South Korea Looks To Boost American Oil & Gas Purchases To Appease Trump
South Korea is looking at a plan to purchase more US oil and gas to diversify its energy sources, and also ‘potentially head off the threat of President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs,’ Bloomberg reports.
The possible move would be aimed at reducing the trade surplus with America, as well as improving the country’s energy security, according to Thursday comments in Seoul from Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy, Ahn Duk-geun. The country is also considering additional government support for companies so they can import more oil and gas from countries outside the Middle East.
“Other countries are all talking about how they need to ease the growing trade deficit under the Trump administration,” said Ahn. “We are pretty much in the same situation so we are thinking about increasing energy imports, and there’s also a need to diversify supplies to improve energy security.”
South Korea is heavily dependent on exports to drive its economic growth – with the US being one of its top trading partners.
The move comes after Trump promised an array of protectionist policies – including universal tariffs – to try and reduce an out-of-control US trade deficit with other nations.
South Korea, the world’s third-largest buyer of liquefied natural gas, follows several other nations who are looking at boosting their purchases of US fossil fuels, including Taiwan, Vietnam and the EU.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Jan. 16 announced that Ashley Moody, Florida’s attorney general, will replace Sen. Marco Rubio in the U.S. Senate, praising her as someone who will deliver results in step with the incoming administration’s America-first agenda.
“Florida deserves a senator who stands unapologetically for conservative principles, supports law enforcement, has a strong record of combatting illegal immigration, and is ready to deliver on President Trump’s agenda. Attorney General Ashley Moody’s exemplary track record shows her commitment to these principles,” DeSantis said.
Rubio is expected to resign from his seat upon receiving Senate approval to become the next U.S. Secretary of State, and DeSantis said Moody will quickly fill the vacant seat.
Joining DeSantis for the announcement, Moody accepted the appointment and promised to bring “the same persistence and passion and tenacity” to her role as a senator that she brought to her role as attorney general.
“You better believe, as a United States Senator, I will work for you, those that stand on that thin line between chaos and order, between safety and crime,” Moody said. “I have got your back … and we will all work to protect the American people and make all of our cities and states stronger and safer together.
“And so I have one message right now to President Trump and to my new colleagues on the United States Senate: America first, let’s get it done.”
DeSantis praised Moody for the work she’s done in the past six years as Florida’s attorney general, stating, “I’m happy to say we’ve had an attorney general who has been somebody that has acted time and time again to support the values that we all share.”
He summarized her track record, touting her tough-on-crime stance and her work fighting against issues such as illegal immigration, the opioid and fentanyl crisis, anti-Semitism, influence and land ownership by communist China, and federal government overreach by agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
He praised Moody for taking legal action against the Federal Emergency Management Agency for alleged discrimination, urging the Supreme Court to remove illegal immigrants from voter rolls before the last election, speaking out against the now-failed state Amendments 3 and 4, and fighting to ban transgender surgeries for minors.
Moody said that what angered her most as a state attorney general was the past four years of having to fight against federal government overreach.
She promised to work to give power back to the American people.
“The only way to return this country to the people, the people who govern it, is to make sure we have a strong Congress doing its job passing laws and actually approving the regulations that these unelected bureaucrats are trying to cram down on the American people,” she said.
She pointed out that she has already served in the judiciary and executive branches of government, and joked that she might be the only senator to serve in a third branch.
She also stressed that she is a trained accountant and could “shrink the bloat of the federal government.”
DeSantis said he won’t appoint Moody’s replacement as Florida’s attorney general before the position is available, but he expects to appoint his Chief of Staff James Uthmeier.
“James Uthmeier is kind of like Ashley,” he said. “He’s proven himself in these fights.”
DeSantis added that he thinks Moody is leaving “big shoes to fill,” but that Uthmeier would do a good job.
Rubio has not yet submitted his resignation, although DeSantis anticipates that Moody will likely take office on Jan. 20.
“I want to thank Senator Rubio for his service in the United States Senate,” DeSantis said. “I think he will serve the country ably as Secretary of State, and we need it, because the last four years has been a total disaster.”
