ЦЕНЗОРА.NET

An independent panel formed to investigate the performance of the Secret Service after an assassination attempt in July against former President Donald Trump has called for extensive changes to the agency, including the installation of new leadership from the outside.

In a report issued Thursday morning, the panel praised the bravery of the individual agents who work to protect political figures in the United States. However, it blasted their leaders for creating an internal culture that has become “bureaucratic, complacent and static,” with the result that “the Secret Service does not perform at the elite levels needed to discharge its critical mission.”

Without “fundamental reform,” the panel warned, other attacks on the agency’s protectees “can and will happen again.”

In a statement, Secret Service Acting Director Ronald L. Rowe Jr. said, “We respect the work of the Independent Review Panel and will carefully examine the report and recommendations released today.”

He added that the agency has started making changes as a result of the attempted assassination.

“We have already significantly improved our readiness, operational and organizational communications and implemented enhanced protective operations for the former president and other protectees,” Rowe said.

Failure in Pennsylvania

President Joe Biden established the panel after a July 13 episode in Butler, Pennsylvania, in which a young man with a rifle was able to get within a few hundred meters of Trump while he was delivering a campaign speech. The would-be assassin fired several shots; Trump’s right ear was struck, but he was not seriously wounded. One bystander was killed, and two others were seriously wounded, before a Secret Service countersniper team killed the gunman.

In the aftermath of the incident, it became clear that there had been multiple failures leading up to the assassination attempt. The gunman was identified as a potential danger in advance of the shooting but was not prevented from accessing the roof of a building with a clear line of sight to the stage where Trump was speaking.

In the minutes leading up to the shooting, law enforcement officials in the crowd were made aware of the shooter’s presence, but because of poor coordination of communications, the information was not relayed to the members of Trump’s protective detail near the stage.

Panel’s recommendations

The panel’s findings include calls for specific changes to the way the Secret Service handles large events such as the Trump rally in Butler.

While the Secret Service has primary responsibility for the security of such events, it relies on other law enforcement agencies, including state and local police, for assistance. The report calls for having a unified command post at events like the Butler rally that would allow better communication among various agencies.

The report also calls for creating specific plans for dealing with all locations within 914 meters (1,000 yards) of an event that offer line-of-sight vision of the protectee, overhead surveillance of all outdoor events, improved communication systems and other changes.

Leadership change

In the wake of the Butler shooting, Kimberly Cheatle resigned as Secret Service director and was temporarily replaced by Rowe. However, the report issued Thursday calls for a much more extensive shakeup of the agency’s higher echelons.

Citing “an urgent need for fresh thinking informed by external experience and perspective,” the panel recommended that a new director, drawn from outside the Secret Service, be put in place and “be allowed to bring in the leadership team he or she thinks most fit.”

The new leadership would be charged with addressing multiple problems identified by the investigation, including “a troubling lack of critical thinking” within the agency and “corrosive cultural attitudes regarding resourcing and ‘doing more with less.’ ”

The report also urged a refocusing of the agency on its protective duties, to the point of potentially “shedding certain peripheral responsibilities,” including complex investigations into financial fraud and counterfeiting.

‘More with less’

Ronald Kessler, an author and journalist who has written two books about the Secret Service, told VOA that the panel correctly identified a number of problems with the agency. In particular, he cited the “do more with less” ethos, which he said has been present in the agency since it was folded into the Department of Homeland Security more than 20 years ago.

Kessler said it has become a point of pride in the agency that it operates on a shoestring rather than demanding more funding and resources.

“It’s a recipe for mediocrity and just the opposite of what anybody would want in any organization,” he said.

Within the agency, Kessler said, “the way to be promoted has been, ‘You don’t make waves, you don’t ask for more money, you don’t point out problems, you don’t expose the fact that the technical systems that are just basic don’t work.’ ”

Kessler praised the decision to seek outside leadership.

“In any organization, when it’s failing, you bring in outside people, whether it’s a private company or a government agency, and the people do respond,” he said.

Doubts about outside leadership

Paul Eckloff, a 23-year veteran of the agency who served as the assistant special agent in charge of the protection details of Presidents Barack Obama and Trump, said he doubted the wisdom of seeking outside leadership for an agency as unique as the Secret Service.

