The Supreme Court on February 8, 2024 in Washington, DC. Julia Nikhinson/Getty ImagesCNN —
Former President Donald Trump made his final pitch Thursday to the Supreme Court in his effort to pause a trial over the election subversion charges brought by special counsel Jack Smith.
“There are overwhelming reasons why the case should not go to trial ‘in three months or less,’” Trump told the Supreme Court in a 16-page filing. “With any other defendant, it would be virtually unthinkable for the case to go to trial so soon, and ‘wildly unfair’ to do so.”
Trump claims former presidents must have immunity from such charges to avoid political reprisals when they leave office. So far, two lower federal courts have balked at that argument.
The Supreme Court is expected to decide on Trump’s request within a few days.
With Trump’s final brief in hand, a question of timing is now squarely before the high court. The justices could deny Trump’s emergency request to temporarily block a DC Circuit ruling against him on the immunity issue or they could agree to further consider his case.
The first outcome would clear the way for a US District court in Washington, DC, to schedule a trial on the underlying election charges, which Smith is eager to resolve before the November election. The second could signal the justices may schedule oral arguments in the case later this year, potentially pushing a trial back several months.
On Monday, Trump asked the Supreme Court to block a unanimous decision from the DC Circuit handed down last week that rejected his claims of immunity from the election subversion charges.
“Without immunity from criminal prosecution, the presidency as we know it will cease to exist,” Trump told the Supreme Court.
Two days later – ahead of deadline – Smith argued in his own brief that Trump had not met the standard to pause proceedings in his case. It generally takes support from five justices to secure such a pause.
“The charged crimes strike at the heart of our democracy,” Smith wrote in https://bersiaplah.com a filing Wednesday. “The public interest in a prompt trial is at its zenith where, as here, a former president is charged with conspiring to subvert the electoral process so that he could remain in office.”
An F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet parked on the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea. Scott Pisczek/CNNOn board the USS Dwight D. EisenhowerCNN —
Alarms blared on the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea at 4 a.m. on Tuesday morning, warning personnel to prepare for potential flight operations against a Houthi drone that was flying over nearby ships.
That drone was ultimately deemed not to bea threat. But the incident demonstrated how the crew of the carrier are constantly on a heightened alert for incoming threats from the Iran-backed militants in Yemen, who have been routinely targeting commercial ships as well as US and coalition forces in the key waterway with missiles and drones.
On board two vessels spearheading the US response to Houthi attacks, the Eisenhower and the US destroyer the USS Gravely in the southern Red Sea, CNN gained unique access and spoke to sailors and pilots who said the Houthi threat remains both unpredictable and unprecedented.
The US Navy is working at a frenetic pace, deploying Jets and firing missiles at a moment’s notice to try to destroy the Houthis’ weapons and infrastructure.
But after dozens of strikes over the last month against Houthi targets both over the Red Sea and inside Yemen, CNN was told that the US military still does not know exactly how much of the Houthis’ capabilities have been destroyed—or how long it will take to deter them for good.
“It’s a wicked problem set that we don’t have a lot of great fidelity on,” said Rear Admiral Marc Miguez, the commander of Carrier Strike Group Two, told CNN on Tuesday.
Unlike state actors like Iran, Russia and China that the US has prioritized for intelligence collection for years, the US was not paying close attention to the Houthis before they started regularly lobbing missiles into the Red Sea, Miguez said. So the US does not know for sure how much the Houthis have stockpiled, particularly when it comes to what they have buried underground.
Learning in real time
The Houthis’ attacks, moreover, mark the first time anti-ship ballistic missiles have been used in combat, and the personnel on board the warships are learning in real time how to respond.
“This isn’t exactly where we expected to be on this deployment,” said Captain James Huddleston, the deputy commander of Carrier Air Wing 3 who regularly flies missions over the Red Sea and Yemen. “Whenever you are doing something for the first time in a region, that’s not without risk,” Huddleston said. “But we have managed that risk to our strike group and our air crew through the management of combat power.”
Dozens of fighter jets take off every day from the Ike carrier to circle the skies over the Red Sea in case they are tasked at a moment’s notice with carrying out a strike against a Houthi target.
An F/A-18 with afterburner prepares to launch from the deck of the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea. Scott Pisczek/CNN
All of the jets carry air to ground missiles so they can respond immediately to a threat, Miguez said.
“Unfortunately, we don’t get a lot of heads up on most of this stuff—especially the ballistic missiles,” he said. The Houthis have also changed their tactics in recent weeks, using drones more regularly to target and attack ships.
“They have tried to target coalition forces, US forces, through swarm attacks, using multiple UAVs, using multiple anti-ship ballistic cruise missiles,” said Captain Marvin Scott, the commanding officer of Carrier Air Wing 3. “They are trying everything that they can, but we are prepared for anything they may throw our way.”
In many cases the Houthis have been using the Samad-3 drone, Miguez said, which is long-range and carries an explosive payload. The Houthis have also been using Iranian-made drones, according to the Defense Intelligence Agency.
“We know for a fact that they are a threat, so we have been taking them down more and more frequently,” he said.