Florida’s other senator, Rick Scott, celebrated Moody’s appointment on social media platform X, welcoming her to the Senate.
“Ashley has done an incredible job fighting for Floridians and keeping our communities safe as Attorney General,” he wrote. “I have no doubt she will do an incredible job as senator.”
DeSantis said that he notified Moody the night before the announcement. He praised the array of choices he had to choose from at both state and federal levels.
He specifically called out Florida Representatives Cory Mills and Kat Cammack, as well as Florida’s Secretary of State Cord Byrd, and State Senator Jay Collins.
Byrd and Collins both congratulated Moody on X shortly after the announcement, and expressed their gratitude to the governor for considering them.
DeSantis also said he “got a kick out of” speculation that he would appoint himself, but said that it was better to “hold the fort down” in Florida, saying that his team can be very helpful to President-elect Donald Trump’s agenda.
“I think we can play a good supporting role when senators like Ashley Moody are fighting for us, and we can be there in support for some of those policies to bring power back to the states,” he said.
Pakistan’s Imran Khan Sentenced To 14 Years In Prison, Supporters Want Trump To Free Him
The unfortunate saga of Pakistani state persecution against former Prime Minister Imran Khan continues, as a Pakistani court on Friday sentenced Khan and this wife to 14 and seven years in prison after finding them guilty of corruption.
He had already been held in jail for a couple years, despite many months of huge protests in various places by supporters demanding his release, after he and his wife were accused of accepting a gift of land from a real estate tycoon in exchange for laundered money, amid many additional pending graft investigations.
Khan and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party reject the allegations, and the former prime minister had pled non-guilty in the case.
“Whilst we wait for a detailed decision, it’s important to note that the Al Qadir Trust case against Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi lacks any solid foundation and is bound to collapse,” PTI’s foreign media wing asserted in a statement.
PTI plans to challenge the verdict in higher courts, with Khan pledging after this conviction: “I will neither make any deal nor seek any relief.”
Khan has meanwhile insisted that his arrest in 2023 was simply politically motivated, designed by his rivals and enemies to keep the popular politician from power. According to a review of the last couple years of turmoil which has gripped Pakistan over Khan’s fate:
While imprisoned, Khan has been facing dozens of cases ranging from charges of graft and misuse of power to inciting violence against the state after being removed from office in a parliamentary vote of confidence in April 2022.
He has either been acquitted or his sentences suspended in most cases, except for this one and another on charges of inciting supporters to rampage through military facilities to protest against his arrest on May 9, 2023.
His supporters have led several violent protest rallies since the May 9 incidents.
He’s gotten some international support and backing amid the saga, with a United Nations panel of exports having announced last year that his detention “had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office“.
Importantly, Khan’s supporters are expressing hope that Trump will use his influence to free him. According to the NY Times on Friday:
Supporters of Imran Khan, the imprisoned former prime minister, are now pinning their hopes on getting him freed — however fanciful — on the wild card among the three: the incoming administration of Donald J. Trump.
Mr. Trump has said nothing publicly to indicate that he plans to intervene in Mr. Khan’s case. Once he is sworn in as president on Monday, Pakistan is unlikely to rank high among Mr. Trump’s foreign policy priorities.
But a series of posts on social media by one of Mr. Trump’s close allies has inspired almost messianic certainty among Mr. Khan’s followers that the once and future American president will help secure his freedom.
PTI had made a better than expected showing in February 2024 parliamentary elections and had decried that this was all a conspiracy to prevent his return to office by the military-run deep state. There are ultimately a whopping 170 legal cases against Khan.
Current Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who emerged victorious in the last elections while Khan had languished in jail, was seen more as the “military’s man” in Islamabad, while Khan’s legacy has sought to be erased by those same elite powers.
This week, Pete Hegseth appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee for his confirmation hearing to be secretary of defense. Some Senate Democrats tried to make the process as grueling as possible, following months of allegations and character assassination since his nomination. They didn’t succeed.
