As he left his home of France for a high-profile meeting with his U.S. counterpart, President Emmanuel Macron carried with him a barrel of frustrations from European allies over some of Joe Biden’s signature policy accomplishments.

Those frustrations quickly bubbled up into public view once Macron reached Washington on Wednesday, as he stopped at the French embassy and delivered a speech in his native language and singled out two bills that Biden signed into law as “choices that will fragment the West, because they create such differences between the United States of America and Europe.”

Macron was talking about the Inflation Reduction Act and the CHIPS and Science Act, two sprawling measures Congress passed over the summer that are poised to pour hundreds of billions of dollars into subsidies and tax incentives for electric car manufacturing and microchip makers in the U.S.

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Macron said he agreed with the broad goals of both bills—jump-starting sustainable energy technologies and making the world economy less dependent in China for chip manufacturing—but warned they come at a time when the strong U.S. dollar is adding to inflation in Europe, Russia’s stranglehold on gas is spiking energy prices, and Europe is facing a recession.

Macron’s demand that Biden rethink some of his administration’s proudest accomplishments is an early warning sign that a growing energy crisis in Europe could test the unity of European nations, as they bear the economic brunt of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war with Ukraine.

After a two-and-a-half hour one-on-one meeting in the Oval Office with Macron, Biden told reporters he makes “no apology for” the massive technology and green energy investments he signed into law. But he acknowledged there might be “glitches” in the $390 billion in climate change initiatives in the Inflation Reduction Act and said he would be looking at “tweaks” that could be made. “When I wrote the legislation, it was never intended to exclude those who are cooperating with us,” Biden said.

The annoyance Macron brought to the White House heats up a long-standing trouble spot in U.S.-European relations as European powers grapple with a raft of measures Biden has put in place to make the U.S. supply chain less reliant on overseas factories and add manufacturing jobs to the U.S. economy.

“What’s the French word for ‘annoyed’?” says Michael Allen, who served in President George W. Bush’s National Security Council and was a former staff director of the House Intelligence Committee, about the French response to the measures. He noted that making changes to such a carefully negotiated piece of legislation wouldn’t be easy for Biden, particularly once Republicans take control of the House in January. “Biden potentially opened Pandora’s box to a mad scramble to fix it sooner rather than later,” Allen says.

Former French ambassador to Washington Gérard Araud said on France’s LCI Television on Thursday morning that some of the Biden provisions drawing frustration in Europe were part of a protectionist trend in American politics that spanned the Trump and Biden administrations. “Presidents Trump and Biden have listened to their voters, and so they’re reinforcing their protectionism,” Araud said. “It’s a long-term protectionism that will not stop, it didn’t stop with Trump, or with Biden, and the Europeans must understand this.”

For his part, Macron has urged his fellow European countries to work to come up with their own economic incentives that could be done in coordination with the U.S. government. “We can’t ask the United States to resolve Europe’s problems,” Macron told reporters on Thursday. “We in Europe must move stronger and faster,” Macron said.

Hosting the French president for Biden’s first State Dinner is part of the repair work being done by the Biden Administration after it blindsided France last year by agreeing to work with Australia on building a nuclear-powered submarine fleet. The surprise announcement sank France’s own lucrative submarine deal with Australia and caused Paris to temporarily recall its ambassadors from Washington and Canberra.

The Biden administration’s decision to fete Macron in Washington is also an acknowledgement that Macron has emerged in the wake of political turnover across the continent as the strongest, most high-profile European leader.

Biden started off his meeting with Macron on Thursday with some flattery.

“Emmanuel is not just the leader of France, he’s one of the leaders of Europe. He’s been very outspoken, and he has been very, very commanding in Europe,” Biden said, sitting next to Macron in the Oval Office.

Macron could use the boost, as he faces harsh political headwinds at home and is eager to play up his influence on the world stage to his audience back in France. His party lost control of France’s parliamentary majority in April and discontent over rising energy costs and economic pain is sapping his popularity. As Macron arrived in Washington on Wednesday, a new poll showed his approval rating at 37%, down 6% since his reelection in April.

Read more: The Challenges Ahead for Emmanuel Macron

Earlier this year, Macron repeatedly spoke to Putin after the Russian autocrat started rolling tanks toward Kyiv in February, but failed to find diplomatic footing and risked fragmenting support for Ukraine before he begged off the effort.

Macron acknowledged on Thursday that the time and terms for peace talks must be determined by Ukraine. Biden said he was “prepared to speak” with Putin if he’s “looking for a way to end the war.” Biden said he had “no immediate plans” to talk to the Russian leader and any talks he had with Putin would be in close consultation with European allies.

