Tag Archives: Department of the Treasury

Syrian Relief Leader Urges US to Lift Sanctions Hindering Post-Earthquake Rescue Effort

“We need heavy equipment, ambulances, and firefighting vehicles to continue to rescue and remove the rubble, and this entails lifting sanctions on Syria as soon as possible,” said the head of a leading humanitarian group.

By Kenny Stancil Published 2-8-2023 by Common Dreams

A disaster response expert has implored the United States to lift its economic sanctions against Syria, warning that the restrictions are hampering rescue and relief operations in the earthquake-ravaged country.

“We need heavy equipment, ambulances, and firefighting vehicles to continue to rescue and remove the rubble, and this entails lifting sanctions on Syria as soon as possible,” Khaled Hboubati, president of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, said Tuesday at a press conference. Continue reading →

Why America has a debt ceiling: 5 questions answered

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*The sky’s not always the limit.*
*AP Photo/Susan Walsh*

Steven Pressman, The New School

Republicans and Democrats are again preparing to play a game of chicken over the U.S. debt ceiling – with the nation’s financial stability at stake.

The Treasury Department on Jan. 13, 2023, said it expects the U.S. to hit the current debt limit of US$31.38 trillion on Jan. 19. After that, the government will take “extraordinary measures” – which could extend the deadline until May or June – to avoid default.

But it’s not clear whether Republicans in the House will agree to lifting the debt ceiling without strings attached – strings that President Joe Biden and Senate Democrats have vowed to reject. Right-wing Republicans demanded that, in exchange for voting for Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House, he would seek steep government spending cuts as a condition of raising the borrowing limit. Continue reading →

Lame-Duck Dems Must Lift Debt Limit, Advocates Say as GOP Doubles Down on Social Security Threats

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“Democrats must do whatever it takes to defeat Republican attacks on our earned Social Security benefits,” said one advocate. “That means raising the debt ceiling this year, before Republicans take control of the House.”

By Julia Conley. Published 11-30-2022 by Common Dreams

#StoptheShutdown Press Conference with Speaker Pelosi and Senator Schumer in 2019. Photo: AFGE/flickr/CC

Progressives on Wednesday warned that time is running out for Democratic leaders to take Republicans at their word regarding slashes to social safety net programs, as U.S. Sen. John Thune indicated the GOP will use a potential fight over the debt ceiling next year as leverage to push cuts—unless the Democrats act now to raise the debt limit while they still control the Senate and House.

Thune (R-S.D.), who is the number-two Republican in the Senate as the chamber’s minority whip, told Bloomberg Tuesday that the party has a “long list” of policy priorities for the next Congress, which will commence on January 3. The party plans to put forward budget reforms including to federal programs which they have long claimed, erroneously, are unsustainable. Continue reading →

Alabama GOP Condemned for Plan to Build Prisons With Covid-19 Funds

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“The Republican Party in a nutshell: contemptible, cruel, and corrupt.”

By Julia Conley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 9-29-2021

Advocates on Wednesday condemned Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey for her plan to use coronavirus relief funds to construct prisons. (Photo: Josh Rushing/cc/ACLU of Louisiana)

Local activists in Montgomery, Alabama were joined by rights advocates across the country on Wednesday in condemning Republican Gov. Kay Ivey’s plan to use federal coronavirus relief funds to build three new prisons in the state—what the governor called “an Alabama solution to this Alabama problem” of overcrowding.

At a rally outside the State House as legislators debated the plan, demonstrators spoke about some of the inmates and prison workers who have died of Covid-19—at least 69 people, according to the Alabama Political Reporter. Continue reading →

‘Catastrophe’ Feared as 35 Million People Are Set to Lose Jobless Aid in 3 Days

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“Millions will suffer as they lose this critical source of income and the loss of spending will suppress job growth.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 9-3-2021

Members of the Georgia State Defense Force from across the state pack supply boxes at Second Harvest of South Georgia food bank in Valdosta, Ga. Photo: Georgia National Guard/Wikimedia/CC

Millions of jobless workers are set to lose critical unemployment benefits in roughly 72 hours—and neither Congress nor the Biden administration seem prepared to do anything about it.

