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Trump may partner with an obscure social media app 'built on the power of positivity' to launch his own network
President Donald Trump. Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images Trump is in talks with obscure social media app FreeSpace as he eyes his own network, Axios reported. The app has just 20,000 downloads and says it's "built on the power of positivity." Trump's advisors have repeatedly teased a new media platform since he was banned by Twitter . See more stories on Insider's business page . Twitter banned then-President Donald Trump on January 8, two days after the attacks on the US Capitol, cutting off his access to a bully pulpit of nearly 90 million followers. Facebook followed the next day, severing ties between Trump and another 33 million accounts. Some initially thought Trump might reappear on Parler , a far-right haven that the Trump Organization had previously held talks with, as an anonymous " Person X " - but those efforts fell through. Since then, Trump's advisors have repeatedly teased new media companies that the former president might create to broadcast his message, including one built by his former campaign manager Brad Parscale . But Axios reported Wednesday that Trump is also in talks with a relatively obscure social media app called FreeSpace, an affiliate of Skylab Apps, that has just 20,000 downloads and not many users. By comparison, Twitter has 192 million daily users , according to its latest quarterly earnings report. The details of a Trump-FreeSpace deal, if one is reached at all, aren't yet clear, according to Axios. A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to a request for comment. FreeSpace says its app is backed by science that makes people "'addicted' to doing good," "built on the power of positivity," and wants to "make social media fun again." It would appear to be an odd partnership for Trump, who is one of the world's largest promoters of misinformation and has consistently used racist , sexist , xenophobic , and violence-inciting language that eventually got him booted from mainstream platforms. Read the original article on Business Insider New MediaMedia CompaniesDownloadsPoliticsMainstream MediaSocial BusinessGetty Images TrumpFreeSpaceAxiosTwitterFacebookThe Trump OrganizationSkylab AppsObscure Social MediaPositivityDonald TrumpBrad Parscale
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Chinese tech stocks fall as U.S. SEC begins rollout of law aimed at delisting
Shares in dual-listed Chinese companies fell sharply on Thursday in Asia after the U.S. securities regulator adopted measures that would kick foreign companies off American stock exchanges if they do not comply with U.S. auditing standards. The move by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adds to the ongoing and...Read Full StoryU.s. StocksTech StocksTechnology StocksPoliticsU.S. InvestorsTrading FirmsU.S. SecU.S. FirmsU.S. CompaniesChinese Communist PartyReutersAlibaba Group Holding LtdJD.Com IncNetease IncThe Hang Seng Tech IndexDonald TrumpJoe Biden
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Visualizing The Echo Chamber
Split Screen is an interesting experiment carried out by The Markup that visualizes the radical difference between the way the news to which US citizens who voted for Joe Biden and those who voted for Donald Trump are exposed on Facebook, and how the political environment on social networks essentially polarizes people and reinforces the echo chamber effect.Read Full StoryUs CitizensSocial EnvironmentPoliticsAlgorithmsSocial EngagementCommunity EngagementSocial NetworksBenefit SocietyFacebookSocial DynamicsCapitolMarkupUsageDefinitionSpecial InterestsJoe BidenDonald Trump
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House to vote on immigration bills with paths to citizenship for "Dreamers" and farmworkers
The House is set to vote Thursday on two proposals that would legalize subsets of the estimated 11 million immigrants living in the U.S. without legal permission, as Democrats gauge the chances of approving immigration legislation and sending it to President Biden's desk. The bills are expected to pass in...Read Full StoryU.s. CitizenshipUndocumented ImmigrantsBillsPoliticsUndocumented WorkersImmigrant WorkersHouseDemocraticSenateDACATPSImmigrant FarmworkersU.S. CitizenshipLegal ImmigrationDreamersDonald TrumpZoe LofgrenDan NewhouseDick DurbinNancy Pelosi
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Elected leaders need to see through 'model minority' myth
Only days after the Atlanta spa shootings, violent incidents against Asian Americans are still happening. Jess Huang writes that she is shocked and frustrated by this, especially because in the earlier days of the pandemic, so many elected leaders failed to recognize the problem as a crisis. As we collectively discuss what to do next, we have to look back and do better, she says.Read Full StoryFbiAsian AmericansPoliticsPolitical LeadersWomen LeadersCommunity LeadersPolitical ViolenceWhite RacismAmericanAAPIPacific IslanderNon-AsianFBICNNLyftDonald TrumpKeisha Lance BottomsJay Baker