The meeting of the two leaders at the White House on Thursday went more than an hour longer than planned. Biden presented Macron with a mirror made from wood that fell on the White House grounds and a record collection of American musicians. Among the gifts Macron gave Biden was a vinyl record of the 1966 French film, A Man and A Woman, the story of a couple who have lost their spouses falling in love, that Biden saw on an early date with First Lady Jill Biden. The visit was set to continue Thursday night with an elaborate state dinner featuring Maine lobster, American caviar, Napa Valley chardonnay, and a performance from New Orleans songwriter and singer Jon Batiste.

Amid the pleasantries and pageantry, Macron made clear that his most pressing disagreement between the two countries was rooted in trade. Macron called on Biden to “synchronize” U.S. economic policies to better align with Europe’s.

Toward the end of the press conference, a French-speaking reporter pressed Macron to show what evidence of improving trade relations he got from Biden, pointing to a line from the avant-garde artist Jean Cocteau, that there’s “no such thing as love, only proof of love.” Macron replied, “We are not here to ask for proof of love. We are here to agree on a strategy and we did.”

—WITH REPORTING BY VIVIENNE WALT/PARIS

Victims of the Uvalde mass shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers at a Texas elementary school in May have filed a $27 billion class-action lawsuit against an array of public entities and officials, seeking damages for ongoing trauma.

The suit filed on Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas names the city of Uvalde, its police department, the school district, the state Department of Public Safety and several police and school officials, alleging they failed to follow protocols for an active shooter.

The May 24 tragedy rocked the United States as the slaughtered schoolchildren were aged 9 to 11 and police waited more than an hour, while some children called for help, before storming the classroom and killing the shooter.

It was the deadliest U.S. school shooting in almost a decade, and many children were wounded.

The class-action suit seeks damages for the survivors including parents whose children were killed and kids who witnessed the massacre, said attorney Charles Bonner, whose California law firm brought the suit. Anyone else in the “zone of danger” could join the suit, Bonner said.

“Parents were telling us that kids are threatening suicide, they’re totally changed from what they were on May 23, the day before the incident,” Bonner told reporters in Uvalde on Wednesday.

“One child is having the nightmare that she’s having a heart attack. In fact two children. The parents are traumatized because they’ve seen this totally night-and-day change.”

A spokesperson for the city of Uvalde said on Thursday the city had not been served with the lawsuit and would not comment on pending litigation.

Representatives for the Uvalde Police Department, the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, the Department of Public Safety and the former chief of the school district’s police force did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Bonner said he was working with the gun violence prevention advocates Everytown in conjunction with a separate suit that Everytown filed on Monday against many of the same defendants plus Daniel Defense, the maker of the AR-15-style firearm used by the 18-year-old shooter.

Daniel Defense did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Separately, the city of Uvalde on Thursday sued District Attorney Christina Mitchell for not handing over investigative materials related to the shooting. The city is asking a state judge to compel Mitchell’s office to hand over records from all law enforcement agencies.

The district attorney’s office said it had no comment on the lawsuit.

Ukraine’s military said Russia had pulled some troops from towns on the opposite bank of the Dnipro River from Kherson city, the first official Ukrainian report of a Russian withdrawal on what is now the main front line in the south..

* Spain has stepped up security at public and diplomatic buildings after a spate of letter bombs, including one sent to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and another to the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid, where an official suffered minor injuries.

* Air raid alerts were issued across all of Ukraine following warnings by Ukrainian officials that Russia was preparing a new wave of missile and drone strikes. “An overall air raid alert is in place in Ukraine. Go to shelters,” country’s border service wrote on Telegram messaging app.

* Ukraine’s military said it had found fragments of Russian-fired nuclear-capable missiles with dud warheads in west Ukraine, and that their apparent purpose was to distract air defences.

* The recently liberated Ukrainian city of Kherson has lost its power supply after heavy shelling by Russian forces, the regional governor said.

* European Union governments tentatively agreed on a $60 a barrel price cap on Russian seaborne oil, with an adjustment mechanism to keep the cap at 5% below the market price, an EU diplomat said.

* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on that big problems had accumulated in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), accusing the West of spurning the chance to make it a real bridge with Russia after the Cold War.

* Lavrov said that discussions with Washington about potential prisoner exchanges were being conducted by the two countries’ intelligence services, and that he hoped they would be successful.

* The European Union needs patience as it sanctions Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, as most measures will only have an impact in the medium and long term, Lithuania’s prime minister said in an interview at  the  Reuters NEXT conference.

