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The recreational use of marijuana is now legal in California. But only a few cities in the U.S. state are ready to start selling pot, which was officially legalized on Jan. 1. The logistics of creating new business models is complicated, but it’s clear the demand is high. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Attorneys for three men accused of plotting to bomb a mosque and apartment complex housing Somali refugees urged a federal judge on Wednesday to include prospective jurors from rural western Kansas because they are more likely to have voted for President Donald Trump.

But the government countered that granting the request would as a matter of policy “wreak havoc,” saying the defense is seeking to pick a jury pool based on ideology while “opening a dangerous door” to similar requests in other cases. 

U.S. District Judge Eric Melgren took the matter under consideration after a hearing in U.S. District Court in Kansas, saying he would try to rule quickly. The trial begins March 19 in Wichita. 

Gavin Wright, Patrick Stein and Curtis Allen are charged with conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction and conspiracy against civil rights for allegedly planning to detonate truck bombs in the meatpacking town of Garden City the day after the November 2016 election. Wright also faces a charge of lying to the FBI.

The three men, who were indicted in October 2016, have pleaded not guilty.

Prosecutors have argued the men formed a splinter group of the militia Kansas Security Force that came to be known as “the Crusaders.” Wright is quoted in a wiretap transcript as saying he hoped the attack on the Somalis would “wake people up” and inspire others to take similar action against Muslims.

The defense contends the case will require jurors to weigh whether the alleged conduct constitutes a crime or whether it is constitutionally protected speech and assembly and the right to bear arms.

Defense attorneys had argued that court plans to only summon citizens in the more urban counties closest to the federal courthouse in Wichita is a discriminatory practice that excludes rural and conservative jurors. But the judge during the hearing noted several counties surrounding the federal courthouse in Wichita already used to draw potential jurors are rural counties.

Kansas voted overwhelmingly for Trump in the 2016 election, and Melgren mused during the hearing that he does not see a material difference between picking a jury pool from a group that voted two-thirds for Trump as compared to a group that voted three-fourths for Trump. During the campaign Trump called for a crackdown on immigration and a ban on Muslims entering the country.

But attorney Kari Schmidt, who represents Wright in the case, told the judge there is a difference in the belief systems between people in rural southwest Kansas where the crimes allegedly occurred and people in the other rural counties near Wichita that the judge cited in making his comparison. 

“I don’t think I can say it’s legally recognizable, but factually recognizable,” she said.

The government cited legal cases finding that groups of prospective jurors defined by geographical location are not “distinctive” groups for purposes of a constitutional attack on a prospective jury pool. By contrast, women and racial groups are considered distinctive groups for such purposes. Prosecutors contended the defense request would set a “dangerous precedent.”

“At its core, it is seeking to stack the deck,” Justice Department attorney Risa Berkower said.
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Questions about U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest tweets about North Korea appear to be exposing some possible rifts between the White House and the U.S. intelligence community over how best to read North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders Wednesday suggested the North Korean leader was mentally unstable when asked about the most recent tweet, despite previous, public assessments from Central Intelligence Agency officials that for all the dangers, Kim is a “very rational actor.”

“The president and the people of this country should be concerned about the mental fitness of the leader of North Korea,” Sanders said. “He’s made repeated threats. He’s tested missiles time and time again for years.”

It is not the first time the U.S. president has disparaged Kim.

In the past, Trump has also referred to Kim Jong Un as “Little Rocket Man,” and in one tweet said he was “obviously a madman.” 

CIA: Kim not crazy

Those assessments from the White House, though, seem to stand in contrast to what CIA officials have been saying for months, arguing that while the threat from North Korea is grave, Kim Jong Un is not crazy.

Instead, they have said the North Korean leader displays “clarity of purpose” even as he antagonizes and provokes on the world stage.

“Kim Jong Un is a very rational actor,” Yong Suk Lee, deputy assistant director of the CIA’s Korea Mission Center, said at an agency-sponsored event this past October.

“Bluster and rhetoric aside, Kim Jong Un has no desire to go toe to toe with [U.S. and South Korea’s] combined forces command,” Lee said. “Kim Jong Un wants what all authoritarian rulers want … to rule for a long time and die peacefully in his own bed.”

Pyongyang’s goal, according to Lee and other intelligence officials, is to gain recognition as a major nuclear power and eventually negotiate a deal with the United States that sees American forces leave the Korean Peninsula.

Other U.S. intelligence agencies have been in agreement.

