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Vice President Kamala Harris today condemned Russia’s air strikes on a maternity hospital in Ukraine as “atrocities of unimaginable proportions” and urged an investigation into the attacks.
Harris also underscored the United States’ commitment to “defend every inch of NATO territory.” The vice president visited Poland as part of an effort to show unity among NATO allies in response to Russia’s war on Ukraine, where the death toll has been rising.
Harris’ visit with a staunch NATO ally became partly a clean-up mission after a controversy erupted over a proposal to provide fighter jets to Ukraine.
The rift opened up after the United States declined Poland’s surprise proposal to provide Soviet-built MiG-29 fighter jets to the US to give to Ukraine. When Harris met with Polish leaders in Warsaw, part of her job was to smooth over the flare-up.
“We have been witnessing for weeks, and certainly just in the last 24 hours, atrocities of unimaginable proportions,” Harris said. “A maternity hospital, a children’s hospital, where we have witnessed pregnant women who were there for care for one reason being taken out because they required care because of an act of violence, unprovoked, unjustified.”
Russian airstrikes hit a maternity hospital in the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol on Wednesday. Three people were killed, including a child, and 17 people wounded.
More live updates on the situation in Ukraine can be found here.
It’s Amy and Chelsea with today’s top stories.
How Congress is looking to punish Moscow
Lawmakers successfully pressured President Joe Biden into announcing a ban Tuesday on the US import of all Russian energy, including oil, as further punishment against President Vladimir Putin for Moscow’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
But Biden’s ban isn’t enough for many lawmakers. The prohibition on Russian energy checks one box off the congressional wish list, but Capitol Hill continues to explore other avenues in supporting Ukraine and penalizing the Kremlin.
The economically punitive measures include:
- a permanent ban on Russian energy imports
- imposing sanctions on anyone selling gold physically or electronically in Russia
- closing loopholes in the US tax system, aimed at preventing Russian oligarchs from hiding assets
- increasing efforts to crack down on money laundering schemes benefitting Kremlin allies.
Lawmakers took the first step Wednesday, overwhelmingly passing legislation that not only includes the ban on Russian oil and energy products but provisions to end normal trade relations with Russia and neighboring Belarus (a close ally to Moscow) and require the US Trade Representative to work towards booting Russia from the World Trade Organization.
“The more economic pain we inflict on Putin, the more pressure he (Putin) will feel to finally end his brutal campaign of terror on the Ukrainian people,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., said on the floor before the vote.
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US lags behind in global crypto regulation
President Joe Biden issued an executive order Wednesday to direct the Treasury Department to establish regulations around cryptocurrency and ordered the Federal Reserve to investigate whether the US should create its own “digital dollar.”
But the US is late to the party compared to other countriesexperts say.
“The US is actually I think a little bit late to the game,” Daniel Ahn, a global fellow at the Wilson Center and former chief economist for the US State Department, said. “Many other countries have already been more active in trying to set up rules and regulations in place for the (decentralized finance) world as a whole.”
The executive order comes as concerns rise about the susceptibility of cryptocurrency to price manipulation, including schemes that make a trade look more valuable than it really is.
The number of cryptocurrencies continue to increase. Tracking site CoinGecko reports that as of Wednesday, it is tracking the prices of thousands of cryptocurrencies that collectively have a market cap of $1.92 trillion. Of them, 41% of the market is held by Bitcoin.
The great American pastime is back. Which team are you cheering for this baseball season? — Amy and Chelsea
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism