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DeSantis and Newsom face off in a Fox News event featuring two governors with White House hopes

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

In this combination of photos, Republican presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks on Sept. 16, 2023, in Des Moines, Iowa, at left, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, speaks on Sept. 12, 2023, in Sacramento, Calif. (AP Photo) In this combination of photos, Republican presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks on Sept. 16, 2023, in Des Moines, Iowa, at left, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, speaks on Sept. 12, 2023, in Sacramento, Calif. (AP Photo) WASHINGTON (AP) — Two big-state governors with presidential ambitions, California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom and Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, met Thursday night for a prime-time faceoff that was expected to be filled with policy fig...

Driver arrested after 2 troopers killed in Las Vegas freeway hit-and-run was impaired, police say

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Two Nevada state troopers in Las Vegas who had stopped to help a driver on the state’s busiest freeway were killed in the pre-dawn hours Thursday when an impaired driver struck them, authorities said.Las Vegas police Undersheriff Andrew Walsh said at a mid-day news conference that they had arrested the driver, who fled after hitting the two officers and evaded authorities for hours before the car involved in the hit-and-run crash was found at a nearby apartment complex.“Right now during this very tragic time, the Nevada state police is going to need that love and support from the community more than ever,” Walsh said.The police department has identified the driver as Jemarcus Williams, 46. Court and jail records did not list on Thursday night an attorney for Williams who could speak on his behalf.Williams faces charges of reckless driving, DUI and failing to stop at the scene of the crash, according to court records. Because the alleged crimes left two people ...

Jewish conference in Denver draws heavy security, protests

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — Gov. Jared Polis spoke Thursday night at the Jewish National Fund conference in Denver, which drew heavy security and protests.Security was highly visible inside and outside the Colorado Convention Center, where the four-day Global Conference for Israel was getting underway. FOX31 Newsletters: Sign up to get breaking news sent to your inbox A noise demonstration planned by Denver Communists and other groups grew outside on Thursday evening. Protesters marched and expressed opposition to the expansion of the Israeli occupation of Palestine.Police shut down much of the area to traffic while this was happening.FOX31 was at the scene. Watch at 9 p.m.

Video shows South Beach restaurant owner, employees beating man who spray-painted food truck, police say

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

WARNING: CONTAINS GRAPHIC VIDEO. VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED.MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (WSVN) — Cellphone video captured the harrowing moments when, police said, a Miami Beach restaurant owner and employees beat up a man who had defaced their food truck, leaving the victim critically injured.The footage, obtained by 7News, captured the assailants repeatedly punching and stomping on the victim behind Harold’s Chicken and Shrimp, located in the area of Washington Avenue and 13th Street, back on June 27.“Oh, my God. I think he’s dead” a witness is heard saying in Spanish in the cellphone video.An arrest warrant states witnesses told officers at least one of the attackers looked “possessed by a demon.”Police body camera video captured the victim bloodied and bruised.“Keep breathing. Stay with me, all right, man?” an officer is heard saying to the victim.According to the arrest warrant, the attackers pulled off the victim’s pants and pumm...

‘Joe Biden is your best friend, until he isn’t’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

Jamie Dettmer is opinion editor at POLITICO Europe. TEL AVIV — Do Israel’s Western allies really believe that the country has the right to defend itself?Israelis aren’t sure.To varying degrees since the military offensive was launched against Hamas, Western allies have sought to persuade Israel to curtail the campaign, and clearly some would prefer for it to be aborted altogether.Reeling from the shock at the sheer ISIS-like savagery of the Hamas attack on kibbutzim in southern Israel, Western allies quickly embraced Israel’s right to self-defense. But many hedged this right from the get-go with caveats — some justified — about the lack of a defining post-war end goal.There was handwringing also about the risks of the war expanding and inflaming the whole region and worry, too, that Israel might allow its anger to push it into over-reaching.Behind the scenes, the Biden administration was urging Benjamin Netanyahu to delay launching the offensive — a bid to run the clock, hoping...