CNN previously reported that the US intelligence community has picked up signs that the Iranians are getting nervous about the Houthis’ attacks because of the impact they have had on some of Iran’s only allies, including China and India.
Officials believe Iran was at one point using one of its suspected spy ships which has long been parked in the southern Red Sea, the Behshad, to help the Houthis target vessels there. But in a notable shift, Iran moved the ship to the coast of Djibouti earlier this month for the first time in over two years, Miguez said. That has reduced the Houthis’ capability to track ships in the Gulf of Aden, Miguez said.
Seconds or minutes to respond
Meanwhile, the crew on board the USS Gravely destroyer in the Red Sea are the tip of the spear against inbound Houthi missiles and drones. The sailors often only have seconds to respond to an inbound missile.
“We could have seconds, or we could have minutes,” said Navy Lieutenant JG James Rodney, who works in the Gravely’s Combat Information Center. “I wouldn’t say much more than minutes.”
The Gravely is equipped with long-range Tomahawk missiles that are capable of reaching targets inside Yemen. But more often, the ship is deploying its anti-air and anti-surface missiles at closer ranges as Houthi missiles and drones close in. Last month, however, a Houthi missile got so close to the Gravely—within one mile of it—that the ship had to use its last line of defense, known as the Phalanx, to take it down. That incident is now being investigated, Miguez said.
The Houthis barrages have been so relentless that the Ike carrier and the destroyers deployed nearby have not made a port call in months, which is highly unusual. Sailors said the environment is stressful, but that it has helped to have a mission.
“It’s definitely not what we expected, to be out here,” said FC1 Michael Zito, who helps to operate the Gravely’s 54-caliber Mark 45 gun and other weapons systems on board. https://bersiaplah.com “We expected to have a more relaxed and chill deployment. But this is what we’ve been training for constantly, day in and day out for years, and we’re ready for whatever else comes through. We’ll do what needs to be done.”
A presidential candidate’s podium is seen on the stage in 2016. Joe Raedle/Getty Images
A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.CNN —
While the 2024 presidential race seems set in stone as a rematch between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, it’s also true that things happen.
Back in November 1872, for instance, the newspaper publisher and Democratic presidential candidate Horace Greeley died after Election Day but before the casting of Electoral College votes. While it did not affect the outcome – President Ulysses S. Grant easily won reelection – Greeley’s death created the difficult question of what to do with the 66 Electoral College votes he had won.
Most electors, meeting in state capitols, did not cast votes for the deceased Greeley,but rather split them among four other candidates. Congress did not count the three votes that were cast for a dead man.
Pictured is American abolitionist, journalist and politician Horace Greeley, who edited the New York Tribune. MPI/Getty Images
In the more than 150 years since Greeley’s death, there have been two constitutional amendments related to presidential succession, but there is still some gray area when it comes to an unforeseen event that strikes a presidential nominee or candidate.
Today, polling suggests voters are worried that both Trump and Biden are too old for the job. Trump will be 78 on Election Day in November, and Biden will turn 82 later that month. Without being macabre, it’s worth knowing what would happen if, for whatever reason, either man was unable to continue with the race.
Replacing either man on the ballot – not that anyone is seriously talking about it – would be a messy and chaotic process that would uncover divisions and disagreements within the political parties. No one knows for sure what would happen if a candidate died or for some reason needed to withdraw from the race.
Here’s a look at the rules for Republicans and Democrats as they currently stand.
What happens if a candidate cannot continue his or her campaign?
The process of replacing a presidential candidate very much depends on when the vacancy occurs – during the primary process and before the party convention; during the convention or after the convention; or before or after people vote in November.
What happens if a vacancy occurs during the primary process?
While Trump and Biden are in total command of the respective races to be the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates, that process will play out between now and June as states conduct primaries and caucuses and assign delegates based on the results.
If a vacancy on either side happens before most of those primaries were to occur, it’s possible that another candidate could emerge and rack up some delegates. But since filing deadlines have already passed for many primaries, it’s unlikely any single candidate, other than Trump or Biden, could rack up enough delegates to win the nomination before party conventions this summer.
It is, however, possible that states could decide to delay their primaries, according to Elaine Kamarck, a member of the Democratic National Committee rules committee anda senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has studied the issue. Republicans will hold their convention in Milwaukee in July, and Democrats will hold theirs just to the south in Chicago in August.
Most delegates will have been awarded by the end of March. Biden has not faced serious opposition in the Democratic primary, has won every delegate at stake so far and needs to win at least 1,968 of 3,934 to secure the nomination on the first ballot of voting.
On the Republican side, Trump has won every contest so far and ultimately needs 1,215 of 2,429 delegates. His top rival, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, is far behind Trump in the delegate race.
What if a vacancy occurs after the primaries and before or during the convention?
If the leading candidate was to drop out of the campaign after most primaries or even during the convention, individual delegates would likely decide the party’s nominee on the convention floor.
That would shine a spotlight on the normally niche question of who those actual delegates are.
There would be a messy political battle in every state over who would get to be a delegate (if the vacancy happened before many of those people were chosen) and then who they would ultimately support. Even people who did not run primary campaigns could ultimately be considered.