The dawn is breaking. The left took their best shot and missed, and now Pete Hegseth looks to be headed for a successful confirmation. His political opponents weren’t able to build enough opposition to stop him and Senators Hirono and Warren’s feigned moral outrage was no match for his poise and take-charge style. In fact, he’s likely to get some bipartisan support.
Mr. Hegseth, like many of President Trump’s nominees, represents a break from the status quo. His nomination directly challenges the internal culture, decision-making process, and politicization of the Department of Defense that the Biden Administration has propagated for the last four years. This leadership, experience, and commitment to reform make him a threat to the status quo, which is why progressives have tried to do whatever it takes to stop him.
After graduating from Princeton in 2003, Pete Hegseth was commissioned as an infantry officer in the Minnesota National Guard. After being stationed in Guantanamo Bay, Hegseth would go on to have a storied career, earning two Bronze Stars during his time in Iraq and Afghanistan, obtaining a master’s degree from Harvard, and serving as CEO of Concerned Veterans for America.
But, like many Americans who have dedicated their lives to serving in the armed forces, he was ultimately betrayed by the very system he spent his career defending and consequently left the service for good.
While serving with the D.C. National Guard in 2021, Pete Hegseth was pulled from his unit assigned to protect Joe Biden’s inauguration. A fellow service member had reported Hegseth’s Jerusalem cross tattoo as a “white supremacist” symbol, and he was subsequently flagged as an insider threat. Just the whisper of such a smear was sufficient to tar him.
But this incident revealed more about the decline in our military than it did anything about Pete Hegseth. As detailed in Hegseth’s book, “The War on Warriors,” politics has been injected at every level of our nation’s armed forces, from the Pentagon all the way down to the military academies, ultimately harming troop morale and recruitment numbers.
Under Joe Biden, DEI initiatives, racial quotas, and diversity have become the central focus and the new standard of success in our nation’s military. Merit and lethality, the rules and standard measurement of any fighting force, have been displaced by progressive ideology. So much so that one of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s first actions leading the DOD was a branch-wide witch hunt for white supremacists in their ranks.
This waste of resources had repercussions across the board. For soldiers looking to make a career in the military, the traditional values of commitment and excellence have been entirely overshadowed by racial considerations. This shift is exemplified by Air Force Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., who was a vocal proponent of DEI and race-based hiring in the military before being promoted to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
Hegseth, like many of us, sees this changing culture as a betrayal both of the typical soldier and the American taxpayer. The prestige, importance, and opportunity that come from service have been entirely lost to a neo-Marxist crusade to remedy racial injustice, ultimately resulting in our war-fighting capacity being diminished and precious budget resources also wasted in the process.
As a result, recruitment numbers have continued to decline under the Biden Administration. In 2023, the Army failed to meet recruitment goals for the second year in a row, leaving it with the smallest active-duty force since 1940. In the Air Force, rather than addressing their failed recruitment efforts, leadership simply axed its standards on body fat composition and, worse, began accepting recruits who tested positive for illegal drugs (previously a permanent disqualification).
At a time when Russia is helping to accelerate North Korea’s nuclear program, China is expanding its sphere of influence across the globe, and tensions in the Middle East are at all-time highs, the strategic pitfalls of a US military at war with itself are deeply concerning.
Our nation’s military needs a leader who can reorient the strategic mission of our armed forces, rebuild military readiness, and restore America’s position as the world’s preeminent fighting force. Pete Hegseth brings the experience needed to lead and a first-hand understanding of the challenges plaguing our armed forces today.
He’s spent his career serving in the military, advocating for its Veterans, and being an open critic of its flaws. Hegseth also understands the realities of serving in combat and the profound impact that poor decision-making by career bureaucrats can have on the lives of everyday soldiers. But most importantly, his confirmation will lead to a recruitment bonanza and restore trust in a corroded institution.
This week’s confirmation hearing was a pivotal moment for our nation’s military. Under Pete Hegseth, who has been entrusted by Trump and the American people to lead our armed forces, we have the opportunity to face America’s challenges on the global stage and prevail. The Senate must confirm Pete Hegseth and give our military the leader it needs.
