President Donald Trump said Thursday he is renaming Lake Ontario to be known as “Lake America” in the U.S. as he exacerbates his trade war with Canada. The Republican president signed an executive order updating the lake’s name for the U.S. geographic naming service. Trump cannot, however, force Canada to follow his preferred naming convention.
The president has been floating the idea of the name change in recent days as the U.S. announced it was imposing
50% tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian goods over the weekend after talks between the countries broke down. Canada struck back on Tuesday, slapping retaliatory tariffs on about $20 billion worth of U.S. goods, from industrial products to everyday purchases.
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The U.S. Department of Justice is suing four states that provide in-state tuition for students without legal status, saying the practice discriminates against U.S. citizens and encourages illegal immigration.
The complaints against Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington were filed Thursday, marking just the latest legal challenges over tuition breaks for such students. In all, the department has filed 21 lawsuits, with five of those resulting in judges permanently enjoining and declaring unconstitutional laws that gave reduced tuition to students living in the U.S. illegally.
“This is a simple matter of federal law: colleges cannot provide benefits to illegal aliens that they do not provide to U.S. citizens,” Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate said in a statement. “This Department of Justice will not tolerate American students being treated like second-class citizens in their own country.”
Federal prosecutors are seeking to keep the four states from providing in-state tuition rates for all immigrants who maintain in-state residency, regardless of whether those students are lawfully present in the United States.
The Trump administration relied on flawed logic to justify scrapping vehicle emissions standards earlier this year, according to a new study by a group of economists published Thursday in the journal Science.
It scrapped the emissions standards when it revoked the endangerment finding, which had long served as the legal underpinning for federal regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.
Researchers who examined the Environmental Protection Agency’s analysis for doing so said eliminating the rules will cost the country billions of dollars, not save it billions.
Even setting aside environmental reasons for keeping emissions rules, “the economic case for the rollback of the standards still falls apart,” said Antonio Bento, one of the study’s authors.
The EPA said it stands by its economic analysis.
“We will not attempt to push an EV mandate on the American people based on facially implausible projections,” the agency said in a statement.
The program provides grants to health care providers for contraception, cancer screenings and other services, mainly for low-income women.
More than 20 states, including New York, Massachusetts and California, argue in a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that the department broke the law when it set stricter rules this year for which providers qualify for the program, including requiring them to end diversity programs.
“This lawsuit is about ensuring safe and effective family planning and reproductive care remains accessible to all,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said at a news conference, adding that the new requirements were politically motivated.
During Kennedy’s confirmation hearings to be the nation’s health secretary, Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., asked about Kennedy’s 2019 trip to Samoa at least three times.
Again and again, Kennedy denied that his reason for the trip was related to vaccines.
Markey said new documents published by the AP and The Guardian on Thursday “confirm what we already knew: RFK Jr. lied to Congress.”
“This is a pattern, not a slip,” Markey said in a statement. “He should never have been confirmed, and he cannot be trusted to run HHS for even one more day.”
In response to questions from the AP, the Department of Health and Human Services said that the Samoa visit “was unrelated to vaccines.”
Trump has wide latitude over how the U.S. government recognizes geographic places and landmarks.
But he can’t force Canada or individual citizens on either side of the border to follow his preferred naming conventions.
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“The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don’t expect to doing much business with Ontario any longer,” Trump posted Tuesday on Truth Social.
This latest branding move — reminiscent of his move to rechristen the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” — highlights how much Trump’s rhetoric and trade policy have sundered the previously warm relationship between Washington and Ottawa.
In a scheduled announcement hours after Trump’s post, Canadian leaders unveiled tariffs on about $20 billion worth of American goods, including steel, dairy products, appliances and farm equipment — a retaliation for the Trump administration’s new 50% tariffs on Canadian goods.
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The lake’s name comes from the Huron Indigenous people’s word “oniatarí:io,” meaning “lake of shining waters,” and predates European settlement in the region. The province, founded in 1867, took its name from the lake.
The International Hydrographic Organization — of which both the United States and Canada are members — works to ensure that the world’s seas, oceans and navigable waters are surveyed and charted uniformly, and also names some of them. But there is no single international body that determines the names of international bodies of water.
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Trump administration lawyers raised the prospect earlier this week that the Kennedy Center would be demolished if Trump’s name wasn’t recognized at the institution to facilitate further fundraising for renovations.
“What was pointed out,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told reporters, “was that if you do nothing, bad things happen. But they’re not going to happen on Thursday.”
Lutnick was speaking ahead of a hearing in Washington to consider arguments over the Kennedy Center’s move to inscribe Trump’s name on the building. He argued that the effort was a way to recognize the president’s contributions to the renovations and said the board wasn’t trying to rename the institution, which a judge ruled earlier this year was illegal.
