Transcripts For LINKTV Democracy Now 20171027 : comparemela.

The continent. Niger, five nigerien soldiers and quarter u. S. Special forces soldiers were killed. We will speak with reporter nick turse who says u. S. Military activity in afririca is a recruiting tool for terror groups. Most americans to understand niger is one small part of something akin to a a u. S. Shadw war on t the africanan continen. That the United States is running about 10 missions per day all across africa. Amy we will talk about nick piece. New then as President Trump declares the Opioid Crisis a Public Health emergency, we will speak with Columbia University psychology and psychiatry professor carl hart. His new piece for Scientific Americanpeople are dying , because of ignorance, not because of opioids. If we are really concerned like the opioids and heroine, we need to tell people how to stay safe. If we are worried about overdose death, about 13,000 people die relatedar from heroine overdoses whereas 35,000 people die from automobile accidents. Amy all that and more, coming up. Welcome to democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. President trump announced that he was directing the department of health and Human Services to declare the Opioid Crisis a Public Health emergency. Walking back his plans announced in august to declare it a more serious National Emergency. The shift means the federal government will not as of now direct any new federal funds to address the Opioid Crisis, which killed 64,000 Americans Last year. Pres. Trump Drug Overdoses arae now ththe leading cause of unintentioional death i i the United States by far. More people are dying from Drug Overdoses today than from gun homicides and Motor Vehicles combined. Amy we will have more on trumps announcement and the Opioid Crisis later in the broadcast with dr. Carl hart. On capitol hill, the house narrowly approved a budget plan that will allow republican lawmakers to push through President Trumps tax bill without the support of a single democrat. Trumps proposed tax overhaul would shower billions of dollars in tax cuts upon the wealthiest americans, including President Trumps family and members of his administration. Republicans are now vowing to introduce the tax bill as eaeary as november 1. Meanwhile, Congressional Democrats are pushing legislation that would prevent President Trump from launching a preemptive strike against north korea. The no unconstitutional strike against north korea bill would bar trump from ordering an attack against north korea without first seeking congressional authority. The bill comes amid mounting tensions between the u. S. And north korea, with President Trump repeatedly threatening to totally destroy all of north korea, a country of 25 million people. The federal government has just released thousands of formerly secret cia and fbi files on the assassination of president john f. Kennedy in 1963. Historians arere now pouring reviewing the documents. Some of the preliminary revelations include a 1975 document that details multiple cia plots to assassinate cuban leader fidel castro under the kennedy administration, including working with mobsters to poison castro with a pill. The federal government was expected to release all of the unity assassination documents as of midnight last night, but in a chaotic late not move, trump and it up blocking the release of a number of the documents under pressure from intelligence agencies. Other parts of the released files ended up being reductive. The final files are expected to be released in april. President trump reportedly intervened to instruct the Justice Department to lift a gag order on an undercover fbi informant who investigated the sale of a Uranium Mining Company to russias Atomic Energy agency, rosatom, under the Obama Administration. This sale is facing increasing scrutiny after it surfaced recently that the fbi was investigating a u. S. Subsidiary of rosatom for racketeering and extortion at the time the Obama Administration approved the sale. Secretary of state Rex Tillerson said thursday y that the United States is seeking a future syria without syrian leader bashar alassad. Speaking after his talks with u. N. Special envoy for syria staffan de mistura, tillerson said we do not believe that there is a future for the assad regime and assad family. The reign of the assad family is coming to an end. Another round of u. N. Backed peace talks on the syrian conflict are slated to resume next month. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy is calling on the Spanish Senate to approve his plan to seize direct control of the Northeastern Region of catalonia and fire its leader, Carles Puigdemont and all regional ministers. If the Senate Approves the use of article 155 of the spanish constitution, spain could also take over catalonias police, public media, and finances. On thursday, Catalan Leader Carles Puigdemont ruled out Holding Snap Elections to diffuse the crisis. This is 16yearold paula perez, speaking thursday. We dont know right now what is going to happen because the situation were living is very chaotic. We will continue to wait to see what happens. Amy but the Spanish Senate and the combo Catalonia Parliament are in session. The senate is expected to approve the central governments takeover of the region and the Catalonian Parliament to declale independence simultaneously. In kenya, at least four people were killed amid clashes during thursdays contested president ial election rerun. Incumbent president Uhuru Kenyatta is expected to win the reelection after his opponent, Opposition Leader raila odinga, boycotted the vote when his demands for changes to the electoral process were not met. This is joseph ouma, whose brother was wounded in the clashes. We were not being violent. We just barricaded the road to prevent ballot boxes from getting to the polling center. We decided to protest because we did not want voting to take place. Then the police came and shot my brother. They were shooting live bullets into the crorowd. Amy after selma blair has accused james toback of threatening to kill her if she publicly accused him of sexual harassment. More than 200 women including blair, have now accused him of sexual harassment. Blair says toback harassed her in 1999, trapping her in hotel room than masturbating in front of her. Afterwards, she said he told her there is a girl who went against me. She was going to talk about something i did. I am going to tell you, and this is a promise, if she ever tells anybody, no matter how much time she thinks went by, i have people who will pull up in a car, kidnap her and throw her in the hudson river with cement blocks on her feet. You understand what im talking about, right . The director of the office of scotte resettlement, lloyd, testified before a house subcommittee thursday where he was grilled by lawmakers about his move to personally intervene to try to unsuccessfully stop an undocumented teenager from having an abortion in texas. The teenager was only able to access the abortion this week after suing the Trump Administration and fighting for a month. This is lloyd being questioned by washington congresswoman pramila jayapal. Do you believe a a womans constitutional right to abortion depends on her immigrationon status . Think any e entrant into thee unUnited States it is a yes or no question, mr. Lloyd. Do you believe a womans constitutional right depends on her immigratioion status, yes or no . A number of r rigs that is not a yes or no answer. Any number of rights to be on depenends on where they stand in terms of our immigration system. Is thatat a yes or r a no . No. Ll take thatat as a so do you believe that immigrants have Constitutional Rights . Maam, ifagagain, somebody wants to come io the United States s i will take that as a no. Do you have medical training of any kind . If i need advice regarding any medical situation regarding ive been sosolta medical so the answer is, no. Mothers to many immigration authorities release her daughter, a 10yearold girl with cerebral palsy, whose to pain by control agents was detained by Border Patrol agents after undergoing surgery on tuesday. The girl, rosa maria hernandez, has been living in the United States since she was three months old, when her parents moved the family to the u. S. In order to access better medical care for rosa. On tuesday, she and her cousin were traveling from laredo, texas, to a hospital in corpus christi, when they were stopped at a border checkpoint. Border patrol agents then traveled with rosa to the hospital and then detained her at the hospital once the surgery was over. She is currently being held in a childrens shelter in san antonio, texexas. And awardwinning indigenous journalist mark trahant has s qt his teaching job at the university of north dakota after the university blocked him from teaching a lecture series on the indigenousled resistance to the Dakota Access pipeline. Professor trahant is the author of multiple books on indigenous history and resistance and has been a finalist for the pulitzer prize. Hes a member of the shoshonebannock tribe in idaho, and the former president of the native americacan journalists association. He says he quit after r his two separarate proposals to focus on the professional and social Media Coverage of the Resistance Movement were rejected by the ununiversity. And those are some of the headlines. This is democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. On thursday, republican and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a classified briefing with pentagon officials on the deadly ambush in niger earlier this month when five nigerien soldiers were killed, meanwhile, the pentagon separately confirmed for the first time that a second u. S. Military team was involved in the operation and was involved in the same timeline. The Associated Press reports the patrol that was ambushed had been asked to help a second team of commandos that had been hunting for a Senior Member of alqaida. There are about 6000 american troops operating in africa, with at least 800 in niniger. Meanwhile, somalia contitinues o recover a massive bombing in mogadishu that killed at least 358 people and wounded over 400 more, and a roadside bomb exploded on sunday killing 11 people. The explosions come after the Trump Administration stepped up a u. S. Campaign against alshabaab in somalia. In march, President Trump declared somalia a socalled zone of active hostilities, giving