Israel ‘Confiscates’ Thousands Of Abandoned Weapons, Including Tanks, From Syria
Something unprecedented is happening in southern Syrian areas being occupied by Israel’s military. In the wake of Bashar al-Assad’s overthrow, Israel is actually stealing or in its words “confiscating” former Syrian Army weaponry and heavy equipment, even tanks.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) acknowledged in a statement Wednesday that soldiers operating in Syria have taken more than 3,300 weapons and other gear belonging to the Syrian Army. An IDF statement on X featured video of transporting an abandoned tank from Syria.
⭕️Over 3,300 weapons have been confiscated from Syrian territory so far.
Our troops continue their mission of frontline defense in Syria to ensure the safety and security of Israeli residents. Syrian Armed Forces tanks, anti-tank missiles, RPGs, mortars and observation… pic.twitter.com/mXAqUFkZt9
Assad fled the country as the al-Qaeda linked group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham entered the environs of Damascus on December 8 of last year.
Since then Israel has mounted literally hundreds of attacks degrading and destroying former Syrian military complexes, bases, and weaponry. Israeli officials have explained that this is to prevent Syria’s advanced weapons from ever being used against Israeli again, or from falling into the hands of the Iranians or their proxies.
Israel has also been taking and occupying Syrian villages and territory, including the Syrian side of Mt. Hermon, and reportedly positioning forces a mere 20 miles from the Syrian capital.
Syria analyst Charles Lister, who has long been in support of radical armed groups which sought to topple Assad, has commented that “Israel hasn’t just been destroying Syria’s military infrastructure and heavy weaponry in recent weeks, it’s also been taking it, intact, back to Israel – tanks, missiles, rockets and more. All of this via a de facto invasion of sovereign territory.”
Most of the equipment is reported to be Russian-made. Another regional analyst, the University of Oklahoma’s Joshua Landis has written, “Israel picks up lots of second-hand military equipment from its new conquests on Syria’s front lines.”
Indeed Israel appears to be positively boasting about this in its official social media postings. But Syria no longer has an army to deal with it, so essentially the IDF is now acting with complete impunity in southern Syria and the Golan region. Assad once had the most advanced air defense systems in the Middle East, but Israeli warplanes have destroyed all the anti-air batteries at this point.
Any future Syrian government which emerges is left with nothing at this point. Forces of the IDF’s 210th “Bashan” Division have continue operations inside Syria to “provide security and protection for the residents of Israel and the Golan Heights in particular,” according to the IDF’s official statements justifying the land and equipment theft.
The Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham has of late urged Washington to pressure Israel to withdraw from the extended Golan buffer zone as well as Mt. Hermon. But post-Assad Damascus has zero leverage, as there’s no military infrastructure left to speak of.
The American people are going to be paying a high price for the 2024 U.S. presidential election and probably for years. I’m not speaking of the results which astonished the world; I’m speaking of the attempt to game the intended results that began more than a year earlier.
It won’t come in the form of higher taxes. It will be inflation, which is another form of taxation.
The problem of dollar devaluation could have been over by now but no. All evidence is that the Biden administration, in service of larger interests and in accommodation of Congressional spending, deployed the printing presses starting in 2023 as a means of assuring its reelection chances. It did not work and now we are stuck with the bill.
To be sure, there was never an overt policy but what I said above is a reasonable interpretation of why the Federal Reserve reversed its stance on the money spigot in 2023 and following.
There was never an excuse to do so. Inflation had already ravaged producers and consumers. The first priority was getting it under control. Instead, they went the other way, thus risking a second wave, which might just be getting going.
The latest producer and consumer price reports look simply awful, a full-on reversal of downward trends to reveal a renewed problem.
Now that Trump is taking office, the corporate media and the Bureau of Labor Statistics is suddenly being more forthcoming about the problem. Inflation is running at 3 percent or 50 percent above target. The low-end estimate of purchasing power losses since 2020 is 23 cents on the dollar. The real-time estimates are closer to 30 cents. The reality depending on what you buy is far higher.
Let there be no confusion about the source of the problem.