“We have long assessed that Pyongyang’s nuclear capabilities are intended for deterrence, international prestige, and coercive diplomacy,” the Office of the Director of National Intelligence wrote in its 2017 World Wide Threat Assessment, issued this past May.

Limits to rationality?

Asked about the apparent differences in the White House and CIA assessments of the North Korean leader’s rationality, a U.S. intelligence official said, “there is no daylight between the idea that Kim is someone who acts with clear goals of self-preservation and the fact that he uses brutal and abnormal methods to achieve these goals.

“To some, testing nuclear weapons while your people are starving is not rational,” the official added. “But when you believe those weapons are critical to your survival, it is not so irrational.”

There are also concerns that Kim’s ability to think and act rationally is limited.

“We don’t think he has an understanding about how tenuous his position is,” CIA Director Mike Pompeo said at the Reagan National Defense Forum in California last month, suggesting, “Those around him are not feeding him the truth about the place he finds himself and how precarious his position is in the world today.”

Questions to the National Security Council about differences between the White House and the intelligence community went unanswered.But on Tuesday, U.S. National Security Adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, offered little hope that Kim Jong Un and North Korea would be willing to negotiate away its nuclear weapons program.

“The only way to do that really now short of war is through coercive economic power,” McMaster told VOA.

“What’s important to recognize is that North Korea is pursuing this nuclear weapon, not for just defensive purposes that you hear some people argue about, but really for coercive purposes, for offensive purposes, and the world has to recognize that,” he added.
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While much of the nation shivers in bone-aching cold, people in Alaska’s largest city are basking in warmer weather, jogging in short sleeves, ice-skating in T-shirts or walking dogs while just lightly bundled up.

Anchorage saw an official high of 44 degrees Tuesday, tying the record set in 1981 and 2011. That was warm enough for Patricia Bierer, who was visiting Alaska this winter from Montana.

“I am from the Bitterroot Valley in Montana, and it’s colder there today than it is here in Alaska,” said Bierer, dressed in a pink parka as she strolled with family members around Anchorage’s Westchester Lagoon. “And my children that are there are jealous because I’ve got 40-degree temperatures here.”

National Weather Service meteorologist Michael Kurtz said areas of high and low pressure are working together to push tropical air to the north. But temperatures are expected to begin dropping Tuesday night, and below freezing by Wednesday. That freeze-thaw vacillation should bring slick conditions to the area.

“I jokingly refer to it as freezy, skid stuff,” Kurtz said.

It comes as the weather service issued wind chill advisories and freeze warnings covering a vast area, from South Texas to Canada and from Montana to Maine. 

The unseasonable temperatures brought Anchorage resident Cassandra Sullivan out to walk her pit bull Athena along downtown streets. She said it helped jolt her out of the winter blues.

“For some reason, with the weather out today as it is and just the breeze and the warm air, it kind of brings me out of it,” she said. 

Ashley Durst, walking her dog at the downtown lagoon during her lunch break, admitted that the warmer weather was a little unusual because it can be minus-30 this time of the year. 

But she doesn’t mind that others are feeling that bite instead.

“I just think maybe it’s time they get their little taste of it for a while,” she said with a smile.
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A senior Palestinian official said Wednesday the Palestinians “will not be blackmailed” by U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to cut aid funding.

Trump wrote on Twitter that the U.S. sends hundreds of millions of dollars each year and gets “no appreciation or respect.”

“They don’t even want to negotiate a long overdue peace treaty with Israel. We have taken Jerusalem, the toughest part of the negotiation, off the table, but Israel, for that, would have had to pay more. But with the Palestinians no longer willing to talk peace, why should we make any of these massive future payments to them?” Trump said in a series of tweets.

Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi responded with a statement Wednesday.

“President Trump has sabotaged our search for peace, freedom and justice. Now he dares to blame the Palestinians for the consequences of his own irresponsible actions!” Ashrawi said.

Trump earlier broke with longstanding U.S. policy by recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and setting in motion the processes of moving the U.S. embassy there from Tel Aviv.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was sharply critical of that move, saying it amounted to the U.S. abandoning the role it had played in the peace process. The U.N. General Assembly also overwhelmingly rejected Trump’s declaration.

Nikki Haley, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said Tuesday the United States will stop contributing to a U.N. agency that gives humanitarian aid to Palestinians.

“We still very much want to have a peace process, nothing changes that,” she said. “As of now, they’re not coming to the table, but they ask for aid. We’re not giving the aid. We’re going to make sure they come to the table.”

The Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital of a future state. The United Nations has long considered Jerusalem’s status as a negotiating point in a two-state solution.