wide latitude to military leaders to launch airstrikes and ground assaults. In may, that led to the first u. S. Combat death in somalia since 1993. In august, a raid by u. S. Soldiers and somali troops on a village outside mogadishu left 10 civilians dead, including three children. The guardian reports the suspected d bomber in the mogadidishu ssacrere is from the specific community targeted by the raid last august, a village near the capital mogadishu. The Mogadishu Massacre killed more than 300 people. This week u. S. Ambassador to the United Nations nikki haley became one of the highestranking officials in the Trump Administration to visit the african continent. Haley traveled to ethiopiaia, south sudan, and the democratic republic of congo, where she arrived after she was forced to evacuate while visiting a refugee camp in south sudan when a protest erupted against president salva kiir. During her visit haley said the , u. S. Relationship with south sudan is at a crossroads. What we areted by seeing. This isnt what w we thought we were investing in. What we thought wewe were investing in is a free, fair society where people could be safe. And south sudan is the opposite of that. Amy well, to talk more about u. S. Operations on the african continent, we are joined by reporter nick turse. He is a fellow at the Nation Institute and contributing writer at the intercept where his latest story is headlined its not just niger u. S. Military activity is a recruiting tool for terror groups across west africa. Also his piece, the u. S. Will invade africa after an attack in new york according to pentagon wargames. Waging a massive shadow war in africa. He is the author of tomorrows battlefield u. S. Proxy wars and secret ops in africa and his latest book is next time theyll come to count the dead war and survival in south sudan. Welcome back to democracy now thank you for having me on. Amy lets begin in south sudan. Why did nikki haley go there . Talk about the protest that occurred there. Dispatchedley was theyre basically as the result of a speech last month that President Trump gave to African Leaders at the United Nations. It was a very tone deaf speech whwhere he and fact lauded the achievements of an african country that doesnt exist, nambia. In the speech, he also mentioned that there were conflicts in the democratic republic of congo and especially south sudan that needed tending to that he was dispatching nikki haley to do something about it. What it was was never exactly clear. She was on something of a factfinding mission. She met with south sududanese refugees in ethiopia. As you mentioned, she went to one of these protection civilian sites in south sudan where there had been internal internally displaced people basically stranded there for years since the civil war broke out in 2013. Things got heated and she was escorted out of the camp. Amy so explain the situation in south sudan. In december 2013, the president a south sudan launched and ethnic lensing campaign. Amy one of the newest countries in the world. Yes, the youngest natation on earth. This was in many ways a u. S. Nationbuilding project. The United States spent somewhere around 11 billion bringing south sudan into nationhood. The south sudanese fought and died for their independence, but the u. S. Is really the back of this project. T all fell apart in 2013 the country has been in the state of civil war since then. The government has been carrying out ethnic cleansing campaigns across the nation. Amy against who . It started out against the largest of the ethnic minorities. This is carried out by president kiir who is a member of the dinka, the Largest Ethnic Group in the country. Since then, the civil war has spread. Most recently, it is been affecting the deep south of south sudan where there are somewhere around 10 to 20 of the minorities. They have been targeted. They have been leaving the country in droves, mostly to uganda. About one million refugees across the border since the late summer of 2016. Was nikki haley, when she in south sudan, said that president kiir could not claim his soldiers werent committing thesese atrocities. But in fact, that is what kiir has been doing for months now. Claiming that fake news and social media drove these people across the border. I was there earlier this year. I talked to refugees who had left the country. I spoke to people displaced in the country. I saw be burned villages. These people ran because of the government run at the cleansing murders, massacres, village burnings. That went on then and it goes on today. Amy what is the u. S. Interest . Now . Think imted states i especially it was a bipartisan effort. There are a lot of people in congress that believe the United States has an ongoing role to play in n south sudan. What the white house things should be done is very unclear. Before Ambassador Haley left, she was talking tough about cutting off u. S. Aid as a way to leverage u. S. Power against the government of south sudan. But since she arrived there and saw the refugees, she said that she now understands that cutting off u. S. Aid would hurt the most vuvulnerable south sudanese. It is difficult to figure out exactly what the United States can d do and what nikki ha