* Switzerland has frozen financial assets worth 7.5 billion Swiss francs ($7.94 billion) as of Nov. 25 under sanctions against Russians to punish Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) said.

* Russia said the German parliament’s move to recognise the 1932-33 famine in Ukraine as a Soviet-imposed genocide was an anti-Russian provocation and an attempt by Germany to whitewash its Nazi past.

* Ukraine sacked a top engineer at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, accusing him of collaborating with Russian forces, and urged other Ukrainian staff at the plant to remain loyal to Kyiv.

* Russia must withdraw its heavy weapons and military personnel from the Zaporizhzhia plant if the U.N. atomic watchdog’s efforts to create a protection zone are to succeed, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

* In a grim sign of the energy crisis caused by Russian attacks on Ukraine’s electricity grid, nine people have been killed in fires over the past 24 hours as Ukrainians resorted to emergency generators, candles and gas cylinders in violation of safety rules to try to heat their homes after power outages.

* “Remember one thing – the Russians are afraid. And they are very cold and no one will help them, because they do not have popular support,” – Andriy Yermak, chief of Ukrainian presidential staff.

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U.S. President Joe Biden may be a man of tradition, but the Democratic Party he leads is poised to get rid of one of its oldest political rituals.

A closed group of Democrats will meet Friday to reshape the party’s presidential nomination process. They plan to bump Iowa as the state where White House runs kick off every four years, hoping to usher in a more diverse, early nominating calendar, according eight senior Democratic officials.

The exact order of states is yet to be settled, but the party is poised to put Michigan ahead of Iowa as the earliest midwest state in the lineup, according to one of those officials.

Democratic officials, who each want their home state to move up the calendar, are vying to be one of the top group of states that start the presidential-picking process before “Super Tuesday,” which often seals the Democratic nominee.

The group previously included Iowa, New Hampsire, Nevada and South Carolina, but its exact makeup in the future is still unclear, sources say.

“The one thing I know for certain is Iowa won’t be leading the nominating contest. Everything else is up in the air and will certainly be fiercely debated,” said one senior official with the National Democratic Committee.

The committee is expected to decide at a meeting on Friday and Saturday in a Washington hotel. The DNC and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.

Because it comes first in the process, Iowa, the country’s 31st largest state by both population and gross domestic product, has for nearly 50 years had an outsized role for both parties in identifying viable candidates to become president.

Presidential hopefuls blanketed Iowa’s airwaves with ads and hopscotch the state to talk to voters at state fairs, town halls and school gymnasiums. They took crash courses in agricultural issues that dominate Iowa’s economy.

Months of activity culminated in the Iowa caucus, where locals gathered to make the case for their favored candidate to other Iowa voters, often wooing their support through multiple rounds of voting until a winner was declared.

After Iowa, both Democrats and Republicans held state primaries that narrow down presidential candidates even further. Republicans have not announced plans to strip Iowa of its first-in-the-nation status.

The U.S. voting population has morphed from about 85% white in 1996 to 69% in 2020, Pew Research shows, with the newest generation able to vote, ‘Gen Z’ just 55% white. Iowa, with an approximately 90% white population, is no longer an accurate predictor of which candidate will do well on the national stage, Democrats say.

Their push to change the primary calendar picked up momentum after 2020 when the Democrats’ Iowa caucuses were plagued by technical and communication issues that delayed the announcement of a winner.

The rules governing the party primaries could be particularly important in 2024. Some White House officials think Biden could face a primary challenge within his own party, and new rules could subtly shift the odds.

Biden has no love lost for Iowa after disappointing results there in 2008 and 2020. His 2020 campaign struggled to raise money and was only secure after the fourth nominating contest that year, in South Carolina, where a heavily Black electorate lifted him to victory.

Twenty states and territories applied for a 2024 early primary spot and 17 were invited make their pitch to DNC officials over the summer.

Officials in Michigan and Minnesota, which hold primaries instead of caucuses, had both fought to take Iowa’s place. Democrats in both states took control of the governors’ mansions and the state legislatures during the midterm elections, giving them the power to shift the schedule if needed.

Some Democrats have argued that Michigan is too big to be an early state, because it will cost candidates dearly to campaign there and also allow some to bypass earlier, smaller states and only concentrate on Michigan. But supporters say a key swing state that offers candidates a true test of viability.

The committee may also consider adding another state to the early nominating calendar, such as Washington or Maryland, source say.

