Saturday, June 15, 2024

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M; COUNTERFEITING
Boeing and Airbus may have used 'counterfeit' titanium in planes, FAA say


Patrick Smith and Jay Blackman
Fri, June 14, 2024 

Boeing and Airbus, the two biggest commercial airline makers, may have used titanium sold using fake documents, according to evidence from a supplier that has triggered a Federal Aviation Administration investigation.

The FAA said in a statement to NBC News on Friday morning it would look into allegations from Spirit Aerosystems that the two aviation giants used titanium in their planes that came with paperwork verifying its authenticity that could have been falsified.

The news adds to a troubled period for Boeing, which is the subject of ongoing federal investigations for alleged safety problems. But the news also brings its fierce rival, France-headquartered Airbus, into the wider scrutiny the aviation industry is facing.

A plane under construction at an Airbus assembly site (Valentine Chapuis / AFP via Getty Images file)

Spirit Aerosystems, based in Wichita, Kansas, which raised the alarm on the titanium issue, said it acted fast to remove all the suspect titanium from the supply chain.

“This is about titanium that has entered the supply system via documents that have been counterfeited. When this was identified, all suspect parts were quarantined and removed from Spirit production,” the company said in a statement.

Spirit added that “more than 1,000 tests have been completed to confirm the mechanical and metallurgical properties of the affected material to ensure continued airworthiness.”

"Boeing reported a voluntary disclosure to the FAA regarding procurement of material through a distributor who may have falsified or provided incorrect records," the FAA said in a statement confirming yet another investigation into Boeing.

"Boeing issued a bulletin outlining ways suppliers should remain alert to the potential of falsified records," the statement added.

Airbus controls about 60% of the commercial airline market with Boeing taking the remaining 40% — the companies' grip on the industry has been called a duopoly.

Boeing said in an emailed statement: "This industry-wide issue affects some shipments of titanium received by a limited set of suppliers, and tests performed to date have indicated that the correct titanium alloy was used."

Boeing added that it was "removing any affected parts on airplanes prior to delivery. Our analysis shows the in-service fleet can continue to fly safely."

Airbus released a statement saying the company "is aware of the situation."

"Numerous tests have been performed on parts coming from the same source of supply," the statement said. "They show that (aircraft) airworthiness remains intact. The safety and quality of our aircraft are our most important priorities and we are working in close collaboration with our supplier.

Earlier on Friday the FAA said it was investigating how a Boeing 737 Max jet became caught in a so-called “Dutch roll” incident while flying from Phoenix to Oakland last month.

Boeing's tumultuous year began when a door panel blew off a 737 Max-9 mid-air in January.

The FAA is also investigating whether Boeing completed required inspections on its flagship 787 Dreamliner jets.

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com

Boeing, Airbus say planes with titanium parts sold with falsified records are safe

Nick Robertson
Fri, June 14, 2024 


(The Hill) – Boeing and Airbus emphasized that there are no safety concerns after revealing Friday that some titanium parts used in their aircraft had falsified documentation, triggering a federal investigation.

Boeing did not say which models of aircraft or how many were affected by the titanium parts, but the company emphasized that it does not believe the discovery impacts safety.

“Our analysis shows the in-service fleet can continue to fly safely,” Boeing said.

Airbus said the parts wound up on its A220 model, a relatively small airliner that is used on shorter routes, but that the model is still airworthy.

“Numerous tests have been performed on parts coming from the same source of supply,” said Airbus, which has its main offices and assembly plant in France. “They show that the A220’s airworthiness remains intact.”

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said it will launch an investigation into how parts without proper documentation were installed on aircraft. Boeing said it will remove the parts from planes that have yet to be delivered to customer airlines.

The FAA is “investigating the scope and impact of the issue,” The Associated Press reported. The agency said Boeing reported the issue with an unnamed distributor “who may have falsified or provided incorrect records.”

Spirit AeroSystems, Boeing’s main manufacturing subsidiary, said titanium parts came with counterfeit paperwork.

“This is about titanium that has entered the supply system via documents that have been counterfeited,” Spirit spokesperson Joe Buccino told the AP. “When this was identified, all suspect parts were quarantined and removed from Spirit production.”

Buccino said more than 1,000 tests have been conducted on the material “to ensure continued airworthiness.”

The investigation, first reported by The New York Times, was sparked when a parts supplier found corrosive damage on titanium parts. Titanium alloy parts are extremely common in aerospace manufacturing, selected for the metal’s strength and heat resistance.

It also comes as Boeing and Spirit are already under intense scrutiny for the manufacturing process of the 737 Max series aircraft. A previous FAA investigation after a door blew out of a flight in January found severe lapses in the company’s safety protocols in manufacturing.

“There are issues around the safety culture in Boeing. Their priorities have been focused on production and not on safety and quality,” FAA Administrator Michael Whitaker said in March. “And so, what we are really focused on now is shifting that focus from production to safety and quality.”

The FAA said its six-week audit of Boeing found “multiple instances when the companies allegedly failed to comply with manufacturing quality control requirements.”

The Associated Press contributed to t
his article.

FAA investigating titanium used in some Boeing, Airbus jets

Updated Fri, June 14, 2024 


By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration is investigating whether false or incorrect documents were used to verify the authenticity of titanium used in some recently manufactured Boeing jets, the agency said.

The New York Times, which first reported the issue on Friday, said the FAA is also investigating the authenticity of documents for titanium used in some Airbus jets.

Aircraft manufacturers are facing strong demand for new planes due to a surge in post-pandemic travel. However, supply-chain problems and component shortages are limiting their ability to meet this demand.

Titanium is an important component in the aerospace supply chain and is used to make landing gears, blades and turbine discs for aircraft.

The FAA said Boeing reported a voluntary disclosure "regarding procurement of material through a distributor who may have falsified or provided incorrect records."

The agency added: "Boeing issued a bulletin outlining ways suppliers should remain alert to the potential of falsified records."

Boeing said the issue involves the broader industry and some titanium shipments received by a limited set of suppliers, affecting a small number of airplane parts.

The planemaker said it was removing any such parts from airplanes prior to delivery and added there is no impact to safety.

Airbus said it was aware of the reports but said "numerous tests have been performed on parts coming from the same source of supply. They show that the A220’s airworthiness remains intact."

Canada has imposed sanctions on Russian titanium, albeit with exceptions. It was not clear if the false documents were connected to sanctions.

Spirit AeroSystems, which supplies fuselages for Boeing and wings for Airbus, said the titanium entered the supply chain with "counterfeited" documents, and all related parts have been removed from its production.

"More than 1,000 tests have been completed to confirm the mechanical and metallurgical properties of the affected material to ensure continued airworthiness," Spirit said.

Last year, jet engine manufacturer CFM International disclosed that thousands of its engine components might have been sold with falsified documentation by a British distributor.

The discovery had prompted airlines to change parts on a handful of planes.

Boeing shares fell 1.8%, while Spirit shares were down about 1%.

(Reporting by Shivansh Tiwary in Bengaluru and David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by Toby Chopra, Rod Nickel and Nick Zieminski)


Engineless Boeing 737 MAX jets await their fate as the company's 737 factory looms behind them in Renton, WA 


FAA investigating how titanium parts with falsified records wound up in Boeing and Airbus planes

DAVID KOENIG
Updated Fri, June 14, 2024 

FILE - An Airbus A220 lands at Toulouse-Blagnac airport, July 10, 2018, in southwestern France. Federal regulators are investigating how parts made with counterfeit titanium wound up in some Boeing and Airbus passenger jets that were built in recent years. Boeing and Airbus said Friday, June 14, 2024, that planes containing the parts are safe to fly. (AP Photo/Frederic Scheiber, File)More


Federal regulators are investigating how parts made with titanium that was sold with falsified quality documentation wound up in Boeing and Airbus passenger jets that were built in recent years.

Boeing and Airbus said Friday that planes containing the parts are safe to fly, but Boeing said it was removing affected parts from planes that haven’t been delivered yet to airline customers.

It will be up to regulators including the Federal Aviation Administration to decide whether any work needs to be done to planes that are already carrying passengers.


The FAA said it is “investigating the scope and impact of the issue.” The agency said Boeing reported the problem covering material from a distributor “who may have falsified or provided incorrect records.” The FAA did not name the distributor.

Boeing and Airbus declined to say how many planes were flying with parts made from the undocumented titanium.

Spirit AeroSystems, which makes fuselages for Boeing planes and wings for Airbus jets, reported the falsified documents.

“This is about titanium that has entered the supply system via documents that have been counterfeited," Spirit spokesperson Joe Buccino said. “When this was identified, all suspect parts were quarantined and removed from Spirit production.”

Buccino said more than 1,000 tests have been conducted on the material "to ensure continued airworthiness.”

The New York Times first reported the FAA investigation. The newspaper said a parts supplier found small holes in the material from corrosion.

The aerospace supply chain is a global one. The titanium came from a supplier in China starting around 2019 and was sold to several companies that make components that Spirit Aerosystems uses in its work for Boeing and Airbus, according to two people familiar with the situation. They spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation.

The New York Times reported that an Italian company, Titanium International Group, noticed that the material looked different from previous supplies and determined that paperwork accompanying the titanium seemed inauthentic. A general manager told the newspaper that the company was cooperating with authorities and could not provide additional information.

The paperwork, called a statement of conformity, describes the part or material, how it was made and where it comes from. It is designed to ensure that parts comply with FAA standards for quality.