It is not gouging grocers. It is not greedy consumers. It is not opportunistic suppliers. It is not even restrictions on energy production.
It is the money printers in D.C. who have deployed their powers to print in service of a Congress that has spent without limit, as if the resources will all appear just like magic. The flood of debt has granted the Fed an enormous portfolio available for playing politics.
Again, one only needs to observe the relationship between M2, the most accurate rendering of the money stock we have, against the CPI. The relationship is impossible to deny both in terms of the data and also the theory. It’s not complicated really but requires just a bit of thought.
Thomas Massie gives the example of 10 apples and 10 dollars, in an economy where all money is spent. Each apple costs a dollar. If the money stock is doubled, each apple costs two dollars. And so on. It’s a simple example but gets the point across. In the real world, there is a lag of the effect, between 12 and 18 months. In this case, the lag hits the 12-month mark almost exactly.
(Data: Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED), St. Louis Fed; Chart: Jeffrey A. Tucker)
None of this is a mystery. Hatred of paper-money printing traces to the very foundation of the nation. Thomas Paine wrote about it extensively. He was an opponent of tyranny and a very thoughtful and brilliant person. He read extensively on history and economic theory as it stood in his time. He stated very clearly:
“I know not why we should be so fond of paper money; it has no intrinsic value, and is not money, but a promise to pay money.”
“Paper money is like dram-drinking, it relieves for a moment by deceit.”
“The evils of paper money have no end. It is a swindle upon the people, and the foundation of all other swindles.”
His views were shared widely among the Founding Fathers. When the Constitution was written, it included a clause requiring states (which managed money) to use only gold and silver in coinage. That clause was long adjudicated by the courts and eventually the proponents of paper money found a means around it, via various emergency declarations and suspensions. The gold standard was restored following the Civil War but suspended again and again. Eventually, the specie backing was removed entirely.
For a long time, between 1933 and 1974, it was illegal even to own gold for investment purposes. That changed and then the United States started minting gold coins again but not as part of official money. They are collectibles, very beautiful but not usable as legal tender. The link between U.S. monetary policy and gold is entirely broken.
Ideally it would be restored. Problem: no one really knows how this could happen. There is no real viable plan to get from here to there. The United States would have to own vast quantities of gold and there would need to be a fixed ratio of exchange, and this would have to pertain not only in the United States but also abroad. The decision alone would cause a mass repatriation of dollars and exhaust the gold stock in a day.
In short, the practical problems associated with restoring a genuine gold standard are inconceivably huge. An even bigger problem is mustering the political will to do it. Both parties benefit from the paper-money system and the flexible monetary policy, for which the U.S. citizen ultimately pays the highest price.
There are other paths toward sound money. The money stock could be instantly frozen, but that would induce deflation on a scale that would be seen as intolerable. I happen not to think this would be a bad thing. A growing purchasing power of money would benefit the people. But the expert class disagrees, warning of a terrible recession. And the reality would likely back that prediction.
The trouble is that the U.S. economy and, really, the world economy, are deeply addicted to debt finance. Putting a stop to that would be very painful. The political will to do that simply is not there.
The genuinely constitutional solution would be to return all responsibility for monetary policy to the states alone, abolishing the central bank entirely. The U.S. Treasury could mint its own currency but that poses dangers of its own. Whether and to what extent those dangers would be as bad as the Fed now is another question.
In the near term, the solution is simply to force the Fed to stop playing politics with its monetary powers. The interest rates should be completely set free from Fed intervention. Open market operations and debt buying and selling should stop entirely. The rest would take care of itself.
Economists I respect suggest a quantity rule that would tie monetary policy to output. While that solution looks good on paper, measuring output accurately is no longer such an easy task. The GDP numbers as they stand are very sketchy and so are the numbers on the inflation rate itself. Without accurate numbers, the capacity of the Fed to conduct monetary policy in any scientific manner pretty well evaporates.
Let us hope that the new Trump administration eventually gets around to dealing with the problem of paper-money inflation. It might have to do so given the genuine risk of a second wave of inflation that could literally doom its political legacy.
