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President Donald Trump plans to nominate conservative filmmaker and documentarian Michael Pack as the next head of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the White House says.

The BBG is the federal agency that oversees Voice of America, along with other congressionally-funded broadcast entities.

Pack is the president of Manifold Productions, an independent film and television production company.

Pack has an extensive background in media, including as senior vice president of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, publisher of the Claremont Review of Books, and as director of Worldnet, the film and television service of the former U.S. Information Agency.

If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Pack would succeed John Lansing as BBG chief executive officer. The term would be for three years.

 
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A time that is supposed to be one of the most joyful moments in a young person’s life was overshadowed by tears at Sunday’s graduation of the senior class of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Seventeen students and faculty – including four seniors who were supposed to have received diplomas – were killed during the February 14 shooting at the Parkland, Florida, high school.

The graduating class, parents and guests solemnly paid tribute to their slain friends in a number of ways.

Senior class president Julia Cordover urged students to change the world by voting in this November’s congressional elections.

The parents and siblings who came to the stage to pick up the diplomas in place of the murdered children got standing ovations.

Some students wore pictures of shooting victims on top of their graduation caps while others had price tags reading “$1.05” dangling from their hats – that is the price per Florida school student that activists say the National Rifle Association donated to Republican Senator Marco Rubio.

Comedian Jimmy Fallon, host of TV’s Tonight Show, was a surprise guest speaker at the ceremony.

“Choose to move forward and don’t let anything stop you. Thank you for your courage and your bravery,” he told the audience.

Another poignant high school graduation ceremony was held near Houston Saturday where 10 people were gunned down at Santa Fe High School two weeks ago.

 
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Washington is watching as the White House prepares for next week’s historic summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, the Singapore encounter that Trump canceled last month is now on again, prompting an avalanche of speculation as to what will transpire and what the summit may produce.
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National Guard troops, police and firefighters ushered the last group of evacuees from homes on the eastern tip of Hawaii’s Big Island early Saturday, hours before creeping lava from the Kilauea volcano severed road access to the area, officials said.

A stream of lava as wide as three football fields flowed over a highway near a key junction on the outskirts of Kapoho, a seaside community of private homes and vacation rentals rebuilt after a destructive eruption of Kilauea in 1960.

The lava flow left Kapoho and the adjacent development of Vacationland,encompassing about 500 homes combined, cut off from the rest of the island by road, according to the Hawaii County Civil Defense agency.

Authorities since Wednesday had been urging residents of the area to pack up and leave before lava spewing from a volcanic fissure at the eastern foot of Kilauea reached the area.

Latest evacuations Saturday

The final phase of the evacuation was carried out late Friday and early Saturday by fire and police department personnel, with help from the Hawaii National Guard and public works teams, county civil defense spokeswoman Janet Snyder told Reuters by email.

An estimated 500 people live in the greater Kapoho area, but Snyder said it was not immediately clear how many residents, if any, chose to stay behind.

Another 2,000 people have been evacuated from the Leilani Estates subdivision, an area further west, where dozens of homes have been devoured or cut off by rivers of red-hot molten rock streaming over the landscape since May 3.

For those whose homes have been unscathed, the prolonged strain of uncertainty has grown increasingly difficult.

Living on edge

“We’re waiting for Pele to make the decision,” said Steve Kirkpatrick, a retired mailman and 14-year resident of Leilani Estates, referring to the volcano goddess of Hawaiian myth. His home was still intact but in harm’s way.

“You go for three weeks and you think everything is fine, and then you can still lose your house,” Kirkpatrick told Reuters as he and his wife, Kathy, ventured back to their community to help friends move out.

“As the lava expands, so has the anxiety,” she said, the low, jetlike sound of lava spouting from the ground audible in the distance.

Lava, toxic gas and ‘Pele’s hair’

Lava was not the only challenge posed by the eruption.

Toxic sulfur dioxide gas emissions have created an additional hazard. So too have airborne volcanic glass fibers, called “Pele’s hair,” wispy strands produced by lava fountains and carried aloft by the wind.

One resident, Nancy Avery, said the glass strands hurt like paper cuts, slicing into her fingers and feet, toes exposed because she wore only sandals. She tried to pick up a strand but, “It just kind of melted into my skin and cut me. It’s so sharp, it feels like the glass is still in there.”

