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For the millions of first-generation immigrants in the United States, whose native languages aren’t common on the streets of New York or any other U.S. community, staying connected to local news and culture can be challenging. But across Diaspora communities, call-to-listen radio programming is designed to fill this need and offer a respite from day-to-day hardships as immigrants, including the undocumented. VOA’s Ramon Taylor has this report from New York.
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For the millions of first-generation immigrants in the United States, whose native languages aren’t common on the streets of New York or any other U.S. community, staying connected to local news and culture can be challenging. But across Diaspora communities, call-to-listen radio programming is designed to fill this need and offer a respite from day-to-day hardships as immigrants, including the undocumented. VOA’s Ramon Taylor has this report from New York.
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Long before Viktor Vekselberg was tied to a scandal over the president and a porn star, the Russian oligarch had been positioning himself to extend his influence in the United States.

Working closely with an American cousin who heads the New York investment management firm Columbus Nova, Vekselberg backed a $1.6 million lobbying campaign to aid Russian interests in Washington. His cousin Andrew Intrater served as CEO of a Vekselberg company on that project, and the two men have collaborated on numerous other investments involving Vekselberg’s extensive holdings.

Now, Intrater’s investment firm is wrestling with the fallout from financial sanctions the U.S. Treasury Department lodged in April against Vekselberg, one of a group of oligarchs tied to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Columbus Nova has insisted it only managed Vekselberg’s vast assets. But an Associated Press review of legal and securities filings shows that the cousins sometimes collaborated in a more deeply entwined business relationship than was previously known.

Spokesmen for Columbus Nova have told the AP that the firm’s business relationship with Vekselberg has been indefinitely halted by the sanctions, which targeted Russian oligarchs accused by Treasury of playing “a key role in advancing Russia’s malign activities.”

All Vekselberg assets in the U.S. are frozen and U.S. companies forbidden from doing business with him and his entities. The deadline to sever those relationships was June 4, but talks between Columbus Nova and the government are continuing, the firm’s spokesmen said. A Treasury Department spokesman declined to comment.

The Columbus Nova spokesmen said the firm is also seeking permission from Treasury to retrieve any assets entwined with Vekselberg’s Renova Group, which the U.S. firm has called “its biggest client.”

Extricating Columbus Nova’s holdings from Vekselberg’s is not so simple. The sanctions apply to all assets in which Vekselberg has more than a 50 percent stake — including some investment funds managed by Columbus Nova in which the firm has an ownership interest, the spokesmen said. They discussed the matter on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the ongoing discussions.

A Russian citizen who has had a U.S. green card and homes in New York and Connecticut, Vekselberg once told an American diplomat he felt “half-American.” Vekselberg heads the Renova Group, a global conglomerate encompassing metals, mining, tech and other assets that is based in Moscow.

He wields an estimated $13 billion fortune that supports Silicon Valley startups, programs at a California state park, a Western-themed resort amid the Joshua trees near Scottsdale, Arizona — and a loan to a Baptist church in Savannah, Georgia.

“I think all along Vekselberg thought a big chunk of his life was going to be anchored here in the United States and he, like other Russia businessmen, has made strategic investments in his philanthropic work to be in better standing here,” said former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul.

Vekselberg also has cemented tech deals using a Kremlin-funded foundation — raising national security concerns years before special counsel Robert Mueller began probing contacts between Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and Russian intermediaries. His opaque corporate structure, which includes an array of hard-to-trace shell companies, has fallen under Mueller’s scrutiny, according to several media reports.

Vekselberg hired Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen as a consultant in January 2017, just months after Cohen paid off the adult film actress known as Stormy Daniels, who has alleged she had an affair with Trump.

But some experts familiar with Vekselberg’s financial holdings wonder if the government is adequately tracking his U.S. assets, let alone the companies or foundations managing his money under other names.

“Given how hidden these companies are in a network of shell companies, it is entirely possible that Vekselberg has a majority stake in businesses that are still functioning in the United States that the government doesn’t even know about,” said Peter Harrell, a sanctions expert and former deputy assistant secretary at the State Department.

Vekselberg’s spokesman, Andrey Shtorkh, did not detail how the billionaire was addressing the sanctions. Shtorkh stressed that the oligarch did not create or control Columbus Nova and gave up his green card more than a decade ago.

“It quickly became obvious that he had little time for more than brief visits to the United States,” Shtorkh said.

Making Western inroads

Vekselberg was born in what is the modern-day Ukraine, and built his fortune investing in aluminum and oil, taking advantage of the privatization of state companies after the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991.

The 61-year-old billionaire burnished his reputation in the West in 2010 when he was appointed president of the Skolkovo Foundation, a nonprofit initiative funded by the Russian government and private investors to build a high-technology research hub aimed at luring digital entrepreneurs to Russia.

While Putin and Vekselberg have not always been strongly allied, the project now appears to have the Russian president’s backing. In January, Putin highlighted a Skolkovo effort as the type of “forward-looking projects” that would receive government support. In a June 2017 meeting at the Kremlin, Putin praised Skolkovo’s work.

In June 2010, Vekselberg traveled to Silicon Valley with then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to try to gain a foothold for the Skolkovo Foundation. He signed a deal with Cisco CEO John Chambers for Cisco to invest $1 billion over 10 years in Skolkovo projects and met with Russian expatriates who urged him to set up a Skolkovo office nearby.

Skolkovo appeared to be a family concern. When members of the same expatriate association gathered in Manhattan to promote U.S. venture capital investment in Russia, the featured speakers included Intrater. And in a presentation dated June 2013 on Skolkovo’s website, Columbus Nova was described as one of several corporate venture funds financing Skolkovo participants. The foundation declined to comment, deferring to Shtorkh, who said that Vekselberg did not have control over the foundation’s decisions.

In 2011, an office near Stanford University was established for the Skolkovo Foundation and two sister funds, amid President Barack Obama’s call for a “reset” in Russia relations.