Under the previous U.S. administration, Secretary of State John Kerry made the peace process a major focus of his agenda, but his shuttle diplomacy ended more than three years ago with no agreement.
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The U.S. will no longer accept “contradictions” in its relationship with Pakistan, according to White House National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster. The comment comes as Pakistanis react angrily to President Donald Trump, who threatened to withhold U.S. aid in response to what he says is Islamabad’s support for terrorist groups. VOA’s Bill Gallo reports.
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Every day after work, Ariana Hawk drives to a water distribution center in Flint, Michigan, where the city provides free bottled water to its residents.

Hawk’s 4-year-old son, Sincere Smith, became the poster child for Flint’s water crisis when his face, pocked by lead-poisoning scars, appeared on the cover of Time Magazine in 2016.

His mother says she still only uses bottled water when she bathes her five children and prepares food. She continues this practice even though the state of Michigan has declared the water is safe to drink, but only if filtered because not all of the lead-affected pipes have been replaced.

“Governor Snyder say that we need to use that filter because our water is safe,” Hawk says. “Our water is not safe.”

Two years after a state of emergency was declared because of lead-poisoned water, many in Flint, like Hawk, still don’t believe the water is safe.

“Some people do not trust regardless of what scientific data shows,” says Sheryl Thompson of the Flint Department of Health and Human Services.

“I even had my pipes redone,” says Flint resident Clades Beal, “but the water is still looking the same.”

Pregnant women and people younger than 21 who drank Flint water are now eligible for special health care coverage paid for by the government. So far, there is no way to reverse the effects of lead poisoning.

“In children, we are worried about decreased IQ points, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder as well as other cognitive impairment,” says Nathaniel DeNicola, MD of George Washington University. “For children, there is not really a way to reverse those effects, but with proper diet, nutrition, counseling, decrease of the exposures, you can help to not make that adverse effects as impactful.”

And while Flint residents continue to receive help, including bags of food, the government works on replacing lead pipes, which was made possible by a settlement from a $97 million lawsuit brought the Natural Resources Defense Council.

“Right now we are in the implementation of the settlement, of the agreement,” says Dimple Chaudhary of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “We were able to get this great agreement. Again recognizing that there is still so much to do in Flint but this piece of it is a good step forward.”

“The state who in my opinion is liable and really should step up so we can get this mass construction,” says Eric Mays, a Flint City councilman. “It should be a national infrastructure project.”

Meanwhile, Flint residents continue their daily battle for clean water.

“That is not fair to the citizens,” Hawk says. “That is not fair to these kids.”
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The United States, Britain and Norway have called on parties in South Sudan’s conflict to stop violating a cease-fire signed last month, their heads of mission in the capital Juba said on Tuesday.

The deal aimed to end a four-year war between the government of President Salva Kiir and rebels in which tens of thousands of people have been killed.

But since the signing of the deal in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, there have been several reported violations for which both sides have been blamed.

The United States, Britain and Norway form a group that supported the 2005 accord leading to the independence of South Sudan from Sudan. They have threatened to impose individual or group sanctions for those violating the cease-fire.

“We call on all signatories, and the field commanders who answer to them, to immediately end all military operations,” the three Western countries said in a statement.

They added that field commanders and their political bosses would be held accountable for violating the cease-fire and impeding humanitarian assistance.

The ceasefire is also designed to allow humanitarian groups access to civilians caught in the fighting and revive a 2015 peace deal that collapsed in 2016 after heavy fighting erupted in Juba.

Rebel attack

On Tuesday, a spokesman for a faction now allied with the government said rebels had attacked their positions on December 31.

He said one of the attackers was killed and two were captured alive in the incident.

The cease-fire was meant to be followed by talks on a revised power-sharing arrangement leading to a new date for polls.

The war in South Sudan, the world’s youngest country, was triggered by Kiir’s decision in 2013 to sack his deputy, Riek Machar. It has been fought largely along ethnic lines between forces loyal to Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, and Machar, who is Nuer.

The war has forced a third of the 12 million-strong population to flee their homes.

On Monday, the U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) said it was investigating an allegation by one of the rebel groups that Kenyan security forces unlawfully deported one of their senior members from Kakuma refugee camp over the weekend.

Rebel spokesman Lam Paul Gabriel said the deportation from Kenya was a violation of the cease-fire.

Spokesmen for the Kenya police and the foreign affairs ministry told Reuters on Tuesday they were not aware of the incident.

South Sudan’s presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny told Reuters the Juba government had no link to any missing citizens in Kenya.
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Bone-chilling cold gripped much of the U.S. as 2018 began, breaking century-old records and leading to several deaths that authorities attributed to exposure to the dangerously low temperatures.