One of the biggest questions heading into the meeting is what to do about New Hampshire. The state has traditionally held the first primary, right after Iowa’s caucuses, but some Democrats would like more-diverse Nevada to get that spot.

But New Hampshire state law requires its secretary of state to set the primary date seven days before any other, providing state officials a firewall against any efforts to boot them as the first primary state.

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A U.S. appeals court on Thursday dealt a blow to Donald Trump, reversing a judge’s appointment of an independent arbiter to vet documents seized by the FBI from his Florida home and allowing all of the records to be used in a criminal investigation of the former president.

A three-judge panel of the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Justice Department in its challenge to a September ruling by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to appoint a “special master” to review the records to decide if some should be kept from investigators. The 11th Circuit also overturned Cannon’s decision to bar investigators from accessing most of the records pending the review.

Trump faces a federal criminal investigation into his retention of sensitive government records after leaving office in January 2021, including whether he violated a 1917 law called the Espionage Act that makes it a crime to release information harmful to national security. Investigators also are looking into potential unlawful obstruction of the probe.

The 11th Circuit said Cannon lacked the authority to grant Trump’s request for a special master.

“The law is clear. We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant,” the panel wrote. “Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so.”

The 11th Circuit ordered the dismissal of Trump’s lawsuit filed after the Aug. 8 raid of his Florida estate.

Trump is likely to appeal the 11th Circuit’s action to the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court.

The Justice Department and representatives for Trump did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Three days after Trump announced a run for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland on Nov. 18 appointed a special counsel, Jack Smith, to oversee the documents criminal investigation and another one also relating to Trump.

FBI agents seized about 11,000 records, including about 100 marked as classified, during the Aug. 8 court-approved search at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach. Cannon appointed Raymond Dearie, another federal judge, at Trump’s request to review the records to consider whether any should be walled off from the criminal investigation.

Cannon also halted prosecutors from using the documents taken in the search as part of their criminal investigation until the conclusion of Dearie’s review, although an appeals court later gave the government access to the materials marked as classified.

Trump’s lawyers have asked Dearie to find that some documents are protected by executive privilege, a legal doctrine that permits presidents to keep certain communications secret, or meet the definition of “personal” papers that should be kept private. Trump’s lawyers argued that he designated certain records as his personal papers, a claim that the Justice Department disputes.

Trump sued two weeks after the Mar-a-Lago raid, arguing that his status as a former president required a third-party review of the documents. While Trump has claimed that he declassified the records and that the FBI may have planted evidence, his lawyers have not repeated those statements in court.

The Justice Department argued that Cannon, who was appointed to her judgeship by Trump, lacked the authority to grant his request for a special master at this stage of the investigation. Prosecutors said they have their own team that combed through the seized pages and kept any potentially privileged information out of the probe.

Justice Department lawyers also said Trump, as a former president, cannot invoke executive privilege for documents that belong to the current executive branch of the U.S. government.

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Two top leaders at Dechert law firm are stepping down from their roles, one month after the legal powerhouse was hit with a pair of racketeering lawsuits related to its alleged role in a hack-and-leak operation on behalf of a Gulf state sheikh.

The departure of CEO Henry Nassau and chairman Andrew Levander—who threatened to sue the Washington Free Beacon three years ago for reporting on separate litigation related to the alleged hacking plot—comes as Dechert faces at least six lawsuits in London, New York, and Washington, D.C., accusing the firm or its attorneys of misconduct.

Most of the allegations involve Dechert’s former head of global litigation Neil Gerrard and one of the firm’s former clients, the leader of United Arab Emirates kingdom Ras al-Khaimah.

Dechert confirmed the shakeup on Thursday and said the company “achieved tremendous success under Andy and Henry’s leadership,” according to Reuters.

Jay Solomon, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, filed a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) suit against Dechert in October in Washington, D.C. Solomon said he was fired from the Wall Street Journal after Dechert lawyers helped orchestrate a plot to steal and leak emails between him and one of his sources, Aviation magnate Farhad Azima. Dechert’s client, the leader of United Arab Emirates kingdom Ras al-Khaimah, was reportedly feuding with Azima at the time of the hack.

Azima filed a similar RICO case against Dechert in New York last month and has ongoing litigation against the group in London. Former Georgian politician Gela Mikadze sued the firm in London in September. Two Jordanian businessmen are also suing Dechert in London as part of a kidnapping and torture case involving the kingdom of Ras al-Khaimah.

Dechert and Gerrard lost a lengthy legal battle earlier this year against the Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation, an African mining company and former client. The ENRC claimed Gerrard secretly leaked damaging information about the company while serving as its lawyer to induce it to pay him higher legal fees.

