Cristina Maza
@CrisLeeMaza
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Covering foreign policy & defense @nationaljournal email: cmaza @nationaljournal .com Better on Substack:
DC•Baltimore•World
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From yesterday, Mitch McConnell advocated for Oleg Deripaska's company Rusal to be removed from the sanctions list. Now it is investing $200 million to build a new aluminum plant in McConnell's state of Kentucky
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I wrote about Attorney General William Barr's financial ties to Russia and work for entities connected to the Russia investigation, including dividends from Howard Lorber's Vector Group and work for the law firm representing Alfa Bank
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Ukraine's Interior Ministry says there have already been hundreds of casualties, CNN reports.
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“What’s important to note is the quid pro quo involving the RNC platform regarding America’s support for Ukraine and a connection to the interference in elections and Trump Tower Moscow,"
@olgaNYC1211
told me
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I asked Rudy Giuliani if he flew to Vienna on December 6 in a plane owned by billionaire Alexander Rovt and he responded:
"Paid for plane and didn’t deal with an owner."
I asked if it's true he's been meeting with Ihor Kolomoisky and his associates in Ukraine.
Crickets...
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Rex Tillerson met secretly w/House Foreign Affairs Committee and said the Trump admin “actively avoided” confronting Russia about electoral interference “in an effort to develop a solid relationship with the Kremlin.” via
@ErinBanco
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The current fighting in Eastern Ukraine is likely Russia’s last offensive before it exhausts its available manpower
This article is locked, so here's a quick 🧵 with some of the takeaways:
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Not trying to be a jerk, but is this supposed to say threats?
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Rudy Giuliani was named in a criminal complaint in the Netherlands last month because his former law firm set up a company that helped Kazakh fugitives Leila and Viktor Khrapunov launder money (my latest)
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I tried to be as thorough as possible in this piece, but there's a lot there so please let me know which details I missed. And thanks to
@olgaNYC1211
for additional details and context
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Russian officials are using William Barr's summary of the Mueller report to claim that their government is innocent of election interference. It's not. My latest w/insights from
@kalenskyj
,
@jedshug
, and
@olgaNYC1211
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Subpoena number 3.
🚨🚨 BREAKING: The AG for the District of Columbia has subpoenaed documents from Trump’s inaugural committee, NYT reports
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Do you deny a 36-year-old woman the right to dance just because she is the head of state?
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When the news hosts are lecturing you on foreign policy, it might be a sign you don't actually know what you're talking about.
RAMASWAMY: We can actually go the other direction. Reopen economic relations with Russia. Freeze the current lines of control--
KILMEADE: So let Russia take 20 percent of the country?
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U.S. officials are tracking the efforts of the Russian paramilitary Wagner Group outside of Ukraine.
According to cables, officials are gathering intelligence on the group's activities in countries like the Central African Republic, Mali, and Serbia.
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the gist of this story is that the Parnas, Fruman, Giuliani operation in Ukraine was a Firtash-funded (i.e. Putin backed) effort to take over Naftogaz.
Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman alleged Favorov’s boss (Naftogaz CEO Andriy Kobolyev) was a puppet of George Soros.
That's the same thing Rudy Giuliani said about former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovich
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This is one of the most horrific things I’ve read in recent memory, with eyewitness accounts of a Hamas massacre and numerous rapes and executions at a psytrance party in the Negev.
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Not to politicize the important news of the prisoner swap, but this is a major win for the Biden-Harris administration.
Trump has repeatedly claimed to be the only person who could bring
@evangershkovich
home.
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In my latest, for
@VICEWorldNews
, I spoke with Armenian PoWs from the conflict in Nagorno Karabakh
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Calls for more heavy weaponry have grown urgent as Ukrainian forces risk being encircled by heavily armed Russian troops in Ukraine’s East.
Ukrainians are circulating a wish list of weaponry around Washington. Here's what's in it:
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NEW: Momentum is growing for a special international tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders for the crime of aggression against Ukraine.
Ukrainian activists have been calling for this for months. But now they have support from key allies in Congress.
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JUST NOW: Bill Barr says he sees no reason to appoint a special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden.
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this picture from the D.C. protests is...umm...something.
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I'm watching the morning news in Spain and it's striking how climate change is front and center: flooding in the Isle of Man and Birmingham, a tornado in Germany, an iceberg twice the size of Menorca breaks off in Antarctica.
U.S. news barely touches these stories.