Titanium alloys have been used for decades in aircraft production because of their light weight, strength and resistance to corrosion and high temperatures. They are used in airframes, landing gear and other parts.

Boeing said tests indicate that the parts were made from the correct titanium alloy, which raised questions about why the documentation was falsified. The company, based in Arlington, Virginia, said it buys most of the titanium it uses directly from other sources, and that supply is not affected by the documentation issue.

Boeing said it was removing affected parts on planes before delivering them to airlines. “Our analysis shows the in-service fleet can continue to fly safely,” the company said. It did not say which of its aircraft models were affected.

Airbus said the parts wound up on one of its models, the A220, a relatively small airliner that is used on shorter routes.

“Numerous tests have been performed on parts coming from the same source of supply,” said Airbus, which has its main offices and assembly plant in France. “They show that the A220’s airworthiness remains intact.”

Officials said the affected parts could be replaced when planes undergo scheduled maintenance checks. It would be up to the FAA and its European counterpart to decide whether to order airlines to replace the parts sooner.


FAA is investigating how Boeing, Airbus jets may have ended up with counterfeit titanium. Here's a timeline of the company's mounting problems.

Plus, the FAA is also probing a "Dutch roll" incident.

Katie Mather
·Internet Culture Reporter
Updated Fri, June 14, 2024 



The Federal Aviation Administration has opened two more investigations into Boeing. The first probe was prompted by an incident in which a 737 Max experienced a rare event known as a "Dutch roll," and the second, which also involves Airbus planes, follows a report that counterfeit titanium may have been used in some jet parts.

Boeing has faced heightened scrutiny since the start of 2024, with Congress calling on top executives to testify at a Senate hearing in mid-April over whether the company’s corporate culture prioritized money-saving measures over safety in its production of the 787 Dreamliner and the 777 aircraft.
🚨 What just happened?

In May, a Southwest flight from Phoenix to Oakland, Calif., experienced a Dutch roll at 32,000 feet midflight. A Dutch roll is when a plane’s tail slides and the aircraft starts rocking from side to side simultaneously, which impacts the plane’s stability, potentially throwing the aircraft off course or making it too difficult to turn. It is a rare situation, but pilots are trained on how to recover from it.

The May 25 flight did not result in any injuries to the passengers or crew.

An early report by the FAA found that there was damage to a unit that provides the backup power to the rudder, which controls the plane’s rotation and stability.

Separately, the New York Times reported on June 14 that a recent investigation by supplier Spirit AeroSystems found that counterfeit titanium, sold with falsified documents, was used to build parts for Boeing and Airbus jets. It is unclear how many planes may have parts made of counterfeit titanium and how it may affect the structural integrity of those aircraft.

Boeing has responded that most of its plane materials have been tested and remain unaffected. The aircraft that allegedly have components made with the material were built between 2019 and 2023 and include some Boeing 737 Max and 787 Dreamliner planes.
🗓️ Let’s rewind. How did we end up here?
May 2024

The Seattle Times reports a second Boeing whistleblower died after spending two weeks in the hospital from a sudden infection. Joshua Dean accused Boeing supplier Spirit AeroSystems of ignoring manufacturing defects on the Boeing 737 Max model before being fired in 2023.
April 2024

FAA announces investigation into near-miss incident at LaGuardia Airport involving Southwest Airlines 737 on March 23.


Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 makes an emergency landing at Preston Smith International Airport after a small fire in the left engine.


Boeing pays Alaska Airlines $160 million to make up for losses the airline suffered following the mid-flight door plug blowout.


FAA announces investigation into claims made by new Boeing whistleblower, Sam Salehpour, an engineer who had worked on the 787 and 777 aircraft. He alleged that the planes were improperly fastened together and he was worried that after years of use, the planes could break apart mid-flight.


United Airlines claims the emergency grounding of the Boeing 737 Max 9 jetliner cost the company $200 million in the first three months of the year.


In a Senate hearing, lawmakers called multiple aviation safety specialists and former Boeing employees to testify. Witness Sam Salehpour, a quality engineer at Boeing, alleged that the company had ignored all of the issues he’d flagged with the 787 aircraft and that he was “subjected to threats of violence from my supervisor” after he spoke out.

Read more from the Associated Press: Boeing put under Senate scrutiny during back-to-back hearings on aircraft maker's safety culture
March 2024

The FBI is investigating the Alaska Airlines flight in January in which a door plug blew off the plane midflight — and has told passengers they may be “a possible victim of a crime.”


The FAA’s 737 Max production audit finds multiple instances in which Boeing allegedly did not comply with manufacturing quality control requirements.


In two separate incidents, a Boeing 777-200 loses a wheel during takeoff from San Francisco and a Boeing 737 skids off the runway after landing in Houston.


The next week, a prominent Boeing whistleblower — former employee John Barnett — dies by suicide while in Charleston, S.C., for a deposition for a lawsuit against Boeing.


A Boeing 787 Dreamliner nosedives during a flight from Sydney to Auckland, New Zealand, injuring at least 50 people, on the same day a Boeing 777 flight from Sydney is forced to turn around due to a maintenance issue.


Another Boeing 777 is forced to make an emergency landing at Los Angeles International Airport after pilots report a flat tire.


A Boeing 737 that took off from San Francisco later that week is found to be missing a panel during a postflight inspection.


Boeing sues Virgin Galactic, accusing it of stealing trade secrets.


Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun announces he will be stepping down by the end of the year. The CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, Stan Deal, is retiring and Boeing’s chairman, Larry Kellner, will not be seeking reelection as a board director.


A United Airlines Boeing 777 flight from San Francisco to Paris was diverted to Denver due to an engine issue.


A United Airlines Boeing 787 plane headed to Newark, N.J., from Tel Aviv, Israel, was forced to make an emergency landing at New York Stewart International Airport because of extreme turbulence. Seven passengers were taken to the hospital and 15 were treated on-site for injuries.


An Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 jet from Honolulu to Anchorage, Alaska, was forced to turn back after a malfunctioning bathroom sink flooded the cabin.

Whistleblowers, nosedives and a DOJ investigation: Read more about Boeing’s March mishaps on Yahoo News
February 2024

The NTSB publishes a preliminary report that found the Alaska Airlines flight was missing four key bolts, which is why the door plug blew out.
January 2024

Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 experiences a door plug blowout midflight. The FAA subsequently grounds all Max 9 aircraft to investigate.

Read more from BBC News: Passenger describes being on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282
December 2023

Boeing urges airlines to inspect all 737 Max jets for potential loose hardware in the plane’s rudder control systems.
August 2023

Boeing reports a supplier quality issue with 737 Max planes involving improperly drilled holes.
October 2022

The FAA tells Boeing that some documents submitted for the certification review of the 737 Max 7 are incomplete.
March 2021

China’s aviation regulator claims there are major safety concerns with the Boeing Max jets.
November 2020

The FAA allows Boeing 737 Max planes to fly again.
September 2020

An 18-month-long investigation by a House of Representatives panel concludes that Boeing failed in its design and development of the Max aircraft and was not fully transparent with the FAA.

Read more from Reuters: U.S. lawmakers fault FAA, Boeing for deadly 737 Max crashes
January 2020

Boeing suspends all 737 production.
⚖️ Boeing has had problems for years. Why is it being investigated now?

“We’ve known [about Boeing] for five years,” Mark Pegram, father of one of the Ethiopian Airlines flight victims, told NPR in March. “I think the rest of the world is finally waking up to it, that these weren’t just isolated incidents.”

Boeing has paid billions of dollars in settlements since 2018, and the company and its leaders entered into a deferred prosecution agreement in January 2021 with the Department of Justice that has so far helped them avoid criminal prosecution.

Boeing paid $1.77 billion to compensate airline customers, $243.6 million as a criminal fine and $500 million for a compensation fund for family members of crash victims, CNN reported.

yearlong FAA-commissioned panel review was critical of the safety culture at Boeing, and found that executives and employees were not aligned with what the safety standards were, according to a report released in February. The investigation also found that many employees were afraid of retaliation for speaking up.


FAA chief admits agency was ‘too hands-off’ before Boeing door blowout

Nick Robertson
Thu, June 13, 2024 



The head of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said Thursday the agency was “too hands-off” with regulating aircraft manufacturers before a door blew out of a Boeing plane in January, causing weeks of scrutiny into the company’s manufacturing safety.

FAA Administrator Michael Whitaker said in a Senate Commerce Committee hearing about Boeing that his agency “should have had much better visibility” into Boeing’s manufacturing process.

“FAA’s approach was too hands-off, too focused on paperwork audits, and not focused enough on inspections,” he said. “We have changed that approach over the last several months, and those changes are permanent. We have now moved to a more active, comprehensive oversight model, the audit plus inspection model, which allows the FAA to have much better insight into Boeing’s operations.”

The door blowout of a Boeing 737 Max operated by Alaska Airlines, caused by missing bolts, resulted in the grounding of every similar aircraft in the country and mandatory inspections. An investigation into Boeing’s process found a lax safety culture and oversights during manufacturing.

“There are issues around the safety culture in Boeing. Their priorities have been focused on production and not on safety and quality,” Whittaker said in March. “And so, what we are really focused on now is shifting that focus from production to safety and quality.”

The FAA said its six-week audit of Boeing found “multiple instances when the companies allegedly failed to comply with manufacturing quality control requirements.”

