The Godfather's Daughter: An Unlikely Story of Greed, Treason, and Corruption

China Approved More Ivanka Trump Trademarks the Same Week As Daddy’s ZTE Pivot
By David Boddiger

Optics and ethics are two words that simply are lacking in the Trump family lexicon.
We already knew Donald Trump’s recent about-face on the Chinese telecom company ZTE—considered a national security threat by both Democrats and Republicans—was suspect. 

Shortly after Trump tweeted earlier this month that he was reversing policy on ZTE, news reports surfaced that the Chinese government had agreed to grant $500 million in loans to an Indonesian resort project that would directly enrich Donald Trump. 

The loan was announced just 72 hours before Trump tweeted his order to bail out ZTE from impending closure.
Now, the government ethics watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) is reporting that the Chinese government approved five trademark applications for Ivanka Trump’s businesses the same week Trump tweeted his pro-China reversal. 

Another trademark was approved the previous week.
The trademarks, applied for in March 2017, give the president’s daughter’s company rights in China on goods including bath mats, textiles, and baby blankets, CREW said.
“Ivanka Trump Marks LLC already holds more than a dozen trademarks in the country as well as multiple pending applications. China is also a major supplier of Ivanka Trump-branded merchandise,” CREW stated.
Ivanka has placed her part of the business that bears her name in a trust, but she continues to receive profits, the watchdog group said. 

Last year, three of her business’s trademark applications in China were approved the same day she and her husband, presidential adviser Jared Kushner, had dinner with Xi Jinping at the family’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
Also, Trump’s looming trade war with China by way of new tariffs on Chinese goods would conveniently exempt clothing, a not-so-subtle benefit to his daughter’s businesses.
On Friday, Trump announced via Twitter that he had struck a deal with ZTE to put the company back in business in exchange for China’s payment of a substantial fine, its placement of U.S. compliance officers at the firm, and changes to its management team, The New York Times reported. 

In doing so, Trump blamed former President Barack Obama and Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer, and Democrats in general, for ZTE’s past spying misdeeds, while unabashedly making himself out to be a hero.
But it isn’t just Democrats who are angered by Trump’s ZTE policy shift. 

Republican Sen. Marco Rubio spent all week “raising alarm bells” over Trump’s dealing, according to NBC News, including delivering a “25-minute tirade on the Senate floor.”
“Yes they have a deal in mind. It is a great deal... for #ZTE & China,” he tweeted on Friday.
Additionally, both chambers of Congress advanced amendments to block any executive action ordered by Trump that would benefit ZTE, NBC reported.

Corrupted Clown President

More than 60 lawmakers demand ethics investigation into Trump's relationship with China
BY MARY TYLER 

More than 60 Democratic representatives are demanding an ethics investigation into Trump's ties to China, following his recent push to rescue Chinese telecommunications firm ZTE.
Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) posted a letter to David Apol, acting head of the federal government's ethics office, to Twitter on Sunday, stating that the request was prompted by Trump "advocating" for ZTE just days after the Chinese government gave one of the president's business endeavors a $500 million loan.
In the letter, lawmakers say the business dealing between the Trump Organization and China may have violated U.S. laws forbidding public officials from accepting payments or gifts from foreign entities without Congress's approval.
"The Chinese government's loan provides a clear financial benefit to Trump," the letter reads. "Despite the nearly unanimous recommendation by legal experts that he divest from his business interests before assuming the presidency, he failed to do so, instead placing his adult children in charge of day-to-day operations."

NEW: Will be sending this letter with more than 60 colleagues to demand an ethics investigation into @realDonaldTrump advocating for a Chinese company just days after China’s government gave his company a $500 million loan. pic.twitter.com/EC2fbjz4gr— David Cicilline (@davidcicilline) May 27, 2018

Rep. David Cicilline

Because Trump still holds interests in his businesses via a revocable trust — an arrangement that allows him to draw funds at his discretion — the president will be able to oversee the project and "earn a profit if it succeeds," according to the letter.
The project, an Indonesian theme park and development that will house Trump-branded hotels and golf courses, snagged a $500 million loan from China earlier this month.
Three days after the loan was reported, Trump announced that he ordered his administration to buoy ZTE, saving it from financial collapse. 