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I wrote about
@ShriPrakashJi
+ his accusations against Orthodox Christian anti-cult activist Alexander Dvorkin
#Russia
A Hindu spiritual Guru in Russia claims he's the target of Orthodox Christian activists
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“Eleven days before Trump’s inauguration, oligarch Viktor Vekselberg met with Michael Cohen at Trump Tower. Vekselberg came to discuss Russia relations with Cohen, attended the inauguration, and then flew to see Putin on Jan 26th,"
@olgaNYC1211
explains
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Another Russia investigation bombshell today
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Anyone else feel really rough after their second shot? 💉
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NEW: Officials in Kyiv are waiting for a potential announcement about main battle tanks for Ukraine to come out of the Ramstein Air Base meeting in Germany on Friday, Jan 20, when the U.S. will convene its third Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting.
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All in all, as one Russian military expert told me, “there is no large body of Russian manpower coming....There’s no large Russian reserve available."
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One of the power plant manufacturers involved in the proposed project in Saudi Arabia, Westinghouse Electric, is a subsidiary of Brookfield Asset Management, the company that bailed out Jared Kushner’s property on 666 Fifth Avenue:
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MIT confirms that it cut its ties with Viktor Vekselberg because of U.S. sanctions. The oligarch is currently lobbying to be removed from the Treasury's sanctions list:
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OK,
@shakira
is officially my idol.
I just graduated from my 4 week Ancient Philosophy course with the University of Pennsylvania (
@Penn
). I know... my hobbies are very impractical, but it took a lot of hours after the kids were asleep. Thank you Plato and predecessors for all the "fun" over the past month!
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Agalarov is a person of interest to Mueller because his ties to Trump and Putin run deep: “In "February 2014, Ivanka Trump travels to Moscow and meets with Emin Agalarov, and Emin travels to Florida to meet with Trump,”
@olgaNYC1211
explains in my latest
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“Vekselberg is connected to a few people in Trump’s inner circle. In 2014, on a trip to Moscow, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner met with Emin Agalarov and attended a private fundraising dinner with Vekselberg,"
@olgaNYC1211
explains in my latest:
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.
@elonmusk
"is acting like a carrier pigeon for a dictator purposely bombing civilians,"
@juliaioffe
writes, adding that the world's richest man is Putin's "useful idiot."
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"The [Mueller} report needs to be publicized because that’s the more important impact on national security, to shine a spotlight on how Russians are destabilizing democracies around the world,"
@jedshug
told me
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A senior adviser to former Catalan president Puigdemont met with Russian officials and former intelligence officers to secure Russia’s help in severing Catalonia from Spain, according to a European intelligence report reviewed by The New York Times.
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In my latest,
@anders_aslund
argues that Dmitry Firtash's extradition could mean a lot for reform in Ukraine +
@olgaNYC1211
breaks down Firtash's ties to organized crime & Paul Manafort
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For anyone saying that Hillary Clinton is spreading conspiracy theories by claiming that Russia is grooming Tulsi Gabbard, I direct you to this
@bpopken
piece from February on Russia's social media support for Gabbard and her presidential aspirations
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Ukrainian sources tell me that in intercepted phone calls, Russians say they have signed contracts to fight for only 90 days.
Many Russians will expect to be sent home from the front line sometime in May. That could raise significant problems for Russia’s war effort.
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In this interview,
@lapatina_
talks about staying in constant touch with friends from Iraq and Syria because only they can understand what she’s experiencing.
A humbling reminder that it’s impossible to understand war from afar, no matter how immersed in these topics you are.
What amazes me time and again when I speak with Ukrainians like
@lapatina_
is how poised they are in the midst of a nightmare. An air raid siren went off right when we started speaking & yet she was thoughtful and unflappable for the next 25 mins.
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"I would imagine that the lobbying that Russia is doing is similar to the lobbying that they were doing when they created illegitimate victories in getting the World Cup located in Moscow through FIFA,"
@Billbrowder
on Russia and Interpol (My latest)
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Judge Sullivan, citing John Gleeson, says that Michael Flynn's false statement to the FBI went to the heart of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
#FlynnHearing
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Even if Russia succeeds in recruiting 130,000 more soldiers as it said it would, it won’t be able to increase its ability to fight on the ground in Ukraine anytime soon.
It would take months to train new recruits and integrate them into existing units.
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Some personal news: Today is my last day
@Newsweek
.
That means I'm looking for a JOB! But I'll be freelancing & pursuing enterprise stories until I find the perfect fit. I'm open to all opportunities, including those that require travel. Get in touch if you want to work with me!
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Russia called up at least 100,000 reservists during the first phase of its war in Ukraine, but experts assess there are not many still waiting to fight.