In the ruling, a London judge said Gerrard “lied continuously” throughout the case and was “so obsessed with making money from his work that he lost any real sense of objectivity, proportion, or indeed loyalty to his client.”

The post Lawyer Who Threatened Free Beacon Steps Down From Firm Amid Hacking, Kidnapping, Racketeering Claims appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to headline a conference held by one of the foremost anti-Israel groups in the country, a move that is being interpreted as a shot at Israel’s newly elected government led by incoming prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Blinken on Wednesday announced that he will serve as the headline speaker at the annual conference for J Street, which as recently as last month trashed Netanyahu, accusing the incoming prime minister of “building and bulldozing [his] way to permanent, undemocratic control of the West Bank.” The group also advocates conditioning U.S. aid to Israel, routinely attacks the Jewish state for defending itself against Palestinian terrorism, and employs notoriously terrible pumpkin carvers. It is funded by liberal anti-Israel billionaire George Soros, though the organization initially tried to hide this fact, as well as by far-left groups such as the Ploughshares Fund, one of the chief proponents of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.

The conference kicks off this weekend, with Blinken set to address the confab on Sunday, alongside former Bernie Sanders adviser and longtime Israel critic Matt Duss, Daily Beast writer Wajahat Ali, a cadre of pro-Palestinian activists, and several Democratic members of Congress, including Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D., Md.) and senator-elect Peter Welch (D., Vt.).

Blinken’s decision to attend J Street’s headline event is eliciting concerns at Foggy Bottom and sparking outrage among friends of the Jewish state already aggrieved at the Biden administration’s decision last month to launch an unprecedented FBI investigation into the death in Israel of a Palestinian-American journalist. Israel determined that the journalist was unintentionally shot by its security forces during a standoff with Palestinian terrorists.

Multiple sources, both within and outside the State Department, who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon said Blinken’s decision to attend J Street’s conference is part of an effort by the Biden administration to undermine the new Netanyahu government and distance itself from the incoming prime minister’s conservative coalition.

“It’s repugnant that while Israelis are being repeatedly targeted by terrorists, and the [Department of Justice] launches an unwarranted and politicized investigation of our ally, the secretary of state thinks it’s a good idea to elevate an organization that spends its time demanding aid to Israel be conditioned and criticizing the Jewish state for defending herself,” Sandra Parker, the chairwoman of the CUFI Action Fund, told the Free Beacon in a statement.

While Blinken is not the first secretary of state to address a J Street conference—then-secretary John Kerry and then-vice president Joe Biden both spoke in 2016—the timing of his address is being viewed as highly symbolic. The Biden administration in December took the extraordinary step of launching a Justice Department investigation into the shooting of a Palestinian-American reporter by the Israel Defense Forces.

Israel in September conducted its own independent review in cooperation with the U.S. State Department, and U.S. lawmakers are accusing the administration—given the president’s support for an additional FBI investigation—of kowtowing to radical elements in the Democratic Party who seek to transform Israel into a pariah state.

One senior State Department official told the Free Beacon that “attending this J Street event is like a blatant and obvious attempt to stick Bibi [Netanyahu] in the eye.”

“Unfortunately,” said the source, who was not authorized to speak on record, “it has the effect of undermining our relationship with Israel, and thus U.S. national security.”

It’s not the first sign that the Biden administration is less than elated at Netanyahu’s reascension to power last month. Biden waited days to congratulate the newly elected Israeli leader, drawing accusations the president was trying to isolate Netanyahu’s conservative government before it even was seated.

“The Biden administration is filled with partisans who hate Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu. They banned the use of the phrase ‘Abraham Accords,’ couldn’t bring themselves to have President Biden call Netanyahu to congratulate him until their silence became comical, and now they’re even unleashing the FBI,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) told the Free Beacon. “So of course Secretary Blinken is going to J Street, an anti-Israel activist group that also criticized the Abraham Accords, loathes Netanyahu, and regularly calls for investigations against Israel. It’s both disgraceful and predictable.”

One former Israeli government official told the Free Beacon the administration is not even trying to hide its disdain for Netanyahu and his conservative coalition.

“This is simply bad diplomatic strategy,” said the source, who would only speak on background so as not to upset either government. “Speaking to J Street may displease the incoming Israeli government, but they’re hardly afraid of the lobby. This doesn’t send a message of strength but rather one of petulance. Secretary Blinken should know better.”

The post Welcome, Bibi: Blinken To Headline Anti-Israel J Street Conference appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.