The lava itself, extruded from about two dozen fissures that opened on the slope of Kilauea’s “eastern rift zone” earlier this month, has also knocked out telephone and power lines and forced the shutdown of a geothermal energy plant.

Lava burned two buildings at the plant, a substation and a warehouse that stored a drilling rig on the property, officials said.

Eruption cycle began in 1983

The latest upheaval of Kilauea, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, comes on the heels of an eruption cycle that began in 1983 and continued almost nonstop for 35 years, destroying more than 200 dwellings and other structures.

The current activity has been accompanied for weeks by daily periodic explosions of gas and volcanic rock from Kilauea’s summit crater as well as earthquakes.

But the summit has quieted down over the past few days, as tons of rubble shaken loose from the interior walls of the crater have fallen into the void and plugged the bottom of the vent.

Scientists are unsure whether the blockage will eventually bring an end to further eruptions at the summit or lead to a buildup of pressure that could cause a much bigger explosion.
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China has warned that any agreements with Washington in their talks on settling a sprawling trade dispute “will not take effect” if threatened U.S. sanctions including tariff hikes go ahead.

The statement Sunday came shortly after delegations led by U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and China’s top economic official, Vice Premier Liu He, held another round of talks on China’s pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States by purchasing more American goods. 

The Chinese statement said the two sides made “positive and concrete progress,” but neither side released details.

The statement said, “If the United States introduces trade sanctions including increasing tariffs, all the economic and trade achievements negotiated by the two parties will not take effect.”

Ross said U.S. and Chinese officials have discussed specific American export items Beijing might buy as part of its pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States.

The two sides began a new round of talks in Beijing this weekend aimed at settling a simmering trade dispute.

Ross gave no details at the start of his meeting Sunday with Liu, China’s top economic official. But Chinese envoys promised after the last high-level meeting in Washington in mid-May to buy more American farm goods and energy products.

President Donald Trump is pressing Beijing to narrow its politically volatile surplus in trade in goods with the United States, which reached a record $375.2 billion last year. He’s threatening to hike duties on up to $150 billion of Chinese imports.

“Our meetings so far have been friendly and frank, and covered some useful topics about specific export items,” Ross said.

Ross was accompanied by agricultural, treasury and trade officials. Liu’s delegation included China’s central bank governor and commerce minister.

There was no indication whether the talks also would take up American complaints that Beijing steals or pressures foreign companies regarding their technology. The White House renewed a threat this week to hike duties on $50 billion of Chinese technology-related goods over that dispute.

Private sector analysts say that while Beijing is willing to compromise on its trade surplus, it will resist changes that might threaten plans to transform China into a global technology competitor.

Ross had a working dinner Saturday evening with Liu, also at the same guesthouse in Beijing.

China has promised to “significantly increase” purchases of farm goods, energy and other products and services. Still, Beijing resisted pressure to commit to a specific target of narrowing its annual surplus with the United States by $200 billion.
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The president of a leading Baptist seminary in Texas was dismissed because of his response to two rape allegations made years apart by students, according to officials at the Fort Worth-based school.

Kevin Ueckert, board chairman for Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, in a statement Friday criticized the actions of former President Paige Patterson.

Ueckert said Patterson sent an email to the head of campus security in 2015 to say he wanted to meet alone with a student who told him she had been raped, to “break her down.”

The attitude expressed by Patterson in the email was “antithetical to the core values of our faith,” Ueckert said.

Patterson also was criticized by the board for his response to a student’s allegation of rape in 2003 when Patterson was president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

That allegation was never reported to law enforcement, and Ueckert said Patterson gave contradictory information to the board when asked about it.

A working phone number for Patterson could not be found Saturday to answer the allegations.

Documents returned

Also contributing to the downfall of one of the leading figures of the Southern Baptist Convention were documents requested by the North Carolina school.

Southeastern Baptist had requested the return of any school records Patterson took with him when he departed to become president of Southwestern Baptist in 2003. Through an attorney, Patterson initially claimed last month not to have any such records, Ueckert said. But then the attorney later provided records clearly indicating they belonged to Southeastern Baptist, the board chairman said.

Shortly after the records were turned over, the wife of Patterson’s chief of staff posted them online as part of a blog entry, Ueckert said. The records included the names of students and other information not authorized for release by officials at either school, he said.

“I believe this was inappropriate and unethical,” Ueckert said.

