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WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met in Panama Sunday with President José Raúl Mulino, on the first leg of his first official overseas trip as the nation’s top diplomat.

Rubio’s trip will also take him to El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and the Dominican Republic. It will include talks with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves, Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo, and Dominican President Luis Abinader.

This marks the first time in more than 100 years that a U.S. Secretary of State’s first official visit abroad is to Latin America, according to U.S. Special Envoy for Latin America Mauricio Claver-Carone.

Officials and experts say the visit is partly aimed at countering China’s growing influence in the region. The trip comes as President Donald Trump pushes to regain control of the Panama Canal, and as Washington intensifies efforts to curb illegal migration.

“Secretary Rubio’s engagements with senior officials and business leaders will promote regional cooperation on our core, shared interests: Stopping illegal and large-scale migration, fighting the scourge of transnational criminal organizations and drug traffickers, countering China, and deepening economic partnerships to enhance prosperity in our hemisphere,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement on Friday.

Trump has asserted that China controls the Panama Canal, a crucial trade route linking the Atlantic and Pacific. But Panama has denied the claim, insisting that it manages the canal impartially for all maritime traffic.

On Thursday, Rubio warned that China could potentially block access to the canal in the event of a conflict.

“If the government in China in a conflict tells them to shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to. And in fact, I have zero doubt that they have contingency planning to do so. That is a direct threat,” Rubio said during an interview with SiriusXM Radio.

In Panama City, Mulino ruled out any discussion of control over the canal with Rubio.

“I cannot negotiate and much less open a process of negotiation on the canal,” he told reporters on Thursday. “That is sealed. The canal belongs to Panama.”

During a Friday briefing, Claver-Carone warned of the “increasingly creeping presence” of Chinese companies in the Canal Zone, spanning ports to telecommunications infrastructure. He called it a serious concern not only for U.S. national security but also for Panama and the entire Western Hemisphere.

Some analysts caution that China has been employing economic and noneconomic tactics across the Western Hemisphere to expand its influence, prompting national security concerns.

“You might think that you are just getting more Chinese investment in your country, but pretty soon you are kind of being coerced or coaxed into signing at the Belt and Road Initiative, or you’re being coaxed into signing another deal that gives elements of your telecoms,” said Ryan Berg, director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, during an online discussion Thursday.

The Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, is a massive infrastructure project launched by China in 2013 under President Xi Jinping, aiming to connect multiple continents through land and maritime routes. The United States has cautioned that the BRI “is fueled by China’s mission to manipulate and undermine the global rules-based trading system for its own benefit.”

China’s foreign direct investment, or FDI, in Latin America and the Caribbean has grown significantly, Berg said, citing approximately $160 billion in Chinese FDI over the past 15 years.

China’s foreign direct investment, or FDI, in Latin America and the Caribbean has grown significantly, Berg noted. He added that five countries in the region already have free trade agreements with China, while two others are negotiating FTAs with the country.

“From the lens of national security, a lot of China’s commercial endeavors are fundamentally military ambitions that they’re prepositioning into Latin America,” said Joseph Humire, executive director of the Center for a Secure Free Society, or SFS, a national security think tank.

“China’s been in Panama for more than 20 years, but China really got politically active in Panama after 2017,” when Panama signed the BRI and shifted its diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to the People’s Republic of China, said Humire on Thursday. He said that Panama’s economy has declined in recent years.

All the nations on Rubio’s itinerary maintain diplomatic ties with Cuba and Venezuela.

Given the strained U.S. relations with these countries and their restrictions on accepting deportees, Rubio may use his trip to advocate for “third-country” agreements, allowing other nations to receive people deported by the U.S. Additionally, he could work on facilitating increased repatriation flights for migrants.

On Friday, Trump envoy Richard Grenell is set to meet with Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela’s longtime socialist leader, as the Trump administration intensifies its deportation and anti-gang efforts.

Grenell also urged the Maduro government to immediately release American hostages.
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U.S. President Donald Trump said Sunday that Americans may face economic “pain” because of new tariffs he is imposing on the country’s three biggest trading partners —Canada, China and Mexico — but contended that it would be “worth the price” to bolster U.S. interests.

Despite sharing a free-trade pact he negotiated with Canada and Mexico in his first term in office, Trump on Saturday imposed 25% tariffs on the two countries set to take effect Tuesday, and hit China with a new 10% levy in addition to already enacted tariffs.

Trump claimed the three countries were not doing enough to halt illegal immigration and the deadly opioid fentanyl from entering the United States.

In Truth Social posts early Sunday, Trump acknowledged American consumers could face higher prices because of the tariffs. U.S. companies that pay the tariffs to the federal government to import goods from other countries then often pass on at least part, if not all, of their higher costs to consumers rather than absorb their extra expenses themselves.

But Trump aimed most of his comments at Canada, targeting one of the U.S.’s closest allies. The U.S. Census Bureau said the U.S. had a $55 billion trade deficit with Canada last year.

“Why? There is no reason,” Trump contended. “We don’t need anything they have. We have unlimited Energy, should make our own Cars, and have more Lumber than we can ever use.”

“Without this massive subsidy, Canada ceases to exist as a viable Country. Harsh but true! Therefore, Canada should become our Cherished 51st State. Much lower taxes, and far better military protection for the people of Canada — AND NO TARIFFS!” Trump said.
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PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. — U.S. groundhog Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow Sunday and predicted six more weeks of wintry weather, his top-hatted handlers announced to a raucous, record-sized crowd at Gobbler’s Knob in Pennsylvania.  

Phil was welcomed with chants of “Phil, Phil, Phil,” and pulled from a hatch on his tree stump shortly after sunrise before a member of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club read from a scroll in which he boasted: “Only I know — you can’t trust A.I.”  

The woodchuck’s weather forecast is an annual ritual that goes back more than a century in western Pennsylvania, with far older roots in European folklore, but it took Bill Murray’s 1993 “Groundhog Day” movie to transform the event into what it is today, with tens of thousands of revelers at the scene and imitators scattered around the United States and beyond.  

When Phil is deemed to have not seen his shadow, that is said to usher in an early spring. When he does see it, there will be six more weeks of winter.  

The crowd was treated to a fireworks show, confetti and live music that ranged from the Ramones to “Pennsylvania Polka” as they awaited sunrise and Phil’s emergence. Gov. Josh Shapiro, local and state elected officials and a pair of pageant winners were among the dignitaries at the scene.  

