Iranian Hackers Allegedly Leak Trump Campaign’s 271-Page Dossier on JD Vance’s Weaknesses
The Trump campaign has claimed that a massive leak of internal documents, including a detailed 271-page file on Senator J.D. Vance’s (R-OH) potential vulnerabilities, may have been orchestrated by Iranian hackers. While these claims have yet to be confirmed, the leaked information has raised significant concerns within the campaign.
Politico, the outlet that received the leaked communications, reported that the documents were sent by an anonymous source claiming to have obtained them through hacking. The Trump campaign confirmed the authenticity of the communications on Saturday, attributing the leak to foreign entities hostile to the United States. According to campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung, these documents were obtained illegally with the intent to disrupt the 2024 election and create chaos within the American democratic process.
Supporting this claim, a recent report from Microsoft indicated that Iranian hackers had compromised the email account of a high-ranking official within the Trump campaign in June 2024. This hacking incident reportedly coincided with the period when President Trump was in the process of selecting his vice-presidential running mate.
The Microsoft report further detailed that another Iranian group, believed to be connected to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), attempted a spear phishing attack on a senior official in a presidential campaign. The phishing email, sent from the compromised account of a former senior advisor, contained a malicious link designed to reroute traffic through a domain controlled by the hackers.
Politico revealed that it began receiving emails on July 22 from an AOL account under the alias “Robert.” These emails included internal communications from the Trump campaign, with one email containing the extensive 271-page dossier on J.D. Vance titled “POTENTIAL VULNERABILITIES.” When questioned about the source of the documents, “Robert” advised Politico not to investigate further, suggesting that such inquiries could legally jeopardize the publication of the information.
This incident is not the first time Trump has been targeted by hackers. In 2020, his social media account was compromised when a hacker guessed his password, “maga2020!” Moreover, Trump has allegedly been the target of an Iranian assassination plot, leading to charges against a Pakistani man with ties to the Islamic Republic by the Department of Justice.
#Election2024 #CyberSecurity #Hacking #IranianHackers #TrumpCampaign #JDVance #PoliticalLeaks #ForeignInterference #CyberThreats #USPolitics
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Starmer and Macron plan to accompany Zelensky to White House on Trump visit
Sir Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron are considering accompanying Volodymyr Zelensky to Washington to salvage his relationship with Donald Trump.
The visit would be part of a three-pronged plan being worked out by Kyiv’s European allies after a dramatic spat in the Oval Office between the US and Ukrainian presidents led to Washington suspending military support for the war-torn nation.
“We are considering potentially having President Macron travel again to Washington, alongside President Zelensky and his British counterpart,” an Élysée Palace spokesman said.
“We’re currently engaged in tight negotiations which involve the French president, as well as the entire government.”
Mr Macron’s office later said there were no current plans for the trip, while No 10 also denied plans were under way.
It comes as Mike Waltz, the US president’s national security adviser, said the president would consider restoring aid to Ukraine if peace talks were arranged and “confidence-building measures on the table”.
#SirKeirStarmer #Macron #Zelensky #WhiteHouse
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Israel launches air attacks near Syria’s Tartous
Israel has carried out air strikes near Syria’s Mediterranean port city of Tartous, Syrian state media has reported.
An Israeli army statement on Monday said that its forces “struck a military site where weapons belonging to the previous Syrian regime were stored in the area of Qardaha”, the hometown of deposed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, some 60km (37 miles) north of the Tartous port.
#Aljazeera #News #Israel #Syria
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China vows to ‘fight till the end’ as Trump escalates trade war
China has vowed to “fight till the end” after US President Donald Trump escalated his trade war by doubling tariffs on all Chinese imports to 20%.
Beijing hit back at Trump’s levies by imposing retaliatory tariffs of up to 15% on selected American goods, expanding export controls to a dozen US firms and filing a lawsuit at the World Trade Organization. It also sent a stern warning to the Trump administration: Chinese people will never bow to “hegemony or bullying.”
“Pressure, coercion and threats are not the right ways to engage with China. Trying to exert maximum pressure on China is a miscalculation and a mistake,” Lin Jian, a spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry, told a regular news briefing Tuesday afternoon. “If the US insists on waging a tariff war, trade war, or any other kind of war, China will fight till the end.”
The barrage of retaliatory measures and fiery exchanges came as Chinese leader Xi Jinping is preparing to hold a major political gathering designed to project confidence in his country’s ability to stay the course and weather external headwinds.
As thousands of delegates convene in the Chinese capital for the country’s “two sessions” annual meeting, Xi and his officials are set to use the highly choreographed spectacle to broadcast China as a major power steadily advancing its tech prowess and global rise.
That escalating rivalry between the two powers will be in the spotlight on Wednesday morning in Beijing, when Trump’s first address to Congress will roughly coincide with a state-of-the-union-like speech delivered by China’s No. 2 official Li Qiang at the opening meeting of the National’s People Congress (NPC), which rubber-stamps decisions already made behind closed doors.
There, Li is expected to announce China’s yearly targets for economic growth and military spending — and lay out how Beijing plans to continue its economic growth and transformation into a technological powerhouse in the face of mounting pressure from the United States.