President emeritus briefly

The Fort Worth seminary initially named the 75-year-old Patterson as president emeritus May 23 after pushing him out of his position as president. The board at the time said that he and his wife could continue to live on campus as theologians-in-residence. But trustees later cut all ties after confirming the new allegations against him, officials previously said.

Patterson had drawn scrutiny in recent months based on accusations that he made remarks about a teenage girl’s body, said female seminarians should work hard to look attractive and argued that abused women should almost always stay with their husbands.

The comments led to a letter from a group of “concerned Southern Baptist women” dated May 6 to the board, asking trustees “to exercise the authority you have been given by the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention and to take a strong stand against unbiblical teaching regarding womanhood, sexuality and domestic violence.”

Patterson issued an apology days later: “I wish to apologize to every woman who has been wounded by anything I have said that was inappropriate or that lacked clarity,” his statement said. “Please forgive the failure to be as thoughtful and careful in my extemporaneous expression as I should have been.”
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A lawyer tapped to lead a task force at the Environmental Protection Agency overseeing cleanups at the nation’s most polluted places worked until recently for a top chemical and plastics manufacturer with a troubled legacy of creating some of those toxic sites.

Steven D. Cook has been named as the new chair of the Superfund Task Force, which EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt created last year to revamp how the agency oversees cleanups at the more than 1,300 toxic sites.

Before beginning work in February as deputy assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management, Cook served more than 20 years as in-house corporate counsel for LyondellBasell Industries — one of the world’s largest plastics, chemicals and refining companies.

EPA records show that LyondellBasell and its subsidiaries are listed as being potentially responsible for at least three dozen Superfund polluted sites.

Half of appointees have industry ties

​An analysis by The Associated Press shows that nearly half the political appointees hired at EPA under President Donald Trump have industry ties. Of more than 60 EPA hires tracked by the AP over the last year, about one-third worked as registered lobbyists or lawyers for chemical manufacturers, fossil fuel producers or other EPA-regulated companies.

Trump promised as a presidential candidate to drain the swamp in Washington. An executive order signed two weeks after his inauguration bars former lobbyists and corporate lawyers from participating in any matter they worked on for private clients within two years of going to work for the government.

Following a request by AP, EPA provided a copy of an April 20 memo Cook signed recusing himself from participating in regulatory matters involving LyondellBasell. However, as stated in the letter, Cook can participate in matters affecting his former employer as long as his actions would also impact at least five similarly situated companies.

“All EPA employees receive ethics briefings when they start and continually work with our ethics office regarding any potential conflicts they may encounter while employed here,” said Lincoln Ferguson, an EPA spokesman. “Steven Cook is no different.”

It was not immediately clear whether Cook would be allowed to participate in decisions involving LyondellBasell, anyway. AP reported in March that White House counsel Don McGahn has issued at least 37 ethics waivers to key administration officials, including three working at EPA, that allow them to help regulate the very industries from which they previously collected paychecks even after signing recusals. It was not clear whether Cook was granted a waiver, and Ferguson did not respond to AP’s inquiries on the subject.

LyondellBasell claims

Lyondell Chemical Co., a Houston-based subsidiary of LyondellBasell, agreed to pay $250 million in 2010 to settle environmental claims and provide cleanup funds for 15 properties across the country as part of bankruptcy proceedings.

Another subsidiary of the Dutch chemicals conglomerate, Equistar Chemicals, agreed in 2007 to spend more than $125 million on pollution controls and cleanup costs to address a myriad of air, water and hazardous waste violations at seven petrochemical plants in Texas, Illinois, Iowa and Louisiana. Court filings made as part of the company’s legal settlement with the Justice Department, and EPA listed Cook as the primary contact for Equistar.

LyondellBasell subsidiaries are identified as a responsible party on dozens of Superfund sites. The companies set aside funds for cleanups before emerging from bankruptcy.

“LyondellBasell resolved its Superfund obligations nearly a decade ago,” said Pattie Shieh-Lance, a corporate spokeswoman in Houston. “The company does not currently have any such obligations.”

Replacing Pruitt friend

Cook is taking over as chair of the Superfund Task Force following the resignation of Albert “Kell” Kelly, a longtime friend and business associate of Pruitt’s. AP reported in August that federal banking regulators had banned Kelly, who previously the chairman of Oklahoma-based SpiritBank, from banking for life. Members of Congress had been pressing for details about what led to the banking sanctions against Kelly when he quit his EPA job.