Vekselberg also spawned another foundation to benefit Fort Ross, a California state park that was once a Russian settlement. The foundation and affiliates donated at least $3.2 million to the park’s programs and activities between 2010 and 2017, according to the foundation’s website.

As Obama’s effort to reboot diplomatic relations sputtered, federal officials began raising alarms about the Skolkovo Foundation’s ties to Putin.

The FBI’s Boston division gave tech startups a frank warning in an April 2014 column published in a trade journal.

“The foundation may be a means for the Russian government to access our nation’s sensitive or classified research, development facilities and dual-use technologies,” wrote Lucia Ziobro, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s Boston office.

Spotlight grows 

Media attention zeroed in on Vekselberg and Intrater in May when Michael Avenatti, the attorney for porn actress Stormy Daniels, released a memo claiming the cousins routed about $500,000 through Columbus Nova to a shell company set up by Trump attorney Cohen.

Avenatti claimed that just before the 2016 presidential election, Cohen used the same shell company, Essential Consultants LLC, to pay the adult film star $130,000 to keep silent about her allegation of a one-night stand with Trump a decade earlier.

Eleven days before Trump’s inauguration, Vekselberg and Intrater jointly met with Cohen, one of several meetings between Trump intimates and high-level Russians during the 2016 campaign and transition. During the meeting in Cohen’s office in Trump Tower, Vekselberg and Cohen discussed U.S.-Russia affairs, said a person familiar with the meeting who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to discuss the session.

According to financial records reviewed by the AP, the meeting occurred the same month that Intrater’s firm began making payments to Cohen’s LLC that totaled $500,000, delivered in eight installments ending in August 2017.

In a statement on its website, Columbus Nova denied that Vekselberg played any role in its payments to Cohen.

Intrater’s firm, which described itself in a company website entry as “a multi-strategy investment firm managing over $15 billion of assets,” has handled Vekselberg’s financial holdings for nearly two decades, company spokesmen say.

But as far back as 2000 — during Columbus Nova’s start up — Intrater also worked for Vekselberg as CEO of a subsidiary of the Russian’s Renova Group conglomerate. Between 2000 and 2004, the New York-based subsidiary, Renova Inc., commissioned a Washington lobbying firm to work for both Vekselberg and Russian interests.

Shtorkh acknowledged Renova Inc. is owned by the billionaire. According to a lobbying contract reviewed by AP and validated by spokesmen for Columbus Nova, Intrater served as Renova Inc.’s CEO for at least three years even as he built up his own investment firm.

The Columbus Nova spokesmen described Renova Inc. as a “rep firm,” a marketing company that represented Vekselberg’s conglomerate in the U.S. They added that Intrater took on his Renova Inc. role as a client service to Vekselberg as part of his asset management role for the Russian.

In April 2001, Intrater signed a contract with Washington lobbying firm Carmen Group Inc., representing the Vekselberg company. The lobbying firm said in congressional filings that it had been hired to “encourage trade and cultural exchanges between the United States and Russia.”

The contract also said the Carmen Group was hired to “organize congressional and other high-level U.S. government delegations to meet with foreign government and business leaders abroad and in the U.S.” Columbus Nova spokesmen said no U.S. delegations were brought to Russia.

Carmen Group was paid $1.58 million; a spokeswoman for the lobbying firm declined to detail its work.

While the Columbus Nova spokesmen acknowledged Intrater has served on advisory boards of several companies where Vekselberg owed majority stakes, they said Intrater took those positions because of his role managing assets for Columbus Nova.

Intrater joined the board of one such firm in the mid-2000s, becoming a director — and briefly, chairman — of an American cable company that transformed into a Moscow-based firm after a Vekselberg-financed takeover. Between 2004 and 2007, the cousins teamed up in the acquisition of Moscow CableCom Corp., a U.S.-based cable company once known as the Andersen Group that now serves several Russian cities.

Intrater joined the board after Columbus Nova routed $51 million from the New York firm’s investors to Moscow Cablecom the cable firm in 2004. That same year, Vekselberg’s Renova Group took a stake. By July 2007, Vekselberg’s company had financed the cable firm’s acquisition in an estimated $152 million deal.

Documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission list both Vekselberg and Intrater as key figures in the cable firm acquisition. But Columbus Nova representatives said that some filings made by the now-defunct Moscow CableCom Corp contained errors, including overstating the role of a Columbus Nova corporate entity in one round of investments.

Winding down assets

Vekselberg’s unfettered access to the U.S. withered when his assets in America were frozen under sanctions April 6, causing him nearly $1 billion in losses, Forbes estimated.

The Treasury Department included a Russia-based corporate entity owned or controlled by Vekselberg in its sanctions, but warned that the list shouldn’t be viewed as a complete inventory of companies linked to the oligarch.

Two of Vekselberg’s largest companies — Renova Management AG and the engineering firm Sulzer, both based in Switzerland — swiftly and publicly corrected course to lessen his control or financial interests.

Some entities associated with the oligarch in the United States have been less forthcoming.

Shtorkh said Vekselberg is an investor in a venture fund called Maxfield Capital, which lists a San Francisco office on its website. A Maxfield Capital representative in Russia said the fund was taking steps to fully comply with sanctions requirements, but offered no specifics.

“Vekselberg’s money directly or indirectly represents quite a hefty chunk of all assets under management,” said Michael Minkevich, who managed deals for the fund in Silicon Valley until January. “They definitely need to find some way to cut any ties.”

Shtorkh said Vekselberg had a limited partnership interest in the Cayman Islands-based fund and did not have control over Maxfield Capital.

As for Vekselberg’s park foundation, its director did not respond to emails or voicemails.

Sarah Sweedler, president of another nonprofit that received funding from Vekselberg’s foundation to run programming at Fort Ross, said her group has no outstanding business with the foundation and has not communicated with its staff since the sanctions hit.