The Russian military announced a spring recruitment effort last month that will last into June.
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NEW: A look at the Congressional response to Russia's downing of a U.S. drone.
Lawmakers are getting serious about pushing the administration to develop a strategy for the Black Sea region.
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Putin has not formally declared war on Ukraine. Unless he does, it will be difficult to justify a further mass mobilization.
Conscripts cannot be legally sent to fight in combat, although many were forced to sign contracts so the military could lawfully send them into Ukraine.
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It's impossible to overstate how important Boris Nemtsov was to the Russian and Ukrainian people. Boris Nemtsov represented hope and united Russians and Ukrainians through messages of peace and unity,"
@AndreaChalupa
told me:
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After a week of terrifying tests – including a thyroid biopsy – I am thrilled to announce that I DO NOT have cancer.
The relief I feel is indescribable. I have never felt so lucky to be here in my beautiful, mundane life with all its petty problems.
Now back to work tweets.💪
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Many of the individuals responsible for training new soldiers have already been sent to the front line, raising questions about who would be available to train recruits.
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Those contract fighters will probably be obliged to stay past their 90-day contracts. But that will dampen morale.
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This, paired with constant jokes about Trump staying longer than 2 terms, is disconcerting.
They’re trying to criminalize dissent. Read the bill. They use the terms “antifa”, “affiliated with antifa”, and “left-wing activists” interchangeably.
They want to call you a terrorist for opposing the Trump administration too strongly or loudly.
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Training will also likely be a problem. Russia’s military is a hybrid entity that consists partly of professional volunteer soldiers, known as contract soldiers, and partly of conscripts.
The conscripts serve one-year terms that aren’t long enough to receive adequate training.
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In my latest
@nationaljournal
, I wrote about the Afghan diversity visa lottery winners who are seeing their hopes of escaping the Taliban fade.
If cases aren’t resolved by Thursday, the diversity-visa selectees risk losing the opportunity to emigrate.
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Rudy Giuliani's theories about George Soros, Joe Biden, and U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch may have contributed to the ambassador's early dismissal (my latest)
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They also don’t receive additional training after returning home. That means many are not much more skilled than regular civilians.
These conscripts make up around one-third of the Russian military.
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My latest: A look at the role of European women – including Ukrainian women – in driving international policy during wartime.
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"Religious freedom in Russia is in a dire state and we're concerned about the status of all religious minorities there" (My latest)
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Interesting tidbit: researchers
@AtlanticCouncil
told me that the majority of pro-Maduro hashtags originated out of Turkey.
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I am hearing from sources in Nagorno Karabakh and Armenia that the announced ceasefire is not holding.
"Shelling continues, people are dying," one government official wrote in a message. "Azeri forces are entering deserted villages and looting them."
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During the House Intelligence hearing on Russia,
@JackieSpeier
asks about Raiffeisen bank's ties to Russia and why the bank financed a Trump real estate project in Toronto and never asked for reimbursement
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In case you forgot about Ukraine for the holidays,
@JohnEdHerbst
reminds us “Moscow likes to commit aggression when the world is not paying attention. It invaded Afghanistan during the Christmas season in 1979 and attacked Georgia during August vacation"
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Today, Christmas Eve, the Russian foreign ministry warned that “it is quite possible” that Ukraine will launch military action against Russia in the next few days. Many think Moscow is laying the groundwork for an armed attack against Ukraine
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NEW: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is sparking new initiatives for global justice as officials worldwide look for ways to hold Moscow accountable.
A dive into international efforts to collect evidence of atrocities and how Congress is trying to help:
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Some personal news: I'm excited to announce that I will join
@nationaljournal
as their foreign policy and defense correspondent in September.
Watch this space and subscribe to National Journal. I look forward to getting started!
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I thought this podcast would be redundant and boring for anyone who has read the Mueller report. I was wrong. It’s very entertaining and the production is fabulous.
For your Friday night or weekend listening:
THE REPORT, Part III:
The Campaign & The Leaks
This is where things start to get *really* interesting....
Listen to the sample below, then subscribe or download episodes at
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Really interesting insight into
@DavidCornDC
's reporting process and interactions with Mary Trump
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In Washington and Kyiv, criticisms of national security adviser Jake Sullivan's approach to the war in Ukraine have been mounting for months.
Now Sullivan is accused of pushing Ukraine to show a willingness to negotiate with Russia.
My latest:
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Reminder: Vekselberg's company Columbus Nova paid Michael Cohen $1 million for "consulting," half of which went through the fund used to pay Stormy Daniels hush money
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NEW: Nagorno Karabakh's residents say they are running out of food because the Lachin corridor – their only access to Armenia - has been blockaded for almost a month.