“The report is indicative of some fundamental misunderstandings of how the Secret Service operates, and these misunderstandings would be shared by any outside leader,” he told VOA.

“It would exacerbate problems within the rank and file, who believe that they are not well represented,” Eckloff said. “If the complaint about Secret Service leadership was that they were detached from the operators on the ground — [a job] they ostensibly have done before — imagine a leader who never held a post. How detached would they be?”

Eckloff also warned that requiring the agency to focus exclusively on its protective mission would be counterproductive. Serving on a protective detail is extremely intense work, he said, with agents often working weeks at a time without a day off.

For that reason, the agency tries to limit the time agents are assigned directly to a protective detail to periods of five to eight years, after which they rotate off and move into investigative work.

This leaves the agency with a deep pool of experienced agents who can be called upon to assist in protective details at times when the agency needs to surge its capacity, which occurs at least every four years during presidential elections.

The panel reviewed the attack from early August through early October. Members were Mark Filip, a former federal judge and former deputy attorney general; David Mitchell, a former superintendent of the Maryland State Police; Janet Napolitano, former secretary of homeland security; and Frances Townsend, a former homeland security adviser to President George W. Bush.
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washington — The United States on Thursday announced fresh sanctions targeting Chinese and Russian entities for their role in designing, building and shipping attack drones that have resulted in mass casualties in Ukraine.

The sanctions target two Chinese entities, Xiamen Limbach Aircraft Engine Co., Ltd., and Redlepus Vector Industry Shenzhen Co Ltd (Redlepus), Russian entity TSK Vektor and TSK Vektor’s General Director Artem Mikhailovich Yamshchikov.

A senior administration official told reporters Thursday that the entities were involved in developing the Russian Garpiya series long-range attack drones, producing them in China and shipping them directly to Russia.

“The Garpiya, designed and produced in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in collaboration with Russian defense firms, has been used to destroy critical infrastructure and has resulted in mass casualties,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement.

“Today’s action is part of our continued effort to disrupt attempts by PRC-based and Russia-based entities and individuals to support Russia’s acquisition of advanced weapons technology and components. We will continue to impose costs on those who provide support to Russia’s military-industrial base.”

The senior administration official said the U.S. has warned Beijing in the past about the network, contradicting Chinese statements that they are not aware of such networks.

Two Chinese firms are directly “involved in producing and shipping things that are unmistakably part of Russia’s war against Ukraine and are going unmistakably to an actor that the West has already identified and sanctioned as being part of the Russian military industrial base,” said the official.

Since 2022, the U.S. has sanctioned close to 100 entities based in China and Hong Kong. The majority of them are part of the supply chain of dual-use items – components or goods that can be converted by Russia into military items that are then being deployed against Ukraine.

However, Thursday’s sanctions were the first to hit Chinese entities “directly developing and producing complete weapons systems in partnership with Russian firms.”

Also Thursday, the U.K. announced its largest package of sanctions against Russia’s “shadow fleet of oil tankers” – ships that supposedly knowingly operate in defiance of Western sanctions.

London said 18 more shadow fleet ships will be barred from U.K. ports, bringing the total number of oil tankers sanctioned to 43.

Sanctions working

In response to VOA’s question, the official said that Western sanctions are working.

“This is having a direct impact on their economy. It’s having a direct impact on their ability to get war material. It’s having a direct impact on the quality of goods that they are achieving,” the official said.

A second senior administration official said Moscow is feeling “unprecedented external pressure” on its trade and investment projects with China. Growing trade ties between the two countries, though, indicate “they are continuing to innovate and circumvent which is why we are also moving out on sanctions and other tools.”

China says it is not providing weapons for Russia. Beijing maintains it handles its export of dual-use items in accordance with laws and applies strict controls on drone exports.

The sanctioned companies’ transactions are “incompatible” with Beijing’s statements, the second official said. “If China is serious about that commitment, we are asking them to take action to shut down this network.”

Beijing has said in the past it “firmly opposes unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction that have no basis in international law or authorization of the U.N. Security Council.”