The scrutiny has tanked the company’s stock and brought additional scrutiny from Congress. The Justice Department launched a criminal investigation in March, and members of the Senate Commerce Committee have previously promised more oversight.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), the committee’s ranking member, said in March more oversight is “unquestionably” needed.

“This is an ongoing issue. Obviously, what has happened with Boeing in recent months is deeply concerning. The NTSB is engaged in investigation dealing with the Alaska Airlines incident. That investigation needs to proceed to conclusion,” he told The Hill.

“The challenges we’ve seen recently have raised real and material concerns and concerns that need to be addressed.”



CHINA CHARM OFFENSIVE DOWN UNDER
China Premier Li backs 'dialogue, not confrontation' in New Zealand

AFP
Fri, June 14, 2024 


Chinese Premier Li Qiang visits the New Zealand Institute for Plant and Food Research on Friday in Auckland (Brett Phibbs)


Chinese Premier Li Qiang said Friday he supported "dialogue, not confrontation" during a visit to New Zealand where he stirred up hope of new trade avenues.

Li is on a six-day tour of New Zealand and Australia, the highest-ranking official to visit either nation since his predecessor in 2017.

China accounts for 30 percent of New Zealand's export earnings, according to World Bank data, but there are fears this could evaporate if the world's second-largest economy continues to slow.

The Chinese premier praised "historic" developments in relations between the two countries over the past decade during a speech before a gala dinner in Auckland hosted by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon.

"We both emphasised that countries should live in harmony, engage in dialogue, not confrontation, and have cooperation, not conflict," Li said.

Luxon, who has raised sensitive issues such as foreign interference and recent escalations in the South China Sea with Li, said the pair had reached a better understanding of their "respective priorities".

New Zealand, long seen as one of China's closest partners in the region, has become increasingly bold in its criticism of Beijing's expanding influence in the South Pacific.

Business remains a priority, however.

Li met some of New Zealand's biggest exporters and most influential companies during the visit, which wraps up Saturday when he flies to the South Australian capital Adelaide.

- 'Big on collaboration' -

Mark Piper, chief executive of a top New Zealand government science institute, met the Chinese premier during a tour of an Auckland research facility earlier in the day.

"He was talking about more research collaborations and more people exchanges, which is what we're really interested in," Piper told AFP.

"He was really big on collaboration, the value that New Zealand can bring to China and that China can bring to New Zealand."

New Zealand was one of the first developed nations to sign a comprehensive free trade deal with Beijing.

Chinese consumers have a voracious appetite for New Zealand's premium meat, dairy and wine.

Li touted opportunities for trade, tourism and investment when he started his tour in New Zealand's capital Wellington on Thursday.

But he warned that emerging differences between the two nations "should not become a chasm that blocks exchanges and cooperation between us".

China's Li signals demand for New Zealand dairy and meat

Updated Fri, June 14, 2024


By Lucy Craymer

WELLINGTON (Reuters) -There is a growing demand in China for high-quality dairy, beef and lamb products from New Zealand, Premier Li Qiang said on Friday, the second day of his trip to the Pacific island nation.

Li's trip to the region, which also includes a four-day stopover in Australia starting on Saturday, is aimed at strengthening trade and diplomatic ties with the two Pacific nations. China is the biggest trading partner of both nations.


Li visited the New Zealand Institute for Plant and Food Research in Auckland on Friday, a government agency tasked with promoting the farming, food and beverage industries, before meetings and a dinner with business people, academics and diplomats.

Li said more bilateral business opportunities would emerge in the areas of energy, information technology, biomedicine and other emerging industries, Chinese state media reported.

He reiterated that China would work with New Zealand to upgrade their comprehensive strategic partnership, and stressed the need for increased cooperation in services trade and cross-border e-commerce.

His comments came as Chinese firms formally applied for an anti-dumping probe into pork imports from the European Union, escalating tensions after the bloc imposed anti-subsidy duties on Chinese-made electric vehicles.Global food companies from dairy producers to pork exporters are on high alert for potential retaliatory tariffs from China.

New Zealand and China on Thursday signed bilateral agreements on trade and climate during Li's trip, the highest level Chinese visit to New Zealand in seven years.

BOOMING TRADE

Li has promised that Beijing will further expand market access, create a market-oriented and internationalised business environment, and he encouraged entrepreneurs to seize opportunities, Chinese state media said.

Beijing sees itself as a key part of New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon's plan to double exports over the next 10 years.

China is already New Zealand's largest trading partner with bilateral trade totalling nearly NZ$38 billion ($23.27 billion).

New Zealand remains keen to further boost trade ties with China but has also toughened its stance over the last year, accusing Beijing of hacking its parliament and noting what it characterises as a growing Chinese threat to Pacific security.

After his meeting with Li on Thursday Luxon said that as well as discussing trade, he had also raised concerns about issues such as Chinese interference.

Li's meeting with New Zealand opposition leader Chris Hipkins was cancelled on Friday, due to Hipkins facing travel issues.

($1 = 1.6329 New Zealand dollars)

(Reporting by Alasdair Pal in Sydney; Additional reporting by Liz Lee in Beijing; Editing by Michael Perry and Gareth Jones)


China's Li pays 'very positive' visit to Fonterra, New Zealand minister says

Reuters
Fri, June 14, 2024 

(Reuters) - Chinese Premier Li Qiang visited New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra on Saturday, a stop Trade Minister Todd McClay called "very positive" after the Chinese leader had spoken of demand for New Zealand's agricultural products.

"Fonterra is an important part of the Chinese food supply chain, a lot of our dairy products go to China," McClay said in comments broadcast on Radio New Zealand after Li visited Fonterra's Auckland headquarters with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon.

Li said on Friday, the second day of his trip to the Pacific island nation, that there was growing demand in China for high-quality dairy, beef and lamb products from New Zealand.

China's second-highest ranked official is to travel to Australia on Saturday for a four-day stopover on a trip aimed at strengthening trade and diplomatic ties with the two commodities-exporting nations. China is the biggest trading partner of both countries.

Beijing sees itself as a key part of Luxon's plan to double New Zealand's exports over the next 10 years.

"I think it was clear there was a real appreciation on the part of the premier of China and their delegation just about how much that relationship has grown."

On Friday, Li visited Auckland's New Zealand Institute for Plant and Food Research, a government agency that promotes the farming, food and beverage industries, before meetings and a dinner with business people, academics and diplomats.

Li met with Luxon in the capital Wellington on Thursday, signing agreements on trade and climate change, with human rights also on the agenda.

In the first visit by a Chinese premier to Australia since 2017, Li is to visit the South Australia state capital Adelaide, the national capital Canberra and the mining state of Western Australia.

(Reporting by Sam McKeith in Sydney; Editing by William Mallard)

Chinese Premier Li launches trade-friendly Australia visit

AFP
Sat, June 15, 2024 

Chinese Premier Li Qiang will tour a wine producer and hold talks with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on his trade-centred visit to Australia (Marty MELVILLE)

China's Premier Li Qiang embarked on a four-day trip to Australia on Saturday, dangling the promise of expanded trade even as the two nations compete for influence in the Pacific.

Li -- the second most powerful man in China after President Xi Jinping -- touched down in Adelaide at the start of a diplomatic mission across the resource-rich continent.

The premier waved from the plane's doors and was greeted on the airport tarmac by Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, other government officials, and a group of photographers and TV journalists.

Flying in from a similarly trade-centred visit to New Zealand, Li is the highest ranking Chinese official to visit either country since 2017.

The premier will tour a South Australian wine grower and check in on two Chinese-loaned giant pandas in Adelaide zoo, hold talks with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese before tucking into a state lunch in Canberra, and then travel to a lithium mine in Western Australia.

His vineyard visit is a nod to China's recent lifting of swingeing trade sanctions on wine, timber, barley and beef exports imposed in 2020 during a diplomatic rift with a former conservative government.

The measures cost Australian exporters an estimated Aus$20 billion ($13 billion) a year.

Australia's rock lobster industry hopes Li will reopen its exports to China, removing one of the last sanctions in place since Albanese's government took power in 2022 and adopted a softer diplomatic approach to Beijing.

The Chinese premier's visit "reflects the improving tone," said Ryan Neelam, director of the foreign policy programme at Sydney-based think tank the Lowy Institute.

"The relationship is now more focused on the economic opportunities between them than it has in the past, which has been overshadowed by the political and security differences," he said.

"But at the same time, those differences haven't gone away."

Australia has tightened its defence alliance with the United States as it seeks to parry Beijing's expanding diplomatic and military influence on island states scattered around the Pacific region.

China describes the AUKUS security pact between Washington, London and Canberra -- a deal that would equip Australia with nuclear-powered but conventionally armed submarines to patrol the region -- as a divisive measure that raises nuclear proliferation risks.

- Wine and pandas -

In the most recent a sign of military tensions, Australia accused China of "unsafe and unprofessional" conduct after one of its warplanes fired flares in the path of a naval helicopter last month over the Yellow Sea.

Albanese has promised to tell Li the behaviour was "inappropriate".

Canberra also reacted with "outrage" when a Beijing court handed down a suspended death sentence to Chinese-Australian dissident writer Yang Jun earlier this year.

Such disagreements are likely to be aired behind closed doors, Neelam said.

Instead, Li sets a friendlier tone on the first full day of his trip Sunday -- visiting the famed Barossa winemaking region in Adelaide, hometown of Australia's foreign minister, who is credited with helping stabilise relations with Beijing.