Cook’s appointment to lead the task force was first reported by Bloomberg.

He is currently the top political appointee at EPA’s Land and Emergency Management office, which oversees the agency’s response to chemical spills and oversees management of the Superfund program.

Trump has nominated Peter C. Wright to serve as assistant administrator for Land and Emergency Management, but he has not yet been confirmed to the post by the U.S. Senate. Wright has worked as a corporate lawyer at Dow Chemical Co. since 1999. 
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An anonymous bidder offered more than $3.3 million Friday for a private lunch with Warren Buffett, an amount just short of the record paid in 2016 and 2012 for the chance to pick the brain of the renowned investor and philanthropist.

An online auction that raises money for the Glide Foundation’s work to help the homeless in San Francisco ended Friday night on eBay with a winning bid of $3,300,100. The winner wished to remain anonymous.

Third highest price paid

The price was the third highest in the 18 years Buffett has offered the lunch. Winners paid $3,456,789 in 2012 and 2016, which remain the most expensive charity items ever sold on eBay.

Buffett has raised more than $26 million for the Glide Foundation through the annual auctions. Bidders continue to pay high prices for the chance to talk with Buffett, who leads Nebraska-based Berkshire Hathaway, and the event raises a significant part of Glide’s $20 million annual budget.

Buffett supports Glide because of the work the charity does to help people. His first wife, Susie, introduced him to Glide after she volunteered there.

“Glide really takes people who have hit rock bottom and helps bring them back. They’ve been doing it for decades,” Buffett said.

Glide provides meals, health care, job training, rehabilitation and housing support to the poor and homeless.

One topic off limits

Buffett has said he gets asked about a variety of topics during the lunch. The only subject that’s off limits is what Buffett might invest in next.

The winners of the lunch auction typically dine with Buffett at Smith and Wollensky steak house in New York City, which donates at least $10,000 to Glide each year to host the lunch.

Buffett’s company owns more than 90 companies including insurance, furniture, railroad, jewelry, utility and candy businesses. Berkshire Hathaway also has major investments in companies including Coca-Cola Co., Apple, American Express and Wells Fargo & Co.
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For Muslims, the month of Ramadan is a time for self-reflection and prayer — and fasting from sunrise to sunset. After sunset, families and friends enjoy a meal called Iftar. At a mosque in Virginia, outside Washington, people of various faiths came to Iftar one evening and to join Muslims in prayer. VOA’s Deborah Block has the story.
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President Donald Trump says America is safe because the U.S. Coast Guard is “strong.”

Trump calls the Coast Guard the “elite force” that defends borders, patrols the waters, protects U.S. cities and keeps enemies at bay.

He spoke Friday while presiding over a Coast Guard change-of-command ceremony in Washington.

Adm. Karl Schultz became the 26th Coast Guard commandant, succeeding Adm. Paul Zukunft.

Trump thanked Zukunft for a “lifetime of noble service” and expressed “complete confidence” that Schultz will carry out his new responsibilities with “character, strength and devotion.”

Trump recalled watching the Coast Guard last year after powerful hurricanes struck Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico. Trump says no brand has gained more than the Coast Guard and that the public has “tremendous respect” for it.
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Puerto Rico’s Institute of Statistics is suing the island’s health department and demographic registry to obtain data on the number of deaths following Hurricane Maria as a growing number of critics accuse the government of lacking transparency.

The lawsuit was filed Thursday, the same day that Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rossello told CNN there would be “hell to pay” if officials didn’t release mortality data.

A spokeswoman for the island’s health department, which oversees the demographic registry, did not immediately respond to a message for comment.

Institute of Statistics Director Mario Marazzi-Santiago said Friday the data is urgently needed so Puerto Rico’s government can help prevent deaths in the event of another hurricane. Many believe the official death toll of 64 is an undercount.
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Officials say the remaining wreckage of United Flight 93 will be returned later this year to the Pennsylvania memorial marking where it crashed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Flight 93 National Memorial Superintendent Stephen Clark says the wreckage will be buried in a restricted area of the park Shanksville that’s accessible only to loved ones of the victims.

President of the Families of Flight 93 Gordon Felt says his group requested a final search of the debris to see if there were any human remains or personal items in the wreckage.

Clark says workers found a number of items that will be added to the memorial collection, including an orange passenger call button.

The National Park Service will release a full report of the items collected later this year.
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