Self-employed New York gingerbread artist Jon Lovitch has attended the event for 33 years. “I like the cold, you know, and this is probably the best and biggest midwinter party in the entire world,” Lovitch said in Punxsutawney. “And it’s just a really good time.”  

Phil has predicted a longer winter far more often than an early spring, and one effort to track his accuracy concluded he was right less than half the time. What six more weeks of winter means is subjective.  

Tom Dunkel, president of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, says there are two types of people who make the trek to Gobbler’s Knob: the faithful seeking to validate their beliefs and the doubters who want to confirm their skepticism.  

Phil communicated his forecast to Dunkel through “Groundhog-ese” with the help of a special cane that Dunkel has inherited as the club’s leader. It’s not as if he speaks in English words. “He’ll like wink, he’ll purr, he’ll chatter, he’ll — you know — nod,” Dunkel said.  

Attendance is free but it cost $5 to take a bus and avoid a 1.6 kilometer trek from the middle of town to the stage where the prediction was made, some 123 kilometers northeast of Pittsburgh.  

The need for so many buses is why the local schools, where the sports mascot is the Chucks, close when Groundhog Day falls on a weekday.  

Keith Post, his wife and a friend have watched the “Groundhog Day” movie in each of the past five years and decided this was the time to make the trip from Ohio to witness the event.  

“We booked rooms almost a year in advance and we’re here,” Post said. “We’re doing it.”  

A new welcome center opened four years ago and the club is working on an elaborate second living space for Phil and family so they can split time between Gobbler’s Knob and Phil’s longtime home at the town library. The club also put up large video screens and more powerful speakers this year to help attendees in the back of the crowd follow the proceedings.  

“It’s a holiday where you don’t really owe anyone anything,” said A.J. Dereume, who among the club’s 15-member inner circle serves as Phil’s handler and held him up to loud cheers on Sunday. “You’re grasping onto the belief, you know, in something that’s just fun to believe in.”  

Jackie Handley agreed a year ago to visit Punxsutawney for the first time to help a friend check off an item on their bucket list. They were ready for the subfreezing temperatures. “It’s once in a lifetime — we’re probably not going to come back. And we have tons of warm clothes,” said Handley, who lives in Falls Church, Virginia. After the forecast was made, club members and Phil posed for photos with people from the crowd.  

Phil has a wife, Punxsutawney Phyllis, and two pups born this spring, Shadow and Sunny, although his family did not join him on stage for the big event. The groundhog family eats fruits and vegetables, get daily visits from Dereume and sees a veterinarian at least once a year. The club’s lore is that Phil is the same woodchuck who has been issuing weather forecasts for the past century, thanks to an “elixir of life” that keeps him immortal. “There’s only one Phil, and it’s not something that can be handed down,” Dunkel said. “Just like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, there’s only one.”  

Groundhog Day celebrations, formal and informal, were being held in many Pennsylvania towns and elsewhere on Sunday. There have been Groundhog Day events in at least 28 U.S. states and Canadian provinces. 
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LOS ANGELES — The Grammy Awards take center stage in Los Angeles on Sunday at a celebration that will honor the best of music while acknowledging the deadly wildfires that scarred a hub of the industry. 

Beyonce will compete for the top Grammy prize of album of the year with her country record “Cowboy Carter.” The superstar singer has never won the album trophy despite winning 32 career Grammys, more than any other musician. 

Also in the running for album of the year are megastar Taylor Swift for “The Tortured Poets Department” and Billie Eilish for “Hit Me Hard and Soft.” 

The ceremony will be broadcast live on CBS starting at 8 p.m. ET (0100 GMT on Monday) from the Crypto.com Arena in downtown Los Angeles. Comedian Trevor Noah returns to host the telecast, which will be part awards show, part fundraiser for musicians and others impacted by the recent fires. Hundreds of people in the music business were among those who lost homes in the disaster. 

“It will be a little tricky to pull off, but I’m starting to think they’re going to be able to do it,” said Paul Grein, awards editor at music publication Billboard. With the fires under control, “people can take a breather and express gratitude and relief that we made it through that.” 

Eilish and best new artist nominees Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, Benson Boone and Teddy Swims are among the night’s scheduled performers. The show will feature a tribute to Quincy Jones, the prolific music producer who died in November. 

At last year’s Grammys, Beyonce’s husband and rapper Jay-Z argued that voters had not given proper recognition to Black artists including his wife. Grammy winners are chosen by the 13,000 singers, songwriters, producers, engineers and others who make up the Recording Academy. 

“I don’t want to embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than anyone and never won album of the year. So even by your own metrics, that doesn’t work,” Jay-Z said on stage. 

“Cowboy Carter” was viewed by experts and fans as a reclamation and homage to an overlooked legacy of Black Americans within country music and culture. It became the first album by a Black woman to land at No. 1 on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart when it was released last spring. 

The Beyonce album was snubbed, however, by voters for the Country Music Awards in their nominations in September. 

The “Cowboy Carter” nomination is Beyonce’s fifth entry in the album of the year category. Swift has won the honor a record four times, including last year for “Midnights.” 

Beyonce leads all Grammy nominees this year with 11 nods, followed by Eilish, Charli XCX, Kendrick Lamar and Post Malone with seven nominations each. Swift landed six nominations and will present one of the night’s awards. 

Beyonce’s other Grammy nods include record and song of the year for single “Texas Hold ‘Em.” 

Competitors for song of the year, an award for songwriters, are Eilish for “Birds of a Feather,” Carpenter for “Please Please Please” and Roan for “Good Luck, Babe!” 

In record of the year, nominees include Carpenter’s “Espresso” and Swift’s duet with Post Malone, “Fortnight.” 
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LOS ANGELES — Anthony Obi never imagined the night of Jan. 7 would be the last time he’d step inside his safe haven. 

The Houston rapper, known professionally as Fat Tony, has lived in the Altadena neighborhood for a year and says he and his neighbors were prepared for heavy winds and perhaps a few days of power outages. 

“I totally expected, you know, maybe my windows are going to get damaged, and I’ll come back in, like, a day or two and just clean it up,” said the rapper. 

But residents like Obi woke up the following morning to news that thousands of homes and entire neighborhoods had been burned to ash, destroyed by flames that wiped out large areas of Pacific Palisades and Altadena. Although the neighborhoods are on opposite ends of the county, they are known hubs for many of the city’s creative community, housing filmmakers, actors, musicians and artists of various mediums. 