Vekselberg also has ties to two other foundations operating in the U.S. The Link of Times Foundation USA Inc. did not respond to voicemails or emails seeking comment, and the administrator of the Mariinsky Foundation of America Inc. said Vekselberg was removed from the board of directors last year.

The Skolkovo Foundation’s activities have not been disrupted by U.S. sanctions, Shtorkh added.

Sean Kane, a former senior official with the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, said it was unusual but not unprecedented for a sanctioned person to have such extensive personal and business relationships inside the United States.

OFAC regulations require companies to do their own checking to ensure they aren’t doing business with sanctioned entities. But Kane said that problems sometimes surface years later because it is so difficult to unravel complex corporate structures.

Kane, who now is in private practice in Washington, said that “nobody has the time or resources to be tracking how these people are moving their money 24/7. Any entanglements that U.S. foundations and companies have with sanctioned individuals such as Vekselberg will need to be looked at very carefully.”
…

Argenoves Pinales, a 25-year-old medical assistant and restaurant manager working two jobs is over the moon to become a US citizen. Now, he wants to vote Donald Trump out of office.

“I feel great,” he beams, one of 200 immigrants from 47 countries who pledged the oath of allegiance at a New York citizenship ceremony, and one of more than 14,000 being welcomed nationwide at dozens of events between June 28 and July 10 designed to celebrate Independence Day.

He dreams of going back to college to study criminal justice and joining the police department. He was one of 86 migrants from the Dominican Republic at Tuesday’s ceremony, the largest single group and one of those countries experiencing a decline in US immigration visas.

“Everyone in my house is a citizen, so they were asking me ‘oh you have to become one,'” he said. “So if something happens you can stay here.”

The number of people getting visas to move permanently to the United States is expected to fall 12 percent during Trump’s first two years in office, according to a Washington Post analysis of government data.

“I became a citizen to vote,” says Pinales, looking ahead to 2020, the next time that Americans can elect a president. “He’s not going to be there!” he says of Trump.

“When he talks it’s just him, him, him, him. You know he’s rich, he’s got money so he doesn’t care about poor people.”

The Supreme Court last week upheld the US president’s travel ban, restricting arrivals from the mostly Muslim countries of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, as well as North Korea.

The number of new arrivals from those Muslim-majority countries are heading toward an 81 percent drop by September 30, according to the Washington Post.

Of those countries, only Yemen was represented at the ceremony, and by only one new citizen.

The number of immigrant visas granted to people from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Pakistan, the Philippines and Vietnam had also declined, the Washington Post analysis found.

At Tuesday’s ceremony, in the illustrious Beaux-Arts New York Public Library building on Fifth Avenue, a taped message of welcome from Trump was greeted with warm applause. “God Bless the USA” was played.

‘Mixed emotions’

Young, old, people of all colors and backgrounds were united in one purpose — cheering in delight and many waving tiny US flags. The more gregarious posed thumbs up or blew a kiss to excited friends and relatives in the audience while collecting their certificates.

“For all its flaws, we have many, it is a great country” said Tony Marx, president of the New York Public Library, delivering a rallying cry for civic engagement and the responsibilities of democracy.

“When you see the country going in directions you don’t agree with, from left or right I don’t care… you now are citizens and you must act as citizens in the polling booths, on the streets, in meetings.”

Immigration has always ebbed and flowed. If Barack Obama presided over an increase later in his administration, the number of visas so far granted under Trump are still higher than in earlier Obama years.

But if US politicians are paralyzed about illegal immigration, those who spoke to AFP — having jumped through all the hoops themselves — were united in believing others had to abide by the law.

Of the seven new citizens who agreed to speak, Pinales alone was directly critical of Trump. Several expressed positive thoughts, others declined to comment.

“I understand both sides. They want to secure the country. At the same time people want to be with their family. So it’s mixed emotions,” said Aziz Traore, 23, who arrived from Mali as a seven-year-old.

The Washington Post says the number of immigrant visas approved for Africans is on set to fall 15 percent. Last January, Trump allegedly branded African nations “s–thole countries” sparking scandal.

Yet Traore, who now lives in the Bronx, was unwilling to criticize.

“I know a lot of third world countries and there’s a lot of crimes over there and problems with the government,” he told AFP.

“He’s the president,” said Drvan Victorin, 19, who migrated from the tiny Caribbean island of St Lucia in search of a better life. “He knows what’s best for us. So I think he’s doing it for a good reason.”

 
…

Argenoves Pinales, a 25-year-old medical assistant and restaurant manager working two jobs is over the moon to become a US citizen. Now, he wants to vote Donald Trump out of office.

“I feel great,” he beams, one of 200 immigrants from 47 countries who pledged the oath of allegiance at a New York citizenship ceremony, and one of more than 14,000 being welcomed nationwide at dozens of events between June 28 and July 10 designed to celebrate Independence Day.

He dreams of going back to college to study criminal justice and joining the police department. He was one of 86 migrants from the Dominican Republic at Tuesday’s ceremony, the largest single group and one of those countries experiencing a decline in US immigration visas.

“Everyone in my house is a citizen, so they were asking me ‘oh you have to become one,'” he said. “So if something happens you can stay here.”

The number of people getting visas to move permanently to the United States is expected to fall 12 percent during Trump’s first two years in office, according to a Washington Post analysis of government data.

“I became a citizen to vote,” says Pinales, looking ahead to 2020, the next time that Americans can elect a president. “He’s not going to be there!” he says of Trump.

“When he talks it’s just him, him, him, him. You know he’s rich, he’s got money so he doesn’t care about poor people.”

The Supreme Court last week upheld the US president’s travel ban, restricting arrivals from the mostly Muslim countries of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, as well as North Korea.

The number of new arrivals from those Muslim-majority countries are heading toward an 81 percent drop by September 30, according to the Washington Post.