You can assume, for instance, that Vice President Kamala Harris would be a top contender to be on the ballot if, for some reason, Biden left the race. At the same time, given Haley’s weakness in primaries, it seems unlikely that Republicans would coalesce around her if Trump was unable to run.
On the Democratic side, there would also be another group to consider: the “superdelegates,” a group of about 700 senior party leaders and elected officials who are automatically delegates to the convention based on their position. Under normal party rules, they can’t vote on the first ballot if they could swing the nomination, but they’re free to vote on subsequent ballots.
Has anything like this ever happened before?
The modern primary and caucus system evolved only in recent generations as voters demanded more involvement in the nominating process.
The election that sparked change was in 1968, when President Lyndon B. Johnson decided not to run after an embarrassing finish in New Hampshire’s primary. Johnson won, but just barely.
When he dropped out of the presidential race, it set off a chaotic dash to replace him. One candidate who jumped in the race, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Los Angeles just after winning the California primary, creating the difficult question of who his delegates should support.
The ultimate Democratic winner that year, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, amassed his delegates in states that did not conduct primaries, securing enough support to win the nomination.
Violence on the streets of Chicago around the convention marred the event and helped inspire the system of primaries and caucuses we have today where voters pick presidential candidates through delegates bound to support a specific candidate.
What if a candidate left the race after the convention?
It would take a drastic event for a candidate to leave the race in the few months between a party’s nominating convention in the summer and the general election in November.
Democrats and Republicans have slightly different methods of dealing with this possibility. You can imagine the end result would probably be that the running mate stepped up to be on the general election ballot, but that is not necessarily guaranteed.
Democrats – The Democratic National Committee is empowered to fill a vacancy on the national ticket after the convention under party rules, after the party chair consults with Democratic governors and congressional leadership.
Republicans – If a vacancy occurs on the Republican side, the Republican National Committee can either reconvene the national convention or select a new candidate itself.
Would the running mate automatically become the nominee?
An in-depth Congressional Research Service memo also notes that if an incumbent president becomes incapacitated after winning the party’s nomination, the 25th Amendment would elevate the vice president to the presidency, but party rules would determine who rises to become the party’s nominee.
Neither party, according to CRS, requires that the presidential candidate’s running mate be elevated to the top of the ticket, but that would obviously be the most likely scenario.
Has a candidate ever left the race after the convention?
In modern times, per CRS, the Democrat running for vice president in 1972, Sen.Thomas Eagleton, was forced to step aside after the convention after it was discovered that he was treated for mental illness (1972 was a very different time! Today, thankfully, there is not nearly the stigma attached to mental health).
The DNC actually needed to convene a meeting to affirm Sargent Shriver as Democratic nominee George McGovern’s second-choice running mate.
What if a president-elect was incapacitated after the election?
If a president-elect was to die, timing is again important.
Under the Constitution, it is electors meeting in state capitols who technically cast votes for the presidency. While some states require that they vote for the winner of the election in their state, in others they have leeway.
The CRS memo, which cites several congressional hearings on the subject, suggests it would clearly make sense for a vice president-elect to simply assume the role of https://bersiaplah.com president-elect, but the law itself is murky.
Under the 20th Amendment, if a president-elect dies, his or her running mate, the vice president-elect, becomes president.
There could be some question, for instance, about when exactly a person becomes president-elect. Is it after the electors meet in December, or after Congress meets to count Electoral College votes on January 6?
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled on Wednesday that Russian figure skaterKamila Valieva did not meet the burden of proof to overturn her four-year ban for testing positive for trimetazidine.
Valieva had suggested the prohibited substance was in her body because she ate a strawberry dessert her grandfather made for her on the same chopping board on which he crushed up his heart medication.
Trimetazidine is listed as a “metabolic modulator” and its use by athletes is banned, both in and out of competition.
Though it would not increase heart rate, unlike other performance-enhancing drugs that are classed as stimulants, it is believed that trimetazidine can help with endurance in physical activity.
Valieva’s lawyers presented multiple possible explanations for why she tested positive prior to the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, the 129-page CAS report outlined.
One scenario dubbed the “Grandfather explanation” in the CAS report was that Valieva’s grandfather, Mr. Solovyov, made her a strawberry dessert on a chopping board that was contaminated with his trimetazidine medication.
But the court determined there were “too many shortcomings in the evidence, and too many unanswered questions,” adding that the “panel has decided that the athlete did not discharge her burden of proving … that her ADRV [Anti-Doping Rule Violations] was not intentional.”
CNN Sport contributor Christine Brennan, who is also a national sports columnist for USA Today, reported: “In a nutshell, here’s what we learned: Valieva claimed the banned substance that was in her body got there because she ate her grandfather’s strawberry dessert.
As a result of Valieva’s four-year ban and subsequent disqualification of results, backdated to Christmas Day 2021, the US Figure Skating team will receive a gold medal for its 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic performance, after the then 15-year-old’s Russian Olympic Committee was knocked down to third with the re-ranking of results. Japan will receive the silver medal, while Canada – which was left “extremely disappointed” after not being awarded the bronze – remained in fourth place.
