up his middle finger at the troops as he slipped under the cover of some trees. The unrest, it seems, is now largely being fuelled by such individuals, who the police have branded 'agitators'. In one confrontation in Little Tokyo, protesters used rubbish bins as cover while police fired concussive devices in an attempt to disperse the crowd. Others shouted 'f*** the pigs' as a convoy of police cars raced through the city centre to respond to yet another emergency incident. One small business owner whose property was graffitied said she supported the government's deployment of reservists and soldiers. 'I think it's needed to stop the vandalism,' she told AFP, declining to give her name. Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. Despite the temporary deployment of hundreds of marines, those continuing to gather in downtown Los Angeles did not seem scared by the prospect of military intervention. 'I hope they do bring in the marines, they won't stop us,' said Estrella Corral, 39, from the nearby city Pasadena. Corral, who said she had been tear-gassed four times since Friday, accused the government of antagonising the protesters with its 'militarised' response. 'They're the ones escalating this, not us. Why do we need marines? It's not Afghanistan.' Protests in Los Angeles against President Trump's immigration crackdown took place for the fourth day in a row on Monday. Thousands peacefully attended a rally at City Hall while hundreds demonstrated outside a federal complex that included a detention centre where some immigrants were being held. After darkness had descended, a near-constant percussion of gun shot-like bangs erupted throughout the downtown district as those brave, or foolish, enough to antagonise police — either by throwing water balloons or bottles — were met with pepper spray projectiles, tear gas, flash bangs and rubber bullets. The Los Angeles police chief said he was confident in the police department's ability to handle large-scale demonstrations without assistance from troops. Jim McDonnell said that the US Marines' arrival without co-ordinating with the police department would present a 'significant logistical and operational challenge' for them. Newsom called the deployments reckless and 'disrespectful to our troops' in a post on X. 'This isn't about public safety,' Newsom said. 'It's about stroking a dangerous president's ego.' The California governor has threatened to sue the government over the 'illegal' deployment of the National Guard and US Marines, saying they were being used as 'political pawns' by the White House. 'It's a blatant abuse of power,' Gavin Newsom said. 'The courts and Congress must act. Checks and balances are crumbling.' The White House has remained defiant in the face of the growing national protests, which threaten to spiral into a mass movement not seen since the widespread demonstrations in 2020 sparked by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. In a statement released on Monday night, the vice-president, JD Vance, said the 'administration will not be intimidated by lawlessness'. 'President Trump will not back down,' he wrote on X. Protests against the Trump administration flared in nine other American cities on Monday night, including New York, Philadelphia and San Francisco. In Austin, Texas, tear gas was used to disperse a crowd that had gathered outside a federal detention facility. Police declared an unlawful assembly and told protesters they would be arrested or subject to 'chemical agents' if they did not leave. About 60 people were arrested in San Francisco and several more detained in New York after about 100 people gathered near a federal building in Manhattan. In Dallas a crowd of about 400 protesters chanted 'ICE, ICE, shut it down' and scuffled with police, resulting in further arrests. The Pentagon has confirmed that 700 US Marines would be deployed alongside up to 4,000 National Guard reservists to quell further unrest in Los Angeles, despite resistance from the state governor and city mayor. Though military forces have been used domestically for major disasters such as Hurricane Katrina and 9/11, rarely have they been deployed to quell civil disturbances. The last time came in 1992, in Los Angeles, amid widespread rioting sparked by the acquittal of white police officers for beating a black man, Rodney King. The use of marines marks an intensification in the showdown between President Trump and those opposed to his government's deportation of suspected undocumented immigrants. The White House has said it aims to deport 3,000 illegal migrants every day. At least 56 people have been arrested in the past two days of protests in downtown Los Angeles after a sweeping crackdown on illegal and unauthorised migrants. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) carried out raids since Friday, which resulted in more than a hundred arrests. The Department of Homeland Security said that immigrants detained in the raids included individuals convicted of sex crimes, burglary, drug-related charges and other offences. Activists and community members argue that blameless immigrant workers are being detained and families have been torn apart. The California governor has condemned President Trump's decision to deploy marines as 'un-American'. Gavin Newsom posted on X that Marines 'shouldn't be deployed on American soil facing their own countrymen to fulfil the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial President. This is un-American.' Some 700 US Marines based at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Centre in Twentynine Palms were preparing to mobilise for deployment to Los Angeles, according to a post on X from US Northern Command. President Trump ordered active-duty marines and 2,000 more National Guard troops into Los Angeles on Monday as he vowed that those protesting an immigration crackdown would be 'hit harder' than ever. After a fourth day of protests, with clashes between police and demonstrators, he wrote on his Truth Social platform: 'I promise you they will be hit harder than they have ever been hit before.'
Edinburgh Reporter
10 minutes ago
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Calls for the government to address demand for prostitution
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