“L.A. is not just rich, famous people who have giant mansions that were destroyed,” said visual artist Andrea Bowers, who is helping artists recover. “So many members of our community lost everything. They lost all their artworks and their archives – that’s irreplaceable, a lifetime of labor and a lifetime of research.” 

“A lot of my collectors lost their homes,” said figurative and conceptual artist Salomon Huerta, who lost his Altadena home of three years to the Eaton fire and worries the art scene in L.A. will downsize as a result of the wildfire. “Before the fire, I was in talks with certain collectors. And then, after the fire, they’re not in a good place to talk. I’m hoping that there’s support so that the art scene can still thrive. But it’s going to be tough.” 

Obi and Huerta lost not only personal treasures, business opportunities and homes but also vital equipment and professional archives, adding to their emotional burden. 

Huerta left behind slides and transparencies of past work that he had planned to digitize for an upcoming book. 

“Everything’s gone,” Obi said. “All of my stuff that is related to Fat Tony music that was in that house is gone, and it was the motherlode of it.” 

Grief and Hope 

Kathryn Andrews never imagined she’d experience another wildfire in her lifetime. 

The conceptual artist was forced to flee her Pacific Palisades neighborhood as smoke drew near, the second time in four years she’s had to escape a wildfire. 

She lost her Juniper Hills property to the 2020 Bobcat fire, which burned a large section of rural Los Angeles County. 

“I’ve already experienced one home being burned. I think you have a different focus after that. Maybe we become a little bit less attached to material things. And we began looking at a bigger long-term picture, thinking about, you know, how we live together in community, how we live in relation to the land and how we can work together to solve this,” she said. 

Andrews is the co-founder of relief effort Grief and Hope, which aims to support creatives financially as they enter the long road ahead and was founded alongside a group of gallery directors, art professionals and artists like Bowers, Ariel Pittman, Olivia Gauthier and Julia V. Hendrickson. 

“Our primary goal is getting people triage money for just whatever the most emergent need is,” said Pittman. 

The fundraising effort began shortly after the fires broke out with a Go Fund Me seeking $500,000. They have now raised over $940,000 of their new $1 million goal via The Brick, a nonprofit art space. As of Tuesday, Grief and Hope had received more than 450 inquiries, and Pittman said the funds would be evenly distributed to applicants. The deadline for artists to submit a needs survey has concluded, but the relief effort will continue fundraising until mid-March. 

Grief and Hope also has five different groups of volunteers providing peer-to-peer support, helping with medical needs, safety issues and renter’s issues, and collecting survey data to better serve their creative community. 

“These are people who already have made very long-term commitments in their work, including the five of us, towards building community and building sustainability around artists and art workers in our city and beyond,” said Pittman. 

For Grief and Hope, creating a more sustainable future for artists throughout the city begins with affordable studio spaces and housing. 

Long road ahead 

For photographer Joy Wong, losing her home of eight years meant losing the beauty of Altadena. She described the overall area as “a pocket of heaven.” 

“I didn’t want to leave,” said Wong, who safely evacuated with her husband and 2-year-old daughter. “We were just so in love with this house, and it wasn’t just my house. It was also my studio space.” 

Many, like Obi, Wong and Huerta, have started GoFundMe accounts. Meanwhile, initiatives and relief efforts have popped up around Southern California, ready to assist with clothing donations, art supplies, professional equipment for creatives and more. 

“I’m applying to everything,” said Obi, who needs to replace his instruments and recording equipment. 

Wong said she’s received much support from family, friends and colleagues. 

“I think I just have to kind of lean on the community and get back into shooting,” she said. “I got to get all my gear back, too. It’s going to be a long road, but it’ll be OK.” 

Arts scene rebirth 

Superchief Gallery co-founder and director Bill Dunleavy said he believes that this is an opportunity to rebuild long-needed infrastructure for the arts throughout Los Angeles. 

“Quite a lot was lost in the areas affected by the fire. And it’s going to affect rent prices and studio prices and art markets and everything else,” said Dunleavy. “I’ve been so impressed with the amount of compassion that people feel and the sense of duty people have felt to help with this. … I hope that continues into the coming years.” 

Creative director Celina Rodriguez said she hopes freelance artists and creatives continue to work and shoot production or projects throughout the city, rather than leaving because of the wildfires. 

“Having lost so many locations that we would shoot, typically in Malibu, Topanga, the Palisades, all throughout, we will have to absolutely come together and figure out how we can continue working in Los Angeles … and urge people to shoot productions here,” she said. 

Rodriguez and Dunleavy began collecting donations at the Downtown Los Angeles gallery and within 48 hours transformed it into a bustling donation center with over 150 volunteers. The duo are now working with displaced families to make sure their daily needs are being met. 

Dunleavy said the relief effort has only encouraged him to take this work beyond just the donation center and explore the possibilities of nonprofit work for the community. 

“All of our wheels are turning now that we’ve seen the power that just self-organizing can have.”
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As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to travel to Washington to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump, Hamas frees three more Israeli hostages — including a dual U.S. citizen — and Israel frees dozens of Palestinian prisoners. The next phase of the Gaza ceasefire is expected to be on the agenda when the leaders meet on Tuesday. Linda Gradstein reports for VOA from Jerusalem.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. State Department said Saturday that the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) — the world’s leading HIV initiative — was covered by a waiver for life-saving humanitarian assistance during a 90-day pause in foreign aid.

Just hours after taking office on Jan. 20, President Donald Trump ordered the pause so foreign aid contributions could be reviewed to see if they align with his “America First” foreign policy. The U.S. is the world’s largest aid donor.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio initially issued a waiver for emergency food aid and then Tuesday for life-saving medicine, medical services, food, shelter and subsistence help. However, the lack of detail in Trump’s order and the ensuing waivers has left aid groups confused as to whether their work can continue.

So, Saturday the State Department’s Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy issued a memo, seen by Reuters, clarifying that PEPFAR was covered by the Jan. 28 memo and spelling out what activities were allowed.

These include life-saving HIV care and treatment services, including testing and counseling, prevention and treatment of infections including tuberculosis (TB), laboratory services, and procurement and supply chain for commodities/medicines. It also allows prevention of mother-to-child transmission services.

“Any other activities not specifically mentioned in this guidance may not be resumed without express approval,” it said.

