Once presenting itself as one of the world’s most welcoming countries to refugees and immigrants, Canada is launching a global online ad campaign cautioning asylum-seekers that making a claim is hard.

The C$250,000 ($178,662) in advertisements will run through March in 11 languages, including Spanish, Urdu, Ukrainian, Hindi and Tamil, the immigration department told Reuters.

They are part of a broader shift in tone by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s unpopular government on immigration and an effort to clamp down on refugee claims.

Migrants have been blamed for high housing prices, although some experts argue this is a simplistic explanation, and polls show a growing number of Canadians think the country admits too many newcomers.

The four-month campaign is budgeted to cost a third of the total spend on similar advertisements over the previous seven years.

Search queries such as “how to claim asylum in Canada” and “refugee Canada” will prompt sponsored content titled “Canada’s asylum system – Asylum Facts,” the ministry said.

“Claiming asylum in Canada is not easy. There are strict guidelines to qualify. Find out what you need to know before you make a life-changing decision,” one ad reads.

Canada has long been seen as a welcoming place for newcomers. Now its leaders are slashing immigration and trying to get temporary residents to leave and to prevent people fleeing U.S. President-elect Donald Trump from claiming asylum.

“Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada is working to combat the spread of misinformation and disinformation about Canada’s immigration system, and to highlight the risks of working with unauthorized representatives,” a department spokesperson wrote in an email.

Refugee Case Backlog

It may be an uphill battle. Canada’s refugee system faces a 260,000-case backlog amid growing global displacement. The government has little control over who claims asylum.

Its immigration minister has hinted at fast-tracking claims deemed unlikely to succeed. The government is hoping millions of people will leave the country on their own when their visas expire, and the immigration minister has threatened to deport them if they do not.

It is a dramatic about-face for a government that for years set out the welcome mat.

In January 2017, when Trump took office, Trudeau tweeted: “To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada.”

On Nov. 17, nearly eight years later, Trudeau published a video promoting his government’s immigration policies, calling out “bad actors” who “have been exploiting our immigration system for their own interests.”

Last month, the Liberal government, trailing in polls, announced it is slashing permanent and temporary immigration. The population is projected to shrink slightly for two years.

Ad campaigns to counter misinformation on how to apply for asylum could be useful, said University of Ottawa law professor and immigration expert Jamie Chai Yun Liew.

“On the other hand, if they’re saying, ‘You’re not welcome’ … it does seem contrary to Canada’s approach in the past,” she said. “They’ve switched their messaging.”

Several conservatives expressed concerns Sunday over President-elect Donald Trump’s announcement of Republican Florida sheriff Chad Chronister to be administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

Trump revealed Saturday in a statement that he will nominate Chronister to lead the DEA in his second administration, stating that the Florida sheriff will work with his attorney general pick, Pam Bondi, “to secure the Border, stop the flow of Fentanyl, and other Illegal Drugs, across the Southern Border.”

While Chronister received praise from colleagues and others after the initial announcement, some Republicans have begun to fire back due to his actions during the COVID-19 lockdown.

In March 2020, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office released a press statement revealing that they had arrested local Tampa Bay church pastor Dr. Rodney Howard-Browne on two second-degree misdemeanors for unlawful assembly and violation of public health emergency rules.

In a post on X from the Libertarian Party of Mississippi, the group called out Chronister’s decision to arrest Howard-Browne, leading Republican Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie to respond as well.

“I’m going to call ‘em like I see ‘em. Trump’s nominee for head of DEA should be disqualified for ordering the arrest a pastor who defied COVID lockdowns,” Massie wrote on X.

I’m going to call ‘em like I see ‘em. Trump’s nominee for head of DEA should be disqualified for ordering the arrest a pastor who defied COVID lockdowns. https://t.co/pHSmGr81Tz

— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) December 1, 2024

Conservative podcasters the Hodge Twins and journalist Mike Cernovich also called out Trump’s choice on X, highlighting Chronister’s COVID-19 stances at the time of the incident.

This guy can’t be the DEA leader @realDonaldTrump https://t.co/OsKOlFmhA0

— Hodgetwins (@hodgetwins) December 1, 2024

Trump’s choice for DEA discriminated against unvaccinated law enforcement officers under his command. pic.twitter.com/xCEiZWYQyX

— Cernovich (@Cernovich) December 1, 2024

Media personality John Cardillo wrote on X that he had deleted his original post praising the Florida Sheriff after remembering that he is a “COVIDian Sheriff who arrested a pastor during services because ‘COVID’ to be prosecuted by Andrew Warren, the Soros funded prosecutor DeSantis removed from Office.”

Deleted my post supporting Chronister as Trump’s DEA Adminitrator pick.

I completely forgot that Chronister is COVIDian Sheriff who arrested a pastor during services because “COVID” to be prosecuted by Andrew Warren, the Soros funded prosecutor DeSantis removed from Office.

— John Cardillo (@johncardillo) December 1, 2024

While Chronister had taken to social media to publicly thank Trump for the nomination and stated that he is “deeply humbled by this opportunity to serve our nation,” podcaster Tim Pool instead called for him to serve prison time.

Let’s revisit this after he serves prison time for conspiracy against rights for arresting a pastor during covid lockdowns https://t.co/Fl4JLCBIzO

— Tim Pool (@Timcast) December 1, 2024

At the time of Howard-Browne’s arrest, Chronister stated that while faith is important and authorities “would never impede on someone’s ability to lean on their religious beliefs as a means of comfort,” those practicing their beliefs must do so “safely.”

“His reckless disregard for human life put hundreds of people in his congregation at risk and thousands of residents who may interact with them this week in danger,” Chronister said. “The River at Tampa Bay has an advantage over most places of worship, because they have access to technology that allows them to live stream their services over the internet and broadcast television for the more than 4,000 members to watch from the safety of their homes.”

In addition to the local pastor’s arrest, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office released 164 inmates in March 2020 to help slow the spread of COVID-19 at the county jail.

“We want to protect our employees here. We want to protect the remainder of the jail population. We also feel these low-level, non-violent offenders will be better served at home with their families,” Chronister said at the time.

However, only a day after their release, one of the inmates, 26-year-old Joseph Edwards Williams, was arrested again on charges of second-degree murder in connection to a homicide along with charges of felony firearm possession, heroin possession and resisting arrest.

“There is no question Joseph Williams took advantage of this health emergency to commit crimes while he was out of jail awaiting resolution of a low-level, non-violent offense,” Chronister said after the incident. “As a result, I call on the State Attorney to prosecute this defendant to the fullest extent of the law.”

Following the announcement of Chronister’s pending nomination, Howard-Browne released a video interview featuring Chronister, whom he said was his friend.

“Yes, I did get arrested during COVID, but we’ve always been friends and we remain friends today,” Howard-Browne said in the video posted to X Sunday evening, adding that he “fully” endorsed Chronister to lead the DEA.

Chronister said he was proud Florida was among the first states to relax COVID rules. “It certainly was a very happy day when I was able to call the state attorney and say ‘drop those charges,’” Chronister told Howard-Browne in the video.

One Democrat governor and one Democrat member of U.S. Congress spoke out against President Joe Biden pardoning his son on Sunday night despite his repeated lies that he would not do so.

Biden issued a sweeping pardon for his son that covered every crime he committed “or may have committed or taken part in” over an 11 year period.

Far-left Colorado Governor Jared Polis posted on X:

“While as a father I certainly understand President @JoeBiden ’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country.”

“This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation,” he continued.

“When you become President, your role is Pater familias of the nation. Hunter brought the legal trouble he faced on himself, and one can sympathize with his struggles while also acknowledging that no one is above the law, not a President and not a President’s son.”

While as a father I certainly understand President @JoeBiden’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation.…

— Jared Polis (@jaredpolis) December 2, 2024

Rep. Greg Stanton (D-AZ) posted on X that Biden “got this one wrong.”

“This wasn’t a politically-motivated prosecution,” he said. “Hunter committed felonies, and was convicted by a jury of his peers.”

President-elect Donald Trump slammed Joe Biden for pardoning his son despite his promise that he would not.

“Does the Pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J-6 Hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years?” Trump asked on social media. “Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!”

A spokesperson for the president said in a separate statement that “the failed witch hunts against President Trump have proven that the Democrat-controlled DOJ and other radical prosecutors are guilty of weaponizing the justice system.”

“That system of justice must be fixed and due process must be restored for all Americans, which is exactly what President Trump will do as he returns to the White House with an overwhelming mandate from the American people,” the spokesperson added.

Conservative political commentator Dinesh D’Souza issued an apology Monday to a man who appeared in his documentary 2000 Mules for inaccurately depicting him as an election fraud mule.

The documentary, released in 2022, alleged that the 2020 election results were affected by thousands of people who were paid to collect ballots in swing states, including Georgia, where Mark Andrews was filmed dropping off five ballots in a box. While Andrews was dropping off the ballots of his household, which included his three adult children and his wife, his face was blurred in the film as he was implied to be a part of the scheme.

D’Souza issued a statement on his website dedicated to the documentary. As the filmmaker, D’Souza said the cellphone geolocation information depicted in the film, along with the surveillance video, was provided to him by the organization True the Vote. He explained that he recently learned the two pieces of data and the video “may not have actually been correlated.”

“I owe this individual, Mark Andrews, an apology. I now understand that the surveillance videos used in the film were characterized on the basis of inaccurate information provided to me and my team. If I had known then that the videos were not linked to geolocation data, I would have clarified this and produced and edited the film differently,” D’Souza said. “I make this apology not under the terms of a settlement agreement or other duress, but because it is the right thing to do, given what we have now learned. While I do not believe Mr. Andrews was ever identified by the film or book, I am sorry for any harm he believes he and his family has suffered as a result of 2000 Mules.”

Andrews filed a federal lawsuit against D’Souza over the matter two years ago. As a result, even the documentary’s publisher, Salem Media Group, issued an apology to Andrews shortly after. However, True the Vote made clear this was a mistake made by the film producers in an effort to glamorize the premise.

“The central premise of 2000 Mules, as identified and validated by True the Vote’s research, remains accurate. However, regarding the individual mentioned in Mr. D’Souza’s statement, TTV had no editorial control over the ‘2000 Mules’ movie and no involvement in the books,” True the Vote’s statement read. “We did not select videos or graphics used for dramatic effect. This individual was not part of the geospatial study in which TTV identified 242 unique devices having visited at least 10 ballot drop boxes—a fact that was communicated to Mr. D’Souza’s team.”

Despite the apology, D’Souza maintained “that the 2020 election was not the ‘most secure election in US history’ — far from it! — and that there was systematic election fraud sufficient to call the outcome into question.”

2000 Mules grossed more than $1 million in its first 12 hours of streaming before entering select theaters.

The U.S. is preparing to send Ukraine an additional $725 million in military assistance, including counter-drone systems and munitions for its High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, which could indicate more of the longer-range missiles are headed to the battlefield.

Two U.S. officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the package before it was announced, did not confirm whether the munitions for the HIMARS are the coveted ATACMS — the Army Tactical Missile System. But Ukraine has been pressing for more of the longer-range missiles to strike additional targets inside Russia.

The package also includes more of the anti-personnel land mines that Ukraine is counting on to slow Russian and North Korean ground forces in Russia’s Kursk region.

President Joe Biden has pledged to spend all of the military assistance funds Congress approved earlier this year for Ukraine before the end of his administration on Jan. 20, which before Monday’s news included about $7.1 billion in weapons that would be drawn from the Pentagon’s stockpiles.

There is widespread speculation about what the new Trump administration will mean for Ukraine as the incoming president has promised to end the conflict.

In a major shift, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signaled on Friday that an an offer of NATO membership to territory under Kyiv’s control could end “the hot stage of the war.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. showed off his rippling muscles during an impressive shirtless workout, joking that he was prepping for his confirmation hearing as President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

In a viral video seen more than 3.4 million times since it was posted Sunday, Kennedy works out with another shirtless gym rat at Gold’s Gym in Venice, California, as “Eye of the Tiger” plays over their routine.

As Kennedy’s partner performs a clean pull-up and maintains a handstand on the bar, the incoming health czar joins him with a swift pull-up rollover on the same bar.

The tricky maneuver had the soles of Kennedy’s feet just inches away from his workout partner’s face, but the 70-year-old managed a successful flip and dismount.

Kennedy shared the footage with the caption: “Practicing moves for my confirmation hearing.”

Watch:

RKF Jr is doing bar workouts in jeans at Golds gym Venice pic.twitter.com/B24ZFQE0FT

— AJAC (@AJA_Cortes) December 2, 2024

The video is one of many Kennedy has posted of himself working out at the gym, where he has touted his good health after being picked to lead the HHS under the incoming Trump administration.

Still, Kennedy’s nomination has led to widespread criticism over his vocal history of vaccine skepticism and controversial comments on COVID-19.

On the campaign trail, Trump vowed that he would let Kennedy, who has long waged war on institutions like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “go wild on medicines.”

To be formally appointed as America’s health czar, Kennedy will first need to be approved by the Senate Finance Committee, which has a Republican majority.

After allegedly being imprisoned, beaten and raped, the woman needed help to make it across the lobby of the hotel so she could finally escape.

Emerging into downtown El Paso, court documents state, she made her way to an immigration centre, where she readily admitted to a US Border Patrol agent that she had crossed illegally into the country from Mexico just months earlier.

Some time after arriving in the city in southern Texas, she told investigators, she had been drugged, assaulted, and forced into prostitution by a woman called Estefania Primera.

The woman who left the hotel that day in September was not the only victim, according to a Border Patrol memo published by the New York Post.

It states that Primera made herself the kingpin of a sex trafficking ring after illegally crossing the border and being released by immigration authorities.

Primera, who goes by the moniker “La Barbie”, is a member of the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and used her own children as drug mules, the memo continues.

To critics, the tattooed face that stares out from her police mugshot is the face of the broken asylum system that Joe Biden has presided over.

Homeland security sources cited by the Post claim Primera was set loose with an electronic ankle tag by immigration authorities.

According to the report, she then pried the monitor off within weeks allowing her to set up her criminal operation in the hotel.

According to the warrant issued for Primera’s arrest, in which she was charged with the trafficking of persons, she approached a female migrant and told her about how she could make money as a prostitute.

The woman, who is only referred to as “Victim 1” in this document, said she declined before Primera forced her to consume fentanyl.

In the warrant, she states that she was kept on a diet of the addictive and often deadly opioid – how long this went on for is unclear – and drifted in and out of consciousness as she was repeatedly raped.

On several occasions, she is said to have woken up naked, injured and bleeding.

At one point the woman said she tried to escape running down to the hotel manager to show her the injuries she had sustained.

The manager, according to the arrest warrant, told her that this was probably caused by her spouse and asked her to return to her room.

It was only on Sept 10 that, assisted by an unnamed woman, she was able to walk to the lobby and out of the local hotel, where she made contact with a Border Patrol agent.

Authorities later found that the woman’s face had been plastered over multiple adverts featuring graphic descriptions of the sex acts she would be forced to undertake.

She told her interviewing officer, as relayed in court documents, that she had witnessed Primera being paid for the acts she was forced to undergo without her consent.

The case raises disturbing questions about who exactly immigration authorities are releasing into the US, and how closely they are monitoring them.