I hope someone in the Trump administration is listening: at minimum the Fed must stop its quantitative easing and commit itself to a policy of monetary stabilization at the very least. Yes, we could face a technical recession and that is politically dangerous. But a continuation of inflation is even more so.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.
Progressive Congressional Staffers Throw Tantrum, Demand 32-Hour Work Week
With many Americans working two jobs to make ends meet, mollycoddled progressive staffers on Capitol Hill are now demanding 32-hour workweek.
In a letter to top House and Senate leaders Thursday, the Congressional Progressive Staff Association proposed establishing a rotating 32-hour workweek on the Hill, claiming that reduced hours could “improve worker satisfaction, increase staff retention in Congress, and model a more sustainable approach to work on a national level,” Politico reports.
Under the proposal, congressional staffers would still work long hours when their boss is around. But when Congress is in session, district office staffers would be entitled to an abbreviated, 20-percent-lighter schedule, and when it is not, D.C.-based staff would have a lighter week.
“We do not want a 32-hour workweek to just be another special benefit for Congressional staff,” the group said in its letter requesting the special benefit. “We hope that by adopting this policy, Members of Congress can help to advance the discussion around a more sustainable workweek as a national priority and model how it can work for private and public employers across the country and the world.”
Ah – so by granting rich-kid, connected staffers their 32-hour workweek (and we assume therapy ponies are next), they can set an exaaaample (Michael Savage voice) for the rest of the country – and the world.
Socialists are ecstatic at the idea:
It’s an idea that’s gained some traction on the left, with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introducing legislation to implement a 32-hour workweek nationally. But those on the right and some corners of the left immediately panned the plan when it was released Thursday.
That said, others think it’s a terrible idea:
For some Democrats, the cusp of Trump’s inauguration was the wrong time to pitch working less. Said Tim Hogan, a Democratic communications consultant and former Hill staffer: “lol read the room guys.” -Politico
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) mocked the idea on X, posting “Why not be bold and ask for a 0-hour workweek? I wonder how blue-collar Americans would feel about white-collar workers demanding a 32-hour workweek.”
Republicans also mocked the idea, suggesting that it was a good one as long as they scale back their salaries to match.
“Progressives should opt in. Easy place to cut 20%+ @elonmusk,” posted Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) on X.
The rich kids slapped back, with group spokesperson Michael Suchecki saying “The frustration about this initiative comes from a fundamental misunderstanding. CPSA is not calling for Congress to jeopardize its productivity with a new office schedule. We believe — and researchers agree — that implementing a rotating 32-hour work week will not maintain existing levels of productivity and work quality, but increase them.“
On Saturday, Gaza ceasefire talks were down to the wire, and President-elect Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy wanted to hash out the deal once and for all with Benjamin Netanyahu, but the Israeli leader’s office said he could not be roused during Shabbat.
Steve Witkoff allegedly gave a “salty” reply, making it clear he didn’t care if it was the Sabbath, the Jewish day of rest. In the words of one report from Haaretz, Witkoff said Trump expected Israel to agree to the ceasefire, and “things that Netanyahu had termed life-and-death issues…suddenly vanished.”
So, who is Witkoff, Trump’s new man in the Middle East?
Witkoff is a Republican and a billionaire Jewish-American real estate developer. His soft, slightly nasally voice masks his reputation as a hard-charging negotiator who developed the nerve for leveraged loans as a teenager betting at the racetrack. When he was starting off in the cut-throat world of New York City real estate in the 1990s, he wore a handgun strapped to his ankle, according to a Wall Street Journal expose from the time.
Witkoff has been praised for pushing the ceasefire across the finish line. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani credited him in a speech announcing the deal on Wednesday, albeit one usurped by Trump’s earlier proclamation that an “EPIC” ceasefire had been reached. It is important to note that Witkoff was mentioned before the sitting Biden administration’s envoy, Brett McGurk.
The New Yorker turned south Floridian has no official training as a diplomat and his appointment epitomizes Trump’s disdain for traditional bureaucrats and policy wonks, who are steeped in area expertise and boast graduate degrees in international relations but lack private sector experience.