The special counsel report found that Biden willfully retained classified information, including top secret documents, and knew he was in possession of some documents as far back as 2017. He also shared some of that information with the ghostwriter of his 2017 memoir.
The special counsel decided not to charge the president in the case – primarily because he found that nothing proved a willful intent by Biden to illegally hold onto classified information and his cooperation with the investgation.
Yet, in a politically damaging line of reasoning, Hur wrote that one reason Biden wasn’t going to be prosecuted was because he would present to a jury as an elderly man “with a poor memory.” Biden’s lawyers objected to the description – calling it “investigative excess” and accusing Hur of flouting Justice Department rules and norms.
The report is sure to become an issue in the 2024 campaign – where Biden’s likely opponent, Donald Trump, is facing criminal charges for his handling of classified material, even though Hur made clear how different the two cases were.
Hur laid out in detail how Biden mishandled classified materials, writing that FBI agents discovered materials from “the garage, offices, and basement den in Mr. Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware, home.”
The materials included classified documents, including some marked at the highest top secret/sensitive compartmented information level, related to military and foreign policy in Afghanistan, as well as and notebooks “containing Mr. Biden’s handwritten entries about issues of national security and foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence source and methods.”
The special counsel raised Biden’s age and memory in explaining why he didn’t bring charges.
“We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” Hur wrote.
“Mr. Biden’s memory also appeared to have significant limitations,” Hur wrote in another passage, adding that his conversations with his ghost writer “from 2017 are often painfully slow, with Mr. Biden struggling to remember events and straining at times to read and relay his own notebook entries.”
While Hur also listed other reasons for not prosecuting Biden, the memory and age-related passages are sure to become campaign fodder for Trump and Republicans, who have already made the president’s age a key part of the campaign.
House GOP Whip Tom Emmer, the No. 3 Republican, called Hur’s findings “alarming.”
“It’s clear @joebiden does not have the cognitive ability to be president,” Emmer said on X.
Hur says evidence didn’t support charging the president
While the investigation revealed that Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials” after leaving office, Hur’s report says his team concluded that the evidence didn’t support prosecuting the president.
According to the report, in 2017 – after leaving office – Biden worked with a ghostwriter for his memoir and told the writer in a recorded conversation that he had “just found all the classified stuff downstairs,” which investigators believe referred to his home he was renting in Virginia.
Investigators believe the evidence suggests Biden was referring to classified documents about the Afghanistan troop surge in 2009 – which FBI agents later found in his garage in Delaware.
Hur’s report says the “best case for charges” would rely on Biden possessing classified documents in 2017, since it was after he had left the vice presidency and before he became president in 2021.
But, the report says, “several defenses are likely to create reasonable doubt as to such charges.”
“For example, Mr. Biden could have found the classified Afghanistan documents at his Virginia home in 2017 and then forgotten about them soon after. This could convince some reasonable jurors that he did not retain them willfully,” the report says.
The report also says that the fact that Biden never talked about the documents again in the “dozens of hours” of recorded conversations with his ghostwriter, paired with how the documents were found in Biden’s garage – in a damaged box surrounded by “household detritus” – could suggest Biden had forgotten about them.
“In addition, Mr. Biden’s memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023,” the report says, “And his cooperation with our investigation, including by reporting to the government that the Afghanistan documents were in his Delaware garage, will likely convince some jurors that he made an innocent mistake, rather than acting willfully – that is, with intent to break the law – as the statute requires.”
Republicans get political gifts from Hur’s report
Congressional Republicans wasted no time seizing on Hur’s report, claiming that the decision not to bring criminal charges is evidence of political bias against their party’s likely presidential nominee in 2024, as well as that details about Biden’s memory issues prove he is not fit for office.
Republican lawmakers did not expect Hur to prosecute Biden but the finding that his “memory was significantly limited” during interviews with investigators has fueled a cascade of political attacks from Trump’s allies on Capitol Hill.
Shortly after the report was released, GOP members of the House Judiciary committee called Hur’s decision not to prosecute Biden a “double standard,” an apparent reference to the fact that Trump was charged with crimes related to his own handling of classified information by special counsel Jack Smith.
“Despite the fact that Hur acknowledges Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen. DOUBLE STANDARD,” the House Judiciary GOP said on X.
House Oversight Committee Republicans, who have separately investigated Biden’s handling of classified documents, criticized Hur’s report before it was even released or delivered to Congress.
“This is not a transparent Administration, and our investigation will not stop,” Oversight committee Republicans posted on X.
The GOP-led panel also criticized the Department of Justice for not bringing criminal charges.
Differences with Trump’s case
Republicans have long drawn parallels between Hur’s investigation and that of Smith, who last year brought charges against Trump related to his handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after he left the White House, despite critical differences in the two cases.
Hur was careful to note the distinction between the two cases in the report – namely that Biden cooperated with the investigation and returned the documents, while Trump did not give back his documents when asked and then tried to cover it up.
“Most notably, after being given multiple chances to return classified documents and avoid prosecution, Mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite.” Hur wrote. “According to the indictment, he not only refused to return the documents for many months, but he also obstructed justice by enlisting others to destroy evidence and then to lie about it.