“That’s yesterday,” Lutnick said of the renaming debate.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe made a surprise visit to Moscow earlier this week, but Trump won’t share what he told Russian officials.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing unidentified people briefed on the matter, that Ratcliffe’s trip was to deliver a warning to Russia not to attack NATO countries.
Asked during Thursday’s Oval Office exchange with reporters about whether Ratcliffe delivered that message to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump offered a roundabout response.
“I don’t want to comment on that, but they’re not going to attack,” Trump said.
The president said recent flooding in a border area of China and Nepal was terrible to see, describing how “strong, well-built buildings were wiped out like they were toothpicks.”
Talking to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday, he said the U.S. has spoken with Nepalese leaders and offered to provide “anything they want.”
Trump said there were 50 or 60 Americans in the area but added that a full accounting hasn’t been completed.
The State Department has said 90 Americans were unaccounted for in China and Nepal. It said it was not aware of any U.S. deaths.
Hawaii’s Democratic Gov. Josh Green on Thursday called for Kennedy to resign as health secretary, saying he “misled Congress about his intentions in Samoa and his stance on vaccinations during his confirmation hearings.”
The statement came in reaction to new reporting from the AP and The Guardian revealing that documents refute Kennedy’s statements to senators that a 2019 trip he took to Samoa had “nothing to do with vaccines.”
Green, a Democrat and physician, organized flights loaded with vaccine doses to administer inoculations in Samoa during its deadly measles outbreak later in 2019.
Green said Kennedy’s “fear tactics” contributed to that disaster.
“He and his anti-vax organization intentionally misled the Prime Minister and the people of Samoa about the measles vaccination earlier that year, and Samoa paid the ultimate price,” Green said.
The president was asked about Cruz teasing a 2028 presidential run and responded, “I would say that he’s very talented. He’s a very good friend of mine. I think he might do that, yeah.”
Trump added of Cruz: “He’s a talented guy.”
Cruz ran for president in 2016 and was among the last Republican primary candidates still in the race when Trump clinched the party’s nomination.
Trump said Thursday he is renaming Lake Ontario to be known as “Lake America” in the United States as he exacerbates his trade war with Canada.
The Republican president signed an executive order that updated the lake’s name for the U.S. geographic naming service. Trump cannot force Canada to follow his preferred naming convention, however. The move is reminiscent of his move last year to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America.’”
Trump, who signed the order as he was sitting at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, had a large sign behind him propped on a stand with a map of the Great Lakes. Over Lake Ontario, in big red letters, the map read “Lake America.”
He told reporters that Canada is “the worst” to deal with on trade. “They feel entitled and we can’t have that,” he said.
The president has been floating the idea of the name change in recent days as the U.S. announced it was imposing 50% tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian goods over the weekend after talks between the countries broke down.
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AP’s latest findings about Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ’s trip to Samoa show his platform “is built on lies and grifts that leave a trail of dead children in their wake,” said Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, which oversees Kennedy’s health department.
The AP reported earlier Thursday that new documents refute Kennedy’s account that his 2019 visit, before a deadly measles outbreak, had “nothing to do with vaccines.”
Responding to the reporting, Wyden said he plans to press Republicans to refer Kennedy to the Justice Department for criminal investigation for lying to Congress.
If Democrats take the Senate majority in this fall’s elections, he added, his committee will prioritize holding Kennedy accountable.
“There are consequences for lying to Congress,” he said.
A group of U.S. senators led by Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada is urging Immigration and Customs Enforcement to cancel its plan to outfit officers with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks.
In a letter to ICE’s acting director, Cortez Masto and 15 of her colleagues in the Democratic caucus questioned ICE’s need to spend up to $20 million on the devices and the agency’s ability to use them appropriately.
“The blatant and tragic misuse of force in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, Houston, Maine, and other locations around the country raises significant skepticism about the agency’s professional capability to safely deploy a new tool that could be used to harm Americans without cause,” the letter said.
A Russian sanctions package in Congress represents the most ambitious effort to support Ukraine since Trump returned to the White House. The Senate approved it after a personal plea from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who told lawmakers after Lindsey Graham’s funeral last month that his country needs the sanctions as a morale booster.
The bill Graham promoted would deprive President Vladimir Putin of oil and gas revenue fueling the war machine. But House approval is uncertain. House Speaker Mike Johnson faces resistance from some Republicans. And many Democrats supportive of Ukraine warn it would hand Trump too much tariff authority.
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U.S. missile stocks in Europe have been moved to the Middle East, where U.S. and Gulf allies have fired off significant numbers of interceptors, including Patriots, to thwart Iran’s drones and missiles. Some of those attacks have killed and wounded American troops.
Though a Russian ballistic missile attack against NATO countries is not imminently expected, CIA Director John Ratcliffe went to Moscow this week to warn Russia not to attack, The Wall Street Journal reported. Trump played down the significance of the rare and secretive trip, saying it was “sort of semi-routine.”