China's punitive tariffs had effectively blocked premium Australian wine exports, worth an estimated Aus$1 billion a year, until just three months ago.

Even now, Australian vintners are hesitant to rush back into pre-tariff levels of trade with China, said Paul Turale, marketing manager at industry body Wine Australia.

"A lot of importers are probably taking a more conservative approach to bringing in new labels or new wines and are waiting to see it stabilise," he said.

"It will take some time to grow to what the industry was before."

First, though, Li will pop into Adelaide Zoo where giant pandas Wang Wang and Fu Ni have been on loan from China since 2009.

Hopes are high that the pair -- instruments of China's so-called panda diplomacy -- will be allowed to stay despite producing no offspring in their time together.

djw-bur/mtp



China Li’s Australia Trip Is ‘Significant’, Chalmers Says

Swati Pandey
Sat, June 15, 2024 


(Bloomberg) -- Chinese Premier Li Qiang’s visit to Australia is a “really significant step” for the two nations’ relationship, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Saturday.

Li will land in Australia for a four-day trip on Saturday, heading to Adelaide, Canberra and Perth as part of the first visit by a Chinese premier since early 2017, when relations began to deteriorate.

This follows Li’s visit to New Zealand, where he pledged to strengthen economic ties with Wellington. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said the two premiers had discussed issues such as foreign interference, the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait.

While the trip is the latest sign of warming relations between Australia and China, both countries are facing strategic and political tensions across a range of fronts, from strengthening security ties between Canberra and Washington to the global struggle over critical mineral supply chains.

Li’s visit “recognizes the key economic and broader relationship between Australia and China,” Chalmers said at a press conference in Queensland state. “We’re looking forward to engaging with Premier Li and his colleagues on this really important visit.”

Chalmers will also sign the Memorandum of Understanding on the Strategic Economic Dialogue with National Development and Reform Commission Vice Chairman Liu Sushe that was agreed last year.

“We believe that engagement is good for our people, it’s good for our economy and it’s good for our country more broadly, and that’s what this visit is all about,” Chalmers said. “We’ve made really encouraging progress stabilizing the relationship with China but in a way which is consistent with our values and our interests.”

When asked by a journalist if the Australian government will confront the Chinese prime minister on humanitarian issues, Chalmers said “we are prepared to speak up for those values and interests when that’s appropriate.”

“We don’t pretend that isn’t sometimes a difficult relationship to manage or a complex relationship to manage,” he said. “And so we disagree with the administration when we need to, we engage where we can and I think we’ve seen some of the fruits of that, certainly in terms of the economy over the last couple of years.”

(Adds Li’s NZ visit in third paragraph. A previous version of this story was corrected to clarify it’s the first visit by a Chinese premier in more than seven years.)

 Bloomberg Businessweek
US imposes sanctions on Nordic Resistance Movement in fight against white supremacy

Daphne Psaledakis
Fri, June 14, 2024 a

Members of the Neo-nazi Nordic Resistance Movement march through the town of Ludvika


By Daphne Psaledakis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on the neo-Nazi Nordic Resistance Movement and several of its leaders, designating them terrorists as Washington seeks to combat violent white supremacy, the U.S. State Department said.

The action designates Sweden-based NRM and three of its leaders as "specially designated global terrorists," the State Department said in a statement.


NRM is the largest neo-Nazi group in Sweden and has branches in Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Finland, where it has been banned since 2020, according to the statement.

"The United States remains deeply concerned about the racially or ethnically motivated violent extremist threat worldwide and is committed to countering the transnational components of violent white supremacy," State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.

"NRM’s violent activity is based on its openly racist, anti-immigrant, antisemitic and anti-LGBTQI+ platform," he added.

The State Department said members and leaders of the group have carried out violent attacks against political opponents, protesters, journalists and others, and have also taken steps to collect and prepare weapons and explosive materials and organized training in violent tactics, including knife fighting.

Friday's action freezes any of the group's U.S. assets and generally bars Americans from dealing with it.

U.S. President Joe Biden has railed against white supremacy while in office.

He frequently says the "Unite the Right" white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 made him decide that he should run for president in 2020. The rally followed months of protests over the city's plan to remove a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

In 2021, Biden launched the first-ever U.S. National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism that included resources to identify and prosecute threats and new deterrents to prevent Americans from joining dangerous groups.

Biden has also called on Congress to do more to hold social media companies accountable for spreading hate.

(Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis and Jarrett Renshaw; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)


US designates Nordic neo-Nazi group as terrorists

Jennifer Hansler, CNN
Fri, June 14, 2024 




The US State Department on Friday designated a Nordic neo-Nazi group and three of its top officials as terrorists.

It’s the second time in history that the US has designated a foreign White supremacist organization and its leaders as terrorists.

The department designated the Nordic Resistance Movement (NRM) and three of its top officials – Tor Fredrik Vejdeland, Pär Öberg, and Leif Robert Eklund – as Specially Designated Global Terrorists on Friday, according to a statement from spokesperson Matthew Miller.

It is the first time the Biden administration has made such a designation of a White supremacist group. The Trump administration in 2020 designated the Russian Imperial Movement (RIM) and its leaders as Specially Designated Global Terrorists.

NRM is a transnational neo-Nazi organization founded in Sweden in 1997, with branches in Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and Finland, according to the State Department. It was banned in Finland in 2020.

According to a State Department fact sheet, NRM was designated “for having committed or attempted to commit, posing a significant risk of committing, or having participated in training to commit acts of terrorism that threaten the security of United States nationals or the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States.”

The designation of NRM comes as US officials have warned that White supremacist terror groups continue to pose a threat at home and abroad. The 2024 Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community found that the “transnational racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists (RMVE) movement, in particular motivated by white supremacy, will continue to foment violence across Europe, South America, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand inspiring the lone actor or small-cell attacks that pose a significant threat to U.S. persons.”

“NRM’s violent activity is based on its openly racist, anti-immigrant, antisemitic, and anti-LGBTQI+ platform,” Miller said Friday. “The group’s members and leaders have carried out violent attacks against political opponents, protestors, journalists, and other perceived adversaries.”

“NRM members have also taken steps to collect and prepare weapons and explosive materials, including on behalf of the group and in furtherance of its goals,” Miller continued. “In addition, NRM has organized training in violent tactics, including hand-to-hand combat and knife fighting.”

The State Department said they were making the designations as “part of a broader U.S. government effort to address the transnational dimensions of the threat posed by REMVE actors and reflect the Biden-Harris Administration’s continued commitment to countering domestic terrorism (DT), which includes REMVE.”

In remarks Wednesday, a top State Department counterterrorism official warned that “transnational linkages” were increasing, “with individuals and groups communicating both online and in-person, radicalizing individuals—frequently young people—to violence, recruiting, and sharing tactical training, including sharing instructions for making weapons.”

“REMVE actors are becoming more and more adept at exploiting social media platforms, online gaming platforms and game-adjacent platforms, smaller websites with targeted audiences, and encrypted chat applications to recruit new followers, plan and rally ideological support, and disseminate materials that contribute to radicalization and mobilization to violence,” said Ian Moss, the deputy coordinator for the Bureau of Counterterrorism.

In 2019, then-President Donald Trump signed an executive order that gave the US government greater latitude to go after groups who train terrorists, not only groups that carry out terrorist attacks.

Friday’s designation will deny NRM members from accessing the US financial system, with the intention of making it more challenging for them to move money through the international system and fund their efforts.
U$ FOR PROFIT HEALTH CARE

How a major public hospital is protecting doctors by silencing the patients who accuse them

Lewis Kamb
Fri, June 14, 2024

LONG READ

She hadn’t quite turned 19 and had just started college when Hana Hooper found out she was dying.

An echocardiogram revealed the telltale signs in grayscale images of an enlarged heart chamber, its walls stretched thin. Her diagnosis — end-stage dilated cardiomyopathy — sounded complicated. But in simple terms, it meant that Hana needed a new heart, and fast.

To survive long enough to get one, she first needed what’s sometimes called “bridge to transplant” surgery — a procedure to place a device in the left ventricle of her failing heart to help it keep pumping.


Hana Hooper had just started college when she was diagnosed with a fatal condition that forced her to seek a heart transplant. (Polly Schaps / Courtesy American Heart Association)

Her worried parents, Ali and Patrick Hooper, sought to buy time for Hana, the middle of three daughters they raised near Seattle, by arranging for her to have the surgery at one of the most prestigious and largest public hospitals in their home state: the University of Washington Medical Center.

But shortly after an esteemed cardiac surgeon, Dr. Nahush Mokadam, performed the procedure in January 2017, it became clear something had gone wrong. Hana suffered a stroke, slipped into a semi-coma and lost her sight.

Her parents later alleged in a lawsuit that Mokadam had used an unconventional surgical technique that put Hana at higher risk for stroke without telling them in advance.

They claimed that, to cover up his wrongdoing, the doctor blamed the surgery’s problems on an unexpectedly “significant amount of plaque” he encountered in Hana’s aorta and removed her from a transplant eligibility list because of it. When the family wanted a second opinion, Mokadam threatened to tell other transplant programs Hana wasn’t suitable for a new heart, they said.


“Dr. Mokadam lied about his operative findings and sought to prevent Hana from obtaining a life-saving” heart transplant, Hana and her parents asserted in a legal notice that preceded the suit.

Mokadam referred questions about the case to his lawyer, who declined to comment.