Rishi Sunak’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it COP28

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

LONDON — Rishi Sunak flies into the world’s biggest climate summit on Friday — and soon flies straight back out again.The U.K. prime minister, whose government has faced intense scrutiny for a softening of key climate plans, is expected to attend COP28 in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for just 11 hours.Sunak is arriving in the morning and leaving Friday evening — a flying visit for a leader who has faced accusations he is “simply uninterested” in green issues.French President Emmanuel Macron is sticking around for at least 24 hours, an Élysée official confirmed. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez are expected to make it a two-day stint.Sunak will also be outdone — at least in terms of time commitment — by the U.K.’s head of state, King Charles III, who arrived on Thursday and will give the opening address at the leader’s summit on Friday morning.The king — a longstanding climate campaigner — is expected to call on countries to raise the...

Hey, Greece! You want your marbles back? Steal ’em

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column.What’s all the fuss about the Elgin Marbles? You can’t even play actual marbles with them! The governments in Athens and London have spent the week sniping at each other over the Elgin Marbles — Greece of course would prefer that we call them Parthenon Sculptures, but that sounds a little too much like a mid-1970s prog rock band — after British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak canceled a meeting with his counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis, a decision Athens dubbed “unprecedented” and “disrespectful.”Anyway, if Greece really does want the marbles back, it’s going about it all wrong. Don’t rely on diplomacy, that never works (as a reminder, the EU’s top diplomat is Josep “Take foot, put foot squarely in mouth, speak” Borrell), just steal them!I’m not sure that theft from the British Museum is even classed as a crime (POLITICO’s lawyers would like me to point out that theft of any kind...

Mayor of Paris hits back at ‘misogyny’ after scandal-ridden Tahiti trip

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

PARIS — Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo said attacks on her governing style after a controversial trip to Tahiti were sexist and an attempt to tarnish her reputation ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games. The mayor, who accused the government of lagging on Olympic preparations, has faced fierce criticism in recent weeks for taking a trip to French Polynesia just days after a terror attack in a school and amid tensions in Paris after the Hamas attack in Israel.Her trip’s official purpose was to visit the Tahiti venue that will host the 2024 Olympics’ surfing competition, as unveiled by newspaper Le Canard enchaîné on October 25. However, outlet Le Parisien later reported that Hidalgo went on to visit her daughter who lives on an island near Bora-Bora for a one-week private vacation. In total, the trip by the mayor, who was accompanied by no less than five members of her cabinet, cost about €60,000, according to figures provided by her staff, amid a sharp increase in the town’...

Putin’s buddy Orbán pushes EU to the brink over Ukraine

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán regularly pushes the EU to the cliff edge, but diplomats are panicking that his hostility to Ukraine is now about to finally kick the bloc over the precipice. A brewing political crisis is set to boil over at a summit in mid-December when EU leaders are due to make a historic decision on bringing Ukraine into the 27-nation club and seal a key budget deal to throw a €50 billion lifeline to Kyiv’s flailing war economy. The meeting is supposed to signal to the U.S. that, despite the political distraction over the war in the Middle East, the EU is fully committed to Ukraine. Those hopes look likely to be knocked off course by Orbán, a strongman who cultivates close ties with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and who is widely seen as having undermined democracy and rule of law at home. He is demanding the whole political and financial process should be put on ice until leaders agree to a wholesale review of EU support for Kyiv. That gives E...

The most powerful people in Europe (for better or worse)

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:58:57 GMT

Listen on Spotify Apple Music Google Play EN_Google_Podcasts_Badge Created with Sketch. Acast Amazon Music This week, we take you inside our POLITICO 28 unveiling of Europe’s most powerful people and unpack Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s comments on the Israel-Hamas war and her plans to run for the top job again. Also, we reveal new tactics used by successfu...