European and NATO officials say Russia could be in a position to attack countries in the alliance by 2030. Patriot stockpiles are projected to rebound by then. In the meantime, Russia’s war in Ukraine could hinder its ability to carry out any missile attack on Europe as it would be a challenge for Moscow to fight an air war on two fronts.
The shortage of advanced missile interceptors is largely driven by Trump’s war with Iran, a U.S. defense official in Europe and a NATO official told The Associated Press, raising concerns about vulnerabilities in NATO countries to a potential Russian attack.
The U.S. defense official said the most concerning shortfall involves Patriot missile interceptors, which can shoot down Russia’s high-speed ballistic missiles. The NATO official confirmed the low inventories of Patriots among American and NATO forces in Europe. Both spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters.
In the event of a Russian ballistic missile assault on, for example, a military headquarters or power plant, NATO could be in a similar position to Patriot-starved Ukraine and be forced “to take punch after punch in the mouth,” the U.S. defense official said.
In Europe, the American military “definitely” does not have enough Patriots to stop any possible sustained ballistic missile attack and would have “very limited” capability to defend against a single ballistic missile strike or a stray Russian missile that goes off course, the U.S. official said.
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When Democrats gathered this week in a West Michigan congressional district they’re trying to flip blue, they wanted to talk about the cost of living under President Donald Trump. But it didn’t take long for the conversation to turn to a controversy dividing their party.
One attendee chided U.S. Rep. Hillary Scholten for failing to support Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed.
“Your inflammatory rhetoric has nothing to do with creating a better economic future for the people of West Michigan, and everything to do with protecting the pipeline of our tax dollars to Israel,” the woman said.
The exchange captured a problem confronting Democrats as they head toward November. Party leaders believe concerns about the economy have given them an opening to win control of Congress, but internal divisions are making it harder to keep the focus there.
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Iran’s economy, already strained by high inflation, years of Western sanctions and a war that has sharply reduced oil revenue, is poised for more instability as the Trump administration tries to coerce other countries into ending all financial dealings with the Islamic Republic.
A decision by the United Arab Emirates to suspend trade relations with Iran last week kick-started the White House’s latest attempt to isolate Tehran into submission. Iran entered the war with its foreign commerce concentrated among a relatively small group of countries, leaving it with fewer places to turn now.
The success of the U.S. strategy will largely hinge on China, the main buyer of Iranian oil and its top trading partner. Russia, a fellow target of sweeping U.S.-led sanctions, has a military conflict and economic crisis of its own and probably can’t offer longtime ally Iran much hard financial support.
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The Canadian government is investing an additional $60 billion over the next five years to reduce its dependence on American suppliers, a shift due to Trump’s pressure to contribute more to NATO as well as strained trade relations with Washington.
Canada aims to boost domestic defense capabilities and create jobs while developing innovative technologies for military and civilian use, like drones and robotics. Clothing maker Wuxly, known for luxury parkas, is joining in, making high-tech military gear.
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s vow to strengthen Canadian economic self-sufficiency is a boon for Canadian startups and established companies, as well as firms in Europe.
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UEFA also filed a request in a southern Florida district for authorization of discovery “in a foreign proceeding” against FIFA itself, which has offices in the Miami suburb of Coral Gables.
Thrive and Kushner were to be the anchor investors intending to pay FIFA $4.2 billion for a 20% stake in a subsidiary that would run the soccer body’s commercial events, including the World Cup.
A 56-page UEFA document seen by The Associated Press suggests the $4.2 billion could have been a “fraudulently off-market price promoted by Infantino for his own benefit.”
Infantino dropped the sell-off plan on Aug. 1 after a furious backlash by global soccer leaders, including UEFA.
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UEFA is preparing a criminal complaint against FIFA President Gianni Infantino in Swiss courts for possible financial mismanagement over his failed plan to sell future World Cup profits to private investors.
UEFA said Thursday it filed documents in a Manhattan court requesting discovery of potential evidence from the New York investment fund, Thrive Capital Management, founded by Joshua Kushner, the younger brother of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Iran’s top negotiator and parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf is thanking China for rejecting the U.S. “economic D-Day” policies against Iran.
“We welcome China’s principled statement rejecting illegal sanctions against Iran,” Qalibaf posted on social media Wednesday.
Earlier this week, Tehran had warned that it would respond harshly to expanded U.S. sanctions, including measures against countries it sees as cooperating with Washington. Iran has repeatedly targeted Bahrain and other Gulf countries with missiles and drones since the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Feb. 28.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Organization said Thursday that it had received a report of an oil tanker hit in the Strait of Hormuz.
The monitoring agency, run by the British military, said that local authorities reported that the vessel was hit by an unknown projectile on Tuesday in the waters between Oman and Iran, causing it to catch fire.
The crew was reported to be safe and there have been no reports of environmental damage, the UKMTO said.
