WASHINGTON – The Senate on Tuesday stumbled over a must-do bill to prevent the government from shutting down this weekend and to fund the fight against the Zika virus. Democrats, demanding money so Flint, Michigan, can address its lead-contaminated water crisis, overwhelmingly opposed the measure, as did a dozen of the Senate’s most conservative members.
The 45-55 vote stalls the stopgap funding bill – for now at least – and is exasperating top Republicans like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who made several concessions to Democrats in weeks of negotiations over the measure.
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Tuesday announced career diplomat Jeffrey DeLaurentis as his choice to become the first U.S. ambassador to Cuba in more than a half-century, a move that sets up a possible fight with congressional critics of Obama’s overtures to the communist island nation.
DeLaurentis currently is the top diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Havana.
Senate confirmation is required but will be tough for the White House to win before Obama’s term ends.
JERUSALEM – Former Israeli President Shimon Peres, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and elder statesman of Israeli politics, has died, the Israeli news website YNet is reporting. He was 93.
Peres’ condition worsened following a major stroke two weeks ago.
He was one of the country’s most admired leaders at home and abroad and the last surviving link to Israel’s founding fathers.
He filled nearly every position in Israeli public life in an unprecedented seven-decade political career.
Associated Press