Trump sought to revive ZTE earlier this month, roiling lawmakers on both sides of the aisle who have sought to fortify restrictions on the company's ties to the U.S.
Despite a wave of bipartisan pushback, Trump on Friday appeared to confirm that his administration had reached a deal to put ZTE back in business.
"I closed it down then let it reopen with high level security guarantees, change of management and board, must purchase U.S. parts and pay a $1.3 Billion fine," he tweeted late Friday. 

"Dems do nothing but complain and obstruct."
Cicilline and the letter's co-signatories raised alarm over the short time frame between the loan's announcement and Trump's hinting at a renewed deal with ZTE.
"We believe that these events raise several potential constitutional and ethical violations," the letter continues. 

"… [T]he extremely short time period between the Chinese's [sic] government's loan and Trump's order to roll back penalties on ZTE warrants a review of any applicable federal ethics regulations."
Lawmakers went on to ask the ethics office to investigate whether the administration improperly secured the $500 million loan from China, whether Trump sought and obtained congressional approval before accepting the loan, and whether Trump or a member of his administration violated federal statute regarding conflicts of interest or ethics in the decision to ease sanctions on ZTE.
"The Trump administration has yet to give a satisfactory answer about the reason behind and the appropriateness of making concessions to ZTE, a Chinese company that illegally sold U.S. technology to hostile regimes," they wrote. 

"The Trump administration has also completely failed to address the suspicious timing between this policy reversal and the Chinese government's loan to a Trump-linked project."
"As you know, the issue of U.S. policy being manipulated by a foreign entity or the personal business interests of a public official is of grave concern to the American people. We ask that you promptly conduct a review of this matter and keep us apprised periodically about the progress of your investigation," the letter concludes.
Lawmakers have expressed previous concerns about ZTE potentially threatening national security. 

A 2012 House Intelligence Committee report warned congressional leaders to be wary of doing business with ZTE and Chinese competitor Huawei.
ZTE was banned by the Commerce Department from buying tech components after it violated U.S. sanctions by selling equipment to North Korea and Iran.

Chinese Aggressions

U.S. warships sail near South China Sea islands claimed by Beijing
By Idrees Ali


WASHINGTON -- Two U.S. Navy warships sailed near South China Sea islands claimed by China on Sunday, two U.S. officials told Reuters, in a move that drew condemnation from Beijing as Donald Trump seeks its continued cooperation on North Korea.
The operation was the latest attempt to counter Beijing’s efforts to limit freedom of navigation in the strategic waters.
While this operation had been planned months in advance, and similar operations have become routine, it comes at a particularly sensitive time and just days after the Pentagon uninvited China from a major U.S.-hosted naval drill.
The U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Higgins guided-missile destroyer and the Antietam, a guided-missile cruiser, came within 12 nautical miles of the Paracel Islands, among a string of islets, reefs and shoals over which China has territorial disputes with its neighbors.
The U.S. military vessels carried out maneuvering operations near Tree, Lincoln, Triton and Woody islands in the Paracels, one of the officials said.
Trump’s cancellation of a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has put further strain on U.S.-China ties amid a trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies.
Critics of the operations, known as a “freedom of navigation,” have said that they have little impact on Chinese behavior and are largely symbolic.
The U.S. military has a long-standing position that its operations are carried out throughout the world, including in areas claimed by allies, and that they are separate from political considerations.
Satellite photographs taken on May 12 showed China appeared to have deployed truck-mounted surface-to-air missiles or anti-ship cruise missiles at Woody Island.
Earlier this month, China’s air force landed bombers on disputed islands and reefs in the South China Sea as part of a training exercise in the region, triggering concern from Vietnam and the Philippines.
The U.S. military did not directly comment on Sunday’s operation, but said U.S. forces operate in the region daily.
“We conduct routine and regular Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPs), as we have done in the past and will continue to do in the future,” U.S. Pacific Fleet said in a statement.
China’s Defense Ministry expressed its anger, saying it had sent ships and aircraft to warn the U.S. warships to leave, saying they had entered the country’s territorial waters without permission.
The move “contravened Chinese and relevant international law, seriously infringed upon Chinese sovereignty (and) harmed strategic mutual trust between the two militaries,” it said.
In a separate statement, China’s Foreign Ministry urged the United States to stop such actions.
“China will continue to take all necessary measures to defend the country’s sovereignty and security,” it added, without elaborating.