Despite the challenges, analysts aren’t bracing for any major policy surprises or U-turns from the roughly weeklong meetings of both the NPC and the country’s top advisory body. True decision-making power lies with the Chinese Communist Party, whose authority cannot be challenged in the country – and Xi, the party’s most powerful leader in decades.
The increased tariffs — and the threat of more economic and tech controls to come — are casting a long shadow over China’s two sessions, which observers will also be watching for signs on how Beijing will continue to address its rumbling economic difficulties at home.
And signs point to Beijing staying the course on its leader’s strategies to bolster innovation, industry and self-sufficiency to steel itself against frictions ahead: all while projecting that, in China, it’s business as usual.
We must “face difficulties head-on and strengthen confidence” amid growing external challenges, the Communist Party journal Qiushi quoted Xi as saying in an article released Friday that’s meant to set the tone for the gathering.
#CNN
#China #Asia #US #Trump
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Trump has instructed to raise Canadian tariffs on aluminum and steel to 50%
Trump orders more tariffs on Canada after Ontario levies tax on electricity exports
Donald Trump has ordered an increase in tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum and threatened to impose more levies, after Ontario yesterday slapped a 25% surcharge on electricity exports to three US states.
In a lengthy post on Truth Social, Trump said he would “permanently shut down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada” if the country did not end unspecified tariffs it had placed on US goods:
Based on Ontario, Canada, placing a 25% Tariff on “Electricity” coming into the United States, I have instructed my Secretary of Commerce to ad an ADDITIONAL 25% Tariff, to 50%, on all STEEL and ALUMINUM COMING INTO THE UNITED STATES FROM CANADA, ONE OF THE HIGHEST TARIFFING NATIONS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD. This will go into effect TOMORROW MORNING, March 12th. Also, Canada must immediately drop their Anti-American Farmer Tariff of 250% to 390% on various U.S. dairy products, which has long been considered outrageous. I will shortly be declaring a National Emergency on Electricity within the threatened area. This will allow the U.S to quickly do what has to be done to alleviate this abusive threat from Canada. If other egregious, long time Tariffs are not likewise dropped by Canada, I will substantially increase, on April 2nd, the Tariffs on Cars coming into the U.S. which will, essentially, permanently shut down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada. Those cars can easily be made in the USA!
Ontario’s addition of a 25% electricity surcharge affects New York, Minnesota and Michigan, which receive electricity from the province.
#News #Canada #USA #TheGuardian
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Arab Leaders have an alternative to Trump's GAZA plan - "Draft" statement obtained by the BBC
A $53bn (£41.4 billion) reconstruction plan to rival President Donald Trump's idea for the US to "take over Gaza" and move out more than two million Palestinians has been approved by Arab leaders at an emergency summit in the Egyptian capital Cairo.
"The Egypt plan is now an Arab plan," announced the secretary general of the Arab League Ahmed Aboul Gheit at the end of this hours-long gathering.
Without referring specifically to President Trump's ideas, he underlined that "the Arab stance is to reject any displacement, whether it is voluntary or forced".
Egypt had produced a detailed blueprint, with a 91-page glossy document including images of leafy neighbourhoods and grand public buildings, to counter a US scheme labelled as a "Middle East Riviera" which shocked the Arab world and beyond.
#USA #US #GAZA #Egypt #News #BBC
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Stocks fall as Trump warns of US economy trade war 'transition'
A sell-off in the US stock market gathered steam on Monday, fuelled by rising concern about the cost of the trade war to the world's largest economy.
The S&P 500, which tracks the biggest American companies, fell about 2% in early trade, while the Dow Jones dropped 0.9% and the Nasdaq sank more than 3.5%.
The falls came after President Donald Trump ducked questions about whether the US economy was facing a recession or price rises as a result of tariff moves, while warning instead of a "period of transition".
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, however, insisted there would be no contraction in the US, although he acknowledged that the price of some goods may rise.
Investors fear that tariffs - which are taxes on goods applied as they enter the country - will lead to higher prices and ultimately dent growth in the world's largest economy.
"The level of tariffs that Trump is imposing, I think no doubt, will have to cause inflation somewhere down the line," Rachel Winter, investment manager at Killik & Co, told the Today programme.
Economist Mohamed El-Erian said investors had been optimistic about Trump's plans for de-regulation and lower taxes, while under-estimating the likelihood of a trade war.
He said the recent falls in the stock market, which started last week, reflect the adjustment of those bets.
"It's a complete change in what the market expected," he added, noting that investors are also responding to signs that businesses and households are starting to hold off on spending amid the uncertainty, which could hurt economic growth.
European stocks closed lower on Monday, with France's CAC and the London FTSE indices both closing around 0.9% lower. Germany's DAX closed 1.75% lower.
Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at the stockbrokers Hargreaves Lansdown, said it was because of "unease around the impact of Trump tariffs". She added that concerns over the US economy entering a recession is worrying investors.
Tesla shares fell about 8% on Monday, while tech stocks Nvidia and Meta were both down more than 4%.
Speaking to Fox News in an interview broadcast on Sunday but recorded on Thursday, Trump appeared to acknowledge the concerns, responding to a question about whether the US was facing recession: "I hate to predict things like that. There is a period of transition because what we're doing is very big. We're bringing wealth back to America. That's a big thing."
"It takes a little time, but I think it should be great for us," he added.
#BBC #News #Trump #USA
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