The National Weather Service issued wind chill advisories and freeze warnings Tuesday covering a vast area from South Texas to Canada and from Montana through New England. Authorities opened warming shelters in the South as temperatures dipped notably close to zero degrees Fahrenheit (-17.7 degrees Celsius) in Alabama and Georgia.

The bitter cold wave enveloped much of the Midwest on Monday, yet that didn’t deter hundreds of people from ringing in the New Year by jumping into Lake Michigan. Throngs of people took part in the Polar Plunge in Milwaukee, despite sub-freezing temperatures and a warning of potential hypothermia from the local fire chief. Organizers canceled a similar event on the Chicago lakefront, after the temperature there dipped below zero and thick white steam rose from the lake. Organizers said the arctic blast made jumping into the lake too dangerous. An annual New Year’s Day water ski show on Pigeon Lake in western Michigan was canceled for the first time since the event was launched in 1980 because the water was frozen solid.

Temperatures plunged below zero elsewhere in the Midwest, including in Aberdeen, South Dakota, where the mercury dropped to a record-breaking minus 32 (-35.5 Celsius). The city’s previous New Year’s Day record had stood for 99 years.

In Nebraska, temperatures hit 15 below zero (-26 Celsius) before midnight Sunday in Omaha, breaking a record low dating to 1884. Omaha officials cited the forecast in postponing the 18th annual New Year’s Eve Fireworks Spectacular that draws around 30,000 people.

It was colder in Des Moines, Iowa, where city officials closed a downtown outdoor ice skating plaza and said it wouldn’t reopen until the city emerged from sub-zero temperatures. The temperature hit 20 below zero (-29 Celsius) early Monday, with the wind chill dipping to negative 31 degrees (-35 Celsius).

 The weather service said temperatures in Indianapolis early Tuesday tied a record low of minus 12 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 24 degrees Celsius) for January 2 set in 1887. Indianapolis Public Schools canceled classes for Tuesday on all its campuses due to the predicted sub-zero temperatures. Students had been scheduled to return from winter break.

In northeastern Montana, the wind chill readings dipped as low as minus 58 (-50 Celsius). And in Duluth, Minnesota, a city known for its bitter cold winters, the wind chill dipped to 36 below zero (-38 Celsius).

Plunging overnight temperatures in Texas brought rare snow flurries as far south as Austin, and accidents racked up on icy roads across the state. In the central Texas city of Abilene, the local police chief said more than three dozen vehicle crashes were reported in 24 hours.

It’s even cold in the Deep South, as temperatures plummeted early Tuesday to 14 (-10 Celsius) in Atlanta and 26 (-3 Celsius) as far south as New Orleans. Temperatures fell to 8 (-13 Celsius) degrees near Cullman, Alabama, and 20 degrees (-6.5 Celsius) in Mobile, Alabama. Georgia saw one of its coldest temperatures of the winter: 2 degrees (-16.5 Celsius) shortly before dawn at a U.S. Forest Service weather station at Toccoa, Georgia. Warming shelters were opened across the South as freeze watches and warnings blanketed the region, including hard freeze warnings for much of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

The cold is blamed in at least nine deaths in the past week. Most recently, police in St. Louis said a homeless man found dead inside a trash bin Monday evening apparently froze to death as the temperature dropped to negative 6 degrees (-21 Celsius). Sheriff’s officials in Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin, said a 27-year-old woman whose body was found Monday evening on the shore of Lake Winnebago likely died of exposure.

The Milwaukee County Medical Examiner’s Office said two men whose bodies were found Sunday showed signs of hypothermia. Police believe the cold weather also may have been a factor in the death of a man in Bismarck, North Dakota, whose body was found near a river.

 
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VOA’s Pentagon Correspondent Nike Ching spoke with Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Andrew Peek about the protests in Iran.

Q: “Let me start by asking, what is the implication of the protests in Iran to Washington’s policy towards that country and to the region? What is the next step for the United States?”

Peek: “Well these protests are indicative of what the United States government has said all along. The biggest victim of the Iranian government are the Iranian people. We are watching the events extremely closely. We continue to support the Iranian people, the president has been very clear about that. We call on the Iranian government to respect the right of their people to protest peacefully, to respect the right of free-flow information and not to use violence against peaceful protesters. These are basic human rights we think they should uphold.”

Q: “Just to follow up, today, the plan for the U.S. policy for the next step.”