Of those countries, only Yemen was represented at the ceremony, and by only one new citizen.

The number of immigrant visas granted to people from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Pakistan, the Philippines and Vietnam had also declined, the Washington Post analysis found.

At Tuesday’s ceremony, in the illustrious Beaux-Arts New York Public Library building on Fifth Avenue, a taped message of welcome from Trump was greeted with warm applause. “God Bless the USA” was played.

‘Mixed emotions’

Young, old, people of all colors and backgrounds were united in one purpose — cheering in delight and many waving tiny US flags. The more gregarious posed thumbs up or blew a kiss to excited friends and relatives in the audience while collecting their certificates.

“For all its flaws, we have many, it is a great country” said Tony Marx, president of the New York Public Library, delivering a rallying cry for civic engagement and the responsibilities of democracy.

“When you see the country going in directions you don’t agree with, from left or right I don’t care… you now are citizens and you must act as citizens in the polling booths, on the streets, in meetings.”

Immigration has always ebbed and flowed. If Barack Obama presided over an increase later in his administration, the number of visas so far granted under Trump are still higher than in earlier Obama years.

But if US politicians are paralyzed about illegal immigration, those who spoke to AFP — having jumped through all the hoops themselves — were united in believing others had to abide by the law.

Of the seven new citizens who agreed to speak, Pinales alone was directly critical of Trump. Several expressed positive thoughts, others declined to comment.

“I understand both sides. They want to secure the country. At the same time people want to be with their family. So it’s mixed emotions,” said Aziz Traore, 23, who arrived from Mali as a seven-year-old.

The Washington Post says the number of immigrant visas approved for Africans is on set to fall 15 percent. Last January, Trump allegedly branded African nations “s–thole countries” sparking scandal.

Yet Traore, who now lives in the Bronx, was unwilling to criticize.

“I know a lot of third world countries and there’s a lot of crimes over there and problems with the government,” he told AFP.

“He’s the president,” said Drvan Victorin, 19, who migrated from the tiny Caribbean island of St Lucia in search of a better life. “He knows what’s best for us. So I think he’s doing it for a good reason.”

 
…

European businesses are unsettled as they watch the U.S. and China collide over trade. And for good reason: the nascent global trade war could represent the biggest single threat to the economic upswing that has helped the region get past its financial crisis.

In theory, some European companies could benefit, jumping into market niches if Chinese businesses are kept out of the U.S. market. But that would only be a few companies or sectors.

When your entire economy is heavily dependent on trade, an overall slowdown in global commerce caused by tit-for-tat import taxes provokes fear and undermines confidence.

And that’s just what’s happening in Europe. By one measure, business confidence has fallen in six of the past seven months in Germany, where exports are almost half of annual economic output.

“It’s worth all our efforts to defuse this conflict, so it doesn’t become a war,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Wednesday.

The U.S. is due to put tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods on Friday. The Chinese will respond with tariffs on an equivalent value of U.S. products such as soybeans, seafood and crude oil.

Amid all this, Europe has its own trade dispute with the U.S. After the U.S. put tariffs on steel and aluminum from many allies, including the European Union, the 28-country bloc responded with import taxes on some $3.25 billion of U.S. goods. The Trump administration is also studying the option of putting tariffs on cars, which would significantly escalate the confrontation.

The head of the EU’s executive, Jean-Claude Juncker, will head to Washington in late July to try to personally persuade Trump against further measures targeting Europe.

The disputes over trade threaten to spoil the good times for Europe’s economy.

Growth last year was the strongest in a decade, since before the global financial crisis. While that has eased in recent quarters, the economy is still strong enough to create jobs. The number of unemployed fell by 125,000 in May, leaving unemployment in the 19 countries that use the euro at 8.4 percent, the lowest since 2008 and down from a high of 12.1 percent in 2013.

“Trade tensions stoked by U.S. President Donald Trump are clouding the economic outlook in Europe,” wrote analysts at Berenberg bank in London. They rated the trade risk ahead of troubles from Italy’s heavy debt load or faster than expected interest rate increases from the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Many European companies would suffer because they both produce and sell goods in the U.S. and China, the world’s biggest economies.

For example, tariffs that China is expected to impose Friday on U.S.-made autos would hit German carmakers Daimler and BMW since they both make vehicles in the United States and export them to China.

Daimler has already lowered its outlook for profits, citing higher than expected costs from the new tariffs. BMW warned in a letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Friday that tariffs would make it harder for it to sell in China the vehicles it builds at its factory in Spartanburg, South Carolina, “potentially leading to a strongly reduced export volumes and negative effects on investment and employment in the United States.”

Last year, BMW exported 272,000 vehicles from the Spartanburg plant, more than half its total production. Of those, 81,000 — worth $2.37 billion — went to China. BMW says its exports reduced the U.S. trade deficit by around $1 billion.

By themselves, the tariffs that take effect Friday won’t immediately have a dramatic impact on global trade. The fear is that retaliation will spiral, hitting the total amount of global commerce.

Even if the overall effect is to harm growth, there could be benefits for some European companies and sectors. Economists Alicia Garcia Herrero and Jianwei Xu at the French bank Natixis say that European makers of cars, aircraft, chemicals, computer chips and factory machinery could in theory snare market share by substituting for Chinese or American products in the two markets. But that’s only if Europe’s own trade dispute with the U.S. does not escalate — a big if.

Europe is waiting to see whether the Trump administration will go ahead separately with tariffs on auto imports. European companies like BMW, Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen’s Porsche and Audi divisions, and Fiat Chrysler send $46.6 billion worth of vehicles every year to the U.S. Some 13.3 million people, or 6.1 percent of the employed population of the EU, work in the automotive sector, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers Association.