More than 20 million people living with HIV, who represent two-thirds of all people living with the disease receiving treatment globally, are directly supported by PEPFAR.

Under Trump’s foreign aid pause, all payments by U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) stopped Tuesday — for the first time since the fiscal year began on Oct. 1 — and have not resumed, according to U.S. Treasury data. On Monday USAID paid out $8 million and last week a total of $545 million.

The Trump administration is also moving to strip a slimmed-down USAID of its independence and put it under State Department control, two sources familiar with the discussions said Friday, in what would be a significant overhaul of how Washington allocates U.S. foreign aid. 
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WASHINGTON — U.S. warplanes took aim at the Islamic State affiliate in Somalia, hitting what officials described as high-ranking operatives in the terror group’s mountainous stronghold. 

U.S. President Donald Trump announced the precision strike Saturday on social media, describing the main target as a “Senior ISIS Attack Planner and other terrorists he recruited and led.” 

“These killers, who we found hiding in caves, threatened the United States and our Allies,” Trump said. “The strikes destroyed the caves they live in, and killed many terrorists without, in any way, harming civilians.” 

A separate statement from U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the strikes targeted an area in Somalia’s Golis mountains, and “further degrades ISIS’s ability to plot and conduct terrorist attacks threatening US citizens, our partners, and innocent civilians.” 

Neither Trump nor Hegseth named the IS planner, though U.S. officials said the strikes were carried out in coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia.   

General Adan Abdi Hashi, commander of the Puntland Devish Forces said the airstrikes targeted at least 10 locations of the Islamic State militants in the Cal-Miskaad area, which is part of the Golis mountains.   

“The strikes targeted about 10 locations in the Cal-Miskaad areas, most of them caves, and we believe that many of the militants were killed,” said the general.  

Residents in Qandala, a small town in Bari region of Puntland told VOA on the condition of anonymity because they feared for their lives, that they could see from the distance plumes of smoke and flames, and that they could hear at least seven huge explosions.

Officials from Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region thanked the U.S. on social media, calling the operation a success. 

“The latest airstrike, carried out today, resulted in the elimination of several high-ranking #ISIS members,” according to the statement. 

U.S. Africa Command, which oversees U.S, military efforts on the continent, said it, too, assessed multiple terror operatives had been killed. 

The Islamic State, also known as IS or Daesh, has increasingly played a key role in the terror group’s operations in Africa and beyond. 

Since 2022, Somalia has been home to al-Karrar, one of nine regional Islamic State offices established to help sustain the terror group’s capabilities. As a result, IS-Somalia has become both a key cog in the IS financial network, funneling money to affiliates in Afghanistan and elsewhere in Africa. 

IS-Somalia has, at the same time, become more influential under the leadership of Abdulkadir Mumin, a former militant with the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab, who is thought to now head IS’ directorate of provinces, overseeing the terror group’s affiliates in Africa. 

Some U.S. officials worry Mumin has risen even higher, perhaps acting as the Islamic State’s top emir. Others disagree but there is consensus that Mumin is nonetheless a pivotal figure. 

The U.S. previously targeted Mumin in May of last year.  

Recent intelligence assessments have further warned IS-Somalia has more than doubled in size over the past year and may now boast up to as many as 1,600 fighters, bolstered by an influx of fighters from Ethiopia, Morocco, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania and Yemen. 

Most of IS-Somalia’s manpower has been concentrated in Puntland, especially in the Golis Mountains, also known as the Cal-Miskaad mountains. 

Saturday’s airstrike, the first against IS in Somalia so far this year, was carried out by fighter jets launched from the USS Harry S. Truman, currently in the Red Sea, according to defense officials who spoke to VOA on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss details of the operation. 

It comes as Somali forces in Puntland continue a military offensive against ISIS militants hiding in Cal-Miskaad mountains. Puntland also thanked the United Arab Emirates which they say provided air support to the ongoing offensive.    

The operations, which started in late December 31, drove militants from vast areas in the northeastern highlands of Somalia. 

The militants, many of them foreigners, have claimed carrying out IED attacks against Puntland forces.  

The fiercest clashes occurred late last week when the regional forces dislodged the militants from Turmasaale, a strategic location about 150 kilometers southeast of Bosaso. 

The Somali government called Saturday’s airstrikes by the U.S. “a critical step in our shared fight against terrorism.” 

“The Federal Government of Somalia welcomes the firm and decisive counterterrorism efforts led by the United States,” it said in a statement. “Together, we will continue to dismantle extremist networks … and build a future free from the scourge of terrorism.” 
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WHITE HOUSE — U.S. President Donald Trump signed an order Saturday that places 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico and 10% tariffs on goods from China, the White House said.

“Both Canada and Mexico have allowed an unprecedented invasion of illegal fentanyl that is killing American citizens, and also illegal immigrants into our country,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during her briefing Friday.

Leavitt did not say whether there would be any exemptions to the measures. “These are promises made and promises kept by the president,” she said.

Asked by reporters Friday, Trump said there was nothing the three countries could do to reverse his decision and that the tariffs were “not a negotiating tool.”

“It’s a pure economic — we have big deficits with, as you know, with all three of them,” Trump said. “We’re not looking for a concession, and we’ll just see what happens.”

Trump had said he would tariff Canadian crude oil imports at 10% beginning Saturday. Other Canadian goods would be hit with a 25% tariff.

The president vowed to impose sweeping tariffs on semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, steel and aluminum, and oil and gas.

“All forms of medicine and pharmaceuticals,” Trump said. “And we’ll be doing, very importantly, steel, and we’ll also be doing chips and things associated with chips.”

The tentative plan is for the tariffs to take effect on Tuesday.

Trump warned he would “absolutely” place tariffs on goods from the European Union.

“They’re treating us so badly,” he said.

Outgoing Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country would respond.

“We’re working hard to prevent these tariffs, but if the United States moves ahead, Canada’s ready with a forceful and immediate response,” he posted on social media.

Meanwhile, Mexico had a more muted response. Its economic ministry posted a message on social media saying that Mexico and the United States were “partners, not competitors.”

Tariffs could backfire

China, Mexico and Canada account for more than one-third of the goods and services imported into or bought from the United States.

Some economists warn that the tariffs could backfire.

Imports from Mexico and Canada make up around 3% of U.S. GDP, while exports make up around 2.5% percent of U.S. GDP, said Brad Setser, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations

A 25% tariff on Mexico and Canada amounts to a “tax hike on imports from those countries” and will “have an immediate and negative impact on the U.S. economy,” he told VOA. “It’s a strategy for shrinking the U.S. economy.”