The argument behind electronically tracking those who cross the border is that it stops them missing asylum hearings while their case progresses.

But as of March, of the 19,000 individuals being monitored remotely, around a thousand reportedly managed to abscond by pulling off their ankle tags.

The hotel at the centre of Primera’s case was not named by court documents but was later alleged to be El Paso’s Gateway Hotel by the New York Post.

It appears to have been named – in a terrible irony – for those who make it across the border to the Texas city for the promise of a better life and new opportunities.

Instead, what new migrants would have found, according to a civil lawsuit filed against its management, was a hotel swimming in trash and a hub for ruthless Tren de Aragua members.

The gang has come to national attention amid reports that its members had taken over apartment blocks in the city of Aurora, Colorado.

However, they have other bases elsewhere in the US – in New York, they are said to be grooming children as young as 11 to join their criminal underworld.

In El Paso, police officers spoke to at least 10 Venezuelans at the hotel displaying the tell-tale tattoos that denote the ranks with the gang: a silhouette of Michael Jordan, an AK-47 assault rifle, grenades, trains and – at the top of the chain – stars.

“La Barbie” has at least two star tattoos, one marking each shoulder.

Crime has spiralled out from the Gateway Hotel to the rest of downtown El Paso, police said in an affidavit attached to the lawsuit.

Texas authorities have declared that the city is “ground zero” for Tren de Aragua’s operations.

The lawsuit also notes police observation of a woman, who is not identified as Primera but matches her alleged patterns of behaviour, who is “suspected of running prostitution” out of the Gateway Hotel.

The unnamed woman operated around the Sacred Heart, a Catholic church which functions as a haven for migrants, where witness accounts in the lawsuit describe her offering sex for money.

Primera was later apprehended at the same location.

“We confirmed the female lives at the Gateway Hotel with her kids,” a police officer stated in an affidavit attached to the lawsuit.

“Further, several subjects have told us about the high activity of narcotics, prostitution and weapons occurring inside the hotel.”

It added: “All subjects have become unco-operative in providing their information to law enforcement as they want to remain anonymous due to fear of retaliation from the criminal organisation.”

According to the Border Patrol memo, Primera was apprehended with her five children, whom she allegedly used to “store and sell narcotics”.

She will face a judge next month, and could be jailed for up to 20 years if found guilty.

Jaguar’s controversial new concept electric car has been leaked online – showing the vehicle in Barbie pink.

Images appearing to show the new model have been posted on X by Autocar magazine showing the sleek, low-slung vehicle with a long bonnet and wide grille.

The car, which will be officially unveiled at Miami Art Week tonight, is shown in bold pink and metallic blue.

A Jaguar spokesman said it was “aware” of the images circulating online and said the colours were “Miami Pink and London Blue.”

“Miami Pink celebrates the vibrancy of the city while London Blue, a modern take on the Opalescent Silver Blue of the E-Type, is a nod to Jaguar’s British heritage.”

However, the hot pink vehicle has drawn comparisons with the FAB 1 car driven by Lady Penelope in the Thunderbirds and the Barbie car. Others have suggested that Jaguar should be renamed Pink Panther in light of the overhaul.

The hot pink vehicle has drawn comparisons to the FAB 1 car driven by Lady Penelope in the Thunderbirds

The styling suggests a marked gear change from traditional Jaguar models as the British car maker prepares for a new generation of electric models.

The company has been gearing up for its relaunch for weeks, attracting criticism online for seemingly abandoning its traditional customers in favour of a younger new market.

The leaked images of the concept car features slim, LED lights and large alloy wheels. It does not have a rear windscreen, instead boasting a rear-view camera on each side.

The interiors adopt a minimalist design with an oval-shaped steering wheel, while the company’s divisive new logo is emblazoned on the front and back.

Jaguar’s new design, which is expected to form the basis of its upcoming electric GT, has already attracted ridicule online.

Some social media users have compared the car to an air conditioning unit after the company released a glimpse of the new model last month.

The concept car is at the heart of efforts by Jaguar to reverse a recent decline in sales.

Jaguar is hoping to shake off its heritage reputation – embodied by the “Jag man” stereotype – and instead target a new generation of wealthier, younger customers.

Rawdon Glover, Jaguar’s managing director, has said that people like Nigel Farage are no longer important to the brand’s vision as it pursues a “completely different audience” to its traditional customers.

However, the rebrand has triggered a storm of controversy amid accusations that the company is abandoning loyal customers and dealerships.

More widely, the company has been mocked for its advert featuring catwalk models but no cars. Meanwhile, the car maker ditched its historic “growler” cat logo, replacing it with a new symbol featuring the letters J and L.

The rebrand has attracted scrutiny even from within the advertising industry. Paul Burke, an advertising copywriter, told The Telegraph: “As a piece of creative work it’s rubbish. It’s really cheaply done and there’s no idea in it.”

However, others have suggested that it was too early to judge the success of the campaign, pointing out that Jaguar has succeeded in attracting significant media attention.

Mr Glover has defended the rebrand, saying criticism of actors in the campaign had featured “vile hatred and intolerance”.

He told the Financial Times: “We need to re-establish our brand and at a completely different price point so we need to act differently.

“If we play in the same way that everybody else does, we’ll just get drowned out. So we shouldn’t turn up like an auto brand.”

A Jaguar spokesman said: “We are aware of images circulating online ahead of Jaguar’s official reveal at Miami Art Week. Tune in to the Jaguar Instagram and TikTok channels to see the real thing tonight.”

Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter Sunday night, a reversal for the president, who repeatedly said he would not use his executive authority to pardon his son or commute his sentence.

“I believe in the justice system, but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice — and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further. I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision,” Biden said in his statement.

Hunter Biden was scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 12 for his conviction on federal gun charges. He also was set to be sentenced on Dec. 16 in a separate criminal case in which he pleaded guilty to federal tax evasion charges in September.

The president issued a “full and unconditional pardon” for any offenses Hunter Biden has “committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024,” according to the White House statement.

A senior White House official told NBC News, which was the first to report on the pardon decision, that the president decided over the weekend to grant his son a pardon and began to inform his senior aides Sunday.

The president also spoke about his son’s struggles with addiction in his statement Sunday night, saying that his political opponents were trying to “break” him by going after Hunter.

“No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son — and that is wrong,” Biden said in his statement. “There has been an effort to break Hunter — who has been five and a half years sober, even in the face of unrelenting attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they’ve tried to break me — and there’s no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough.”

In a separate statement, Hunter Biden said he had “admitted and taken responsibility for my mistakes during the darkest days of my addiction — mistakes that have been exploited to publicly humiliate and shame me and my family for political sport.”

Despite all of this, I have maintained my sobriety for more than five years because of my deep faith and the unwavering love and support of my family and friends,” he added. “In the throes of addiction, I squandered many opportunities and advantages. In recovery we can be given the opportunity to make amends where possible and rebuild our lives if we never take for granted the mercy that we have been afforded. I will never take the clemency I have been given today for granted and will devote the life I have rebuilt to helping those who are still sick and suffering.”

Steven Cheung, a spokesman for President-elect Donald Trump, said, “The failed witch hunts against President Trump have proven that the Democrat-controlled DOJ and other radical prosecutors are guilty of weaponizing the justice system. That system of justice must be fixed and due process must be restored for all Americans, which is exactly what President Trump will do as he returns to the White House with an overwhelming mandate from the American people.”

Biden, 82, is using his pardon power to ensure Hunter Biden does not spend time in jail as he nears the end of his term in the White House and has no future election to face. In recent months, he has said he would not pardon his son or commute his sentence.

“I will not pardon him,” he said in June after a jury found Hunter Biden guilty on three federal gun charges.