“We have people that know everything about the Middle East, but they can’t speak properly…he is a great negotiator,” Trump said at a press conference in January, praising his friend.
There, Trump reiterated his now infamous pledge that “all hell will break out” in the Middle East if the hostages held in Gaza were not freed by the time he takes office on 20 January. “You know what that means, do I have to define it for you,” he barked at a journalist, who pressed for details.
Witkoff may not have Trump’s bravado, but the two golfing friends go back nearly forty years.
Fix, lease, sell…or refinance
Witkoff first met Trump in 1986 when he was a young real estate lawyer at a white-shoe law firm where the future president was a client. Associates say Witkoff was inspired to ditch his corporate job and enter real estate because of Trump.
Witkoff started out by buying small tenements in the Bronx and Harlem during the 1987 real estate crash. His early deals were a far cry from globe-trotting ones he would strike later in the Gulf. He relied on a small regional bank called M&T in Buffalo, New York, for loans.
To cut costs, he performed the labor on his buildings himself – even reportedly leaving a 1992 New Year’s Eve dinner party to dig a sewage trench.
Like Trump, his real estate empire was based on debt and a close-knit circle of family, friends, and their relatives – some of whom he hired when they were out of work. “We fix buildings, lease them up, and then sell or refinance them,” Witkoff told The Wall Street Journal in a 1998 interview.
By then, Witkoff was a proper player in New York real estate with bodyguards and a sprawling empire of office buildings. Witkoff Group’s portfolio comprises properties in New York, southern Florida and Los Angeles. One of his latest projects is Shell Bay, a luxury golf development near Miami, where one-bedroom condos start at $1.9m.
Praise on Gulf states
Like the Trump organixation, Witkoff’s firm has done business with the energy-rich Gulf.
In 2023, he sold Manhattan’s swanky Park Lane Hotel to the Qatari Investment Authority, the country’s sovereign wealth fund, for $623m. Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund also took a stake.
Trump has tapped a slew of Middle East experts for senior government positions, often those who have been critical of Qatar and Islam.
Witkoff’s incoming deputy, former State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus, said she converted to Judaism in Saudi Arabia, where people “hate Jews”.
Trump tapped Eric Tagger, a Republican Senate staffer who has slammed Qatar for its alleged ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, as the top official overseeing the Middle East at the National Security Council. However, Witkoff has rarely waded into the details of Middle Eastern culture and religion or debates on groups like the Muslim Brotherhood. He is all business and has been universal in heaping praise on Gulf states.
At Qatar’s 20204 Economic Forum, he praised Qatar, calling it “very, really impressive”, adding, “whoever they had who master planned here did a really good job…this is solid government. The hotels here are magnificent.”
Witkoff has expressed similar admiration for the UAE’s pro-business agenda. In December, he took the stage at Bitcoin MENA, a cryptocurrency conference in Abu Dhabi. Witkoff and Trump’s sons are cofounders of World Liberty, a crypto company.
Witkoff doesn’t speak much in public, but when he does, he is measured and deliberate. Appearing on Fox News in January, he said Trump’s “strong stance, his certitude in asserting that ‘all hell would break loose’ is moving people,” when asked about the ceasefire talks.
He added: “They (the hostages) are living in terrible conditions, and it’s time for everybody to come back.” His remark that “There will be plenty of Palestinians who will be released as a result of this and they will go home to their families,” did not elicit a response from Fox News host Sean Hannity.
With Trump saying he will use the hostage deal to expand the 2020 Abraham Accord agreements, Witkoff is likely set to delve deeper into the world of Gulf politics and the Israel-Palestine conflict.
He has also said he wants to solve tensions with Iran over a nuclear weapon “diplomatically…if people are willing to adhere to their agreements,” but, ever the negotiator, he did not show too much of his hand: “We are not going to have a nuclear arms race in the Middle East.”
Watch: Last Blinken Presser Overshadowed By Chaos As Journalists Dragged From Briefing Room
Blinken’s final news conference Thursday, which came hours after the announcement of a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel, was a bit of a disaster given no less than two journalists were forcibly removed from the US State Department briefing room.