Trump has long threatened to impose tariffs to pressure countries to help his administration stop illegal immigration and the smuggling of chemicals used for fentanyl. He has pledged to use tariffs to boost domestic manufacturing and has praised its use as an effective economic policy.

Trump believes that “tariffs are a great source of leverage,” and that he will “convince Canada and Mexico to make big concessions under the threat of tariffs,” Setser said. “But these measures are going to be pretty costly to the U.S.”

Trump acknowledged that the tariffs might cause a “short-term disruption” for consumers but said it would lead to a long-term benefit for U.S. manufacturing.

“Tariffs don’t cause inflation. Tariffs cause success,” he said.

During his first administration in 2018, Trump negotiated and signed the United States-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement, in part to narrow the United States’ big trade deficit — the gap between what it sells and what it buys — with its neighbors. He once called the deal “the fairest, most balanced and beneficial trade agreement we have ever signed into law.”

However, the U.S. deficit in the trade of goods with Mexico has widened from $106 billion in 2019 to $161 billion in 2023, according to government data. The trade gap in goods with Canada has also increased, from $31 billion in 2019 to $72 billion in 2023.

“He’s now acting like his deal caused a disaster needing an emergency fix,” said Derek Scissors, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

There’s no justification for high tariffs on Canada, a market economy that’s not in the top five of U.S. trade deficits, Scissors said. “Fentanyl shipments across the Canadian border are tiny,” he added.

Fentanyl and illegal migration are justifications for border restrictions on Mexico, Scissors said. However, tariffs “don’t stop illegal immigration and probably encourage it by threatening jobs in Mexico.”

The stock market erased early gains and closed lower Friday after the White House announcement on tariffs.

Kim Lewis contributed to this report.
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WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that Venezuela has agreed to receive all Venezuelan undocumented migrants captured in the United States and pay for their transport.

“Venezuela has agreed to receive, back into their country, all Venezuela illegal aliens who were encamped in the U.S., including gang members of Tren de Aragua,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

He said Venezuela has also agreed to provide transportation.

The Venezuelan government did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

U.S. envoy Richard Grenell met with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in the South American country on Friday. Hours after their meeting, six American hostages were released and returned to the United States from Venezuela.

The announcement of Venezuela’s decision to accept the return of its citizens who were illegally in the United States comes one week after Trump threatened to impose tariffs and sanctions after Colombia refused to accept military flights carrying deportees.

Colombia reversed its course and agreed to accept migrants following the threats.

“We are in the process of removing record numbers of illegal aliens from all countries,” said Trump, who vowed to crack down on illegal immigration in his 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump, a Republican, issued an array of executive orders to crack down on illegal immigration after taking office on Jan. 20, including actions aimed at deporting record numbers of migrants in the U.S. without legal status.
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Several U.S. government web pages changed or went dark Friday as agencies scrambled to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive orders declaring his administration would recognize only two genders and ordering an end to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

In a letter sent Wednesday, the Office of Personnel Management directed agency heads to terminate grants and contracts related to “gender ideology,” ask staff to remove pronouns from their government emails and disband resource groups on the issue, too. The directive, which ordered agencies to institute changes by 5 p.m. Friday, also asked agencies to remove the term “gender” from government forms and swap it out with “sex.”

Here is a list of changes and missing pages seen so far. Several pages have popped up since being taken down, some with changes:

National Park Service pages for historic sites related to the internment of Japanese Americans, the Tuskegee Airmen and the Stonewall Uprising for gay rights were inaccessible. The Tuskegee site was back online a short time later, but the others remained down Friday evening.

The State Department removed the “X” gender marker and replaced “gender” with “sex” on online consular forms. A page with tips for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex travelers was altered. It’s now titled “LGB Travelers” instead of “LGBTQIA+ Travelers.”

The Census Bureau’s homepage was down. Links to reports and topic pages outlining details about the gender identity, sexual orientation and characteristics of the nation’s population returned errors. A message Friday afternoon for one topic page titled “Sexual Orientation & Gender Identity” read, “The area of census.gov that you are trying to access is currently unavailable due to maintenance.” Another page titled “Mental Health Struggles Higher Among LGBT Adults Than Non-LGBT Adults in All Age Groups” also was unavailable. Archives of both pages show they were accessible within the past week. The bureau’s homepage was up Saturday morning.

Intelligence Community Inspector General reports were scrubbed from the website of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Trump previously fired around 17 inspectors general — known as independent government watchdogs — at multiple federal agencies.

A Bureau of Prisons web page originally titled “Inmate Gender” was relabeled “Inmate Sex” on Friday. A breakdown of transgender inmates in federal prisons was no longer included.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website took down much public health information: contraception guidance; a fact sheet about HIV and transgender people; lessons on building supportive school environments for transgender and nonbinary kids; details about National Transgender HIV Testing Day; a set of government surveys showing transgender students suffering higher rates of depression, drug use, bullying and other problems. The agency also removed its data repository, data.cdc.gov. A message said “the website will resume operations once in compliance” with Trump’s executive order.

In addition, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the military to immediately stop recognizing identity months, including Black History Month, Women’s History Month, Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, National Hispanic Heritage Month, National Disability Employment Awareness Month and National American Indian Heritage Month.
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WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Friday fired a group of prosecutors involved in the Jan. 6 criminal cases and demanded the names of FBI agents involved in those same probes so they can possibly be ousted, moves that reflect a White House determination to exert control over federal law enforcement and purge agencies of career employees seen as insufficiently loyal.

Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove ordered the firings of the Jan. 6 prosecutors days after President Donald Trump’s sweeping clemency action benefiting the more than 1,500 people charged in the U.S. Capitol attack, according to a memo obtained by The Associated Press. About two dozen employees at the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington were terminated, said a person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss personnel issues.

A separate memo by Bove identified more than a half-dozen FBI senior executives who were ordered to retire or be fired by Monday, and also asked for the names, titles and offices of all FBI employees who worked on investigations into the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot — a list the bureau’s acting director said could number in the thousands. Bove, who has defended Trump in his criminal cases before joining the administration, said Justice Department officials would then carry out a “review process to determine whether any additional personnel actions are necessary.”