The president has discussed pardoning his son with some of his closest aides at least since Hunter Biden’s conviction in June, said two people with direct knowledge of the discussions about the matter. They said it was decided at the time that he would publicly say he would not pardon his son even though doing so remained on the table.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre recently told reporters that Biden’s position has not changed.

“We’ve been asked that question multiple times. Our answer stands, which is ‘no,’” she said.

Asked last week whether the president is still committed to not granting clemency for his son, White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said: “The president has spoken to this.” Pressed about whether Biden’s position has changed, Bates replied, “I don’t have anything to add what he said already.”

First lady Jill Biden has also said her husband would not pardon their son.

“Joe and I both respect the judicial system, and that’s the bottom line,” she said in an interview in June.

Hunter Biden’s criminal trial in June was the first involving the child of a sitting president.

Pardoning him after that trial would have ignited a political firestorm for his father, who was campaigning for re-election. Republicans have for years attacked Hunter Biden over his foreign business dealings and accused him and the president of corruption. They have also argued that Hunter Biden was getting special treatment by the Justice Department because of his father’s political power.

GOP criticism reached a peak in July 2023 when Hunter Biden pleaded guilty in a deal with federal prosecutors over the tax and gun charges, which collapsed after a judge raised questions about it. That development led Attorney General Merrick Garland a couple weeks later to appoint the U.S. attorney investigating Hunter Biden, David Weiss, as a special counsel.

Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race in July, but a pardon before last month’s election also could have generated political blowback on the candidacy of Vice President Kamala Harris after she took his place on the Democratic ticket.

Together, the 12 counts Hunter Biden is convicted of or has pleaded guilty to carry a maximum prison sentence of 42 years. But the maximum sentences typically are not given out for convictions of these crimes. The Justice Department has said, for instance, that while the tax charges carry a maximum sentence of 17 years, sentences are typically less than that.

Asked in an interview in June whether he would rule out a pardon for his son, Biden answered, “Yes.”

Days later, after Hunter Biden was convicted on federal gun charges by a jury in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, the president said in a statement that he would respect the outcome. He then told reporters he would abide by the jury’s decision.

“I’m extremely proud of my son Hunter,” Biden said. “He has overcome an addiction. He’s one of the brightest, most decent men I know, and I am satisfied that I’m not going to do anything. I said I abide by the jury decision. I will do that, and I will not pardon him.”

Joseph Ziegler, an IRS case agent who became a whistleblower in the Hunter Biden tax probe, told NBC News last year that he opened the investigation himself after seeing bank records that suggested Hunter Biden was paying prostitutes and spending lavishly out of a corporate bank account. Ziegler said politics played no role in his decision to open the case.

“I’m a 38-year-old gay man,” he said. “My politics are simple. I am a Democrat.”

Neil Eggleston, who was White House counsel to President Barack Obama, told NBC News on Monday that “if I were his White House counsel, I would encourage him to pardon his son.” He said he has not been contacted or consulted by the White House about any pardon preparations.

“The clemency power has few limitations and certainly would extend to a Hunter Biden pardon,” Eggleston said.

Eggleston’s opinion echoes that of other former Justice Department and White House officials previously involved in presidential pardons who told NBC News that they thought Biden should exercise this power in advance of the incoming Trump administration.

Five adults and two children, including a baby, have been left injured after a driver crashed his vehicle into pedestrians at a Christmas market in the United Kingdom.
The incident, believed to have been an accident, occurred in Chipping Sodbury, near Bristol.

According to reports, the driver appeared to be an elderly man, likely in his 80s.

The BBC reports:

Avon and Somerset Police said a man – believed to be in his 80s – collided with pedestrians at a low-speed while manoeuvring out of a parking space.

A spokesperson said that despite the large emergency response no one is currently described as having either life-threatening or life-changing injuries.

Five ambulances, an air ambulance, and several other resources were dispatched to the market town, which is around 18 miles (29km) north-east of Bristol.

Organizers of the market announced on social media that it will remain open.

🚨#BREAKING: A car drives in to people including children at a Christmas gathering in Chipping Sodbury, UK. pic.twitter.com/PmTOUNlhMA

— World Source News 24/7 (@Worldsource24) December 1, 2024

“We have been advised by the police not to cancel today’s event, so the remainder of the High Street from Hobbs House Bakery down towards Broad Street and Horse Street is still open,” the post said.

“We would ask anyone attending today to please not take photos of the incident, and not speculate on social media as we work the emergency services to help those people who need assistance.”

Witness Esra Ward, who was running a pizza stall, told the BBC, “The car was parked, and suddenly we saw him accelerate coming out of his parking space and hit a couple of people.”

“There was a mum with a baby in a pushchair in front of the car. Apparently at the back he has hit a few more people, a family. They had ambulances and police and fire all here in about five minutes.”

Aday after nominating his son-in-law’s father to be ambassador to France, President-elect Donald Trump has picked his daughter Tiffany’s father-in-law, Massad Boulos, to be his Senior Advisor to the President on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs.

“Massad is an accomplished lawyer and a highly respected leader in the business world, with extensive experience on the International scene,” Trump, 78, wrote on Truth Social.

“He has been a longtime proponent of Republican and Conservative values, an asset to my Campaign, and was instrumental in building tremendous new coalitions with the Arab American Community,” he added.

Boulos, who was born in Lebanon, has a net worth estimated in the billions of dollars, according to the New York Post.

He runs Nigeria-based Boulos Enterprises, a company that produces and distributes mechanical equipment and motorcycles.

Tiffany married Michael Boulos in 2022.

New York City is home to more than 58,000 illegal migrants who are either convicted felons or are currently facing criminal charges — and there are about 670,000 of them nationwide — the New York Post reported of new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) data.

The Post reported:

Of the 759,218 illegal-border crossers living in the Big Apple the feds were aware of as of Nov. 17, a jaw-dropping 58,626 — 7.7% — were either previously convicted of crimes or had criminal charges pending, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency data.

Out of that 58,626, about two percent — 1,053 — are “suspected or known gang members,” the ICE data revealed.

The numbers are just as staggering across the rest of the country, with 662,586 — or 8.6 percent — of the nearly 7.8 million illegal migrants living on this side of the border having previously been convicted or have charges pending as of July 21.

The total number of suspected or known gang members is “unclear,” the Post reported.

Elon Musk reacted to these figures with a simple, “Wow”:

Wow https://t.co/zFYLXRG8ZZ

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 30, 2024

NYC ICE Director Kenneth Genalo told the outlet he is “frustrated” with the city’s sanctuary laws that prevent immigration officials from enforcing deportations, and he hopes that he gets more resources to help his office get the criminals out.

“In New York City, it would take a lifetime to clear the city of the criminals that we have” if the current policies and funding stay the same, Genalo said.

More than 223,000 migrants have made their way to NYC since the spring of 2022, forcing taxpayers to bear the cost of funding shelters that have disproportionately been placed in the city’s poorest neighborhoods.

According to a July New York Post report, a whopping 193 government-run migrant shelters are operating in the Big Apple — but none of them are located in the top five zip codes by median income.

As the shelters began to overflow, many migrants are sleeping on the streets, Breitbart News reported.

In August, residents of a Brooklyn neighborhood sounded the alarm about an all-male, 400-bed migrant shelter opening up around the corner from a private Christian grade school.

“No one told us from the city side about the shelter’s coming up,” concerned mother-of-three Irina Edelstein said during an appearance on Fox & Friends First.

Shortly after President-elect Donald Trump handily won the November election, NYC Mayor Eric Adams (D) conceded that he is willing to work with the incoming administration on the immigration crisis.

“I am willing to sit down with this administration like I tried to sit down with the previous administration in my 10 trips to Washington to say: we have a problem that is overrunning our cities,” Adams announced at a press conference, according to Politico. “I’m hoping this administration will hear what I’m saying and listen to some of the ideas that I have been pushing for … close to two years now.”

