TV News LIES

The documents were released overnight on Tuesday and include a claim that Donald Trump was on a flight with Epstein and a 20-year-old woman in the 1990s. There is no indication that the woman was a victim of any crime and being included in the files does not indicate any criminal wrongdoing.

The files also include a series of emails between Ghislaine Maxwell and someone who signs himself as “A” and uses the alias “The Invisible Man”. In August 2001, “A” wrote to Maxwell: “I am up here at Balmoral Summer Camp for the Royal Family”.

Emails show Maxwell discussing arranging “girls” and “two-legged sight seeing” for a man identified in the correspondence as “The Invisible Man”, who is widely believed to be Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. In a February 2002 email exchange about a proposed trip to Peru, Maxwell forwards messages from Juan Estoban Ganoza outlining possible activities, including visiting the Nazca Lines.

The former Barclays chief executive Jes Staley and the ex-US Treasury secretary Larry Summers were appointed as executors of Epstein’s estate, according to a newly released tranche of documents linked to the now-deceased child sex offender.

Included in the batch of files was a now-deleted fake video that appeared to depict Epstein attempting to end his life. Also in the trove are photos of the fake Austrian passport uncovered from a safe during a 2019 FBI raid of Epstein’s home in Manhattan. There is also a 2021 subpoena to the Mar-a-Lago Club relating to the federal investigation into Maxwell. Also revealed was that the FBI sought to question Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor about his links to a second millionaire sex offender, Peter Nygard.

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A coalition of Democratic-led states filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to prevent Donald Trump’s administration from defunding the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau by refusing to request money from the Federal Reserve.

Democratic attorneys general from 21 states and the District of Columbia filed the lawsuit in federal court in Oregon, arguing that the administration’s decision not to seek additional funding for the US consumer watchdog is unlawful and undermines Congress’s authority under the US constitution.

“The administration’s actions are a handout to those who drive up costs by cheating hardworking Americans, and I will keep fighting to ensure they follow the law and our constitution,” New York attorney general Letitia James, a Democrat, said in a statement.

The CFPB did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trump, a Republican, has sought to dismantle the CFPB since returning to office in January and has installed Russell Vought, his budget director, as the acting head of the agency. While efforts to fire most of its employees are tied up in litigation, Vought has effectively halted most CFPB activities.

The agency, which is tasked with protecting consumers in the financial sector, began operations in 2011 under Barack Obama after the 2008 financial crisis. It has since returned more than $21bn improperly taken from consumers, its supporters say.

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President Trump announced on Monday a new class of battleships as part of the U.S. Navy’s “Golden Fleet.” 

The president said that he approved a plan for the Navy to start construction of the two battleships, which will be equipped with guns, missiles, hypersonic weapons and high-powered lasers.

President Trump trumpeted the ships as being built with “all steel” as opposed to aluminum.

Trump said the timeline of building the ships would be about two and a half years

When asked if the new class of ships is developed to counter China, Trump said they are intended to counter “everybody.”

"They’ll be the fastest, the biggest and by far, 100 times more powerful than any battleship ever built,” Trump said standing alongside Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Navy Secretary John Phelan and Secretary of State Marco Rubio at a Mar-a-Lago public appearance.

The new battleships, which will anchor the “Golden Fleet,” will weigh more than 30,000 tons, and the military is expected to have between 20 and 25 as part of the effort to bolster the U.S. Navy.

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China on Monday accused the U.S. of violating international law in seizing oil tankers off the coast of Venezuela, appearing to take the side of Caracas as Washington looks to take a third oil tanker this month.

“The U.S. practice of arbitrarily seizing other countries’ vessels grossly violates international law,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters, according to Bloomberg, adding that Beijing opposes anything that “infringes upon other countries’ sovereignty and security, and all acts of unilateralism or bullying.”

Lin added that Venezuela “has the right to independently develop mutually beneficial cooperation with other countries,” and Beijing supports Caracas in “defending its own legitimate rights and interests.”

The comments come as the U.S. on Sunday sought to seize a third oil tanker in an effort to cut off funding for the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

But the effort in the Caribbean Sea by the U.S. Coast Guard was thwarted when the tanker, the Bella 1, refused to submit and sailed away. Washington last year placed sanctions on the ship for transporting Iranian oil.

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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will present plans for a possible fresh attack on Iran to US President Donald Trump during his upcoming visit to Washington, NBC News reported Saturday, citing several unnamed officials.

According to the report, Israel is growing increasingly concerned that Iran is rebuilding and even expanding its ballistic missile production in the wake of the nations’ 12-day war in June.

Israel is also worried that Iran is rebuilding its nuclear enrichment program, which was heavily damaged by Israeli and American strikes, the report added.

Netanyahu and Trump are expected to meet at the US president’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida at the end of the month.

While Israel has publicly called Iran’s nuclear program an existential threat, officials quoted in the report said that the ballistic missiles were seen by Jerusalem as a more pressing concern.

TVNL Comment: Bibi needs a new war to stay out of prison.  Why not with Iran?

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The Ukrainian army was battling an attempted Russian breakthrough in the Sumy region, it said on Sunday, following reports that Moscow forcibly moved 50 people from a border village there.

This marks a renewed Russian advance in the part of the region previously largely spared from intense ground fighting since Ukraine regained land there in a swift 2022 counter-offensive.

“Fighting is currently ongoing in the village of Hrabovske,” Ukraine’s joint task force said, adding the troops were “making efforts to drive the occupiers back into Russian territory.”

It has also refuted media reports saying that the Moscow troops were in the neighboring Ryasne village.

Earlier on Sunday, the Ukrainian rights ombudsman said the enemy’s troops forcibly moved about 50 people from Hrabovske to Russia.

On Thursday, Russian soldiers “illegally detained about 50 civilians -- residents of the village of Hrabovske in the Sumy region,” ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said.

He added that they were held incommunicado in poor conditions, before the Russians “forcibly took them to the territory of the Russian Federation” on Saturday.

AFP is unable to verify the claims, and there was no official Russian comment on the matter.

However, on Saturday, the Russian army said it had captured the village of Vysoke, a few miles from Grabovske.

Sumy military administration said on Saturday it evacuated residents from the border communities in the area, who previously refused to leave, in armored vehicles.

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The Trump administration is recalling nearly 30 career diplomats from ambassadorial and other senior embassy posts as it moves to reshape the US diplomatic posture abroad with personnel deemed fully supportive of Donald Trump’s “America first” priorities.

The chiefs of mission in at least 29 countries were informed last week that their tenures would end in January, according to two state department officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal personnel moves.

All of them had taken up their posts in the Biden administration but had survived an initial purge in the early months of Trump’s second term that targeted mainly political appointees. That changed on Wednesday when they began to receive notices from officials in Washington DC about their imminent departures.

Ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president, although they typically remain at their posts for between three and four years. Those affected by the shakeup are not losing their foreign service jobs but will be returning to Washington for other assignments should they wish to take them, the officials said.

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