The allegations of alarming misconduct in the notice and suit have never made headlines— and the university hoped they never would.

After more than two years, the case was settled in March 2023 with a $12 million payment and neither Mokadam or the university admitting wrongdoing. But the university did include a confidentiality clause — also known as an NDA — a legal tool widely used by major corporations and wealthy celebrities to make accusations go away. In this case, the agreement instructed the Hoopers “not to publicize the names or identities of the defendants” with “any description of their conduct.”

Nondisclosure agreements can keep sensitive details out of the public eye, but they have come under attack in recent years for shielding bad actors and allowing misconduct to persist. Critics say they allow prominent people to keep sexual assault allegations under wraps, for instance, and businesses to silence would-be whistleblowers. But there’s been little focus on the persistent use of NDAs to conceal allegations of wrongdoing at taxpayer-funded institutions, including public hospitals.

While using confidentiality to hide allegations of malpractice is widespread, lawyers and scholars particularly question the use of NDAs at public hospitals, since they receive tax dollars and are subject to transparency laws.

“The information they’re hiding is publicly available, so confidentiality is just a barrier they’ve set up for victims,” said Paul Luvera, a now-retired trial lawyer in Washington state who opposes the routine use of NDAs. “It’s an intimidation clause.”

In 70 of the 89 settlement agreements negotiated for the University of Washington Medical Center and other UW-affiliated hospitals and clinics from 2015 to early 2023 and obtained through public records requests by NBC News, the university included confidentiality clauses that require victims and their families to keep silent about their claims, the amounts they were paid, or both, as a condition of settlement.

As a result, the public has been kept in the dark about allegations of egregious medical mistakes and serious misconduct at Washington’s largest taxpayer-funded hospital system. Payments to settle cases that included confidentiality requirements ranged from as low as $2,000 to as high as $14 million.

Copies of the settlement agreements reviewed for this article, including those that drew some of the largest payments, show the university required secrecy in cases that alleged grave harm:

A newborn who suffered severe brain damage because doctors allegedly failed to properly monitor his heart rate during childbirth ($14 million).


A man who died after doctors allegedly misdiagnosed and improperly treated a cancerous mass in his face and neck ($6 million).


A girl left with permanent cognitive disabilities after a doctor who operated on her face allegedly left bone fragments behind in her skull, causing a catastrophic stroke ($11 million).

A spokesperson for UW Medicine, Susan Gregg, said that the accusations leading to such confidential settlements “may not be factually accurate.”

“Like many health care organizations, including publicly owned organizations, UW asks for confidentiality in order to achieve finality and certainty when a claim concludes,” Gregg said in a statement.

“Confidentiality clauses are a standard industry practice.”

Law firms hired to defend the university are generally instructed in their contracts that settlements “must include” confidentiality. In its NDAs, the university usually presents the agreements to claimants as “mutual promises” of confidentiality, but also typically includes the phrase “will make reasonable efforts” about its own vow to keep the agreement quiet.

That’s because, in some states, government-run hospitals that are subject to public records laws cannot legally withhold many of the key details they require their accusers to keep secret — and they know it.

Several families who settled claims with the University of Washington told NBC News that they weren’t aware that if an outside party requested settlement agreements, the university couldn’t keep them secret. One claimant, Ruby Blondell, said it felt like the university “wasn’t being completely honest.”

“I was taken aback — should we say slightly shocked — to know that we had signed a nondisclosure agreement and we weren’t allowed to talk, but the information was there for the finding for you,” said Blondell, a retired UW professor whose husband, Douglas Roach, died of cancer after alleging in a lawsuit that university doctors failed to tell him about a critical lesion spotted in his lungs. “It was borderline creepy to see that document in your hands with my signature on it,” she said.

Ruby Blondell looks at a photo of herself with her late husband, Douglas Roach, taken before they were married in 2004. “He was very upset that we weren't going to have the life together we’d planned,” she said. (Lewis Kamb / NBC News)

Other hospitals around the country subject to public records laws regularly employ the same secrecy tactics to keep malpractice cases hidden, documents obtained through public records requests show.

The University of Kansas Hospital Authority required confidentiality in settlements with families of two men who claimed that their loved ones died after contracting bacterial infections due to a faulty medical device used during open-heart surgeries. A spokesperson for the hospital system did not respond to specific questions about the cases but said it had “robust processes and systems in place to address the small number of situations where harm occurs while providing needed care.”

The University of Texas-MD Anderson Cancer Center used an NDA to settle a 2019 claim alleging that doctors had removed part of a woman’s brain after mistaking it for what one of them called a “baseball-sized” tumor, the woman claimed, leaving her permanently brain damaged. Doctors at a different hospital later diagnosed her with a rare but treatable form of multiple sclerosis that causes brain lesions, her claim states. MD Anderson declined comment about the case; the doctors involved didn’t respond to requests for comment.

NDAs can also limit accountability by stifling the regulatory complaints and publicity that prompt investigations, NBC News found.

Some patients wrongly assume that after they file a malpractice claim, their allegations will always be investigated by an outside state regulator. Others may believe that the NDA means they can’t file their own regulatory complaints. None of the settlements reviewed addressed the issue directly.

Public licensing records in Washington show no enforcement actions have been taken against Mokadam, who left the university in 2018 about three months before Hana managed to get a heart transplant at the Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

Mokadam is one of at least six former UW doctors to leave the university for jobs in other states since 2015 within roughly a year of facing malpractice claims, lawsuits or settlements, records show. Asked about this finding, the university’s Gregg said there was “no way to know the motivation” for why a particular doctor might leave his or her job.

Mokadam now works as cardiac division director at Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center. A spokesperson for Ohio State declined to specifically comment about the case but said the hospital system adheres to a strict review process when hiring doctors.

Under Washington state law, hospitals are required to submit reports to the state medical commission within 60 days any time they make a payment over $20,000 to settle a claim alleging damages caused by an identified doctor’s negligence. The National Practitioners Data Bank, a federal repository of malpractice and disciplinary records, separately requires such a report within 30 days, regardless of payment amount. Gregg said the university submitted one report for Mokadam — nearly three months after the 2023 settlement — to the Data Bank and requested a copy be forwarded to the commission. The university “doesn’t need to duplicate the reporting,” she said.

But the commission said it never received the report. When pressed by NBC News, it later discovered the Data Bank had sent its copy to a state health department office that did not share it. Without the report, the commission knew nothing of Hooper’s malpractice claims against Mokadam — and never investigated them.

Spokespersons for the commission and health department each said the law clearly requires hospitals to send reports directly to the commission. The commission said it is now looking into the Hoopers’ allegations against Mokadam.

Gregg separately said that Hana’s care was “reviewed under the UW Medicine quality improvement program,” but declined to say more about what she called a “confidential process.”

­­­­And then there are the NDAs, which gag patients and their families.

When asked recently if her family would discuss Hana’s case, Ali Hooper checked with her lawyer and declined the offer. “We’re totally bound by the settlement agreement and don’t want to do anything to jeopardize her situation,” she said.

Several others who settled malpractice claims against the university that included confidentiality requirements declined to talk with NBC News, expressing concerns about potential legal consequences.

But Susanna Grieser and her husband, Mark, opted to break their silence, saying they feel it’s their civic duty to speak out.

Susanna Grieser, right, and her husband, Mark, before her 2016 dental surgery. (Margaret Albaugh for NBC News)

In November 2016, Susanna, who had emigrated from Venezuela two years before, went to the UW School of Dentistry to get a broken tooth removed.

A student dentist convinced her after X-rays that she also needed a right molar pulled, assuring Susanna the procedure would be “easy,” she said.

But during surgery, the student and an older male faculty dentist who accompanied him struggled to remove the molar, said Susanna, 60. After the student dentist finally got the tooth out, Susanna, who was partially sedated, could feel the force of his weight pressing into her face as he jammed bone graft material into her exposed tooth socket, she said.

When she finally emerged from surgery more than three hours later, Susanna was still groggy and numb, but “knew something was wrong immediately,” she said.

Over the next few months, Susanna said she suffered constant, debilitating pain, according to her medical records and a state health department investigation. She avoided opening her mouth or touching her face, records show. She hardly spoke, ate only mashed foods, rarely slept and routinely missed work. She also fantasized about driving into oncoming traffic and off a bridge, the records show.

“The pain was so bad,” she said in an interview, “I almost killed myself.”

When she returned to the clinic for help, one faculty dentist referred Susanna to another, who referred her to another. They prescribed her medication but told her they could not explain what caused her pain. One dentist prescribed her medication that resulted in convulsions, the records show.

All the while, they added, the university was badgering the couple, who were uninsured, over their bills.


Susanna Greiser becomes emotional (Margaret Albaugh for NBC News)

In June 2017, Susanna was sent to Dr. Jansjit Dillon, an oral surgeon at UW-run Harborview Medical Center. Dillon took X-rays revealing that beneath the bone-grafted socket, a major nerve in Susanna’s jaw had been partially obliterated, the dentist's notes summarizing the visit say.

A few weeks later, Dillon transplanted a new nerve into Susanna’s mouth. The university later billed the Griesers more than $70,000 for the surgery, records show.

The details above were recounted to investigators as part of the state probe spurred by her husband Mark’s complaints. Dillon told an investigator that the university dentists’ failure to suction out bone graft material was “a medical error,” and if they had done so earlier Susanna’s nerve could have been saved, a report of the investigation found.