However, Adams clarified that he is “not a supporter of mass deportation,” a move that Trump has repeatedly said he will accomplish once he retakes the presidential office.

The cartel recruiter slipped onto campus disguised as a janitor and then zeroed in on his target: a sophomore chemistry student.

The recruiter explained that the cartel was staffing up for a project, and that he’d heard good things about the young man.

“‘You’re good at what you do,’” the student recalled the recruiter saying. “‘You decide if you’re interested.’”

In their quest to build fentanyl empires, Mexican criminal groups are turning to an unusual talent pool: not hit men or corrupt police officers, but chemistry students studying at Mexican universities.

People who make fentanyl in cartel labs, who are called cooks, told The New York Times that they needed workers with advanced knowledge of chemistry to help make the drug stronger and “get more people hooked,” as one cook put it.

The cartels also have a more ambitious goal: to synthesize the chemical compounds, known as precursors, that are essential to making fentanyl, freeing them from having to import those raw materials from China.

If they succeed, U.S. officials say, it would represent a terrifying new phase in the fentanyl crisis, in which Mexican cartels have more control than ever over one of the deadliest drugs in recent history.

“It would make us the kings of Mexico,” said one chemistry student who has been cooking fentanyl for six months.

The Times interviewed seven fentanyl cooks, three chemistry students, two high-ranking operatives and a high-level recruiter. All of them work for the Sinaloa Cartel, which the U.S. government says is largely responsible for the fentanyl pouring over the southern border.

Those affiliated with the cartel put themselves in danger just by talking to The Times, and spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. Their accounts matched those of American Embassy officials who track cartel activities, including the role students are playing in cartel operations and how they are producing fentanyl. Times reporters spoke to a chemistry professor, who said the recruitment of his students was common.

The students said they had different jobs within the criminal group. Sometimes, they said, they run experiments to strengthen the drug or to create precursors. Other times, they say, they supervise or work alongside the cooks and assistants who produce fentanyl in bulk.

It’s unclear how widespread the recruitment of students has become, but the pursuit of trained chemists seems to have been influenced in part by the coronavirus pandemic.

A 2020 Mexican intelligence assessment, leaked by a hacker group, found that the Sinaloa Cartel appeared to be recruiting chemistry professors to develop fentanyl precursor chemicals after the pandemic slowed supply chains.

American law enforcement officials also said that many young chemists had been swept up in arrests at Mexican fentanyl labs in recent years. The arrested chemists told the authorities that they had been working on developing precursors and making the drug stronger, according to the officials.

A chemistry professor at a university in Sinaloa State said he knew that some students enrolled in chemistry classes just to become more familiar with skills needed to cook synthetic drugs. The professor, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals, said he had identified students who fit that profile by their questions and reactions during his lectures.

“Sometimes when I am teaching them synthesis of pharmaceutical drugs, they openly ask me, ‘Hey, professor, when are you teaching us how to synthesize cocaine and other things?’” he said.

Eager to preserve cooperation on migration, the Biden administration avoided publicly urging Mexico to do more to dismantle the cartels. President-elect Donald J. Trump has promised a more aggressive approach, threatening to deploy the U.S. military to battle the criminals, and vowing last month to issue a 25 percent tariff on Mexican goods if the country doesn’t stop the flow of drugs and migrants across the border.

In response to the tariff threat, Mexico’s new president, Claudia Sheinbaum, said that “international collaboration” was needed to prevent the shipment of precursors to Mexico from “Asian countries.”

But as the cartels gain greater control of the fentanyl supply chain, U.S. officials say, it will become more difficult for law enforcement in both countries to stop the industrialized production of synthetic opioids in Mexico.

The cartels “know we are now focused on the illicit trafficking of these precursor chemicals around the world,” said Todd Robinson, the State Department’s assistant secretary of the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.

Those efforts are driving the cartels “to try to bring this thing in-house,” Mr. Robinson said. “The practical result of that is their ability to more easily and quickly transfer those drugs to the United States.”

Mass producing fentanyl can be relatively straightforward if cartels are just mixing up imported precursors, experts said, because it’s easy to find instructions for producing the drug using those chemicals.

But trying to synthesize the precursors from scratch is a much more difficult process that requires a broader array of chemical techniques and skills, said James DeFrancesco, a forensic science professor at Loyola University Chicago who worked as a forensic chemist at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration for 18 years.

The process is also dangerous. Cooks and students said that even though they wore gas masks and hazmat suits, the risks they face are many: toxic exposure to the lethal drug, accidental explosions, mistakes that enrage their armed and extremely violent bosses.

Yet the work pays more than many legal jobs in chemistry, and that’s often enough of a sell. The second-year student said the recruiter who visited the campus had offered him $800 up front, plus a monthly salary of $800 — twice as much as the average pay for chemists formally employed in Mexico, according to government data.

The 19-year-old, raised in one of the poorest parts of Sinaloa, said he had chosen to study chemistry because his father had cancer and he wanted to help find a cure.

“I want to help people, not kill them,” he said. The idea of making a product that would lead to mass death made him sick — and yet the treatment his father needed was impossible for the family to afford.

He told the recruiter he was interested, and five days later he was picked up by cartel members, blindfolded and driven to a clandestine lab hidden in the mountains, he said.

The Recruiter

Before the Sinaloa Cartel ever approaches a recruit, it scouts out its prospect.

The ideal candidate is someone who has both classroom knowledge and street smarts, a go-getter who won’t blanch at the idea of producing a lethal drug and, above all, someone discreet, said one recruiter in an interview.

In months of searching, he said, he’s found three students who now work for him developing precursors. Many young people just don’t meet his standards.

“Some are lazy, some aren’t bright, some talk too much,” said the recruiter, a lanky middle-aged man with square glasses, who has worked for the cartel for 10 years. He described himself as a fix-it man, focused on improving quality and output in the fentanyl business.

To identify potential candidates, the cartel does a round of outreach with friends, acquaintances and colleagues, the recruiter said, then talks to the targets’ families, their friends, even people they play soccer with — all to learn whether they’d be open to doing this kind of work. If the recruiter finds someone particularly promising, he might offer to cover the student’s tuition cost.

“We are a company; what a company does is invest in their best people,” he said.

When the cartel began mass-producing fentanyl about a decade ago, the recruiter said, it relied on uneducated cooks from the countryside who could easily get their hands on what people in the business call “recipes” for making the drug.

Compared to methamphetamine, a drug that requires more advanced equipment and expertise to manufacture at scale, fentanyl is straightforward to produce if precursor chemicals are available.

“It takes four steps,” said one longtime cook, laying out the process with the simplicity that might be found on the back of a box of cake mix. “You shake it up, mix it, dry it, wash it with acetone.”

But things got more complicated in recent years. China moved to restrict the export of fentanyl precursors, Mexico cracked down on imports of the chemicals and the coronavirus pandemic gummed up supply chains so that those ingredients became harder to find.

The recruiter and all three students interviewed said they hadn’t successfully produced precursors yet.

“We are close, but it’s not easy,” said one former student, a 21-year-old who started working in a lab this year. Baby-faced and bright-eyed, the student had dropped out of school to work for the cartel. “We need to keep doing tests and more tests.”

But the recruiter said the students had been helpful in one key respect: making the fentanyl even more potent.

Student No. 1

About a year ago, a relative approached a first-year chemistry student with a proposal: Wouldn’t she love to make real money as a fentanyl cook?

In an interview, the student said her relative had worked for the Sinaloa Cartel for years and knew exactly what to say to lure the young woman, the eldest of five siblings. Her mother was raising the children alone, cleaning houses 12 hours a day.

The cartel offered the student $1,000 as a signing bonus, the woman said. She was terrified, but she said yes. The lab where she works is about an hour’s flight from Sinaloa’s capital, on the small aircraft the cartel uses to transport cooks to work. Her bosses told her that her job was to manufacture more powerful fentanyl, she said.

The fentanyl coming out of Mexico has often been of low purity, a problem the recruiter attributes to the desperate rush to satisfy Americans’ appetite for the synthetic opioid.

“There was such an explosion of demand that many people just wanted to earn money, and those manufacturers just made whatever without caring about quality,” the recruiter said. But in a competitive market, he said, the cartel can win over more clients with a stronger drug.

The first-year student said she had experimented with all manner of concoctions to increase fentanyl’s potency, including mixing it with animal anesthetics. But none of her attempts at producing fentanyl precursors have worked.

“You’re starting from a blank page,” she said. “How do we create something we didn’t invent?”

Student No. 2

When he first arrived at work, the sophomore chemistry student who had been recruited on campus had no idea what he was supposed to be doing. He said the lab was in the mountains, in the midst of trees and covered by a tarp that had been painted to look like foliage, so it couldn’t be seen from a helicopter.

After three days of work, he said, one of the men in charge told him that he wasn’t there to make fentanyl. He was the newest member of a research and development lab, where everyone was working to figure out how to make precursors from scratch. He said he immediately started worrying about inadvertently causing an explosion.

“They don’t tell you how to do it — they say, ‘These are the products, you’re going to make them with this, it could go wrong, but that’s why you’re studying,’” he said.

The sophomore works with six others, three students from his class in university, and three older men who are not trained chemists. The work is a lot riskier than what he does in school, when he has time to attend.

“Here, if they don’t like what you produce, they can make you disappear,” he said.

A cartel boss recently visited the lab to praise his work, the student said, telling him that if he was able to help produce precursors successfully, the group would give him a house or a car, whatever he wanted.

The sophomore told them what he needed most was money for his dad. He kept his day job a secret from his father.

“When he asks questions, I lie and say I’m working at a company,” the sophomore said. “I think if he knew, he wouldn’t accept the money.”

LeBron James’ media company lost almost $30 million last year. SpringHill, the media company co-founded by basketball star LeBron James, has never made any money.

The company lost $28 million on sales of $104 million last year, according to documents obtained by Bloomberg News. SpringHill lost $17 million in 2022 and is on pace to lose millions more in 2024.

Hollywood production companies that sprouted during the past decade to serve the growing demands of streaming services are struggling as those services cut back on production and scrutinize budgets. This market correction has impacted everyone – from the world’s largest entertainment companies, which have cut staff, to prop houses, real estate developers and the independents like SpringHill.

“The entertainment market shift in 2022/2023 toward profitability brought rising costs, slower buyer decisions, and impacts from industry strikes, prompting us to recalibrate, including writing off underperforming projects to position ourselves for future growth,” SpringHill Chief Executive Officer Maverick Carter said via email, adding that the company is expected to exceed projections this year.

SpringHill recently agreed to a merger with Fulwell 73, the British production outfit behind The Kardashians and the Grammy Awards, a deal that will give the combined company more scale during a challenging business environment. The company, which will have 250 employees, is aiming to be profitable by the end of next year, following a round of staff cuts.

The numbers also highlight the challenges specific to celebrity-backed production companies. These startups were able to raise money at inflated valuations relative to their business fundamentals and have since struggled to live up to the lofty expectations.

James is a trailblazer among athletes. He started a media enterprise while still playing at the highest level, inspiring peers such as Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant to do the same. Carter, James’ longtime friend and business partner, runs the business day to day.

They produced films and TV shows, ran a marketing company, sold apparel and started Uninterrupted, which produces their talk show The Shop. In 2020, James and Carter combined all of their media businesses under SpringHill, named for the apartment complex where James grew up in Akron, Ohio.

SpringHill succeeded where many other celebrity-backed ventures did not. While James is the company’s chairman, most of what they produce doesn’t involve him being in front of the camera. Save for the occasional appearance on The Shop, or a starring role in basketball-themed projects like Space Jam and the Netflix docuseries Starting 5, James is still focused on playing ball. Carter has earned the respect of the business community and sits on the board of concert giant Live Nation.

“We built this business with LeBron, not around him,” Carter said, adding that James “remains deeply engaged in driving the vision and mission he helped shape, focusing more actively on certain passion projects.”

James’ involvement helped the company raise $15 million from Warner Bros. in 2015. In 2020, the pair raised $100 million from investors including Guggenheim Partners and Elisabeth Murdoch. A year later, they added RedBird, Nike and the owners of the Boston Red Sox to their investor group in a deal valuing the business at $725 million. The company had less than $80 million in sales at the time and was losing money.

SpringHill, which grew to 200 employees, raised money at the top of the market for production companies, back when streaming services were adding billions of dollars to their budgets each year to chase new customers. Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine was acquired in a deal that valued the business at about $900 million.

Yet as the market crashed, those lofty valuations started to look excessive. Hello Sunshine has fallen far short of profit forecasts. As part of the deal with Fulwell, SpringHill investors will put a further $40 million into the business.

“The new company has the scale, investors and teams needed to adapt to where this change is heading,” Carter said.

Many celebrities have used their fame to make successful investments in consumer businesses, whether it’s George Clooney with tequila, Selena Gomez with makeup or Rihanna with fashion and makeup. Ryan Reynolds has done it a few times, while James and Carter have been several lucrative investments.

But when it comes to media, the list of successes is short. Kevin Hart just brought in new leadership to revamp his company while Dwayne Johnson is thinking about how to expand his. Producing good movies and TV shows is hard, and having a celebrity producer doesn’t guarantee success.

The finance chief of a major car brand is reportedly set to step down just hours after it was reported that the firm was “on the brink of collapse”.

Insiders have claimed that the collapse of a major partnership has left the company scrabbling for financial backing just to make it through 2025.

It was just this week that the Financial Times reported that Nissan was fighting for its very survival in a desperate search for new investment.

Pressure on the firm’s balance sheet was apparently worsened by the reported collapse of the three-way agreement between Nissan, Mitsubishi and Renault, which had been in place since 1999.

Sources claimed that the French manufacturer was looking to reduce its stake in its Japanese partner.

One company official said: “We have 12 or 14 months to survive.

“This is going to be tough.

“And in the end, we need Japan and the US to be generating cash.”

In the wake of that revelation, Bloomberg is now reporting that Nissan’s Chief Financial Officer, Stephen Ma, is expected to leave the role in the near future.

Ma has been in post since 2019 as part of a brutal management cull following the arrest of former CEO Carlos Ghosn, who later fled Japan amid allegations of false accounting.

Since then, the firm has cut 9,000 jobs worldwide and embarked on a savage cutback regime in an effort to save £2 billion.

It is unclear whether the report means that Ma is set to leave the company altogether or that he will be shuffled into a different role.

New CEO Makoto Uchida, who himself took a 50% pay decrease as part of the cuts, attributed Nissan’s struggles to its failure to sure up its hybrid lineup in contrast to rivals Honda and Toyota.

He said: “This has been a lesson learned and we have not been able to keep up with the times.

“We weren’t able to foresee that hybrid electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids would be so popular.”

However, Honda could be the centrepiece of Nissan’s recovery plan, with the company reportedly seeking increased cooperation with its larger rival.

The two companies could be set to ramp up their partnership, with greater financial backing potentially coming from Honda.

It could also buy a stake in Nissan itself, though those within the smaller company say this remains a “last resort” option.

An alliance between the two could be sufficiently large to face down Toyota as Japan’s largest carmaker.

Belgian sex workers have gained the right to sick days, maternity pay and pension rights under the first law of its kind in the world.

