IN HOUSE’S YEMEN VOTE, CONGRESS REASSERTS WARMAKING POWERS
Asserting congressional authority over war-making powers, the House passed a resolution Wednesday that would force the administration to withdraw U.S. troops from involvement in Yemen, in a rebuke of President Donald Trump’s alliance with the Saudiled coalition behind the military intervention.
Lawmakers in both parties are increasingly uneasy over the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and skeptical of the U.S. partnership with that coalition, especially in light of Saudi Arabia’s role in the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a critic of the royal family.
Passage would mark the first time Congress has relied on the decades-old War Powers Resolution to halt military intervention. It also would set up a potential confrontation with the White House, which has threatened a veto. The House voted 248-177 to approve the measure, sending it to the Senate, where a similar resolution passed last year.
Former Air Force officer charged with revealing secrets.
WASHINGTON» A former U.S. Air Force counterintelligence specialist who defected to Iran despite warnings from the FBI has been charged with revealing classified information to the Tehran government, including the code name and secret mission of a Pentagon program, prosecutors said Wednesday.
The Justice Department also accused Monica Elfriede Witt, 39, of betraying former colleagues in the U.S. intelligence community by feeding details about their personal and professional lives to Iran. Four hackers linked to the Iranian government, charged in the same indictment, used that information to target the intelligence workers online, prosecutors said.
Witt had been on the FBI’s radar at least a year before she defected after she attended an Iranian conference and appeared in anti-American videos. She was not arrested at the time.
Mississippi advances ban on abortion after fetal heartbeat.
MISS.» Mississippi is JACKSON, working toward enacting one of the strictest abortion laws in the nation, in a race with other states to push a legal challenge to the more conservative U.S. Supreme Court.
The Republican-controlled Mississippi House and Senate passed separate bills Wednesday to ban most abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, about six weeks into pregnancy. Efforts to pass similar bills are underway in Florida, Kentucky, Ohio, South Carolina and Tennessee.
“I see in this country that we protect sea turtle eggs and we protect other endangered species of animals with a greater degree of scrutiny and zealousness than we protect a child in the womb,” Republican Sen. Angela Hill, a sponsor of the Mississippi bill, said as she fought back tears during a debate.
Nevada woman is the 6th to accuse Arias of sexual misconduct.
NEV.» The longtime RENO, director of the international center at the University of Nevada in Reno is the latest woman to accuse Nobel Peace Prize winner and former Costa Rican President Oscar Arias of sexual misconduct.
Carina Black said in interviews this week that Arias boxed her in against a wall inside an elevator at the university in 1998 and then tried to kiss her.
She said it happened after she spent a day escorting Arias to meetings and an evening speaking engagement at the university.
“I just smacked him in the face and pushed him away,” Black said. “Then the elevators doors opened, and I left.”
Arias, 78, met with prosecutors in Costa Rica on Wednesday to give a statement in two criminal complaints against him alleging sexual assault and sexual abuse, but he has declined to provide any specific public comment since he denied the initial complaint last week.
— Denver Post wire services