Triton island

CONTESTED SEA
Pentagon officials have long complained that China has not been candid enough about its rapid military build-up and using South China Sea islands to gather intelligence in the region.

Satellite photo dated March 28, 2018 shows Woody Island. 

In March, a U.S. Navy destroyer carried out a “freedom of navigation” operation close to Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands.
Chinese officials have accused Washington of viewing their country in suspicious, “Cold War” terms.
China’s claims in the South China Sea, through which about $5 trillion in shipborne trade passes each year, are contested by Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.
The United States has said it would like to see more international participation in freedom-of-navigation operations in the South China Sea.

China spy ring

Two French agents accused of spying for China

Reuters 

PARIS -- Two French former spies could face trial for treason over allegations that they passed state secrets to China, France’s defense ministry said.
Confirming the December arrests of two retired spies, along with the spouse of one of the accused pair, Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly said on Friday the compromised information “could undermine the security of the state”.
Quotidien, a TV show which first revealed the spying case, said China was involved.
A close adviser to President Emmanuel Macron on Friday stayed mum over which foreign country had obtained information from the agents, but suggested such a scenario would not derail relations between Paris and Beijing.
“We’re two big powers who know each other well,” the Macron adviser told reporters.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang declined to comment when asked about the allegations at a daily briefing in Beijing.
The agents have handed over secrets while still in service for France’s DGSE intelligence agency, Parly said on CNews television. 

Both were placed under formal investigation on Dec. 22 to face charges of spying for a foreign power, compromising classified secrets and delivering information detrimental to fundamental national interests, a judicial source told Reuters.
One of the former agents, who have not been identified, also faces charges of directly inciting treason, the source said.
French authorities have not said how recently the double agents are thought to have been operating.
The DGSE itself contacted French prosecutors after uncovering the “extremely serious” behavior of its agents, the defense ministry said in a statement late on Thursday.
“The fact that we sounded the alert is proof of our vigilance,” Parly said.

Axis of Evil

U.S. slaps heavy duties on Chinese steel shipped from Vietnam
Reuters

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Commerce Department on Monday slapped steep import duties on steel products from Vietnam that originated in China after a final finding they evaded U.S. anti-dumping and anti-subsidy orders.
The decision marked a victory for U.S. steelmakers, who won anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties against Chinese steel in 2015 and 2016 only to see shipments flood in from elsewhere. 

The industry has argued that Chinese products are being diverted to other countries to circumvent the duties.
U.S. customs authorities will collect anti-dumping duties of 199.76 percent and countervailing duties of 256.44 percent on imports of cold-rolled steel produced in Vietnam using Chinese-origin substrate, the Commerce Department said in a statement.
Corrosion-resistant steel from Vietnam faces anti-dumping duties of 199.43 percent and anti-subsidy duties of 39.05 percent, it said.
The department has said it would apply the same Chinese anti-dumping and anti-subsidy rates on corrosion-resistant and cold-rolled steel from Vietnam that starts out as Chinese-made hot-rolled steel.
The duties will come in addition to a 25 percent tariff on most steel imported into the United States that resulted from the Trump administration’s “Section 232” national security investigation into steel and aluminum imports.
Although the steel subject to the latest anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties was processed in Vietnam to be made corrosion resistant or cold-rolled for use in autos or appliances, the Commerce Department agreed with the claims of American producers that as much as 90 percent of the product’s value originated from China.
The global steel industry is struggling with a glut of excess production capacity, much of it located in China, that has pushed down prices.
The decision followed a European Union finding in November that steel shipments from Vietnam into the EU also circumvented tariffs.
The Commerce Department said that after anti-dumping duties were imposed on Chinese steel products in 2015, shipments of cold-rolled steel from Vietnam into the United States shot up to $215 million annually from $9 million, while corrosion-resistant steel imports rose to $80 million from $2 million.
The case stems from a petition filed by U.S. producers ArcelorMittal USA, Nucor Corp, AK Steel Holdings Corp and United States Steel Corp alleging that Chinese producers began diverting their steel shipments to Vietnam “immediately” after the duties were imposed. 

