Trump to host Netanyahu at the White House on July 7, Axios reports
June 30 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump will host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on July 7, Axios reported on Monday, citing an Israeli official.
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Times
an hour ago
- Times
Europe's tax climbdown for US firms sets a dangerous precedent
There's been a clear delineation in transatlantic power dynamics on display in the past week and the result is two-nil to President Trump versus Europe. It began at last week's Nato summit, where European leaders fell over themselves to sign up to a wildly ambitious 5 per cent of GDP defence spending target to appease the president. The now infamous 'daddy' quip from Mark Rutte, secretary general of Nato, was probably lost in translation but ended up as a neat summation of the continent's firmly supplicant role vis-a-vis the US. Ever since US vice-president JD Vance lambasted Europe's political class at the Munich Security Conference in February, the Continent's leaders have wondered how far they can rally together to stand up to US intimidation. • Call him Daddy … How flattery and fanfare warmed Trump to Nato Europe, it is said, has the economic heft to lead the free-trading world, signing pacts with like-minded countries, and upholding the norms of co-operation and openness as the US sets fire to them. The subsequent humiliation of Ukraine's President Zelensky by Vance two weeks after Munich, followed by Trump's tariff onslaught in April, was even more ballast to the cause of European 'strategic autonomy' in foreign and economic policy. But this initial bullishness about Europe's ability to fight back meaningfully against Trump has vanished. The US, it seems, has most of the cards in the tariff war and the Europeans don't have the stomach for the fight. The Nato 'deal' is just one example of the asymmetries cemented by the most recent skirmishes with Trump. European governments have signed up to massive defence spending targets this decade with no clear route to how they will be achieved. It all has echoes of the hollow promises to buy up American natural gas and soybean imports by the European Commission when Trump threatened tariffs in his first administration. European and G7 leaders have also firmly stood behind the US over its bombing of Iran — a far cry from the transatlantic schism over the Iraq war. Foreign and security policy was always the weakest point of departure for European sovereignty claims. But on economic policy and trade, there has been hope that the bloc will fight for its economic interests and could land meaningful blows against the US, its largest trading partner. This is why the far more significant concession was not at Nato, but one inked over the weekend by the G7, where the EU and the UK agreed to exempt American firms from a global minimum corporate tax of 15 per cent. This is in return for the US abandoning 'revenge taxes' on investors and companies from countries that the president deems to have discriminatory tax regimes targeting US firms. The revenge tax, known as section 899, was part of Trump's 'big beautiful budget' bill that is due to be voted on by US lawmakers this week. • G7 strikes deal with Trump to escape 'revenge' taxes The tax climbdown won't get as much attention as other fronts in Trump's economic warfare but the administration has landed a major blow against Europe's prized regulatory machinery and the world's attempts to stop multinational companies shifting profits around the globe. The 15 per cent minimum rate was agreed by more than 120 countries at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in 2021. It was the result of a decade of negotiations about how countries should crackdown on corporate profit shifting to tax havens in the years after the financial crisis, when governments bailed out banks and assumed huge debt burdens in the process. Calls for tax justice were redoubled during the pandemic and there was broad agreement that multinationals had to stop gaming the global tax system. It was the US under Joe Biden that forced the Europeans and others to push for two reforms: a 'pillar one' tax would apply to the biggest tech platforms who would be taxed based on where they had customers, and 'pillar two', which would impose a minimum levy of 15 per cent on the largest multinationals with revenues above €750 million. The UK introduced the minimum last year and the EU's 15 per cent was due to kick in from next year, but the US never ratified the agreement after the Democrats lost their majority in the House of Representatives in 2022. This led Trump to claim that the 15 per cent would unfairly target American firms as the US was no longer party to the agreement. The G7 swallowed the argument and in exempting American firms, have hollowed out the only breakthrough in global corporate tax avoidance made this century. The manner in which it was done is equally lamentable. Fiscally constrained governments who had once called for the end of tax havens and demanded big firms pay their fair share, capitulated with ease in the face of a threatened revenge levy which may never have happened. As I've written before, the section 899 clause would have been an act of self-harm from the US and its status as the issuer of the world's reserve currency. In destroying the global minimum tax deal, Trump has given free rein for US tech firms to exploit low tax jurisdictions like Ireland, who he claims are the ones 'ripping off' Americans. Apple and others are far less likely to re-domicile back to America if their cushy tax arrangements get to live another day. The concession is a dangerous precedent for Europe. As Americans will remind their counterparts, what is sovereignty if it is not the ability to decide your own tax affairs? After the OECD scalp, the White House will also demand US tech companies are exempted from Brussels' sweeping digital regulations designed precisely to capture them. Even without a formal deal, a de facto under-enforcement of the EU and UK's digital services laws is on the cards. • Trump threatens retaliation against UK over tax on tech giants Contrast this with how US-China negotiations have evolved. Beijing has emerged with a clear negotiating advantage over Trump, agreeing to keep its precious raw material export licences under a tight leash in return for a tariff rates dropping from 145 per cent to about 50 per cent. Brussels, London, Ottawa and the rest of the G7 have none of the same leverage over Trump.