“In contrast, Mr. Biden turned in classified documents to the National Archives and the Department of Justice, consented to the search of multiple locations including his homes, sat for a voluntary interview, and in other ways cooperated with the investigation,” Hur noted.
Photos show documents stored among household clutter
Hur’s report included a number of photos depicting various parts of Biden’s homes, materials at issue in the investigation and other relevant scenes over the years.
One such photo shows notebooks “seized from (a) file cabinet under (a) television in (Biden’s) Delaware home office.” The report said that Biden “routinely took notes in his notebooks about classified subjects and during meetings where classified information was discussed.”
“For example, he regularly took notes related to the President’s Daily Brief, which typically contains classified information. He also regularly took notes during meetings in the White House Situation Room, and numerous photographs document this practice,” according to the report.
Investigators noted that although “none of the notebooks have classification markings, some of the notebooks contain information that remains classified up to the Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information level.”
Another set of photos showed Biden’s Delaware garage, which “contained a significant volume of boxes, storage, and clutter,” including one that contained classified documents related to Afghanistan policy.
“Among the places Mr. Biden’s lawyers found classified documents in the garage was a damaged, opened box containing numerous hanging folders, file folders, and binders,” the report said. “The box, which was labeled ‘Cabinet’ and ‘Desk file,’ was in a mangled state with ripped corners and two top flaps torn off.”
It continued: “Inside the box, the FBI located two folders containing marked classified documents related to the fall 2009 policy review on Afghanistan.”
The photos harken back to those included by special counsel Smith in his indictment last year of Trump over the former president’s own mishandling of classified documents.
The photos included in Trump’s charging documents showed how he allegedly stored classified documents in various places at his Mar-a-Lago estate, including a ballroom, bathroom shower and his bedroom.
White House criticizes Hur over passages regarding Biden’s memory
The White House counsel and Biden’s personal attorney criticized several of the assertions made in Hur’s report, including comments about the president’s memory.
White House counsel Richard Sauber and Bob Bauer wrote in a five-page letter to Hur on Monday saying that the mention of Biden’s memory was “entirely superfluous.”
“We do not believe that the report’s treatment of President Biden’s memory is accurate or appropriate,” Sauber and Bauer wrote. “The report uses highly prejudicial language to describe a commonplace occurrence among witnesses: a lack of recall of years-old events.”
In a follow-up statement, Bauer accused Hur of “investigative excess” and said he flouted Justice Department regulations and norms.
The attorney said that the special counsel “could not refrain from investigative excess, perhaps unsurprising given the intense pressures of the current political environment.”
“Whatever the impact of those pressures on the final Report, it flouts Department regulations and norms,” Bauer said. “Very little in this opus adds to a clear, succinctly stated understanding of a straightforward conclusion: no misconduct occurred, no charges are warranted. https://bersiaplah.com The Report delves into a discussion of the ‘evidence’ of ‘willful’ retention of classified documents, only to acknowledge that there is, in fact, no case of ‘willful’ retention at all.”
A spokesperson for the Special Counsel’s office declined to comment on the alleged “inaccurate and inappropriate” comments in the Special Counsel’s report.
The billionaire boss of Samsung Electronics, one of the world’s biggest technology firms, will not serve more jail time.
Lee Jae-yong was found not guilty by a Seoul court on Monday on charges of stock manipulation and accounting fraud connected to a controversial merger in 2015 of two Samsung affiliates.
The acquittal comes as a big relief to Lee, who has been embroiled in legal problems for years.
Last year, South Korean prosecutors had asked for a five-year jail term for Lee, alleging that he and other executives inflated the stock price of a textile company, Cheil Industries, and devalued a construction and engineering company, Samsung C&T, ahead of the merger.
They alleged that the merger of the two firms allowed Lee to gain a tighter grip on Samsung Electronics, the group’s flagship company, of which he serves as executive chairman.
Lee’s attorneys had denied any wrongdoing, saying the merger had helped the management of the conglomerate became more stable.
Seoul Central District Court chief judge Park Jung-jae said there was not enough evidence that Samsung had intended to cause losses to Samsung C&T and its shareholders throughthe merger.
“Even if Lee’s control has been strengthened, the merger in this case cannot be considered unfair, as long as there is a reasonable purpose for the merger,” Park said.
It’s unclear if prosecutors will appeal this ruling, which has come as a surprise to experts.
“It is a totally shocking verdict,” Park Sangin, economics professor at Seoul National University, told CNN. He added the decisionwill “lead to lowering the confidence of foreign investors in the Korean legal system and the soundness of the Korean capital market.”
Lee, who is also known as Jay Y. Lee, was previously found guilty of bribery and other corruption charges in 2017 in a separate case. He was sentenced to five years in prison, but walked free after less than a year when an appeals court threw out some of the charges and suspended his sentence.
However, the billionaire was sent back to prison inJanuary 2021 after being sentenced to two and a half years without a suspension after the Seoul High Court found him guiltyof embezzlement and bribery. He was released on parole in August 2021 and pardoned a year later.
