World News

5 hurdles to Senate passage of revised health care bill WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans hope their latest proposed bill to replace Obamacare will attract enough votes from the moderate and conservative wings of their party to pass next week.  But there are at least five hurdles that could derail efforts to reach consensus. They include: 1. The bill still makes major cuts to Medicaid More than 14 million Americans gained eligibility for Medicaid through Obamacare, and they could lose that coverage under the Senate bill, which phases out federal funds by 2024 for expanded Medicaid coverage. That's a problem for some moderate Republicans, who worry that their most vulnerable constituents will be harmed. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, cited those cuts in a tweet Thursday saying that she will vote against a procedural motion to bring the bill to the floor, known as a "motion to proceed." Patients who rely on Medicaid to get treatment for opioid abuse also could lose that c...

Rob Goldstone, Trump Intermediary, Likes Silly Hats and Facebook A new peripheral character in the Trump universe stepped into the spotlight this week: the entertainment publicist and former tabloid reporter Rob Goldstone.This is the man who facilitated a meeting last year between Donald Trump Jr. and Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer and Moscow insider, with the promise of information that “would incriminate Hillary [Clinton] and her dealings with Russia.”

‘A million miles per hour’: Inside Trump’s campaign when Trump Jr. met with Russian lawyer....Farhan It was June 7, 2016, and Donald  stood on the stage at his Westchester County, N.Y., golf club to launch his general-election race against Hillary Clinton with a big promise. “I am going to give a major speech,” Trump declared, before his gaze drifted away from the prepared remarks on the teleprompter at the close of an unusually subdued primary-night speech. “Probably Monday of next week. And we’re going to be discussing all of the things that have taken place with the Clintons. Subscribe to the Post's Must Reads newsletter: Compelling stories you can't afford to miss “I think you’re going to find it very informative and very, very interesting,” he added.  Hours earlier, his son Donald Jr. hit send on an email confirming a meeting with a lawyer with alleged ties to the Russian government with the promise of damaging information about Hillary Clinton. The meeting occurred...

Investigators sift for clues in Mississippi military crash ITTA BENA, Miss. — With debris scattered for miles across the flat countryside of the Mississippi Delta, federal and local officials combed soybean fields for clues in a military plane crash that killed 15 Marines and a Navy sailor. Six of the Marines and the sailor were from an elite Marine Raider battalion at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and were headed for pre-deployment training in Yuma, Arizona, the Marine Corps said Tuesday. Several bouquets were left at the main gate of Stewart Air National Guard Base in Newburgh, New York, where the plane was based. Officials said some of those killed were from the base, but Stewart was closed to reporters and did not issue a statement. "We're feeling the pain that everybody else is," Robert Brush said after dropping off three pots of red, white and blue petunias. He works for a landscaping company that serves the base. Military officials continued to withhold the na...

Giant Antarctic iceberg breaks free of Larsen C ice shelf A giant iceberg twice the size of Luxembourg has broken off an ice shelf on the Antarctic peninsula and is now adrift in the Weddell Sea. Reported to be “hanging by a thread” last month, the iceberg was found to have split off from the Larsen C section of the Larsen ice shelf on Wednesday morning after scientists examined the latest satellite data from the area. The Larsen C ice shelf is now 10% smaller than before the iceberg broke off – or “calved” – an event that researchers say has changed the shape of the Antarctic peninsula. Graphic At 5,800 sq km the new iceberg is half as big as the record-holding iceberg B-15 which split off from the Ross ice shelf in the year 2000, but it is nonetheless believed to be among the 10 largest icebergs ever recorded. “It is a really major event in terms of the size of the ice tablet that we’ve got now drifting away,” said Anna Hogg, an expert in satellite observations of glaciers from...

‘Category 5 hurricane’: White House under siege by Trump Jr.’s Russia revelations The White House has been thrust into chaos after days of ever-worsening revelations about a meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and a lawyer characterized as representing the Russian government, as the president fumes against his enemies and senior aides circle one another with suspicion, according to top White House officials and outside advisers. President Trump — who has been hidden from public view since returning last weekend from a divisive international summit — is enraged that the Russia cloud still hangs over his presidency and is exasperated that his eldest son and namesake has become engulfed by it, said people who have spoken with him this week. Subscribe to the Post's Must Reads newsletter: Compelling stories you can't afford to miss The disclosure that Trump Jr. met with a Russian attorney, believing he would receive incriminating information about Hillary Clinton as part of the Kre...