Despite the ongoing threat posed by the highly transmissible Delta variant, the White House and Democratic lawmakers have provided no indication that they plan to prevent several pandemic-related unemployment programs from expiring on September 6, which—in a cruel irony—happens to be Labor Day. Continue reading →

Biden Admin Urged to ‘Prevent a Historic Wave of Evictions’ by Extending CDC Moratorium, Speeding Up Aid

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“Far too many renters are struggling to access emergency rental assistance programs and are at risk of losing their homes when the moratorium expires,” said the president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

By Kenny Stancil, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-15-2021

Photo: AFSC

The National Low Income Housing Coalition is calling on the Biden administration to “prevent a historic wave of evictions this summer by extending, strengthening, and enforcing the federal eviction moratorium and by implementing a whole-of-government approach to distribute emergency rental assistance more efficiently and effectively to those most in need.”

The national moratorium on residential evictions for nonpayment of rent—a life-saving measure issued last September by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to curb the spread of Covid-19—is set to expire on June 30. CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said that discussions are ongoing as to whether the agency will prolong its partial ban on evictions. Continue reading →

100 years after the Tulsa Race Massacre, lessons from my grandfather

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Gregory B. Fairchild, University of Virginia

When Viola Fletcher, 107, appeared before Congress in May 2021, she called for the nation to officially acknowledge the Tulsa race riot of 1921.

I know that place and year well. As is the case with Fletcher – who is one of the last living survivors of the massacre, which took place when she was 7 – the terror of the Tulsa race riot is something that has been with me for almost as long as I can remember. My grandfather, Robert Fairchild, told the story nearly a quarter-century ago to several newspapers. Continue reading →

Regavim: The Israeli Faux Environmental Org Converting US Donations into Palestinian Evictions

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Funded largely through tax-deductible donations from the United States, Regavim petitions the Israeli government to evict Palestinians under the guise of protecting the environment.

By Jessica Buxbaum Published 5-5-2021 by MintPress News

Israel police guard a military bulldozer at it destroys a Palestinian home in the South Hebron Hills. Photo: International Solidarity Movement.

In the village of Khan al-Ahmar in the occupied West Bank, dozens of Bedouin families are at risk of losing their homes and becoming refugees again by July. While it is the Israeli government and military that are enacting the demolitions and evacuations, their efforts are largely driven by a pro-settler nonprofit supported by American charities.

While it is masked as an environmental organization, Regavim’s work involves petitioning the Israeli government to demolish structures and pursue evictions for Palestinians and Bedouins under the guise of protecting “Israel’s most precious and scarce resources: land reserves, water, air quality” — though much of the organization’s focus is on occupied Palestinian territory. Regavim’s most recent targets have been the villages of Khan al-Ahmar and Susya, located in Area C of the West Bank, which is under total Israeli military control. Israel rarely approves building permits for the indigenous people in Area C so the majority of Palestinian and Bedouin construction there is deemed illegal. Continue reading →

Trump Holdovers Accused of ‘Sabotaging’ Effort to Get Checks to 30 Million Social Security Recipients

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“President Biden can’t stand for this any longer. He must protect Social Security beneficiaries by firing Saul and Black immediately.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 9-25-2021

Graphic: SocialSecurityWorks/Twitter

House Democrats and progressive activists are accusing the leadership of the Social Security Administration—currently headed by Trump holdover Andrew Saul—of slow-walking the Biden administration’s effort to distribute direct coronavirus relief payments to tens of millions of seniors and people with disabilities.

In a letter (pdf) to Saul on Wednesday, Democratic members of the House Ways and Means Committee raised alarm on behalf of “the nearly 30 million Social Security and Supplemental Security Income beneficiaries who are still awaiting their economic impact payments (EIPs)”—checks approved under the recently passed American Rescue Plan. Continue reading →

‘Insane and Pathological’: Head of Iran’s Central Bank Says US Blocking Covid-19 Vaccine Purchases

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The Trump administration is allegedly using sanctions to thwart Iran’s efforts to obtain vaccine stock through the WHO’s COVAX program.

By Brett Wilkins, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 12-7-2020

Coronavirus patients at the Imam Khomeini Hospital in Tehran, Iran in March 2020. Photo: Fars News Agency, CC BY 4.0

The head of Iran’s central bank on Monday accused the U.S. government of actively blocking the country from purchasing stocks of coronavirus vaccine through the World Health Organization’s COVAX program.

Al Jazeera reports Abdolnasser Hemmati said on Instagram that it should be “recorded in historical memory” that crippling U.S.-led sanctions against the Islamic Republic are preventing the country from buying vaccines against the potentially deadly virus through COVAX, the WHO-led global initiative to fast-track development, production, and equitable worldwide distribution of a coronavirus vaccine. Continue reading →

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The Movement Continues – Globally

Tag Archives: Department of the Treasury