Lawmakers voted in May to give sex workers the same employment protections as any other employee, in an attempt to clamp down on abuse and exploitation.

The law, which went into force on Sunday, ensures that sex workers have employment contracts and legal protection.

It is intended to end a grey zone created in 2022 when sex work was decriminalised in Belgium but without conferring any protections on sex workers, or labour rights such as unemployment benefit or health insurance.

Under the law, sex workers have the right to refuse sexual partners or to perform specific acts and can stop an act at any time. Nor can they be sacked for these refusals.

Employers must be of “good character” with a business residence in Belgium; they must also ensure their premises are equipped with panic buttons, clean linen, showers and condoms.

The protections do not cover home working, or activities such as striptease and pornography.

The Belgian Union of Sex Workers described the law as “a huge step forward, ending legal discrimination against sex workers”.

But it said the rules could “be instrumentalised” to reduce or eliminate sex work. It added: “We already see certain municipalities hiding behind the words ‘safety’ and ‘hygiene’ to promulgate very strict local regulations that make sex work almost impossible on their territory.”

Some feminist organisations have criticised the law. When the bill was published in 2023, the Council of Francophone Women of Belgium said it would be “catastrophic” for young girls and victims of trafficking.

“To assume that prostitution exists and that we must protect workers is to accept this sexist violence and not to fight it,” the head of the organisation told Le Soir.

President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday threatened to enact “100% tariffs” on BRICS countries that are trying to move away from using the U.S. dollar as their currency.

“The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER. We require a commitment from these Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs, and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful U.S. Economy,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social.

BRICS, an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, is an economic and geopolitical bloc whose power has grown in recent years, rivaling that of the Group of Seven countries, a coalition of leading industrial nations led by the U.S.

The BRICS coalition has recently grown to include Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

While the U.S. dollar heavily dominates the international financial system, BRICS has backed the creation of an alternative currency in a movement that could potentially lead to de-dollarization, holding massive implications for the U.S.

Trump said the rival group could “go find another ‘sucker’” on Saturday.

“There is no chance that the BRICS will replace the U.S. Dollar in International Trade, and any Country that tries should wave goodbye to America,” he said.

The president-elect’s promises to place sweeping tariffs on BRICS countries follows his announcement this week on planned tariffs against Mexico and Canada.

Trump’s plans would put in motion 25% tariffs on the two countries to stop the flow of drugs and illegal immigrants across U.S. borders the day he takes office on Jan. 20. 2025.

Trump said he had a “very productive meeting” with Canada’s Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau on Saturday during which they appeared to discuss the coming tariffs.

“We discussed many important topics that will require both Countries to work together to address, like the Fentanyl and Drug Crisis that has decimated so many lives as a result of Illegal Immigration, Fair Trade Deals that do not jeopardize American Workers, and the massive Trade Deficit the U.S. has with Canada,” he said in a post to Truth Social.

“I made it very clear that the United States will no longer sit idly by as our Citizens become victims to the scourge of this Drug Epidemic, caused mainly by the Drug Cartels, and Fentanyl pouring in from China. Too much death and hardship! Prime Minister Trudeau has made a commitment to work with us to end this terrible devastation of U.S. Families. We also spoke about many other important topics like Energy, Trade, and the Arctic. All are vital issues that I will be addressing on my first days back in Office, and before,” he continued.

President-elect Donald Trump announced he will nominate Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister to lead the Drug Enforcement Administration.

In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, Trump said that Chronister — who has served the Tampa, Florida, area for over 32 years — will work with his attorney general selection, Pam Bondi, to help secure the U.S.-Mexico Border.

The DEA administrator is a Senate-confirmed position.

“As DEA Administrator, Chad will work with our great Attorney General, Pam Bondi, to secure the Border, stop the flow of Fentanyl, and other Illegal Drugs, across the Southern Border, and SAVE LIVES,” Trump wrote.

Chronister was appointed to lead the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office by then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott in 2017 and has been twice reelected by voters.

He holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in science in criminal justice from St. Leo University and is a graduate of the FBI National Academy’s 260th session.

Chronister is married to Nikki DeBartolo and has two sons.

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody took to X on Saturday to congratulate Chronister on the nomination and praise his experience in fighting on the “frontlines” of the opioid crisis.

“Chad has fought on the frontlines of the opioid crisis, and I know his leadership and decades of experience will be invaluable as we work to combat the flow of Mexican fentanyl into our county,” Moody wrote.

China has been supporting Russia’s economy since the start of the Ukraine war by buying its oil while supplying it with everything from microelectronics to washing machines.

Meanwhile, Beijing has been getting its own strategic benefit: a real-world case study in how to circumvent Western sanctions.

An interagency group, set up by China in the months following the full-scale invasion, has studied the impact of sanctions and produced reports regularly for the country’s leadership, according to people familiar with the matter. The goal is to draw lessons about how to mitigate them, particularly in case a conflict over Taiwan prompts the U.S. and its allies to impose similar penalties on China, the people said.

As part of the effort, Chinese officials periodically visit Moscow to meet with the Russian Central Bank, the Finance Ministry and other agencies involved in countering sanctions, the people said.

The Chinese study effort, which hasn’t previously been reported, is emblematic of the new age of economic warfare unleashed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, where the lines between economic policy and geopolitical strategy are increasingly blurred. That trend is only likely to be amplified by Donald Trump’s second presidential term, where he plans to turbocharge the use of tariffs as a tool for negotiation and coercion.

Russia’s economy has been surprisingly resilient throughout the Ukraine war, but it has shown fresh signs of cracking under Western pressure recently. In the past week, the Russian ruble plunged to its lowest point since the early days of the conflict after the U.S. imposed new banking sanctions.

Moscow owes much of its economic durability to its oil exports and its cooperation with Beijing, as the leaders of both countries seek to challenge the U.S.-led world order. The group that was established shows how deep that collaboration has been, and that Beijing’s support hasn’t entirely been a one-way street with Moscow as the beneficiary.

“For the Chinese, Russia is really a sandbox on how sanctions work and how to manage them,” said Alexander Gabuev, the director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, who focuses on China-Russia relations. “They know that if there is a Taiwan contingency, the tool kit that will be applied against them will be similar.”

People close to Beijing’s decision-making cautioned that the study group doesn’t mean the country is readying an invasion. Rather, Beijing is preparing for the “extreme scenario” of an armed conflict and its economic repercussions, the people said.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry said that the country “has always been committed to conducting normal exchanges and cooperation with all countries in the world, including Russia, on the basis of equality and mutual benefit.”

One area of particular concern for China is its more than $3.3 trillion in foreign-exchange reserves, the world’s largest. The moves by the U.S. and its allies to freeze Russian assets abroad following the Ukraine invasion prompted Beijing to more actively look for ways to diversify its stockpile away from dollar-denominated assets, such as U.S. Treasury bonds.

In a sign of heightened top-level attention on sanction risks associated with the reserves, China’s leader Xi Jinping paid a rare visit to China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange in the fall of 2023, the people close to Beijing’s decision-making said. During the visit, Xi raised the question of how to safeguard the reserves, the people said.

The Chinese interagency group on Russian sanctions reports to He Lifeng, China’s vice premier overseeing economic and financial affairs. He, who has a direct line to Xi, has been the chief architect for ringfencing China’s economy from Western sanctions.

Beijing is “very interested in practically everything: from ways of circumventing them to all sorts of positive effects, such as incentives for the development of domestic production,” said a person familiar with China’s outreach to Russia on sanctions.

The Russia-China relationship has blossomed since the invasion. Bilateral trade reached a record $240 billion last year, juiced by Russian oil sales. Around 60% of newly sold cars in Russia are Chinese, according to Russian data provider Autostat.