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Piers Morgan's GMB meltdown shows he is trapped in his own psychodrama
Just before 10am today, Piers Morgan finally posted the tweet of which he has surely long dreamed: “Good Morning Britain beat BBC Breakfast in the ratings yesterday for the first time.”. The ITV show’s Tuesday figure was almost three times the average of when the former Daily Mirror editor and...Read Full StoryGmbBbc TelevisionTv NewsJournalismBritish Royal FamilyPoliticsCelebritiesGMBDaily MirrorCNNCBSOfcomThe Johnson FactorRoman CatholicWestminsterPiers MorganOprah WinfreyAlex BeresfordSusanna ReidKate GarrawayMargaret ThatcherRupert MurdochMartin BashirSkyMeghan MarkleAndrew NeilDonald TrumpNicholas SoamesJoe BidenJeremy ClarksonTrisha GoddardBoris Johnson
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Yemeni rebel offensive threatens camps of those who fled war
CAIRO (AP) — Already displaced once in Yemen’s grinding civil war, Mohammed Ali Saleh fled with his pregnant wife and their three children to central Marib province last year to seek refuge in a region that has known some relative peace and stability because of well-protected oil fields nearby.But now the fighting is moving toward them again.Iran-backed Houthi rebels are pushing to capture the province from the internationally recognized government to try to complete their control over the northern half of Yemen. If they succeed, the Houthis could claim a strategic win after a largely stalemated battle in almost seven years of fighting.The sounds of war terrify Saleh and his family.“It’s a nightmare we are experiencing every night,” he said from a camp for the displaced that had previously escaped violence.The Houthis launched their Marib offensive in February. The new campaign, combined with increasing Houthi missile and drone attacks on neighboring Saudi Arabia, comes as the Biden administration tries to relaunch talks on ending the conflict in Yemen — the Arab world’s poorest country that has been pushed to the brink of famine by the bloodshed.The Houthi push in Marib also threatens to ignite more fighting elsewhere in Yemen. Government-allied forces, aided by a Saudi-led coalition, have ramped up attacks in other areas recently in an apparent attempt to force the Houthis to spread out their resources and make them more vulnerable.The Marib offensive “is a fateful battle for the Houthis,” said political analyst Abdel-Bari Taher. “It will determine the future of their ability to rule” in northern Yemen.Marib houses a key oil refinery that produces 90% of liquefied petroleum gas, which is used for cooking and heating in almost all Yemenis. Severe fuel shortages already plague many areas across the country.The fighting in Marib could displace at least 385,000 people, according to the U.N. migration agency. Four displacement camps in the province have been abandoned since the start of the offensive, said Olivia Headon of the International Organization for Migration in Yemen.Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014 when the Houthis took control of the capital of Sanaa and much of the northern part of the country, forcing the government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to flee to the south, then to Saudi Arabia.The Saudi-led coalition, backed at the time by the U.S., entered the war months later to try restore Hadi to power. Despite a relentless air campaign and ground fighting, the war has deteriorated into a stalemate, killing about 130,000 people and spawning the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The Biden administration last month officially withdrew its backing for the coalition but said the U.S. would continue to offer support Saudi Arabia as it defends itself against Houthi attacks.The latest offensive has been among the fiercest, with the Houthis moving heavy weapons toward Marib. They have yet to achieve major progress amid stiff resistance from local tribes and government forces aided by airstrikes from the coalition.But the fighting is coming close to civilians and the displacement camps. Houthi forces have hit the provincial capital, also called Marib, and its outskirts with ballistic missiles, explosives-laden drones and shelling, according to aid workers.Sheikh Sultan al-Aradah, the provincial governor, told reporters that the coalition’s airstrikes helped fend off the Houthis. “Without their support, the situation would be very different,” he said.Hundreds of fighters, most of them Houthi rebels, have been killed in the Marib campaign, according to officials from both sides.Houthi leaders have portrayed the offensive as a religious battle, a sign of its significance for them. The rebels have tried to take Marib for years, seizing towns and districts in neighboring provinces.