“Europe cannot win anything” on an overall basis “for one obvious reason: we are net exporters,” said Garcia Herrero, chief economist for Asia Pacific at Natixis and a senior fellow at European research institute Bruegel. “But we should not understate the view that some sectors could get something out of a U.S.-China trade war.”

Amid the brewing conflict, China has sought to get Europe on its side, putting on a diplomatic charm offensive during visits by Merkel and French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe. The EU and China agreed last month to deepen commercial ties and support trade rules. But the EU remains a close, longtime ally of the U.S. on a range of issues, despite the current tensions with the Trump administration.

One negative outcome for Europe, Herrero said, would be if Trump can push the Chinese into a trade agreement aimed at reducing the U.S. trade deficit. The additional U.S. goods to China could come at the expense of European competitors.

“If China concedes to the U.S. proposed agreement, the whole situation faced by the EU would be much tougher,” she and Xu wrote in a research note. “For China to massively reduce its trade surplus with the U.S., it has to in some way substitute its imports away from the EU to the U.S., which would have a significant negative impact on the EU producers.”
…

European businesses are unsettled as they watch the U.S. and China collide over trade. And for good reason: the nascent global trade war could represent the biggest single threat to the economic upswing that has helped the region get past its financial crisis.

In theory, some European companies could benefit, jumping into market niches if Chinese businesses are kept out of the U.S. market. But that would only be a few companies or sectors.

When your entire economy is heavily dependent on trade, an overall slowdown in global commerce caused by tit-for-tat import taxes provokes fear and undermines confidence.

And that’s just what’s happening in Europe. By one measure, business confidence has fallen in six of the past seven months in Germany, where exports are almost half of annual economic output.

“It’s worth all our efforts to defuse this conflict, so it doesn’t become a war,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Wednesday.

The U.S. is due to put tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods on Friday. The Chinese will respond with tariffs on an equivalent value of U.S. products such as soybeans, seafood and crude oil.

Amid all this, Europe has its own trade dispute with the U.S. After the U.S. put tariffs on steel and aluminum from many allies, including the European Union, the 28-country bloc responded with import taxes on some $3.25 billion of U.S. goods. The Trump administration is also studying the option of putting tariffs on cars, which would significantly escalate the confrontation.

The head of the EU’s executive, Jean-Claude Juncker, will head to Washington in late July to try to personally persuade Trump against further measures targeting Europe.

The disputes over trade threaten to spoil the good times for Europe’s economy.

Growth last year was the strongest in a decade, since before the global financial crisis. While that has eased in recent quarters, the economy is still strong enough to create jobs. The number of unemployed fell by 125,000 in May, leaving unemployment in the 19 countries that use the euro at 8.4 percent, the lowest since 2008 and down from a high of 12.1 percent in 2013.

“Trade tensions stoked by U.S. President Donald Trump are clouding the economic outlook in Europe,” wrote analysts at Berenberg bank in London. They rated the trade risk ahead of troubles from Italy’s heavy debt load or faster than expected interest rate increases from the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Many European companies would suffer because they both produce and sell goods in the U.S. and China, the world’s biggest economies.

For example, tariffs that China is expected to impose Friday on U.S.-made autos would hit German carmakers Daimler and BMW since they both make vehicles in the United States and export them to China.

Daimler has already lowered its outlook for profits, citing higher than expected costs from the new tariffs. BMW warned in a letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Friday that tariffs would make it harder for it to sell in China the vehicles it builds at its factory in Spartanburg, South Carolina, “potentially leading to a strongly reduced export volumes and negative effects on investment and employment in the United States.”

Last year, BMW exported 272,000 vehicles from the Spartanburg plant, more than half its total production. Of those, 81,000 — worth $2.37 billion — went to China. BMW says its exports reduced the U.S. trade deficit by around $1 billion.

By themselves, the tariffs that take effect Friday won’t immediately have a dramatic impact on global trade. The fear is that retaliation will spiral, hitting the total amount of global commerce.

Even if the overall effect is to harm growth, there could be benefits for some European companies and sectors. Economists Alicia Garcia Herrero and Jianwei Xu at the French bank Natixis say that European makers of cars, aircraft, chemicals, computer chips and factory machinery could in theory snare market share by substituting for Chinese or American products in the two markets. But that’s only if Europe’s own trade dispute with the U.S. does not escalate — a big if.

Europe is waiting to see whether the Trump administration will go ahead separately with tariffs on auto imports. European companies like BMW, Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen’s Porsche and Audi divisions, and Fiat Chrysler send $46.6 billion worth of vehicles every year to the U.S. Some 13.3 million people, or 6.1 percent of the employed population of the EU, work in the automotive sector, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers Association.

“Europe cannot win anything” on an overall basis “for one obvious reason: we are net exporters,” said Garcia Herrero, chief economist for Asia Pacific at Natixis and a senior fellow at European research institute Bruegel. “But we should not understate the view that some sectors could get something out of a U.S.-China trade war.”

Amid the brewing conflict, China has sought to get Europe on its side, putting on a diplomatic charm offensive during visits by Merkel and French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe. The EU and China agreed last month to deepen commercial ties and support trade rules. But the EU remains a close, longtime ally of the U.S. on a range of issues, despite the current tensions with the Trump administration.

One negative outcome for Europe, Herrero said, would be if Trump can push the Chinese into a trade agreement aimed at reducing the U.S. trade deficit. The additional U.S. goods to China could come at the expense of European competitors.

“If China concedes to the U.S. proposed agreement, the whole situation faced by the EU would be much tougher,” she and Xu wrote in a research note. “For China to massively reduce its trade surplus with the U.S., it has to in some way substitute its imports away from the EU to the U.S., which would have a significant negative impact on the EU producers.”
…

U.S. President Donald Trump is assuring supporters that they will love the Supreme Court nominee he is set to name Monday.

“I think you’re going to be very impressed,” Trump said during a dinner for U.S. troops Tuesday night in West Virginia.