“As we’ve said since the moment we agreed to take on these roles, we are going to follow the law, follow FBI policy, and do what’s in the best interest of the workforce and the American people — always,” acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll wrote in a letter to the workforce.

The prosecutors fired in the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office had been hired for temporary assignments to support the Jan. 6 cases but were moved into permanent roles after Trump’s presidential win in November, according to the memo obtained by the AP. Bove, the acting deputy attorney general, said he would not “tolerate subversive personnel actions by the previous administration.”

Any mass firings at the FBI would be a major blow to the historic independence from the White House of the nation’s premier federal law enforcement agency but would be in keeping with Trump’s persistent resolve to bend the law enforcement and intelligence community to his will. It would be part of a startling pattern of retribution waged on federal government employees, following the forced ousters of a group of senior FBI executives earlier this week as well as a broad termination by the Justice Department of prosecutors on special counsel Jack Smith’s team who investigated Trump.

The FBI Agents Association said the reported efforts to oust agents represented “outrageous actions by acting officials” that were “fundamentally at odds with the law enforcement objectives outlined by President Trump and his support for FBI Agents.”

“Dismissing potentially hundreds of Agents would severely weaken the Bureau’s ability to protect the country from national security and criminal threats and will ultimately risk setting up the Bureau and its new leadership for failure,” the association said in a statement.

It was not immediately clear what recourse any fired agent might take, but the bureau has a well-defined process for terminations and any abrupt action that bypasses that protocol could presumably open the door to a legal challenge.

When pressed during his confirmation hearing Thursday, Trump’s pick for FBI director, Kash Patel, said he was not aware of any plans to terminate or otherwise punish FBI employees who were involved in the Trump investigations. Patel said if he was confirmed he would follow the FBI’s internal review processes for taking action against employees.

Asked by Democratic Senator Cory Booker whether he would reverse any decisions before his confirmation that don’t follow that standard process, Patel said, “I don’t know what’s going on right now over there, but I’m committed to you, senator, and your colleagues, that I will honor the due process of the FBI.”

Before he was nominated for the director’s position, Patel had remarked on at least one podcast appearance about what he called anti-Trump “conspirators” in the government and news media who he said needed to be rooted out.

Trump has for years expressed fury at the FBI and Justice Department over investigations that shadowed his presidency, including an inquiry into ties between Russia and his 2016 campaign, and continued over the last four years. He fired one FBI director, James Comey, amid the Russia investigation and then replaced his second, Christopher Wray, just weeks after his win in November.

Asked at the White House on Friday if he had anything to do with the scrutiny of the agents, he said: “No, but we have some very bad people over there. It was weaponized at a level that nobody’s never seen before. They came after a lot of people — like me — but they came after a lot of people.”

He added, “If they fired some people over there, that’s a good thing, because they were very bad.”

The FBI and Smith’s team investigated Trump over his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and his hoarding of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Both of those cases resulted in indictments that were withdrawn after Trump’s November presidential win because of longstanding Justice Department policy prohibiting the federal prosecution of a sitting president.

The Justice Department also charged more than 1,500 Trump supporters in connection with the Capitol riot, although Trump on his first day in office granted clemency to all of them — including the ones convicted of violent crimes — through pardons, sentence commutations and dismissals of indictments.

This week, the Justice Department fired more than a dozen prosecutors who worked on Smith investigations, and a group of senior FBI executives — including several executive assistant directors and agents in charge of big-city field offices — have been told to either resign or retire or be fired Monday.
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OXON HILL, MARYLAND — Democrats, seeking a new message and messengers to push back against the Trump administration, will elect a new leader Saturday in a low-profile Democratic National Committee election that could have big implications for the party’s future.

More than 400 DNC members from every state and U.S. territory have gathered in suburban Washington for the election, which features a slate of candidates dominated by party insiders. Outgoing Chair Jaime Harrison is not seeking reelection.

Most of the candidates acknowledge that the Democratic brand is badly damaged, but few are promising fundamental changes. Indeed, nearly three months after Donald Trump won the popular vote and gained ground among key Democratic constituencies, there is little agreement on what exactly went wrong.

Facing an emboldened Trump presidency, however, the leading candidates are talking tough. “As we reel with shock at the horror that Trump is visiting on communities across this country, we need a DNC and a DNC chair who’s ready to bring the intensity, the focus and the fury to fight back,” said Ben Wikler, the Wisconsin Democratic chair and a top candidate for DNC chair.

The election comes less than two weeks after Trump’s inauguration and as Democratic leaders struggle to confront the sheer volume of executive orders, pardons, personnel changes and controversial relationships taking shape in the new administration. The next DNC chair would serve as a face of the Democratic response, while helping to coordinate political strategy and repair the party’s brand.

Just 31% of voters have a favorable opinion of the Democratic Party, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released this week that offers a dramatic contrast with Trump’s GOP. Forty-three percent of voters have a favorable opinion of the Republican Party.

The leading candidates for DNC chair, Wisconsin’s Wikler and Minnesota’s Ken Martin, are low-profile state party chairs. They’re promising to refocus the Democratic message on working-class voters, strengthen Democratic infrastructure across the country and improve the party’s anti-Trump rapid response system. They have promised not to shy away from the party’s dedication to diversity and minority groups, a pillar of the modern-day Democratic Party.

But if Martin, 51, or Wikler, 43, is elected, as expected, either would be the first white man to lead the DNC since 2011.

Also in the race: Marianne Williamson, the activist and author; former Maryland governor and Biden administration official Martin O’Malley; and Faiz Shakir, who managed Bernie Sanders’ last presidential campaign.

Shakir has called for sweeping changes within the party, such as more coordination with labor unions and less focus on minority groups sorted by race and gender. The only Muslim seeking the chairmanship, Shakir was alone during a candidate forum this week in opposing the creation of a Muslim caucus at the DNC. But he has struggled to gain traction. Shakir declined to raise money for the contest, decorating his modest booth at this week’s gathering with pictures drawn by his young children with crayons.

By contrast, Martin and Wikler hosted would-be supporters in large hotel suites adorned with dozens of professionally printed signs and offered T-shirts, sunglasses and food.

Wikler has faced questions about his relationship with Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, the billionaire cofounder of LinkedIn. But he cast his fundraising connections as an asset. Indeed, the DNC chair is expected to raise tens of millions of dollars to help Democrats win elections.