Peek: “Absolutely, we continue to speak with our international partners and encourage them to highlight what is happening in Iran. This is a very different approach from 2009, the protests then. We want to make it clear now through visible and vocal support of the Iranian people, that we will not let them suffer anonymously, that when they want to exercise their basic human rights we will support them.”

Q: “Has Secretary [of State Rex] Tillerson spoken with his counterparts in the region since the protests?”

Peek: “We are in touch with our counterparts, particularly in the European Union at an extremely senior level and we are working to build an international coalition to support the Iranian people.”

Q: “President [Donald] Trump has voiced his support to the protesters and people in Iran. How does the United States respond to calls and appeals to lift the travel ban which limits Iranians coming to the United States?”

Peek: “Well, the president has made it very clear that his support is with the Iranian people, I think all of us is. The travel restrictions are a measure imposed as an effort to limit some of Homeland Security vulnerabilities. And I think the United States continues to assess what the vulnerabilities and the best way you address them going forward.”

Q: “Earlier in June, Secretary Tillerson told the Congress he supports elements inside Iran that would lead to a peaceful transition of government, he said, ‘those elements are there, certainly as we know.’  Could you please elaborate what are those elements?” 

Peek: “Sure, I think the secretary’s statement speaks for itself. I’ll tell you what we are thinking is a change in the Iranian government’s behavior, particularly its destabilizing regional activities, its support of terrorism and also the way it treats its people internally. So we’ve been clear about wanting to support those changes, and will continue to do so.”

Q: “About seven years ago, Syria’s civil war began with protests, but was followed by attacks from the Syrian government. In your estimation, how likely will the protests in Iran evolve into the one that’s similar in Syria?”

Peek: “Oh gosh, you know at this point it’s way too early to tell where these protests are headed. You know, I think the protesters have legitimate grievances against their government and they should be heard. You know, the Iranian government should also listen to them, it should not respond by violently cracking down on people who are peacefully demonstrating. I want to say this from our part, we will hold accountable those people or entities who are committing violence, from the top to the bottom, against the protesters. That is not something that is going to happen in a vacuum, we’re watching very closely, in the process of examining actions we can take against those individuals, like sanctions and other means.”

Q: “So, you’re saying that the next step is more sanctions against those who should be responsible to attack the protesters?”

Peek: “We’re considering a variety of options to hold those people accountable, including sanctions.” 

Q: “Could you please elaborate a little bit more on that?”

Peek: “No, I don’t want to get too much into kind of the operational detail here. There are a range of measures, including sanctions, that we can use to take action against those who commit violence against the protesters.”

Q: “You mentioned, I would like to touch on the protests in 2009. Could you please compare the latest protest with those in 2009?”

Peek: “Yeah, certainly, there are some differences, at least what we have seen reported. I think largely there is a lot of similarities though, you know, these protests were born out of some of the same elements in 2009. The fact that the Iranian people seek greater freedoms that are economic opportunities and like a movement bubbling below the surface, it sprouts up occasionally and while the form may occasionally be different, there’s these protesters sparked by one thing, those protesters sparked by another. It all is a horrific (sic) of this underlying current of discontent in Iranian society because of the limited opportunities and the restriction that the Iranian government places on its people.”

Q: “Regarding actions from the United States. What’s the difference between now and then, those measures taken by the United States government?”

Peek: “I think you’ve seen the vast difference in the way that we are handling this. This time there is vocal and immediate support for the people  Iranians who are protesting, that wasn’t in 2009. This is a whole of government support, including Secretary Tillerson, and the president and other officials. I think we are also aggressively working to amplify messages of support from our partners, including the Canadians, the British, the Germans and others, the French, the Italians. To ensure that the Iranian people are able to express their discontent. As I mentioned, we’re also looking at other options of how to hold those regime elements that would crack down, potentially on these protestors, accountable.”

Q: “Besides the coordination with the allies in Europe, how about those in the Middle Eastern — leaders in the Middle Eastern region?”

Peek: “Absolutely, I should have mentioned that while I was discussing our allies. We have been in touch with — we are working to get in touch with —important regional capitals around the world, including the Middle East, to encourage statement and awareness of what’s happening around, in support for the legitimate rights of the Iranian people.”‘

Q: “Has Secretary Tillerson spoken with his counterpart in Saudi Arabia?”

Peek: “I know we are in touch at staff level, I am not sure if the secretary has spoken with his counterpart in Saudi Arabia. No, I don’t believe so in fact.”

Q: “Thank you, before the last question anything else you would like to add?”

Peek: “Only that this administration will continue to support the Iranian people and their legitimate desires for a better life.”
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