None of the dentists who treated Susanna were fined or disciplined by the state, licensing records show. At least one denied wrongdoing to investigators, according to records. The student, now a practicing dentist, declined to comment to NBC News, citing patient confidentiality. The male faculty dentist who oversaw him was never publicly identified; the student’s supervisor of record did not respond to requests for comment, nor did the other dentists involved.

Gregg said the university cooperated with the state investigation and that Susanna’s care was reviewed separately under “the UW School of Dentistry’s quality improvement program.” She said she couldn’t provide further details about that confidential review.

Scott Bramhall, one of the investigators, declined to comment on the case, but said state regulators generally have no authority over unlicensed students.

After the Griesers filed a notice of claim preceding their suit in 2018, the university eventually paid them $600,000 and forgave some bills, they said.

Confidentiality only came up after the deal was struck — when the couple saw a clause in their settlement document. Though he ultimately signed it, Mark said he objected to its inclusion.

Susanna Grieser outside amongst trees at her home. (Margaret Albaugh for NBC News)

“My firm belief is that I have a duty as a citizen to speak out about this to protect my fellow citizens,” said Mark, 66, a semi-retired accountant.

“I’m not afraid to speak up,” said Susanna. “I don’t want this to happen to anybody else.”

In an email, Daniel Whitmore, the couple’s attorney, declined to discuss the case, saying: “I am bound by the confidentiality agreement that I signed.”

Not every lawyer agrees to such constraints. Luvera, the retired attorney from Washington state, rarely allowed himself or his clients to be bound by confidentiality.

For most of his 55-year legal career, Luvera made it a policy to refuse to agree to any form of confidentiality as a requirement of settlement. He resisted NDAs muzzling his clients in personal injury settlements with, among others, the tobacco industry, corporate gunmakers, medical device manufacturers — and public hospitals.

“Keeping secrets just perpetuates more harmful conduct to innocent victims,” he said.

Luvera, whose stance made his firm an outlier, informed prospective clients up front that he’d never agree to an NDA if they hired him. But after a settlement, Luvera said he'd only publicize the results of a case if his clients wanted to go public. “It was always the client’s choice,” he said. “Secrecy was never dictated by the defendant who’d harmed them.”

Examples of secret settlements perpetuating harm are rife in cases involving private corporations and individuals, from Purdue Pharma’s pervasive pushing of oxycontin to Harvey Weinstein’s rampant sexual abuse. But the use of NDAs by taxpayer-funded hospitals to hide allegations of wrongdoing is insidious in a different way, Luvera said, because such public institutions are subject to open records laws.

Patrick Malone, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer who has written extensively about the legal ethics of using NDAs, reviewed the university’s boilerplate confidentiality clause and said, in his opinion, it violates model ethics rules that encourage transparency in claims and defenses.

“There are a number of jurisdictions that have said it’s unethical for a lawyer to hide, under the guise of confidentiality, any of the public facts of a case,” Malone said.

Several local and state bar associations have adopted advisory opinions or rules against lawyers using NDAs and a handful of state laws forbid them under certain circumstances. California prohibits NDAs in sexual abuse settlements. Florida bans “concealing information” in settlements of claims “against the state,” including malpractice cases at public hospitals. And a law passed 30 years ago in Washington state outlaws confidentiality agreements if they keep secret “hazards to the public” — but it doesn’t specify medical malpractice.

“The reality is that unless there’s specific legislation that mandates openness and prevents secrecy, then there’s going to be secret settlements and protective orders that prevent the public from knowing there’s a physician with repeated mistakes or a hospital with repeated failures,” said Richard Zitrin, a University of California-San Francisco law professor who has helped draft anti-secrecy legislation for decades.

Despite the lack of a law in Washington state explicitly banning the use of NDAs in medical malpractice settlements or by public institutions, five lawyers who’ve settled cases with the university in recent years told NBC News they are doubtful that it can enforce its confidentiality requirements.

Joel Cunningham spent 20 years defending the university and other public hospitals before switching sides and joining Luvera’s firm to specialize in suing them. He always included confidentiality in medical malpractice settlements when he defended doctors and hospitals, he said, but “never understood how public hospitals could really enforce these agreements.”

Gregg, the university spokesperson, said it was “not aware of any medical malpractice settlement where the plaintiff breached confidentiality” but “knows of no authority” that has deemed NDAs “generally unenforceable or unethical.”

Most of the plaintiff attorneys interviewed said they disliked NDAs, but several said they sometimes agree to confidentiality with the university if they believe it’s in their client’s best interest or if the client wants to keep certain details private, such as the settlement amount.

“Personally, I don’t believe nondisclosure agreements are good for society,” Mike Wampold, an attorney in Seattle, said. “But I’m not a legislator making public policy. I’m a lawyer representing an individual client.”

He’s never heard of the university coming after someone for breaching confidentiality, but Wampold said if a client were asked to speak about a case with an NDA, he’d likely advise them not to, or at the least “very carefully monitor that conversation.”

And that’s what Wampold did when Ruby Blondell decided to talk to NBC News.

Douglas Roach plays with his grandchildren after he was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2017. (Courtesy Ruby Blondell)

Blondell recently recounted how, after her husband, Douglas Roach, learned he had stage 4 lung cancer in 2017 and faced certain death, he pored over all his UW medical records.

“He was an attorney, and his immediate reaction was, ‘Whose fault is it?” said Blondell, 69, a retired UW classics professor. He soon found the explanation he was looking for, she said.

With her lawyer, Wampold, monitoring her interview with NBC News, Blondell was careful not to elaborate much more about the medical malpractice lawsuit, so as not to violate a confidentiality clause in the couple’s settlement.

But the lawsuit lays out what she and her husband alleged happened. Roach had sought treatment from the University of Washington Medical Center in 2012 after injuring himself in a fall, the lawsuit states. After a radiologist ran a CT scan of his chest that revealed a suspicious lesion in his lungs, that physician “flagged the report as ‘critical.’”

“This critical finding was not communicated to Mr. Roach or his primary care physician, nor was it followed up on by his doctors at UWMC,” the lawsuit states.

Roach would only learn about it five years later, when he went to the emergency room “complaining of cough and chest pressure.” It was too late — doctors diagnosed him a short time later with terminal cancer, the suit states.

Blondell said her husband pursued the lawsuit as an act of love — to ensure she’d be financially secure after he died.

“We couldn’t afford our house without his income,” she said. “And Douglas loved this house.”

The university settled the case for $5 million without admitting wrongdoing in October 2018 — nearly two years to the day before Roach died at 62.

It’s one of at least four malpractice settlements over $1 million reviewed by NBC News that stemmed from allegations of misdiagnosed or mistreated cancers, three of which were blamed for deaths and one for disfigurement, records show. All four settlements included confidentiality clauses.

Blondell didn’t mind that the settlement amount wasn’t public, but worried that the incident would be “swept under the rug.”

Still, she didn’t think she could do anything about that. “I just always heard that these kinds of things usually did come with a confidentiality agreement,” she said. “I just thought it was par for the course.”

The NDA kept the settlement out of the headlines, Wampold noted. But Blondell interjected: “I probably wouldn’t have minded it being public, if in return we got accountability.”

Hana Hooper, now 26, received a new heart in 2018.
 (Polly Schaps / Courtesy American Heart Association)

Last month, the American Heart Association honored 26-year-old Hana Hooper as its “National Woman of Impact” — the charity’s top volunteer for a national fundraising and awareness campaign to combat heart disease in women.

Before Hooper’s latest triumph, her mother gushed with pride in a Facebook post, noting that Hana “fought to overcome” the challenges she’s faced from her stroke, blindness and heart transplant.

“She went from unable to move, talk or walk, to throwing pottery, rock climbing, skiing and so much more,” she wrote.

But Hana faced additional obstacles that her mother cannot publicly share in social media posts under the NDA.

After Mokadam removed Hana from the transplant list, her lawsuit says, a different UW heart surgeon, Daniel Fishbein, rejected his colleague’s assertion that excessive plaque in Hana’s main cardiac artery made her ineligible for a transplant. He arranged for Hana to get second opinions at two out-of-state hospitals. Both relisted Hana as a top priority for transplant. She got her new heart in 2018, court records say.

“I am grateful to be alive today,” Hana said in a press release about her award.

Since leaving Washington for Ohio State University in 2018, just three months before Hana’s successful transplant, Mokadam has had reason to be grateful, too. His latest role as a full-tenured professor and heart surgeon now earns him more than $1 million annually — over $400,000 more than what he earned in his last full year at the University of Washington, records show.

Shortly after taking his prominent new role, Mokadam introduced himself to the Ohio State community in a video posted online. What drew him to his work, he said, was “the ability to help people at the moment when they needed it the most.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
Harvard UFO study claiming aliens could be on Earth disguised as humans is a 'thought experiment,' expert says  



Louis Casiano
Thu, June 13, 2024 

A recent paper published by Harvard and Montana Technological University which speculates that an unidentified, technologically advanced population could possibly be living secretly among humans on Earth seems to be more of a "thought experiment" than an attempt to prove it so, a UFO expert said.

The team that wrote the paper hypothesized that sightings of UFOs, or UAP, unidentified anomalous phenomena, "may reflect activities of intelligent beings concealed in stealth here on Earth … and/or even walking among us."

The beings could be disguising themselves as humans to blend in, and may have come from Earth’s future or might have descended from intelligent dinosaurs, the researchers said.


Recording of UFO flying by the USS Omaha off the coast of San Diego in July 2019.