Some Democratic leaders remain concerned about the direction of their party. “As positive as I am and as hopeful as I am, I’m watching this in real time, thinking to myself, ‘We’re in real trouble because I don’t see a desire to change,’” said Kansas Democratic Chair Jeanna Repass, a candidate for DNC vice chair.
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ANCHORAGE, ALASKA — The Alaska Gold Rush town of Nome faced a bleak winter. It was hundreds of miles from anywhere, cut off by the frozen sea and unrelenting blizzards, and under siege from a contagious disease known as the “strangling angel” for the way it suffocated children. 

Now, 100 years later, Nome is remembering its saviors — the sled dogs and mushers who raced for more than five days through hypothermia, frostbite, gale-force winds and blinding whiteouts to deliver lifesaving serum and free the community from the grip of diphtheria. 

Among the events celebrating the centennial of the 1925 “Great Race of Mercy” are lectures, a dog-food drive and a reenactment of the final leg of the relay, all organized by the Nome Kennel Club. 

Alaskans honor ‘heroic effort’ 

“There’s a lot of fluff around celebrations like this, but we wanted to remember the mushers and their dogs who have been at the center of this heroic effort and … spotlight mushing as a still-viable thing for the state of Alaska,” said Diana Haecker, a kennel club board member and co-owner of Alaska’s oldest newspaper, The Nome Nugget. 

“People just dropped whatever they were doing,” she said. “These mushers got their teams ready and went, even though it was really cold and challenging conditions on the trail.” 

Other communities are also marking the anniversary — including the village of Nenana, where the relay began, and Cleveland, Ohio, where the serum run’s most famous participant, a husky mix named Balto, is stuffed and displayed at a museum. 

Jonathan Hayes, a Maine resident who has been working to preserve the genetic line of sled dogs driven on the run by famed musher Leonhard Seppala, is recreating the trip. Hayes left Nenana on Monday with 16 Seppala Siberian sled dogs, registered descendants of Seppala’s team. 

A race to save lives

Diphtheria is an airborne disease that causes a thick, suffocating film on the back of the throat; it was once a leading cause of death for children. The antitoxin used to treat it was developed in 1890, and a vaccine in 1923; it is now exceedingly rare in the U.S. 

Nome, western Alaska’s largest community, had about 1,400 residents a century ago. Its most recent supply ship had arrived the previous fall, before the Bering Sea froze, without any doses of the antitoxin. Those the local doctor, Curtis Welch, had were outdated, but he wasn’t worried. He hadn’t seen a case of diphtheria in the 18 years he had practiced in the area. 

Within months, that changed. In a telegram, Welch pleaded with the U.S. Public Health Service to send serum: “An epidemic of diphtheria is almost inevitable here.” 

The first death was a 3-year-old boy on January 20, 1925, followed the next day by a 7-year-old girl. By the end of the month, there were more than 20 confirmed cases. The city was placed under quarantine. 

West Coast hospitals had antitoxin doses, but it would take time to get them to Seattle, Washington, and then onto a ship for Seward, Alaska, an ice-free port south of Anchorage, Alaska. In the meantime, enough for 30 people was found at an Anchorage hospital. 

It still had to get to Nome. Airplanes with open-air cockpits were ruled out as unsuited for the weather. There were no roads or trains that reached Nome. 

Instead, officials shipped the serum by rail to Nenana in interior Alaska, some 1,086 kilometers (675 miles) from Nome via the frozen Yukon River and mail trails. 

Thanks to Alaska’s new telegraph lines and the spread of radio, the nation followed along, captivated, as 20 mushers — many of them Alaska Natives — with more than 150 dogs relayed the serum to Nome. They battled deep snow, whiteouts so severe they couldn’t see the dogs in front of them, and life-threatening temperatures that plunged at times to minus minus 51 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit).

The antitoxin was transported in glass vials covered with padded quilts. Not a single vial broke. 

Seppala, a Norwegian settler, left from Nome to meet the supply near the halfway point and begin the journey back. His team, led by his dog Togo, traveled more than 320 kilometers (250 miles) of the relay, including a treacherous stretch across frozen Norton Sound. 

After about 5 1/2 days, the serum reached its destination on February 2, 1925. A banner front-page headline in the San Francisco Chronicle proclaimed “Dogs victors over blizzard in battle to succor stricken Nome.” 

The official record listed five deaths and 29 illnesses. It’s likely the toll was higher; Alaska Natives were not accurately tracked. 

Balto gains fame 

Seppala and Togo missed the limelight that went to his assistant, Gunnar Kaasen, who drove the dog team led by Balto into Nome. Balto was another of Seppala’s dogs, but was used to only haul freight after he was deemed too slow to be on a competitive team.

Balto was immortalized in movies and with statues in New York’s Central Park and one in Anchorage intended as a tribute to all sled dogs. He received a bone-shaped key to the city of Los Angeles, where legendary movie actress Mary Pickford placed a wreath around his neck. 

But he and several team members were eventually sold and kept in squalid conditions at a dime museum in Los Angeles. After learning of their plight, an Ohio businessman spearheaded an effort to raise money to bring them to Cleveland, a city in Ohio. After dying in 1933, Balto was mounted and placed on display at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. 

Iditarod pays homage to run 

Today, the most famous mushing event in the world is the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, which is not based on the serum run but on the Iditarod Trail, a supply route from Seward to Nome. Iditarod organizers are nevertheless marking the serum run’s centennial with a series of articles on its website and by selling replicas of the medallions each serum run musher received a century ago, race spokesperson Shannon Noonan said in an email. This year’s Iditarod starts March 1. 

“The Serum Run demonstrated the critical role sled dogs played in the survival and communication of remote Alaskan communities, while the Iditarod has evolved into a celebration of that tradition and Alaska’s pioneering spirit,” Noonan said. 
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WASHINGTON — A collision between an American Airlines passenger jet and an Army helicopter near Washington, D.C., that killed 67 people brought renewed focus on the federal agency charged with investigating aviation disasters.

National Transportation Safety Board Chairwoman Jennifer Hommendy has described the investigation into the crash as an “all-hands-on-deck event” for the agency.

Here are some things to know about the NTSB:

What does the agency do?

The NTSB is an independent federal agency responsible for investigating all civil aviation accidents as well as serious incidents in the U.S. involving other modes of transportation, such as railroad disasters and major accidents involving motor vehicles, marine vessels, pipelines and even commercial space operators.

“We’re here to ensure the American people that we are going to leave no stone unturned in this investigation,” Homendy said, noting the probe is in the very early stages. “We are going to conduct a thorough investigation of this entire tragedy, looking at the facts.”