The last Maoists in China find refuge in capitalist Hong Kong

Suppressed on the mainland, Mao Zedong’s torch-bearers head to the southern city to mark the anniversary of the Cultural Revolution
By Jun Mai, Choi Chi-yuk

Hong Kong may be the heartland of capitalism but it is also the improbable last redoubt of the unlikeliest of Chinese dissidents – China’s band of Maoists.
The city has become the only place where the self-proclaimed holdouts of Mao Zedong’s cause and staunch opponents of market economics can keep the revolutionary flame burning in public.
The Maoists claim to be the true keepers of the late chairman’s faith and are nostalgic for the Cultural Revolution, a destructive decade that the Chinese government now describes as a period of “turbulence”.
Chen Hongtao, one of dozens of mainland Maoists who headed across the border last week for a demonstration to mark the 52nd anniversary of the start of the Cultural Revolution, said the Chinese authorities had suppressed such gatherings.
The march was organised by Hong Kong’s Mao Zedong Thought Society, an organisation registered in Kowloon City district.
“This [march] is approved and protected by the Hong Kong police. But it’d be impossible to think of doing the same on the mainland,” Chen said.
“Some comrades from the mainland have failed to make the trip due to all sorts of pressure and restrictions.
“It’s very peculiar for a country that claims to be a socialist nation ruled by the Communist Party.”
Those who did make it crossed the border in blue Mao-era military uniforms and waving hammer-and-sickle flags, according to a video circulating on social media.

Despite Beijing’s official line that Maoism is a central part of its ideology, hardline Maoists are very critical of the central government’s policies, blaming the market reforms launched after Mao’s death for widening the country’s wealth gap and rampant corruption.
Chen also lashed out at Beijing’s high-profile commemorations of the bicentenary of Marx’s birth, which included Xi Jinping saying in a speech the party had inherited and innovated with Marxism.
“[The government] never mentions that the core of Marxism is class struggle, or the ultimate mission of the Communists is to bring an end to private ownership,” Chen said.

China's Dirty Crimes: Sonic Experiments

US embassy worker's brain injury in China appears similar to those sustained by diplomats in Cuba 'sonic attacks'.
AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the US was moving medical teams to China over the 'sonic attack' 

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said a brain injury sustained by an American official in a "sonic attack" in China was similar to those that affected US and Canadian diplomats in Cuba.
Pompeo's remarks on Wednesday came hours after the US embassy in China issued a health warning to Americans living in the country an "unusual" auditory or sensory phenomena.
The embassy said a US government employee in the southern city of Guangzhou reported experiencing a "subtle and vague, but abnormal, sensations of sound and pressure", which led to a mild brain injury.
Pompeo told the House Foreign Affairs Committee the "sonic attack" in China was similar to the incidents in Cuba last year.
"The medical indications are very similar and entirely consistent with the medical indications that have taken place to Americans working in Cuba," he said.
The US was moving medical teams to the area to work on the case, he said.
"We are working to figure out what took place both in Havana and now in China as well," Pompeo said.
In Washington for talks with Pompeo, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the US should avoid politicising the case.
"We don't want to see that this individual case would be magnified, complicated or even politicised," Wang told reporters.

'Variety of symptoms'
Heather Nauert, the state department spokeswoman, said the US embassy learned on Friday that the Guangzhou employee showed concussion symptoms after medical testing.
That is the same clinical finding doctors treating the Cuba patients at the University of Philadelphia found.
The Guangzhou worker started experiencing "a variety of symptoms" starting in late 2017 that lasted through April this year, Nauert said.
The worker was sent to the US for further evaluation, she added.
In Cuba last year, 24 diplomats and their family members were left with mysterious injuries resembling brain trauma, which were suspected of being caused by a "sonic attack".
Ten Canadian diplomats and their relatives also suffered similar illnesses.
The still-unexplained incidents sparked a rift in US-Cuban relations, while investigators have chased theories including a sonic attack, an electromagnetic weapon, or a flawed spying device.
Symptoms, sounds and sensations reportedly varied dramatically from person to person, according to The Associated Press.
Some have permanent hearing loss or concussions, while others suffered nausea, headaches and ear-ringing. 

Some struggle with concentration or common word recall.