The relief for Samsung comes at a time when it is battling a sales slump. The South Korean tech giant recently lost its crown as the world’s top smartphone maker to Apple (AAPL), and has also posted its fourth straight quarter of profit decline, in a sign of how demand for consumer devices and the chips that power them continue to remain sluggish.
During his trial last year, Lee had apologized for the troubles suffered by Samsung and its shareholders as a result of his legal struggles.
“The world is experiencing geopolitical risks, and our country is in the middle of them. Technological innovation is occurring in this world at a faster rate than we can imagine,” Lee had said to the judges.
“I believe that it is necessary to respond pre-emptively to an unpredictable future, https://bersiaplah.com and the merger of the two companies was promoted in that regard.”
“In the future, I would like to ask for the opportunity to help Samsung become a truly top-notch company and to focus all my capabilities on moving forward,” he had said.
Palestinians wait to receive food at a donation center in Rafah, southern Gaza, January 27, 2024. Saher Alghorra/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty ImagesCNN —
More than 800 officials from the United States and Europe have signed a scathing criticism of Western policy towards Israel and Gaza, accusing their governments of possible complicity in war crimes.
In a statement obtained by CNN, the officials say there is a “plausible risk that our governments’ policies are contributing to grave violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and even ethnic cleansing or genocide.”
They accuse their governments of failing to hold Israel to the same standards they apply to other countries and weakening their own “moral standing” in the world.
Among them are around 80 United States officials and diplomats, a source told CNN.
In an unprecedented display of coordinated dissent since Israel’s war against Hamas began nearly four months ago, the signatories call on their governments to “use all leverage” to secure a ceasefire and to stop saying that there is a “a strategic and defensible rationale behind the Israeli operation.”
The public letter, released Friday, comes a week after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found South Africa’s claim that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza to be “plausible,” and ordered Israel to “take all measures” to limit the death and destruction caused by its military campaign, prevent and punish incitement to genocide, and ensure access to humanitarian aid.
The statement “shows the depths of concerns and outrage and just horror that all of us are witnessing,” a US official with more than 25 years’ experience, who signed the letter, told CNN on Friday.
“The talking points that keep being delivered day after day are not cutting it.”
The US official told CNN that the signatories were motivated by their shared experience of having their concerns be ignored by their governments and by “the appropriateness” of public dissent by civil servants when ignored internally.
The official added that the ICJ’s decision to hear a genocide case lodged against Israel was validation for the authors’ concerns. Israel has strenuously denied accusations of genocide in Gaza.
“What was really important for those of us on the US side was to link arms with the people in Europe who believe their governments are following the US lead, and feel constrained by that,” the official said. “So we thought it was important that US officials continue to make clear their concerns with government policy on this.”
People bury Palestinians, including those killed in Israeli strikes and fire, at a mass grave in Rafah, January 30, 2024. Mohammed Salem/Reuters
The statement, which does not list its signatories, says that it was “coordinated” by civil servants in European Union institutions, The Netherlands, and the United States, and endorsed by civil servants in Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
Despite the letter not listing its authors, the US official told CNN many colleagues feared losing their jobs, and that the lower number of US signatories reflected stronger protections for official dissents in Europe.
CNN has asked the U.S. State Department, the European Union, and the Dutch Foreign Ministry for a response to the statement. CNN has also reached out to the Israeli government for a response.
A senior British civil servant told CNN of the letter: “We feel that politicians have responded to the evolving situation, evinced by the Foreign Secretary’s words this week.”
The Dutch Foreign Ministry, in a statement to CNN, said that while civil servants are entitled to freedom of expression, they are subject to some limitations under Dutch law.
“It is only natural that the debate in society about the conflict between Israel and Hamas also exists within our ministry. We feel that there should be scope for this debate and we encourage staff to enter into dialogues internally. And these dialogues are taking place.”
‘We are obliged to do everything in our power’
In the letter, the officials say that they raised concerns internally within their governments and institutions, but their professional concerns have often been overruled “by political and ideological considerations.”
“We are obliged to do everything in our power on behalf of our countries and ourselves to not be complicit in one of the worst human catastrophes of this century,” they write.
Israel’s policies, they argue, are counterproductive to its own national security goals.
“Israel’s military operations have disregarded all important counterterrorism expertise gained since 9/11; and that the operation has not https://bersiaplah.com contributed to Israel’s goal of defeating Hamas and instead has strengthened the appeal of Hamas, Hezbollah and other negative actors.”
They say that Western support for Israel has come “without real conditions or accountability.”
“Our governments’ current policies weaken their moral standing and undermine their ability to stand up for freedom, justice, and human rights globally and weaken our efforts to rally international support for Ukraine and to counter malign actions by Russia, China and Iran,” they say.
Finally, they call on their governments to “develop a strategy for lasting peace that includes a secure Palestinian state and guarantees for Israel’s security, so that an attack like 7 October and an offensive on Gaza never happen again.”
Moore and Willis divorced in 2000, but share three adult daughters, Rumer, Scout and Tallulah.