The agency has five board members who serve five-year terms and are nominated by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

How will the investigation work?

For the investigation into Wednesday’s crash, the NTSB will establish several different working groups, each responsible for investigating different areas connected to the accident, board member Todd Inman said.

Inman said those groups include operations, which will examine flight history and crewmember duties; structures, which will document airframe wreckage and the accident scene; power plants, which will focus on aircraft engines and engine accessories; systems, which will study the electrical, hydraulic and pneumatic components of the two aircraft; air traffic control, which will review flight track surveillance information, including radar, and controller-pilot communications; survival factors, which will analyze the injuries to the crew and passengers and crash and rescue efforts; and a helicopter group.

The investigation also will include a human-performance group that will be a part of the operations, air traffic control and helicopter groups and will study the crew performance and any factors that could be involved such as human error, including fatigue, medications, medical histories, training and workload, Inman said.

How long will the investigation take?

NTSB officials did not say Thursday how long the investigation would take, but accident investigations often take between one to two years to complete. The agency typically releases a preliminary report within a few weeks of the accident that includes a synopsis of information collected at the scene.

What is the NTSB’s history?

The NTSB history dates to 1926, when Congress passed a law charging the U.S. Department of Commerce with investigating aircraft accidents. It was established as an independent agency within the U.S. Department of Transportation in 1967 and then separated by Congress in 1974 as a stand-alone organization, fully independent from any other federal agencies. Since its creation in 1967, the agency reports it has investigated more than 153,000 aviation accidents and incidents. 
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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s decision to freeze $45 million in U.S. federal funding for over 400 Burmese students has left many in shock and dismay as their scholarships were abruptly canceled.

The move has also raised concerns about the broader impact it could have on Burmese in Myanmar, a country already grappling with political turmoil and a collapsing education system under military rule.

Students in limbo

One Burmese student who studies at Chiang Mai University in Thailand told VOA that she feels completely lost after learning that her scholarship was being suspended.

“To be honest, I am lost because of this sudden loss of my scholarship. I had been studying with the goal of earning a degree, and now I don’t know what to do,” she said. The student spoke with VOA on condition of anonymity because she fears for her safety if she returns to Burma, which remains under military control.

She said students like her and others at different academic levels are now left without financial support.

“There are students doing four-year master’s degrees, others in four-year bachelor’s programs, and even PhD students. I don’t know whether I should continue my studies, go home, or what my next step should be,” she said. “I am saddened that President Trump only cares about the United States and has cut off my studies.”

An email sent to recipients of the program that was shared with VOA’s Burmese Service, said the Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship Program, or DISP, is currently suspended, and officials “will review whether to continue the scholarship for the students who have been awarded it.”

DISP was created to support Burmese students from marginalized and underprivileged backgrounds, giving them opportunities to study at universities across Asia, including the Philippines, Cambodia, Indonesia, and Thailand. The program also provided funding for online education through the University of Arizona.

For many, the initiative was their only chance to pursue higher education outside of Burma, where the junta-controlled education system has systematically restricted access for those opposing the military regime.

For some students, the immediate impact has been less severe.

Hlwan Paing Thi Ha, who has been studying at Chiang Mai University for a year, told VOA: “My education has already been paid for through the scholarship program, so it hasn’t impacted me yet.” 

Future leaders impacted

One source who has in-depth understanding of the program, said the impact goes beyond just access to education and opportunities. The source spoke with VOA on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak with the media.

More than a quarter of the Burmese students in the program have fled Myanmar due to the military coup, ongoing fighting and forced conscription, which has targeted youth.

“The impact is huge,” the source said, adding that currently, more than 400 Burmese students are attending universities in four countries—the Philippines, Cambodia, Indonesia, and Thailand through the USAID-funded program.

“Of these, 110 were directly recruited from Myanmar, while the rest are students who fled to border regions and Southeast Asian countries due to the military coup or boycotted Myanmar’s junta-controlled education system,” the source said.

The program, which was launched in February 2024, was designed as a five-year initiative, with plans to recruit three batches of students over that period.

“The goal was to ensure that at least 1,000 Burmese students, the ‘current and future leaders of the country,’ could continue their studies in universities across the region. The second batch, which would include hundreds of students, is now in the final stage of the screening process,” the source explained.

Debate continues

In Washington a debate over the freeze and review continues.

On Tuesday, the State Department issued a waiver that exempts some humanitarian aid from the freeze. U.S. lawmakers have also voiced concerns, warning that the freeze will impact American soft power and give China an advantage.

On Wednesday, President Trump defended the funding freeze, specifically calling out the $45 million allocated for diversity scholarships for Burmese students.

“We also blocked $45 million for diversity scholarships in Burma. Forty-five—that’s a lot of money for diversity scholarships in Burma. You can imagine where that money went,” Trump said. “These were the types of payments and many others. I could stand here all day and tell you about things that we found, and we have to find them quickly because we want the money to flow to proper places.”

Name threatens its demise?

Some note that in addition to the freeze, the name of the program may also leave it in a difficult position, with some worrying that the mention of diversity in its title could impact a substantive review of its impact.

The source with direct knowledge of the initiative for Burmese students told VOA that the program was swiftly terminated when the Trump administration began reducing foreign aid, and that its name “Diversity and Inclusion” likely played a major role in its elimination.

“This program was one of the first to be cut as soon as the administration began making budget reductions in this area,” the source said.

While all USAID-funded programs have been temporarily frozen, DISP appears to have been specifically blocked without any review, the source noted.

“USAID officials have not been able to explain why this program was halted so suddenly.”

VOA reached out to the State Department to verify whether the program was permanently blocked or still under review and whether its name played a role in its swift termination. However, as of the time of publication, VOA had not received a response from the State Department.

The source also voiced concern the administration may not understand that the program has no connection to Myanmar’s military junta and was created solely to support young people who lost their education due to military oppression.

Lifeline for ethnic and religious minorities

The Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship Program was set up to reflect Burma’s ethnic and religious diversity, giving equal opportunities to students from all backgrounds who have historically faced discrimination under the Burman-dominated and military-controlled education policies. Burman is the name of the main ethnic group in Myanmar.

Many recipients of the scholarship program belong to ethnic minority groups such as the Karen, Kachin, Shan, Chin, and Rohingya, who have historically faced systemic discrimination in Burma’s education system.  
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