Every month, Beijing exports to Russia more than $300 million of those so-called dual-use items that have both commercial and military applications, according to an analysis of Chinese customs data by the Carnegie Endowment think tank.

Ties have grown between Moscow and Beijing. On Wednesday, Chinese Premier Li Qiang and Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin announced plans for expanded cooperation during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, or SCO, summit in Islamabad, Pakistan. The SCO was founded by Russia and China in 2001 to counter Western alliances.

VOA’s Paris Huang and Henry Ridgwell contributed to this story.
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WASHINGTON — An Alabama man was arrested on Thursday over criminal charges that he hacked the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s X account earlier this year, in an action that caused bitcoin’s value to spike, federal prosecutors announced. 

In January, a hacker posted false news about a widely anticipated announcement the SEC was expected to make about bitcoin, shocking the market and sending the cryptocurrency’s price spiking. The post on @SECGov said the securities regulator had approved exchange-traded funds to hold bitcoin. The SEC deleted the post shortly after it appeared. 

Eric Council Jr., 25, of Athens, Alabama, was arrested on Thursday morning in connection with the hack, the U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of Columbia said in a statement on Thursday. 

The SEC did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Thursday’s arrest.  

The agency previously said it was the victim of “SIM swapping,” a technique used by fraudsters to seize control of telephone lines, when its account on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, was hacked earlier in January.
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The U.S. states of Florida, North Carolina and Georgia are dealing with the aftermath of two major hurricanes that killed hundreds of people and caused tens of billions of dollars in damage. With the presidential election less than a month away and the race extremely close, White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara looks at how the storms might affect voting in these states.
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An independent panel investigating the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania campaign rally faulted the Secret Service for poor communications that day and failing to secure the building where the gunman took his shots. The review also found more systemic issues at the agency such as a failure to understand the unique risks facing Trump and a culture of doing “more with less.” 

The 52-page report issued Thursday took the Secret Service to task for specific problems leading up to the July 13 rally in Butler as a well as deeper one within the agency’s culture. It recommended bringing in new, outside leadership and refocusing on its protective mission. 

“The Secret Service as an agency requires fundamental reform to carry out its mission,” the authors wrote Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas of the Homeland Security Department, the Secret Services’ parent agency, in a letter accompanying their report. “Without that reform, the Independent Review Panel believes another Butler can and will happen again.” 

One rallygoer was killed and two others wounded when Thomas Michael Crooks climbed onto the roof of a nearby building and opened fire as Trump spoke. The former president was wounded in the ear before being rushed off the stage by Secret Service agents. That shooting, along with another incident in Florida when Trump was golfing — a gunman there never got a line of site on the president or fired a shot — has led to a crisis in confidence in the agency. 

The report by a panel of four former law enforcement officials from national and state government follows investigations by members of Congress, the agency’s own investigators and by Homeland Security’s oversight body. 

A look at the report’s key findings and recommendations: 

Poor communications, no plan for key buildings 

The panel echoed previous reports that have zeroed in on the failure to secure the building near the rally that had a clear line of site to where Trump was speaking and the multiple communications problems that hindered the ability of the Secret Service and local and state law enforcement to talk to each other. 

“The failure to secure a complex of buildings, portions of which were within approximately 130 yards of the protectee and containing numerous positions carrying high-angle line of sight risk, represents a critical security failure,” the report said. 

The panel faulted the planning between Secret Service and the local law enforcement, and said the Secret Service failed to ask about what was being done to secure the building: “Relying on a general understanding that ‘the locals have that area covered’ is simply not good enough and, in fact, at Butler this attitude contributed to the security failure.” 

The panel also cited the fact that there were two separated command posts at the Butler rally: one with various local law enforcement and another with the Secret Service: “This created, at the highest level, a structural divide in the flow of communications.” 

There were other communications problems. 

The Secret Service had to switch radio channels because radio traffic of agents protecting first lady Jill Biden at an event in Pittsburgh was popping up on the channels of agents covering the Butler rally. 

The panel also noted that all the law enforcement personnel on the ground were using a “chaotic mixture” of radio, cell phone, text, and e-mail throughout the day to communicate. 

Also the panel said it was unclear who had ultimate command that day. 