“What I’ll say is what I say to my children, which is it’s important to just meet them where they’re at and not hold onto what isn’t,” Moore said on “GMA.” “Because there’s great beauty and sweetness and loving and joy out of that.”
The former couple have continued to amicably share family experiences https://bersiaplah.com over the years. Willis has been married for more than 16 years to Emma Heming Willis, with whom he shares two young daughters, Mabel and Evelyn.
President Joe Biden issued an executive order targeting violent Israeli settlers in the West Bank whom he has said have undermined stability in the area, a US official and source familiar with the matter told CNN.
The new directive, first reported by Politico and expected to be announced Thursday, will impose sanctions on several individuals accused of having participated in the violent acts.
The order targets four individuals accused of directly perpetrating violence or intimidation in the West Bank, a senior administration official said, including people accused of initiating and leading a riot; setting buildings, fields and vehicles on fire; assaulting civilians and damaging property.
The State Department announced the names of the Israelis targeted by the executive order, which blocks their financial assets and bars them from coming to the US. They are David Chai Chasdai, Einan Tanjil, Shalom Zicherman and Yinon Levi.
The White House notified the Israeli government of their plans ahead of the order, an official said.
Officials said they had compiled evidence they said offered proof of the individuals’ role in the West Bank violence that would withstand judicial review, including information from public reporting.
Chasdai, according to the State Department, “initiated and led a riot, which involved setting vehicles and buildings on fire, assaulting Palestinian civilians, and causing damage to property in Huwara, which resulted in the death of a Palestinian civilian.”
Tanjil “was involved in assaulting Palestinian farmers and Israeli activists by attacking them with stones and clubs, resulting in injuries that required medical treatment,” according to a State Department fact sheet.
Zicherman, “according to video evidence, assaulted Israeli activists and their vehicles in the West Bank, blocking them on the street, and attempted to break the windows of passing vehicles with activists inside.” He cornered two activists, injuring both of them, according to the State Department.
Levi “led a group of settlers who engaged in actions creating an atmosphere of fear in the West Bank,” according to the fact sheet.
“He regularly led groups of settlers from the Meitarim Farm outpost that assaulted Palestinian and Bedouin civilians, threatened them with additional violence if they did not leave their homes, burned their fields, and destroyed their property,” it said. Levi “and other settlers at Meitarim Farm have repeatedly attacked multiple communities within the West Bank.”
It’s not clear when each of these acts occurred. The US has no plans to target Israeli government officials for sanctions, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters Thursday.
Biden has condemned these acts of violence in the past, and the issue is one that the president has personally discussed in recent months with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Netanyahu’s office said in a statement Thursday that the sanctions were unnecessary.
“Israel acts against all lawbreakers everywhere, so there is no room for exceptional measures in this regard,” the prime minister’s office said, adding that “the absolute majority” of Israeli settlers in the West Bank “are law-abiding citizens.”
The order comes as the president faces backlash from key parts of his political coalition for his backing of Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza. While the order is not expected to address the situation in Gaza, it will mark one of the more significant actions Biden has taken to critique Israel since the war began in the wake of the October 7 terrorist attack by Hamas and could be a signal from Biden toward Muslim and Arab-American voters who are upset with his refusal to call for a ceasefire.
In December, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced a new policy to prevent extremist Israeli settlers responsible for violence in the West Bank from coming to the United States.
The State Department can apply the policy to both Israelis and Palestinians who were responsible for attacks in the West Bank, Blinken said at the time.
Ultimately, the new policy is expected “to impact dozens of individuals and potentially their family members,” State Department spokesperson Matt Miller said at the time.
Settler violence against West Bank residents has been a primary flashpoint in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since long before the October 7 Hamas attack. When hundreds of Israeli settlers rampaged through the West Bank town of Huwara last February, the ensuing violence was so brutal that the Israeli military commander over the West Bank referred to it as a “pogrom.”
An estimated 700,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank. It’s unclear which specific acts those targeted by Biden’s executive order participated in.
Biden has raised the issue of settler violence in “almost every diplomatic conversation he has with Israeli leaders,” a senior administration official said.
“These actions pose a grave threat to peace, security and stability in the West Bank, Israel, and the Middle East region, and they also obstruct the realization, ultimately, of an independent Palestinian state existing side by side with Israel, and by extension the enduring peace and stability for Palestinians and Israelis alike,” the official said.
Speaking at the National Prayer Breakfast on Capitol Hill Thursday morning, ahead of issuing the executive order, Biden acknowledged the suffering of both Israelis and Palestinians. He said he understands the “pain and passion felt by so many here in America and around the world” in response to the “trauma, the destruction in Israel and Gaza.”
“We value and pray for the lives taken and for the families left behind,” Biden said. “For all those who are living in dire circumstances, innocent men, women and children, held hostage or under bombardment, or displaced not knowing where the next meal will come from, or if it will come at all.”
As of early this week, the overall death toll in Gaza since October 7 had risen to 26,422 with 65,087 injured, according to the Hamas-controlled health ministry in Gaza. More than 1,200 people were killed in the original Hamas attack on Israel and more than 200 were taken hostage.
“Not only do we pray for https://bersiaplah.com peace,” he continued, “we’re actively working for peace, security and dignity for the Israeli people and the Palestinian people.”