The U.S. leader praised his first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, a conservative and former appellate court judge who has now served on the Supreme Court for more than a year.

“We hit a home run there,” Trump said, employing a baseball analogy, adding, “And we’re going to hit a home run here.”

This week, Trump has interviewed seven possible nominees, six of them now serving as appellate court judges, one rung below the Supreme Court, along with Utah Senator Mike Lee. All are conservatives, in line with Trump’s pledge to voters during his 2016 presidential campaign, that given a chance to make one or more lifetime Supreme Court appointments, he would seek to cement a conservative majority for a generation to come.

Trump’s choice, if confirmed by the Senate, would replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, who last week announced his retirement, effective July 31. Kennedy often cast the deciding vote on the court, most often handing the four conservative justices on the court the deciding vote they needed in key 5-4 decisions, but also occasionally siding with the court’s four liberals, notably to favor upholding abortion and gay rights.

Most U.S. analysts assume that Trump’s court choice, no matter who it is, will push the court toward more conservative rulings, possibly overturning some of the decisions Kennedy favored.

Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans say they believe Trump is focusing particularly on three appellate judges — Brett Kavanaugh, who worked in the White House under former Republican President George W. Bush, Amy Coney Barrett, a former Notre Dame Law School professor, and Thomas Hardiman, who was believed to be one of Trump’s finalists when Trump ultimately selected Gorsuch early last year shortly after taking office.
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U.S. President Donald Trump is assuring supporters that they will love the Supreme Court nominee he is set to name Monday.

“I think you’re going to be very impressed,” Trump said during a dinner for U.S. troops Tuesday night in West Virginia.

The U.S. leader praised his first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, a conservative and former appellate court judge who has now served on the Supreme Court for more than a year.

“We hit a home run there,” Trump said, employing a baseball analogy, adding, “And we’re going to hit a home run here.”

This week, Trump has interviewed seven possible nominees, six of them now serving as appellate court judges, one rung below the Supreme Court, along with Utah Senator Mike Lee. All are conservatives, in line with Trump’s pledge to voters during his 2016 presidential campaign, that given a chance to make one or more lifetime Supreme Court appointments, he would seek to cement a conservative majority for a generation to come.

Trump’s choice, if confirmed by the Senate, would replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, who last week announced his retirement, effective July 31. Kennedy often cast the deciding vote on the court, most often handing the four conservative justices on the court the deciding vote they needed in key 5-4 decisions, but also occasionally siding with the court’s four liberals, notably to favor upholding abortion and gay rights.

Most U.S. analysts assume that Trump’s court choice, no matter who it is, will push the court toward more conservative rulings, possibly overturning some of the decisions Kennedy favored.

Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans say they believe Trump is focusing particularly on three appellate judges — Brett Kavanaugh, who worked in the White House under former Republican President George W. Bush, Amy Coney Barrett, a former Notre Dame Law School professor, and Thomas Hardiman, who was believed to be one of Trump’s finalists when Trump ultimately selected Gorsuch early last year shortly after taking office.
…

The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday granted a temporary reprieve to ZTE that allows China’s No. 2 telecommunications equipment maker to conduct business needed to maintain existing networks and equipment in the United States as it works toward the lifting of a U.S. sales ban.

The authorization from the department’s Bureau of Industry and Services, dated July 2 and seen by Reuters, runs until August 1.

ZTE and spokespeople for the Commerce Department did not respond to requests for comment.

ZTE, which makes smartphones and networking gear, was forced to cease major operations in April after the United States slapped it with a supplier ban saying it broke an agreement to discipline executives who conspired to evade U.S. sanctions on Iran and North Korea.

The company had also agreed to pay a $1 billion penalty and put $400 million in an escrow account as part of the deal to resume business with U.S. suppliers — which provide almost a third of the components used in ZTE’s equipment.

The escrow agreement is still pending, according to a source. Until it is executed, ZTE cannot deposit the $400 million in escrow necessary to get the ban lifted.

While the denial order is still in place, the authorization grants a waiver to some companies that do business with ZTE to do so for one month, a source told Reuters.

The waivers allow for a limited type of activity but do not authorize any new business.

The uncertainty about the ban amid intensifying U.S.-China trade tensions has hammered ZTE shares, which have fallen 60 percent since trading resumed last month following a two-month hiatus, wiping out more than $11 billion of the company’s market valuation.

ZTE announced a new board last week in a radical management shakeup as part of a $1.4 billion deal with the United States.
…

The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday granted a temporary reprieve to ZTE that allows China’s No. 2 telecommunications equipment maker to conduct business needed to maintain existing networks and equipment in the United States as it works toward the lifting of a U.S. sales ban.

The authorization from the department’s Bureau of Industry and Services, dated July 2 and seen by Reuters, runs until August 1.

ZTE and spokespeople for the Commerce Department did not respond to requests for comment.

ZTE, which makes smartphones and networking gear, was forced to cease major operations in April after the United States slapped it with a supplier ban saying it broke an agreement to discipline executives who conspired to evade U.S. sanctions on Iran and North Korea.

The company had also agreed to pay a $1 billion penalty and put $400 million in an escrow account as part of the deal to resume business with U.S. suppliers — which provide almost a third of the components used in ZTE’s equipment.

The escrow agreement is still pending, according to a source. Until it is executed, ZTE cannot deposit the $400 million in escrow necessary to get the ban lifted.

While the denial order is still in place, the authorization grants a waiver to some companies that do business with ZTE to do so for one month, a source told Reuters.

The waivers allow for a limited type of activity but do not authorize any new business.

The uncertainty about the ban amid intensifying U.S.-China trade tensions has hammered ZTE shares, which have fallen 60 percent since trading resumed last month following a two-month hiatus, wiping out more than $11 billion of the company’s market valuation.