Cultural issues within the agency 

The report delved into the agency’s culture and painted a picture of an agency struggling to think critically about how it carries out its mission, especially when it comes to protecting Trump. 

The panel said agency personnel operated under the assumption that they effectively had to “do more with less.” The report said the additional security measures taken to protect Trump after the Butler shooting should have been taken before. 

“To be clear, the Panel did not identify any nefarious or malicious intent behind this phenomenon, but rather an overreliance on assigning personnel based on categories (former, candidate, nominee) instead of an individualized assessment of risk,” the panel wrote. 

The panel also noted the “back-and-forth” between the Trump security detail and Secret Service headquarters regarding how many people were needed to protect him. 

The panel also faulted some of the senior-level staff who were involved in the rally for what they called a “lack of ownership.” In one example, the panel said a senior agent on site who was tasked with coordinating communications didn’t walk around the rally site ahead of timen and did not brief the state police counterpart before the rally about how communications would be managed. 

It cited the relative inexperience of two specific agents who played a role in security for the July 13 rally. One was the site agent from Trump’s detail whose job it was to coordinate with the Pittsburgh field office on security planning for the rally. The panel said the agent graduated from the Secret Service academy in 2020, and had only been on the Trump detail since 2023. Before the Butler rally the agent had only done “minimal previous site advance work or site security planning.” 

Another agent assigned to operate a drone detection system had only used the technology at two prior events. 

What did the panel recommend? 

Having a unified command post at all large events where Secret Service and other law enforcement representatives are all physically in the same place; overhead surveillance for all outdoor events; security plans must include a way to mitigate line of site concerns out to 1,000 yards and who’s in charge at the event; and more training on how to get protectees out of dangerous scenarios. 

The panel said the agency also needs new, outside leadership and a renewed focus on its core protective mission while expressing skepticism that the agency should continue with the investigations it currently conducts. While the Secret Service is well known for what it does to protect presidents and other dignitaries, it also investigates financial crimes. 

“In the Panel’s opinion, it is simply unacceptable for the Service to have anything less than a paramount focus on its protective mission, particularly while that protective mission function is presently suboptimal,” the report said. 

The panel members were Mark Filip, deputy attorney general under President George W. Bush; David Mitchell, who served in numerous state and local law enforcement roles in Maryland and Delaware; Janet Napolitano, homeland security secretary under President Barack Obama; and Frances Fragos Townsend, Bush’s assistant for homeland security and counterterrorism. 
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LOS ANGELES — The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has agreed to pay $880 million to victims of clergy sexual abuse dating back decades, in what an attorney said was the largest single child sex abuse settlement with a Catholic archdiocese, it was announced Wednesday.

After the announcement of the agreement in principle, Archbishop José H. Gomez said in a statement, “I am sorry for every one of these incidents, from the bottom of my heart.”

“My hope is that this settlement will provide some measure of healing for what these men and women have suffered,” the archbishop added. “I believe that we have come to a resolution of these claims that will provide just compensation to the survivor-victims of these past abuses.”

Attorneys for 1,353 people who allege that they suffered horrific abuse at the hands of local Catholic priests reached the settlement after months of negotiations with the archdiocese, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The agreement caps a quarter-century of litigation against the most populous archdiocese in the United States.

Attorneys in the Plaintiffs’ Liaison Committee said in a joint statement, “While there is no amount of money that can replace what was taken from these 1,353 brave individuals who have suffered in silence for decades, there is justice in accountability.”

Under the settlement, the plaintiffs will engage in a process— that will not involve the archdiocese — to allocate the settlement amount among the participants.

The archdiocese has previously paid $740 million to victims in various settlements and had pledged to better protect its church members, so this settlement would put the total payout at more than $1.5 billion, the Times said.

Attorney Morgan Stewart, who led the negotiations, said in a statement that the settlement is the largest single child sex abuse settlement with a Catholic archdiocese.

“These survivors have suffered for decades in the aftermath of the abuse. Dozens of the survivors have died. They are aging, and many of those with knowledge of the abuse within the church are too. It was time to get this resolved,” Stewart told the Times.