But the relationship has been lopsided: While China accounts for around a third of Russia’s overall trade, Russia makes up a small part of China’s. Much of Russia’s exports is made up of oil and natural gas that China can get elsewhere.

That means that, if the tables were turned, Moscow wouldn’t be able to provide as much support to China’s economy. That is why Xi has been directing officials to promote trade and deepen economic ties with Russia to achieve a greater “internal driver” for the relationship, according to the people close to Beijing’s decision-making.

While the U.S. has already imposed sanctions on China, including export restrictions on advanced semiconductors and measures against telecommunications giant Huawei, a crisis over Taiwan could lead to an economic war of a different magnitude.

Full-scale financial sanctions by the West would disrupt the country’s financial system, interrupt trade and put $3.7 trillion in Chinese overseas bank assets and reserves at risk, according to a report last year by the Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group think tanks.

Russia reacted to Western sanctions by redirecting commodity flows, injecting massive fiscal stimulus into the economy and evading export controls via neighboring countries. These measures stabilized the Russian economy and enabled Moscow to continue prosecuting its war, even as sanctions have hampered the long-term growth outlook for the country.

One major lesson for China from Russia’s experience has been the importance of preparation, analysts say. Before the war, Russia had sought to diversify its foreign reserves, de-dollarize its economy and build domestic financial plumbing. Even though its success was mixed, those moves helped shield the Russian economy and buy it time to adapt.

Another lesson for China is the value—and limits—of coalitions. The U.S., the U.K., the European Union and other allies worked in unison to expel major Russian banks from the Swift financial network and impose an oil price cap, while Russia countered by strengthening ties with China, Iran and North Korea.

“China learned that the West can get their act together on sanctions when they have to,” said Agathe Demarais, senior policy fellow for geoeconomics at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “Meanwhile, Russia has found its own allies.”

At the same time, disagreements in the Western coalition, especially over oil sanctions due to inflation concerns, have hampered their response. And with China having a much larger footprint in the world economy, the global costs of sanctions are expected to be much higher. At least $3 trillion in trade and financial flows—roughly the equivalent of France’s annual gross domestic product—would be at risk of disruption, according to estimates by the Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group.

“One of the lessons from the sanctions on Russia is that once you start imposing them on a large economy there are economic and political ramifications at home,” said Edward Fishman, a former State Department sanctions official and author of the forthcoming book “Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare.”

China, a major manufacturer, also learned from Russia’s experience about the potential pitfalls of being connected to global supply chains.

For years, Russia had tried—and mostly failed—to make its economy self-sufficient. When sanctions hit, Moscow found itself deeply reliant on Western parts it suddenly couldn’t get. That led to shortages and temporary shutdowns of whole industries, such as carmaking. When they later rebooted, Russian carmakers initially made cars without air bags and other safety features because they didn’t have the parts they needed.

“Sanctions can be really disruptive for any production sector that is enmeshed in global supply chains,” Fishman said. “That makes China highly vulnerable.”

How Russia found ways around such restrictions, however, provides yet another lesson for Beijing, even though China’s vastly larger economy would require a far greater evasion effort.

To bypass the oil price cap, for example, Moscow uses a network of tankers not owned by Western countries or insured by Western companies. More than half of Russia’s seaborne oil is now transported with this so-called shadow fleet, analysts say, and the U.S. and its allies have been racing to target vessels with sanctions.

Meanwhile, Russia found a route through ex-Soviet republics to acquire banned Western goods from luxury cars to dual-use goods with military applications such as microchips in what has come to be known as the “Eurasian roundabout.”

San Jose State volleyball player Blaire Fleming probably played the final college volleyball game of the athlete’s career after a Mountain West Tournament final loss to Colorado State Saturday night.

Fleming led the Spartans on a run to the championship match in a senior season overshadowed by lawsuits from a teammate and a national controversy over Fleming being transgender.

Fleming led the team in spikes and prompted four Mountain West rivals to forfeit a total of seven conference games, including a tournament semifinal.

But Colorado State never shied away from playing Fleming or the Spartans.

The Rams played San Jose two times in the regular season, splitting the season series, and then taking the championship match three sets to one.

Colorado State’s Malaya Jones, the Mountain West player of the year, led the game with 26 kills after kneeling during the national anthem before the match.

Jones was also alleged to have conspired with Fleming in a plan to spike a ball in the face of San Jose State teammate Brooke Slusser in a game Oct. 3, according to a lawsuit filed by Slusser and a Title IX complaint.

Slusser was never spiked in the face, and the Mountain West concluded an investigation into the Title IX complaint, saying it did not find sufficient evidence of wrongdoing. Slusser’s attorney has questioned the validity of the investigation.

Fleming, meanwhile, led San Jose State in the game with 17 kills but committed nine errors and hit poorly in the first two sets when the Spartans fell in a two-sets-to-none hole.

San Jose State’s loss will also mean it won’t advance to the NCAA tournament, which would have introduced further controversy with potential matchups against teams outside the conference.

Boise State forfeited its Mountain West Tournament semifinal match against San Jose State, which could have set a precedent for teams in other states with laws that prevent transgender inclusion in women’s sports.

Boise State, Utah State, Wyoming, Nevada and non-conference opponent Southern Utah all forfeited regular-season matches against San Jose State this season amid the controversy.

Meanwhile, Louisiana Tech, which played its season opener against San Jose State Aug. 30, has told Fox News Digital it did not know Fleming was a biological male and suggested the match wouldn’t have happened if the team had known.

The situation became so widely publicized, Fleming’s presence on the team drew criticism from President-elect Trump on the campaign trail during the most recent election cycle.

Trump weighed in on the situation involving Fleming during a town hall event on Fox News Channel’s “The Faulkner Focus” Oct. 17.

Trump referenced Fleming specifically, describing a video in which one of the athlete’s spikes hit another player.

“I saw the slam. It was a slam. I never saw a ball hit so hard, hit the girl in the head,” Trump said. “But other people, even in volleyball, they’ve been permanently, I mean, they’ve been really hurt badly. Women playing men. But you don’t have to do the volleyball. We stop it. We stop it. We absolutely stop it. You can’t have it.”

Trump revealed his intention to ban transgender inclusion in women’s sports if elected. It became a talking point he made sure to reference at every campaign rally from then until Election Day.

He and Republican allies hammered Democrats’ position of protecting transgender inclusion, which grew increasingly unpopular.

A federal judge could have ended Fleming’s career earlier but decided to allow the player to compete in the conference tournament.

Federal Judge Kato Crews of Colorado, appointed by President Biden in January, denied a motion for injunctive relief in a lawsuit by college volleyball players against the conference.

The players were looking to have their forfeits for refusing to play against Fleming and the Spartans rescinded, which would, in turn, shift the standings heading into the tournament. They also wanted Fleming banned from the tournament.

Crews, however, wrote that the plaintiffs’ request for an emergency delay “was not reasonable” and “would risk confusion and upend months of planning and would prejudice, at a minimum, (San Jose State) and other teams participating in the tournament.”

Despite the lawsuits, Slusser and the rest of the San Jose State roster took the court with Fleming for matches all season.

Fleming was second in the conference in kills per set with a .386, still well behind Jones, who led the way at .457.

Fleming had a signature moment in the second-to-last match of the season against first-place Colorado State at home on Senior Day.

Fleming led the game in kills with 24 and total attacks and clinched victory in the fifth set with a match-point service ace.

Right after the play, Fleming was swarmed by teammates in celebration. Even Slusser got involved. This group celebration took place just days after Slusser and other Mountain West players filed a second lawsuit over Fleming’s presence on the team against San Jose State and the conference.

Now, Fleming, Slusser and their other senior teammates will look ahead to their post-volleyball lives.