Times
an hour ago
- Times
Trump's latest move to deter migrants? ‘Alligator Alcatraz'
President Trump will attend the opening of 'Alligator Alcatraz', an immigration detention centre deep in the Florida Everglades, despite protests from Native Americans and environmental activists. Surrounded by swamp, a remote airbase about 45 miles outside Miami has undergone massive construction work in the sweltering heat of summer, and become a symbol of Trump's plans to aggressively round up and deport migrants. Nicknamed 'Alligator Alcatraz', a reference to the former maximum-security prison in the San Francisco bay, the Florida location was chosen because of the predatory wildlife that deters detainees from escaping — including snapping turtles, venomous cottonmouth snakes and alligators. 'You don't need to invest that much in the perimeter,' said James Uthmeier, Florida's Republican attorney-general, in a recent promotional video. 'People get out, there's not much waiting for them — except alligators and pythons.' Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said the facility was 'surrounded by dangerous wildlife and unforgiving terrain'. 'There is only one road leading in, and the only way out is a one-way flight,' she said. 'This is an efficient and low-cost way to help carry out the largest mass deportation campaign in American history.' The Everglades, a delicate ecosystem of subtropical wetlands, is home to 200,000 alligators. It is also the only place in the US with a population of American crocodiles, the most famous of which is a 14-foot specimen nicknamed 'Croczilla'. Since the 1970s, Burmese pythons, an invasive species, have lurked in the national park's humid forests despite the efforts of bounty hunters to control the population. In summer, the temperatures often climb into the high thirties and anyone wishing to escape the facility would have to contend with mosquitoes, lightning and frequent hurricanes — as well as the alligators. Before Trump's visit on Tuesday, protesters lined the highway that bisects the Everglades National Park to demonstrate against the construction lorries transforming the site into a immigration detention centre. Tents and trailers will provide beds for 5,000 migrants by early July, according to estimates provided by the state. The White House has agreed to meet the running costs, estimated to be about $450 million a year, through the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, used emergency powers to seize the Dade-Collier Training and Transition airport in 2023 despite local opposition. The facility is next to the Tamiami Trail, home to 19 traditional villages of the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes, as well as burial grounds and ceremonial sites. Native American leaders have accused officials of desecrating their homelands and likened Trump's immigration policies to the 19th-century treatment of their ancestors. 'The state would save substantial taxpayer dollars by pursuing its goals at a different location with more existing infrastructure and less environmental and cultural impacts,' Talbert Cypress, chairman of the Miccosukee tribe, wrote in a statement on Facebook. Joining the opposition, environmental groups have filed a federal lawsuit against the project on the basis that the building work could damage an important habitat for endangered species, including the Florida panther and the West Indian manatee. But DeSantis, who lost out to Trump in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination and supported him afterwards, has enthusiastically backed the project. He also suggested Florida could open up another detention centre at Camp Blanding, a US army base more than 300 miles north, to supplement the beds at 'Alligator Alcatraz'. 'Clearly, from a security perspective, if someone escapes, you know, there's a lot of alligators,' DeSantis said in a briefing last week . 'No one's going anywhere.' As part of Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers have been set a target of arresting 3,000 people a day. The aggressive tactics have resulted in violent clashes with protesters, most notably in Los Angeles in June, when Trump deployed US marines and soldiers to quell the unrest. The raids have resulted in 57,000 people being held in detention across the US, exceeding the total beds capacity of 41,500, according to internal documents seen by CBS. Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, has praised Florida for proposing the Everglades as a site to house migrants and the Trump administration has appeared to revel in the controversy. The Department for Homeland Security recently shared an AI-generated image of alligators wearing ICE baseball caps patrolling the detention centre with the caption 'Coming soon!' Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. The Republican Party has also begun selling 'Alligator Alcatraz' merchandise, including T-shirts, hats and drinks coolers.
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
American Pride is declining, new Gallup poll shows
National pride in the United States has reached a record low, with a new Gallup poll indicating a significant decline among Democrats and independents. Only 36 percent of Democrats and 53 percent of independents report being 'extremely' or 'very' proud to be American, contrasting sharply with 92 percent of Republicans. The 56-percentage-point gap in national pride between Democrats and Republicans is the widest recorded since 2001. Overall, 58 percent of US adults express national pride, a continued downward trend over the past decade, with independent voters' pride also hitting a new low. Gallup data suggests a long-term erosion of national pride since 2001, with younger generations, particularly Gen Z, showing significantly lower levels of patriotism compared to older demographics.