"I see this more as a thought experiment. Just putting some ideas out there in a way to try and break away from this rather binary ‘either it’s aliens or it's just a misidentification,'" Nick Pope, who ran the British government’s UFO program, told Fox News Digital. "They're not claiming to have found any evidence of this, but they're trying to kickstart a debate about this, not just with the public but inside science and academica, which has traditionally been very stuffy and skeptical about all this."

The academics at Harvard and MTU admitted that their research may be regarded with skepticism by many, but urged the scientific community to consider their claim "in a spirit of epistemic humility and openness."

The scientists explained the hypothesis of aliens on Earth.

They believe that "remnant forms," which are beings from an ancient, highly advanced human civilization, are walking among humans on earth. The researchers also shared the possible existence of a non-human underground civilization that may be "descendants of unknown, intelligent dinosaurs."

Third, there could be hidden occupants, likened to earthbound angels or fairies, on Earth that have traveled to Earth.

RUSSIAN UFO ENGAGEMENTS, SECRET ‘TIC TAC’ REPORT AND 3 KEY FIGURES SLIP UNDER RADAR AT CONGRESSIONAL HEARING


A paper published by Harvard and Montana Technological universities speculates that an unidentified, technologically advanced population could possibly be living secretly among humans on Earth.

Despite the assumption in popular lore that UFOs could be spaceships, many are just objects that can't be readily identified, such as drones and satellites, said Pope, who analyzed UFO sightings while working for the British Ministry of Defense.

"We looked at about 200 to 300 reports each year," he said. "Most were misidentifications, but some were more interesting, particularly when our pilots saw them."

The federal government has for decades been tight-lipped about information on UFOs, which has fueled conspiracy theories about what it knows. During a May 23 Congressional Oversight Committee, Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., asked Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Jennifer Granholm about "suspicious occurrences" of UFOs around nuclear facilities.

She said the Department of Defense concluded there's no evidence of UFOs or aliens.

"But there may be drones that may be nefarious," said Granholm, who emphasized there are safety protocols and defenses in place.

A Fox News Digital-created UFO hotspot map based off information from the Department of Defense.


Pope said governments hide things from the public all the time, but whether they possess crashed UFOs or aliens in a hanger somewhere isn't known.

"I don't know that but I know a lot do believe it and take it seriously," he said. "That's why I think it's interesting after years of ignoring this subject, Congress is now looking into it more closely. And they've had some classified briefings, but they've also had some public hearings. So there's no smoke without fire."

Fox News Digital's Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Chris Eberhart contributed to this report.




Original article source: Harvard UFO study claiming aliens could be on Earth disguised as humans is a 'thought experiment,' expert says

Harvard researchers suggest aliens may live among us, underground or on moon

Cameron Kiszla
Thu, June 13, 2024 a



A recent legitimization of reports of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena — commonly called UAPs and formerly referred to as UFOs — has brought more eyeballs to the possibility of extraterrestrial life.

While a long-awaited government report issued earlier this year “found no evidence of aliens or extraterrestrial intelligence,” as reported by the Associated Press, two professors from Harvard University and a colleague at Montana Technological University suggested humanity may just be looking in the wrong places.

Instead, reality could be something similar to science fiction movies like 1988’s “They Live,” in which special glasses allow a man to see the aliens who’ve disguised themselves as humans and live in plain sight.

“UAP may reflect activities of intelligent beings concealed in stealth here on Earth (e.g., underground), and/or its near environs (e.g., the moon), and/or even ‘walking among us’ (e.g., passing as humans),” wrote Tim Lomas and Brendan Case of Harvard’s Human Flourishing Program and biological anthropology professor Michael P. Masters of MTU in a report this month. “Although this idea is likely to be regarded [skeptically] by most scientists, such are the nature of some UAP that we argue this possibility should not be summarily dismissed, and instead deserves genuine consideration in a spirit of epistemic humility and openness.”

Did the government confirm aliens exist?

Their writing makes “a case for scientific openness to a concealed earthly explanation” for UAPs, argues that too often, scientists and others try to put UAPs into two categories: human-made technology and “extraterrestrial explanation,” something akin to ancient alien civilizations elsewhere in the universe.

While those explanations are probably more likely to be true than a lunar alien civilization, the researchers said, but that’s no reason to discount it entirely.

Such theories “are far-fetched on their face; we entertain them here because some aspects of UAP are strange enough that they seem to call for unconventional explanations,” they said.

I want to believe: Trump gives surprising answer on the existence of UFOs

Josh Marcus
Thu, June 13, 2024

Donald Trump has revealed whether he believes in UFOs during an interview with social media personality Logan Paul released on Thursday.

While the former president said he doesn’t personally believe in UFOs, he acknowledged the growing contingent of people in- and outside of government who believe aliens exist might have a point.

Trump described meeting with military pilots who had strange encounters with unidentified anomalous phenomena, as the government refers to them.

“I met with pilots, like beautiful — Tom Cruise but taller — handsome perfect, people. ‘Sir, there was something there that was round in form and going like four times faster than my super jet fighter plane,’” Trump recalled being told. “And I looked at these guys and they really mean it.”

“Am I a believer? No,” Trump continued. “Probably I can’t say I am. But I have met with people that are serious people that say there’s some really strange things that they see flying around out there.”

Donald Trump talked UFOs and a whether he believes they exist when he sat down with Logan Paul for an hour-long interview. (Impaulsive/YouTube)

The former president then joked that he’s more unconcerned about “illegal aliens,” a derogatory name for undocumented migrants, than space aliens.

“When you say aliens, I say, ‘Are they illegal aliens?’” Trump told the podcast hosts.

“These [UFOs] might be illegal, but we don’t want to test them.”

Trump said he’s constantly asked by members of the public about aliens and legendary incidents like the 1947 UFO sighting in Roswell, New Mexico.

“You have no idea how many times I’m asked that question,” he said.

In April of 2020, during the final year of the Trump administration, the Pentagon released a series of videos of military pilots encountering UAPs. It followed up the release with a futher bundle of videos the following year.
    China says 2 military employees sold 60 pounds of secret documents to a recycling plant, allowing a shopper to bag 4 volumes for under $1


    Matthew Loh
    Thu, June 13, 2024 



  • China on Thursday highlighted an intelligence gaffe involving 200 sensitive military documents.

  • It said two military personnel who were supposed to destroy the documents sold them for under $4.

  • A retiree bought four volumes of the secrets for about $0.85 from a recycling plant, authorities said.

China's State Security Ministry said on Thursday that a retiree had somehow secured four volumes of confidential military documents at a recycling store for just 85 cents.

The ministry described the incident in a social media post encouraging the public to be vigilant on national security matters, and praised the retiree for reporting the documents to authorities.

He was identified as "Grandpa Zhang." Chinese authorities and media typically do not publish the full names of people who don't have a high profile.

According to the post, Zhang is a former employee of a state-owned enterprise and collects military newspapers and magazines as a hobby.

He was walking in his neighborhood when he passed a scrap store selling two bags filled with books that seemed related to the military, per authorities.

Excited with his find, he paid about 6 Chinese yuan, or $0.85, for one bag of four volumes and brought them home, according to the ministry.

At home, Zhang studied the books, realized they were marked as "confidential" and "secret," and reported them to a public security hotline, authorities added.

The State Security Ministry said agents rushed to Zhang's home and seized the documents. The ministry did not say where Zhang lives.

Upon investigating the scrap store, the state security ministry discovered that Zhang's purchase had been part of eight volumes of 200 secret documents marked for disposal, the post reads.

It said two military personnel in a classified unit, who were identified only as Guo and Li, were tasked with shredding the documents but instead sold them to a recycling plant for about $0.06 per pound. The entire tranche of documents weighed about 60 pounds, meaning the duo made a profit of less than $4 for the entire sale, authorities added.

The ministry criticized the pair as having a "weak sense of confidentiality" and "greed for convenience's sake" but said that the incident did not create a significant intelligence leak.

It said that Guo and Li, as well as anyone else responsible, were dealt with under Chinese law and that the ministry oversaw a revamp of procedures to avoid similar gaffes.

The post on Thursday was part of a push by the State Security Ministry to promote a hotline that Chinese people can use to report national security lapses.

It's unclear what information the documents mentioned by the ministry contained, so it's difficult to say how a leak of such secrets may have affected the Chinese military.

China's State Security Ministry has, in recent months, regularly urged the public to assist in reporting foreign espionage. In April 2023, Beijing made sweeping changes to its anti-espionage law. These changes broadened the definition of spying and banned the transfer of national security information.

Such posturing from China also comes against the backdrop of heightened US-China tensions, particularly over allegations of espionage between the two rivals. The CIA announced in 2021 that it had established a mission center focused solely on China, while Beijing has recently been on the radar for imprisoning businessmen from the US and its allied countries on accusations of spying.

In July 2023, CIA Director William Burns rankled Beijing by saying at a Colorado security forum that his agency has been recruiting businesspeople and Chinese officials for its spy networks.

"We've made progress and we're working very hard over recent years to ensure that we have a strong human intelligence capability to complement what we can acquire through other methods," he said, per The Wall Street Journal.

China, in return, accused Burns of lying and vowed to take "all necessary" countermeasures to American espionage.

Palestinian groups demand inspection of Israeli prisons as detainees are released with chronic health problems

Kareem Khadder and Tim Lister, CNN
Fri, June 14, 2024 


The Palestinian Legislative Council in Gaza has demanded international inspections of Israeli detention centers, after the release of a number of prisoners this week who appeared frail and thin after several months in detention.