ZTE announced a new board last week in a radical management shakeup as part of a $1.4 billion deal with the United States.
…

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will visit Mexico on July 13 to meet President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and discuss immigration, trade, security and development, the U.S. and Mexican governments said on Tuesday.

Lopez Obrador, who won a landslide victory in Sunday’s election and takes office in December, announced Pompeo’s visit first, after meeting with President Enrique Pena Nieto in the presidential palace in Mexico City’s colonial downtown.

Lopez Obrador, the former mayor of Mexico City, won 53 percent of the vote on Sunday, the largest margin for a presidential election since the early 1980s, giving him a strong mandate to make deep changes to policy at home and abroad.

“There’s going to be a real change, a deep change,” Lopez Obrador said after his meeting with Pena Nieto. “It will be a radical change, but nobody should be scared.”

Fond of acid putdowns of rivals and with views that lean toward nationalism and populism, the man best known as AMLO has drawn comparisons with U.S President Donald Trump.

How well the two men get on will determine whether fraught U.S.-Mexico relations improve from current tensions over migration, the North American Free Trade Agreement and Trump’s demand that Mexico pay for a border wall.

Lopez Obrador spoke with Trump on Monday in what he described as a friendly and respectful phone call. An aide said the call provided a reset in relations between the two countries.

On the call, Lopez Obrador offered to help lower immigration to the United States in return for help on economic development in Mexico. The conversations with Pompeo will touch on those subjects, as well as security and trade, Mexico’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

During his meeting with Pena Nieto, the first since Sunday’s election, Lopez Obrador said they had agreed to work jointly on talks with the United States and Canada to reconstruct NAFTA, maintaining the current negotiating team while also including Lopez Obrador’s picks for handling future talks.

Their discussion in Mexico’s colonial-era National Palace also touched on energy, next year’s budget and security issues.

A longtime energy nationalist who says he will pause tenders for oil and gas fields that form a crucial part of Pena Nieto’s energy reform, Lopez Obrador said his team will begin working on how to proceed with the oil, gas and power overhaul once he is officially confirmed as president-elect.

Mexico’s election tribunal says it will ratify the election results by no later than Sept. 6.

Lopez Obrador also said he would form joint teams with Pena Nieto’s administration to analyze the $13 billion Mexico City airport project, which he has repeatedly threatened to scrap, and see what is the best course of action. Lopez Obrador said he accepted an invitation by Pena Nieto to attend a meeting of the Pacific Alliance trading bloc in the Mexican resort of Puerto Vallarta later this month

Pledge for fiscal discipline; peso firms

Lopez Obrador vows to improve Mexicans’ lives by ending corruption and years of drug violence, while also reducing the wealth gap.

His vague policy promises make it hard to judge how far he will take Mexico to the left, although during the campaign and since Sunday’s win, he and his team have repeatedly told international investors that Mexico is open for business.

On Tuesday, he reiterated commitments to respect central bank independence, maintain microeconomic stability and fiscal discipline. He said his transition team will work with the current Finance Ministry to craft the 2019 budget, which is set to include measures to increase some pensions.

He said he will meet with business leaders on Wednesday.

The peso has been volatile since Sunday’s result, but was up 2.5 percent against the dollar on Tuesday, leading gains among emerging market currencies. The Mexican S&P/IPC BMV stock index was also up.

“We are actually quite optimistic about the outcome of the election,” said Paul Greer, a portfolio manager at Fidelity International. “We are overweight local currency government bonds and the Mexican peso.”

AMLO’s plans also include holding public consultations on the future of economic policies including the energy reform, unnerving some investors.

In a TV interview late on Monday, he said he would hold a recall referendum after three years to ask the public whether it still had faith in his presidency.

“Just as they elected me, they’ll have the chance to remove me, but I’m sure I’ll win as there will be results,” he said, reiterating a campaign promise.

Lopez Obrador said he would not make any attempt to run for a second presidential term, which would require a constitutional change.

 
…

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will visit Mexico on July 13 to meet President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and discuss immigration, trade, security and development, the U.S. and Mexican governments said on Tuesday.

Lopez Obrador, who won a landslide victory in Sunday’s election and takes office in December, announced Pompeo’s visit first, after meeting with President Enrique Pena Nieto in the presidential palace in Mexico City’s colonial downtown.

Lopez Obrador, the former mayor of Mexico City, won 53 percent of the vote on Sunday, the largest margin for a presidential election since the early 1980s, giving him a strong mandate to make deep changes to policy at home and abroad.

“There’s going to be a real change, a deep change,” Lopez Obrador said after his meeting with Pena Nieto. “It will be a radical change, but nobody should be scared.”

Fond of acid putdowns of rivals and with views that lean toward nationalism and populism, the man best known as AMLO has drawn comparisons with U.S President Donald Trump.

How well the two men get on will determine whether fraught U.S.-Mexico relations improve from current tensions over migration, the North American Free Trade Agreement and Trump’s demand that Mexico pay for a border wall.

Lopez Obrador spoke with Trump on Monday in what he described as a friendly and respectful phone call. An aide said the call provided a reset in relations between the two countries.

On the call, Lopez Obrador offered to help lower immigration to the United States in return for help on economic development in Mexico. The conversations with Pompeo will touch on those subjects, as well as security and trade, Mexico’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

During his meeting with Pena Nieto, the first since Sunday’s election, Lopez Obrador said they had agreed to work jointly on talks with the United States and Canada to reconstruct NAFTA, maintaining the current negotiating team while also including Lopez Obrador’s picks for handling future talks.

Their discussion in Mexico’s colonial-era National Palace also touched on energy, next year’s budget and security issues.

A longtime energy nationalist who says he will pause tenders for oil and gas fields that form a crucial part of Pena Nieto’s energy reform, Lopez Obrador said his team will begin working on how to proceed with the oil, gas and power overhaul once he is officially confirmed as president-elect.

Mexico’s election tribunal says it will ratify the election results by no later than Sept. 6.