“There are probably multiple agendas at play in Marib but the most urgent is the Houthis’ belief they can take Marib city and end the war for the north, while improving their economic sustainability and their bargaining position with Saudi Arabia,” said Peter Salisbury, Yemen expert at the International Crisis Group.But their offensive could be backfiring.Government-backed forces managed to retake swaths of territory from the Houthis in Hajjah and Taiz provinces. The battle for Marib also could be used as a justification for Hadi’s government to back out of previous partial cease-fires, such as the 2018 U.N.-brokered deal that ended fighting for the key Houthi-controlled port of Hodeida, which handles about 70% of Yemen’s commercial and humanitarian imports.The rebels began the Marib offensive shortly after President Joe Biden removed them from a U.S. terrorism list, reversing a Trump administration decision that brought a widespread outcry from the U.N. and aid groups on humanitarian grounds.The escalation has left international observers at a loss on how to find a starting point for a long-sought peace. Tim Lenderking, the U.S. envoy to Yemen, noted that “tragically, and somewhat confusingly for me, it appears that the Houthis are prioritizing a military campaign.” He has urged them to agree to a recent cease-fire proposal.Mohammed Abdul-Salam, a spokesman for the Houthis, told the rebel-run al-Masirah satellite TV channel that they were studying the proposal, but he also criticized it. He alleged it didn’t offer an acceptable way to end to the blockade imposed by the coalition on rebel-held areas, a reference to the closure of Sanaa’s airport to commercial flights and restrictions on cargo ships at Hodeida.At the same time, the Houthis have intensified their missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia. The coalition said the rebels were encouraged by Biden’s moves, including his decision to halt U.S. support for the coalition in a dramatic break with the joint air campaign against them.The warring parties have not held substantive negotiations since 2019. A deal brokered by the U.N. in 2018 after talks in Sweden has largely gone nowhere; only one of its components — prisoner exchanges — has made any progress, after multiple rounds of talks.Meanwhile, displaced families in Marib live in fear of what comes next.Saleh, 29, and his family fled his native Sanaa in 2017 for the city of Hazm, the provincial capital of Jawf, before the Houthis overran it last year. That forced them to flee to Marib, and they settled in one of the 125 displacement camps there, according to the IOM.“We are tired. We have been displaced several times,” said Saleh’s wife Fatima, who gave birth to their youngest daughter in the camp.—-Associated Press writer Ahmed al-Haj in Sanaa, Yemen, contributed. HouthisFaminePoliticsRebel ForcesRebel FightersArab ForcesU.S. Military ForcesAPYemenisU.N.HajjahHodeidaTrumpIOMAssociated PressSalehPeter SalisburyJoe Biden
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Democrats outspent the GOP on Spanish-language ads in 2020, but it came late
When the Democratic political action committee Nuestro PAC sent election mailers in Florida featuring a photo of Kristin Urquiza — who blamed President Donald Trump for her father's Covid-19 death — 200 were returned with “communist” or “socialist” scrawled on them. The response underscores a blaring lesson from the 2020...Read Full StoryDemocratsCampaign AdvertisingPacsRepublicansPoliticsPresidential ElectionGOP CampaignsSanders CampaignDemocratic LatinoNBC NewsSolidarity StrategiesLatinosNBC LatinoTwitterInstagramDonald TrumpJoe BidenChuck RochaBernie Sanders
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Coronavirus vaccine eligibility to expand dramatically in Ohio: Capitol Letter
C’mon in: All Ohioans age 16 and older will become eligible for a coronavirus vaccine starting March 29, Gov. Mike DeWine announced Tuesday. As Jeremy Pelzer reports, DeWine also said that starting this Friday, eligibility will be expanded to include residents in their 40s and those with cancer, chronic kidney disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, heart disease and obesity. Julie Washington has more on DeWine’s thinking behind the decision. “There is an imperative that shots not sit anyplace, that they are taken up as quickly as possible,” DeWine said.Read Full StoryOhio Republican PartyOhio Democratic PartyState Of OhioPoliticsPublic HealthOhio State UniversityState LawmakersState Of EmergencyU.S. CapitolOhioansClevelandersState Street ConsultantsCOVIDFirstEnergy Corp.Vanderbilt UniversityMike DewineAndrew TobiasCarl IcahnDonald TrumpRob PortmanSherrod BrownTaylor SwiftSteve BurnsEuclid
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Ron DeSantis' Florida boast rings hollow
With Covid-19, we will not be measuring success by employment rates and cherry-picked data, but rather the staggering number of persons who died, writes Kent Sepkowitz. Judging Covid-19 management on anything other than those lost lives is not only disgraceful, it will also almost certainly lead us to make all the wrong decisions about a pandemic that has not left us.Read Full StoryFlorida HousePoliticsPublic HealthRingsSouth FloridaTrump White HouseFloridiansThe USCDCCNNDeSantis BrieflyTexasHeroesAmericaCaliforniaRon DesantisScott AtlasGavin NewsomJohn WayneKristi NoemGreg Abbott