First, veteran journalist Sam Husseini was accused of ‘heckling’ the outgoing top US diplomat. That’s when US State Dept police were called upon to violently drag him out. “You pontificate about a free press!” Husseini told Blinken as he was taken away by several uniformed officers. Some pundits pointed out the double standard given Blinken routinely lectures countries like China, Russia, and Iran on freedom of the press issues. Watch the incident unfold below:
BREAKING Let everyone know this is what the US State Department does to a journalist asking real questions and this is what’s coming for anyone doing the same thing.
“I am asking questions after being told by [spokesman] Matt Miller that he will not answer my questions,” Husseini continued as he was roughly escorted out. “I’m a journalist not a potted plant,” he also said.
Blinken had told Husseini to “respect the process”. He had responded, “Everybody from Amnesty International to the ICJ [International Court of Justice] is saying that Israel is doing genocide and extermination, and you’re telling me to respect the process?”
“Criminal! Why aren’t you in The Hague?! Why aren’t you in The Hague! Why aren’t you in The Hague!” Husseini yelled while being carried out of the room by security.
Fuller video clip:
What stood out for me was not the actions of journalist @samhusseini but those in the room who fell in line, as he was forcibly removed.
Journalist from The GrayZone Max Blumenthal also went off on Blinken. “Why did you keep the bombs flowing when we had a deal in May?” he asked. “Why did you allow my friends’ homes in Gaza to be destroyed?”
Blumenthal charged Blinken with “sacrific[ing] the rules-based order on the mantle of your commitment to Zionism.” “You helped destroy our religion, Judaism, by associating it with fascism,” he said.
For this, Blumenthal too was quickly detained and taken out of the room by State Dept police.
Blumenthal going out with a bang, as the Biden admin spokespersons go out with a whimper and a smirk…
My final words for Tony Blinken, Secretary of Genocide, and his smirking press secretary, Matt Miller pic.twitter.com/DuLnepSwDl
California Gov. Gavin Newsom joined a handful of Republican governors this week in ordering his state to fly the U.S. flag at full height on Inauguration Day, despite President Joe Biden’s order to keep government flags at half-staff because of the death of former President Jimmy Carter.
Flags at the U.S. Capitol and state buildings across the country are expected to remain at half-mast for a 30-day mourning period following Carter’s death.
President-elect Donald Trump, however, has argued the flags should be returned to full height for his inauguration ceremony next Monday.
“The Democrats are all ‘giddy’ about our magnificent American Flag potentially being at ‘half mast’ during my Inauguration,” Trump wrote on Truth Social earlier this month.
“They think it’s so great, and are so happy about it because, in actuality, they don’t love our Country, they only think about themselves.”
He claimed his inauguration would be the “first time ever” the U.S. flags at the U.S. Capitol building would be flown at half-mast.
“Nobody wants to see this, and no American can be happy about it,” Trump added.
In response, several Republican officials, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, announced they would return their state buildings’ flags to full height before Inauguration Day.
Newsom is the first Democrat to join them in the decision.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) announced on Tuesday that flags will fly full-staff at the U.S. Capitol for Trump’s swearing-in ceremony, with the flags being lowered back to half-staff after the event.
The Democrat’s announcement comes just one week after Newsom rallied Democratic state legislatures to pass $50 million in funding to “Trump-proof” the state.
Newsom claimed the funding, passed during a special legislative session, was necessary to “safeguard California values and fundamental rights in the face of an incoming Trump administration.”
He immediately faced blowback from frustrated Californians, who argued Newsom should be focusing on “fire-proofing” the state instead.
“You’re talking about Trump this, Trump that. He’s not even president,” actor Michael Rapaport said last week.
“Get the f*** out of here!”
Last week, Newsom wrote a letter to the president-elect and said he should visit fire-ravaged areas in Los Angeles to “meet with the Americans affected by these fires”
“Join me and others in thanking the heroic firefighters and first responders who are putting their lives on the line,” he said.
Newsom will likely have to rely on federal assistance from the Trump administration to deal with the aftermath of the fires.