Among those released was the Council’s former Speaker, Aziz Dweik, who had been held for nine months, accused of affiliation with Hamas. He appeared much thinner and greyer than before being detained.

The Council said it “looks with anger at the crimes committed by the enemy against the prisoners, and the greatest example is the photo of Dr. Aziz Dweik when he left the occupation prisons.”

The Council alleged that the prisoners had been subjected to starvation, isolation and torture.

Dweik himself said Friday that prisoners were “starved for 24 hours a day. The prisoners are in poor health conditions, suffering from skin diseases, and the food is insufficient even for children, let alone meeting the needs of men.”

He added that sugar, salt, and fruit were virtually absent in the prisons.

CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces and prison authorities for a response to the allegations made by the Council.

Most of the approximately 30 prisoners released from the Negev and Ofer prisoners this week were administrative detainees, who had not been charged with any offenses.

One of them, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society, was Saed Abu Shanab from Tulkarm, who had spent 21 years in Israeli prisons.

The Prisoners’ Society said that the condition of the prisoners “reflect some of the harsh and humiliating conditions of detention, including acts of torture, abuse and starvation, in addition to medical crimes.”

In May, CNN published an investigation based on testimonies from whistleblowers at the Negev facility which reported that “doctors sometimes amputated prisoners’ limbs due to injuries sustained from constant handcuffing; [and] of medical procedures sometimes performed by underqualified medics.”

In response to that reporting, the IDF responded that it “ensures proper conduct towards the detainees in custody. Any allegation of misconduct by IDF soldiers is examined and dealt with accordingly.”

The Israeli military has acknowledged partially converting three different military facilities into detention camps for Palestinian detainees from Gaza since the Hamas-led October 7 attack on Israel.

The Prisoners’ Society said in April that the vast majority of detainees released suffered from health problems “which required the transfer of some of them to the hospital immediately upon their release.”
Dems slam ‘shameful’ House Republicans who voted to restore ‘mammy’ statue in Arlington
ONLY IF SHE IS SPANKING A WHITE BOY OVER HER KNEE

Ariana Baio
Fri, June 14, 2024

Hakeem Jeffries condemned his Republican colleagues who attempted to restore a Confederate statue (AP)

Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the top Democrat in the House, reprimanded 192 of his Republican colleagues who voted in favor of restoring a Confederate statue, depicting a Black “mammy,” in Arlington National Cemetary — calling the decision “shameful.”

“What is this rationale?” Jeffries said in a news conference on Friday. “In a time where America is facing a dangerous world with challenges all across the globe, to decide you want to restore a confederate monument to Arlington National Cemetary.”

On Thursday evening, the group of House Republicans, led by Georgia Rep. Andrew Clyde, voted to restore the Reconciliation Monument as part of an amendment to the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act. But the measure ultimately failed with a 192-230 vote.

The statue, which was taken down in December, was commemorative of the Confederacy and features a Black “mammy” holding the child of a white officer. Black “mammies” were stereotypical portrayals of enslaved women in the American South who were depicted as happy and loyal to white families.

“What exactly is the confederate tradition that extreme MAGA republicans, in 2024, are upholding and you want to use the National Defense Authorization Act to turn back the clock on progress that has been made,” Jeffries said on Friday.

He added, “Is it slavery, rape, kidnap, Jim Crow, lynching, racial oppression or all of the above?”

Jeffries specially called out his Republican colleagues from New York — Anthony D’Esposito, Marc Molinaro and Brandon Williams — for voting in favor of the amendment.

“In the United States of America, it’s shameful,” Jeffries said.

The Confederate statue in Arlington was one of many around the country that were re-evaluated after a national push to remove or rename monuments that commemorate the Confederacy.

The National Museum of African American History & Culture says that the presence of Confederate statues highlights “the honor and virtue of the Confederacy” and frames the South’s struggle as one “against a federal government infringing on its rights” while ignoring the key role that the issue of slavery played.

“What’s lost in this story is what the south was also fighting for: the protection of a true, white America,” the museum says.

Workers dismantle the Confederate Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery December 20, 2023, in Arlington, Virginia (AFP via Getty Images)

In response to Jeffries, Clyde released a statement saying it “pains” him “to see the fabric of our nation unraveling and the history of our country crumbling by the day.”

“Many founding principles and symbols that make the United States the greatest country in the world have been demonized to sow discord for nefarious political gain,” he told the Atlanta Journal-Constituion.

Clyde called the removal of the Reconciliation Monument a “powerful example of this deliberate division.”


Meanwhile, Democratic Rep. Don Beyer, of Virginia, denounced his Republican colleagues’ attempt to hold onto a “humilating portrayal” of enslaved people.

“Today is not the 1920s, it’s not the 1950s, so it’s so disheartening to see a lost cause amendment come before the House in the year 2024,” Beyer said.

He added, “An enslaved woman is depicted as a mammy. She is holding the infant child of a white officer, and an enslaved man is following his owner to war. It is very difficult to see how the humiliating portrayal of a slave woman and a slave man represents reconciliation.”





230-192: A GOP-sponsored effort to restore a Confederate monument to Arlington National Cemetery fails in the House.
The Recount
Fri, June 14, 2024 



The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday rejected an effort to restore a Confederate monument to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia by a 230-192 vote.

Twenty-four Republicans, including two of the four Black House Republicans, joined all present Democrats to vote down an amendment from Rep. Andrew Clyde that would have restored the Confederate memorial to one of the country’s major military cemeteries. The Georgia Republican introduced the amendment to the House’s $883 billion defense programs and policy bill for the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act.

The monument, first constructed in 1914 and removed in 2023, depicts a Black woman tending to the child of a Confederate soldier. Its relocation was recommended by a Department of Defense commission, which began in 2021 in the wake of the 2020 racial justice protests and has also been responsible for renaming formerly Confederate-named military bases. With the vote’s failure, the monument is set to be moved to a nearby historical park.


Almost 9 In 10 House Republicans Voted To Put A Confederate Memorial Back At Arlington National Cemetery


Jonathan Nicholson
Updated Fri, June 14, 2024


The overwhelming majority of House Republicans voted to have a memorial to Confederate soldiers reinstalled at Arlington National Cemetery, drawing a sharp rebuke from Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Congress’ highest-ranking Black lawmaker.


The vote Thursday was on an amendment to the annual defense policy bill that’s seen as a must-pass piece of legislation. It would have required the secretary of the Army to reinstall the memorial in its original location in the nation’s most celebrated military veteran graveyard and not designate it as anything other than a “reconciliation” memorial or monument.

The amendment, though, failed to get a majority, as Democrats voted unanimously against it and were joined by 24 GOP House members. But 192 Republicans, or about 87% of the party in the House, voted in favor, drawing fire Friday morning from Jeffries.

“What is the rationale?” he asked, dismissing arguments proponents had made about the historical role of the monument.

“What Confederate tradition are you upholding? Is it slavery? Rape? Kidnap? Jim Crow? Lynching? Racial oppression? Or all of the above? What exactly is the Confederate tradition that extreme [Make America Great Again] Republicans in 2024 are upholding?”

A defense policy bill that passed over then-President Donald Trump’s veto in the waning days of his administration required the monument’s removal.

The art piece was unveiled in 1914 and sculpted by a Confederate veteran, Moses Jacob Ezekiel. Made of bronze and resting on a 32-foot granite pedestal, it featured a woman symbolizing the South holding a laurel wreath, a plow handle and a pruning hook, a reference to the biblical promise of a time when swords would be turned into plowshares.

Below her was a frieze of 32 figures, which “depict mythical gods alongside Southern soldiers and civilians,” according to the cemetery’s website. Among those figures are a Confederate soldier handing off his infant to an enslaved African American woman for caretaking and an enslaved man in uniform following his owner into battle.

In December 2023, the bronze elements making up most of the memorial were removed while the now-empty granite pedestal was left intact to avoid disturbing graves nearby.

Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), the amendment’s sponsor, said on the House floor that the memorial had been intended to help bring Americans together and had historical significance.

“Let us unite against the destruction of our history. Let us fight for the principles of healing and unity, which is exactly what this memorial was created to accomplish,” he said.

Asked about Jeffries’ criticism Friday, Clyde said calling the sculpture a Confederate memorial was unfair.

“If you go back and you look at the speeches when that monument was dedicated, you will see it was all about unity, healing,” he said. “That’s what it was about. And to say anything else is disingenuous. And honestly, a flat-out lie.”

Arlington National Cemetery, however, begs to differ, calling the monument simply a “Confederate Memorial” on its website and noting its “highly sanitized depictions of slavery.”

In the debate on the amendment, Rep. Jennifer McClellan (D-Va.) said the memorial’s dedication in 1914, well after the Civil War and Reconstruction, and its subject matter show it was not meant to be unifying.

“When this monument was placed, the gentleman said it was for reconciliation, but for who? Not for the Black Americans who saw that monument then, and even today, and see the images of a mammy and a loyal slave following his master into battle. They know what that means,” she said.

“It conjures up the stereotypes that were used to help build the lie of white supremacy, and the stereotypes that were used to help convince Black people to stay in their place,” McClellan said.

Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) agreed.

“It is very difficult to see how the humiliating portrayal of a slave woman and a slave man represents reconciliation,” he said.

Arthur Delaney contributed reporting.