The settlement will be funded by archdiocese investments, accumulated reserves, bank financing, and other assets. According to the archdiocese, certain religious orders and others named in the litigation will also cover some of the cost of the settlement, the Times said.
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Ще троє людей поранені на Донеччині, заявив голова області
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На думку аналітиків, наступальна операція РФ у напрямку Покровська, яка посилилася влітку 2024 року, досягне кульмінації в найближчі місяці
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U.S. forces carried out airstrikes Wednesday against Houthi militant weapons storage sites in Yemen, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said.

The strikes, conducted by B-2 bombers, targeted weapons the Houthis have used in a yearlong campaign of attacks against ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden that have disrupted major sea shipping routes.

“This was a unique demonstration of the United States’ ability to target facilities that our adversaries seek to keep out of reach, no matter how deeply buried underground, hardened, or fortified,” Austin said.

The Iran-backed Houthis have said their campaign of using boats, missiles and drones to target vessels is being done in solidarity with the Palestinians amid the war in Gaza.

The United States and Britain have conducted multiple strikes against the Houthis to try to protect the shipping lanes, while commercial companies have rerouted many ships to use the longer and more expensive route of going around the African continent.

“The Houthis’ illegal attacks continue to disrupt the free flow of international commerce, threaten environmental catastrophe, and put innocent civilian lives and U.S. and partner forces’ lives at risk,” Austin said.
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US President Joe Biden heads to Germany on Thursday, a week later than planned and on a compressed timeline after Hurricane Milton grounded him last week. Both he and Germany’s leader have been facing mounting pressure over their support for Ukraine — both having recently announced new security packages. VOA White House correspondent Anita Powell reports.
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washington — U.S. President Joe Biden joined former Democratic presidents and others to honor longtime human rights advocate and storied political family matriarch Ethel Kennedy at a memorial service in Washington on Wednesday after her death last week at age 96.

The widow of Robert F. Kennedy — a former U.S. attorney general and U.S. senator, who was assassinated while seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968 — founded a human rights center to carry on her husband’s work.

She never remarried and went on to raise her 11 children, enduring a host of other family tragedies along the way, including separate plane crashes that killed her parents, brother and nephew, as well as the untimely deaths of several of her children, grandchildren and a great-grandchild.

She and her husband were devastated by the assassination of his brother, President John F. Kennedy, in Dallas in 1963.

Biden, a fellow Irish Catholic who has leaned on his faith amid his own losses, including the death of his son Beau, said the Democratic family matriarch was there for him at his time of tragedy. He said her husband had been one of his heroes.

“Ethel was a hero in her own right,” Biden said in remarks at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, just blocks from the White House.

Former Democratic presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others, also reflected on her life.

The son of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., who was assassinated just two months before Robert Kennedy, noted the two families’ shared journey and understanding of sacrifice amid their work for social justice.

“Faith and history knitted us together. Respect and love has kept us together,” Martin Luther King III told the crowd.

The Kennedys were known for their parties and Wednesday’s service was no different, with scores of relatives filling the pews and high-profile attendees remembering the infectious spirit highlighted by her children and grandchildren.

“She was a spitfire,” Obama said. “As serious as Ethel was about righting wrongs, she never seemed to take herself too seriously.”

Other Democratic attendees included California Governor Gavin Newsom and former top U.S. diplomat and presidential candidate John Kerry. Country star Kenny Chesney sang “You Are My Sunshine” while Sting surprised guests with “Fragile” and Stevie Wonder with “Isn’t She Lovely.”

Over the decades, Kennedy took up many causes championed by her late husband, including fighting poverty, working for social justice and protecting the environment. Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014. She died on October 10 from complications following a stroke, her family said.

Her daughter Kathleen Kennedy Townsend was Maryland’s lieutenant governor, while her son Joseph P. Kennedy II represented Massachusetts in the U.S. House of Representatives. Her grandson, former U.S. Representative Joseph P. Kennedy III, serves as special envoy to Northern Ireland.

Her son Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine advocate and former independent presidential candidate, broke from his family’s long Democratic ties to endorse Donald Trump in November’s election.

Many members of the Kennedy clan have denounced his election politics and backed the Democratic ticket, now led by U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris after Biden stepped aside in July. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. attended Wednesday’s service alongside his family but made no remarks.
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