Biden said he was engaged in bringing hostages held by Hamas home “day and night,” and was also working to “ease the humanitarian crisis and to bring peace to Gaza and Israel and enduring peace with two states for two peoples.”
In this photo posted to social media platform X on Monday, January 29, US President Joe Biden is briefed by members of his national security team in the Situation Room on the latest developments regarding the attack on US service members in northeastern Jordan.From President Joe Biden via XCNN —
The US’ response to the drone attack in Jordan that killed and wounded US service members on Sunday is likely to be more powerful than previous American retaliatory strikes in Iraq and Syria, officials told CNN, though the Pentagon and White House are being careful not to telegraph the administration’s plans.
President Joe Biden is under increasing pressure to respond in a way that stops these attacks for good. Iran-backed militants have targeted US military facilities in Iraq and Syria over 160 times since October, and several Republican lawmakers have called for the US to hit inside Iran directly to send a clear message.
But the biggest challenge now for the Biden administration is how to respond to the drone strike – the deadliest attack on US forces in the region since the bombing at Abbey Gate killed 13 US service members in the closing days of the Afghanistan withdrawal – without sparking a regional war.
The US has in recent months carried out several strikes targeting Iranian proxies’ weapons depots in Iraq and Syria. To date, none of those strikes have deterred the militants, whose 165 attacks have injured over 120 US service members across the region since October.
Retired Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling said the deaths of US service members “certainly crossed the president’s red line,” and both officials and analysts are expecting a more robust response that is not necessarily confined to one country or one day. But officials have suggested it is unlikely the US will strike within Iran.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the environment in the Middle East is as dangerous as it’s been in the region “since at least 1973, and arguably even before that.”
Blinken added that the US response “could be multileveled, come in stages and be sustained over time.”
The Biden administration could decide to again strike the militant groups in Iraq, Syria or both countries, and could also target the leadership of the regional militias. In at least one case in early January, the US targeted a senior member of Harakat al-Nujaba, an Iranian proxy that has attacked US forces. An offensive cyberattack is another option, officials noted.
A US official said the US is being careful not to be too specific about the origin of the drone or which militants launched it, in order to preserve some element of surprise when the US responds. US officials have said only that the Iranian proxy group Kataib Hezbollah appears to have supported the strike.
“We’re not taking anything off the table,” a US defense official told CNN.
‘We don’t seek a war with Iran’
Still, striking Iran is one of the least likely options at this point, officials said. Biden officials said repeatedly on Monday that the US does not want to go to war with Iran, which would be the likely outcome of a US strike within Iran’s borders.
“We don’t seek a war with Iran. We’re not looking for a wider conflict in the Middle East,” John Kirby, the strategic communications coordinator for the National Security Council, told CNN on Monday. “In fact, every action the president has taken has been designed to de-escalate, to try to bring the tensions down.”
While the US holds Iran ultimately responsible for the attacks given Tehran’s financial and military support for its proxy groups, there are no indications yet that Iran explicitly directed the deadly attack on Sunday or intended it as a deliberate escalation against the US, multiple sources told CNN.
The Iranian government has also denied being involved.
“I don’t think this was intended as an escalation,” said a US official. “It is the same type of attack they’ve done 163 times before and on 164 they get lucky.”
The attack bore many of the hallmarks of the previous 160-plus strikes by the Iran-backed militants, officials said — the only difference being that this one successfully hit a housing container at the US base, called Tower 22, early on Sunday when service members were still in their beds and had little time to evacuate.
The drone also flew low, potentially allowing it to evade the base’s air defenses, and approached the base around the same time as an American drone was returning from a mission. That likely caused confusion and may have delayed a response, officials said.
“We know these groups are supported by Iran, and therefore they do have their fingerprints on this, but I can’t tell you more in terms of who directed it,” Sabrina Singh, deputy Pentagon press secretary, said at a briefing Monday.
Still, if the US attempts to de-escalate through proportionate and limited retaliatory strikes, that could be perceived as weak to Iran and its proxies, said Jon Alterman, the Middle East Program director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
“If everything is deliberate and proportionate, it creates an incentive for people to go right up to the red line and to make sure they know exactly where that red line is,” Alterman told CNN.
Iran has spent years investing in its regional proxies, from Hezbollah in Lebanon to the Houthis in Yemen to the militant groups in Iraq and Syria. Tehran has supplied these proxies, informally known as the “axis of resistance,” with money, weapons, training and supplies as it seeks to broaden its influence in the Middle East and pressure the United States to disengage from the region.
“In the last three months, Iran has benefited profoundly from its years of investment in the axis of resistance,” Alterman said. Tehran has watched as anti-US and anti-Israel protests swept across the Middle East after the Israel-Hamas war started. Iran has grown increasingly closer to Russia and China, and Iraqi officials have recently begun to more loudly call for an end to the US military presence in the country.
These are measures of victory for Iran.
“Every message you see talks about the https://bersiaplah.com fear of escalation from the administration,” said a former senior military official who has closely followed developments in the region. “We have managed to deter ourselves here.”