Lopez Obrador also said he would form joint teams with Pena Nieto’s administration to analyze the $13 billion Mexico City airport project, which he has repeatedly threatened to scrap, and see what is the best course of action. Lopez Obrador said he accepted an invitation by Pena Nieto to attend a meeting of the Pacific Alliance trading bloc in the Mexican resort of Puerto Vallarta later this month

Pledge for fiscal discipline; peso firms

Lopez Obrador vows to improve Mexicans’ lives by ending corruption and years of drug violence, while also reducing the wealth gap.

His vague policy promises make it hard to judge how far he will take Mexico to the left, although during the campaign and since Sunday’s win, he and his team have repeatedly told international investors that Mexico is open for business.

On Tuesday, he reiterated commitments to respect central bank independence, maintain microeconomic stability and fiscal discipline. He said his transition team will work with the current Finance Ministry to craft the 2019 budget, which is set to include measures to increase some pensions.

He said he will meet with business leaders on Wednesday.

The peso has been volatile since Sunday’s result, but was up 2.5 percent against the dollar on Tuesday, leading gains among emerging market currencies. The Mexican S&P/IPC BMV stock index was also up.

“We are actually quite optimistic about the outcome of the election,” said Paul Greer, a portfolio manager at Fidelity International. “We are overweight local currency government bonds and the Mexican peso.”

AMLO’s plans also include holding public consultations on the future of economic policies including the energy reform, unnerving some investors.

In a TV interview late on Monday, he said he would hold a recall referendum after three years to ask the public whether it still had faith in his presidency.

“Just as they elected me, they’ll have the chance to remove me, but I’m sure I’ll win as there will be results,” he said, reiterating a campaign promise.

Lopez Obrador said he would not make any attempt to run for a second presidential term, which would require a constitutional change.

 
…

The revitalized Gateway Arch National Park was dedicated Tuesday, the culmination of a $380 million public-private partnership that Missouri political leaders see as a template for the future of the national park system.

Several hundred people stood in steamy heat for a ceremony in the shadow of the 630-foot-tall (192-meter-tall) monument to westward expansion that sits along the Mississippi River in downtown St. Louis.

The five-year project was the first major renovation since the Arch opened in 1965. It included a $176 million remaking of the sprawling underground museum that sits beneath the Arch, a sprucing-up of the grounds around the monument, and development of a grassy park built over nearby Interstate 44 to eliminate a disconnect that made it difficult and treacherous for pedestrians to move between the area around the Arch and the rest of downtown.

About two-thirds of the funding came from private donations. St. Louis city and county voters in 2013 approved a tax increase that helped fund the project. State and federal grants paid the rest.

Both U.S. senators from Missouri said in interviews that the project was evidence of what can happen when government and the people work together.

“It means that every once in a while we can get it right, because there’s so much noise out there about how bad government is,” Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill said.

Her Republican colleague, Roy Blunt, said the Arch project sets an example that can be used in “big parks in the West and urban parks in the East.”

“I think we’ve really set a template of how we can take care of and further expand this great park system in the future,” Blunt said.

The rebuilt museum is much larger than the previous one that opened in 1976 — 46,000 square feet (4,273 square meters) of space was added. It features a curved glass entrance cut into the ground beneath the Arch. A map on the floor shows the routes followed by pioneers as they moved westward. Another part of the museum tells the history of St. Louis.

“It’s spectacular,” U.S. Representative Ann Wagner, a Republican from St. Louis County, said after a tour. “I’m blown away.”

Admission to the new museum, like the old one, is free. There is a fee for rides on a tram to the top of the Arch, which has been among the most popular attractions in St. Louis since it opened, drawing more than 130 million visitors.

More changes are in the works. A project to improve the Old Courthouse, which is part of the grounds and was the site of the first two trials in the landmark Dred Scott slavery case, is expected to be complete by 2020.
…

The revitalized Gateway Arch National Park was dedicated Tuesday, the culmination of a $380 million public-private partnership that Missouri political leaders see as a template for the future of the national park system.

Several hundred people stood in steamy heat for a ceremony in the shadow of the 630-foot-tall (192-meter-tall) monument to westward expansion that sits along the Mississippi River in downtown St. Louis.

The five-year project was the first major renovation since the Arch opened in 1965. It included a $176 million remaking of the sprawling underground museum that sits beneath the Arch, a sprucing-up of the grounds around the monument, and development of a grassy park built over nearby Interstate 44 to eliminate a disconnect that made it difficult and treacherous for pedestrians to move between the area around the Arch and the rest of downtown.

About two-thirds of the funding came from private donations. St. Louis city and county voters in 2013 approved a tax increase that helped fund the project. State and federal grants paid the rest.

Both U.S. senators from Missouri said in interviews that the project was evidence of what can happen when government and the people work together.

“It means that every once in a while we can get it right, because there’s so much noise out there about how bad government is,” Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill said.

Her Republican colleague, Roy Blunt, said the Arch project sets an example that can be used in “big parks in the West and urban parks in the East.”

“I think we’ve really set a template of how we can take care of and further expand this great park system in the future,” Blunt said.

The rebuilt museum is much larger than the previous one that opened in 1976 — 46,000 square feet (4,273 square meters) of space was added. It features a curved glass entrance cut into the ground beneath the Arch. A map on the floor shows the routes followed by pioneers as they moved westward. Another part of the museum tells the history of St. Louis.

“It’s spectacular,” U.S. Representative Ann Wagner, a Republican from St. Louis County, said after a tour. “I’m blown away.”

Admission to the new museum, like the old one, is free. There is a fee for rides on a tram to the top of the Arch, which has been among the most popular attractions in St. Louis since it opened, drawing more than 130 million visitors.

More changes are in the works. A project to improve the Old Courthouse, which is part of the grounds and was the site of the first two trials in the landmark Dred Scott slavery case, is expected to be complete by 2020.
…