One mother told me her toddler could miss her cancer treatment.
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Here I break down the allegations that the Kremlin helped finance Zelenskiy's campaign. Researchers say the hacked emails look real, but some details are impossible to verify. My latest w/insights from
@AndreaChalupa
,
@olgaNYC1211
, and
@wiczipedia
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#callforpitches
Excited to announce that a new online magazine is looking for stories about political and cultural pluralism – especially quirky international stories w/ a multicultural angle.
Rate is $400 for articles between 1,200-3,000 words.
Pitch: lazomag
@proton
.me
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At the
@AtlanticCouncil
right now,
@anders_aslund
is presenting his new book on Russian kleptocracy. So I'm re-upping my piece on Vladimir Putin's wealth in which Aslund estimates that, "Putin is worth around $100-160 billion."
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Victoria Nuland confirms that Kazakhstan told U.S. officials they are not interested in getting involved in Ukraine.
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A group of Belarusians announces that they created a battalion named after Kastus Kalinouski – a 19th-century Belarusian writer, publisher, and activist against imperial oppression – to defend Kyiv from Russian invaders.
Беларусы объявили о создании отдельного батальона имени Кастуся Калиновского для защиты Киева от русских захватчиков и призывают других беларусов вступать в их ряды.
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I spoke to people in Ukraine about how they survived the last year of war.
For all their resilience, people are burnt out, exhausted, and tired of watching their friends die.
Many worry Western weapons won’t arrive quickly enough to save more lives.
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The NYT morning brief on what so many of us wrestle with everyday:
President Trump’s actions...force election officials, journalists and social-media platforms to choose between telling the truth and sounding nonpartisan.
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The American healthcare industry is so broken that in Kiev I just spent $2 for a cream that would cost me $100 WITH INSURANCE ($600 without) in the U.S. For comparison, the same cream costs $5 in Israel.
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Something for Saturday night: Deutsche Bank wanted to dump a $600 million loan it had outstanding to VTB Group. It sold half to Alfa Bank
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Has anyone else developed a habit during the pandemic of going food shopping as a fun excuse to get out of the house?
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I wrote about the ways Russia is manipulating our justice system and using our own laws against us:
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"You cannot chase the Chinese, you cannot chase the Russians, if you have a State Department that's not working on technology every day,"
@ChrisMurphyCT
at
#NATOEngages
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Emin Agalarov cancels his trip to the U.S., his lawyers blame the Mueller investigation:
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.
@SpeakerPelosi
concludes her trip to Armenia calling the country "an important front in the battle between democracy and autocracy."
"We conveyed a strong message of support for Armenia’s democracy and security, particularly following Azerbaijan’s offensive against Armenia."
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A shocking interview about human rights abuses in Ethiopia, and also the power of lobbyists, that everyone should listen to:
Thank you
@TVietor08
for highlighting the situation in
#Tigray
on the Pod! Just in the last week 8 more bodies floated downstream into Sudan from Ethiopia & images analysed by CNN show 6 bodies bore signs of torture. There is clearly no respite.
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A thing I've been thinking about lately is how/why Americans engage with the wider world.
If you are from the U.S. and are interested in global events/issues/people/news, respond to this Tweet and tell me why. What first piqued your interest? How do you engage with world news?
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NEW: U.S. lawmakers and other officials are debating more money and weapons for Ukraine following its stunning counteroffensive.
Some Republican lawmakers still oppose Ukraine funding.
This piece is paywalled, so here's a 🧵 with takeaways.
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The organization
@btselem
put billboards in Bethlehem and Ramallah directed at President Biden during his visit to Israel.
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Rudy Giuliani says he's in Armenia "as a private citizen." But clearly everyone there will see him as a proxy for President Trump
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has anyone written a deep dive into the many
@DevinNunes
parody accounts and the incredible amount of litigation around them?
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“The Trump Administration’s interactions with Saudi Arabia have been shrouded in secrecy, raising significant questions about the nature of the relationship,” according to a memo by the House Oversight Committee released today
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A new bipartisan Senate bill asks the DNI to produce a report in 180 days with "the estimated net worth and known sources of income of Vladimir Putin and his family members."
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NEW:
@USRepKeating
has a bill w/ a bipartisan group of House lawmakers that would help Ukraine preserve evidence linking Putin to war crimes.
The bill comes as
@avalaina
tells Congress she and her colleagues documented over 18,000 cases of war crimes.
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