DRULAP

The U.S. Soccer Federation reached milestone agreements to pay its men’s and women’s teams equally, making the American national governing body the first in the sport to promise both sexes matching money.

The federation announced separate collective bargaining agreements through December 2028 with the unions for both national teams on Wednesday, ending years of often acrimonious negotiations.

The men have been playing under the terms of a CBA that expired in December 2018. The women’s CBA expired at the end of March but talks continued after the federation and the players agreed to settle a gender discrimination lawsuit brought by some of the players in 2019. The settlement was contingent on the federation reaching labor contracts that equalized pay and bonuses between the two teams.

“I feel a lot of pride for the girls who are going to see this growing up, and recognize their value rather than having to fight for it. However, my dad always told me that you don’t get rewarded for doing what you’re supposed to do — and paying men and women equally is what you’re supposed to do,” U.S. forward Margaret Purce said. “So I’m not giving out any gold stars, but I’m grateful for this accomplishment and for all the people who came together to make it so.”

Perhaps the biggest sticking point was World Cup prize money, which is based on how far a team advances in the tournament. While the U.S. women have been successful on the international stage with back-to-back World Cup titles, differences in FIFA prize money meant they took home far less than the men’s winners.

The unions agreed to pool FIFA’s payments for the men’s World Cup later this year and next year’s Women’s World Cup, as well as for the 2026 and 2027 tournaments.

Each player will get matching game appearance fees in what the USSF said makes it the first federation to pool FIFA prize money in this manner.

“We saw it as an opportunity, an opportunity to be leaders in this front and join in with the women’s side and U.S. Soccer. So we’re just excited that this is how we were able to get the deal done,” said Walker Zimmerman, a defender who is part of the U.S. National Team Players Association leadership group.

The federation previously based bonuses on payments from FIFA, which earmarked $400 million for the 2018 men’s tournament, including $38 million to champion France, and $30 million for the 2019 women’s tournament, including $4 million to the champion United States.

FIFA has increased the total to $440 million for the 2022 men’s World Cup, and its president, Gianni Infantino, has proposed that FIFA double the women’s prize money to $60 million for the 2023 Women’s World Cup, in which FIFA has increased the teams to 32.

For the current World Cup cycles, the USSF will pool the FIFA funds, taking 10% off the top and then splitting the rest equally among 46 players — 23 players on the roster of each team. For the 2026-27 cycle, the USSF cut increases to 20% before the split.

After missing the 2018 World Cup, the men qualified for this year’s World Cup in Qatar starting in November. The women’s team will seek to qualify this year for the 2023 World Cup, cohosted by Australia and New Zealand.

For lesser tournaments, such as those run by the governing body of North America, players will earn identical game bonuses. And for exhibition games, players will receive matching appearance fees and performance payments based on the match result and opponent rank. Players who don’t dress will earn a fee that is the equivalent of participating in a national team training camp.

The women gave up guaranteed base salaries which had been part of their CBA since 2005. Some players had been guaranteed annual salaries of $100,000.

“I think we’ve outgrown some of the conditions that may look like we have lost something, but now our (professional) league is actually strong enough where now we don’t need as many guaranteed contracts, you know, we can be on more of a pay-to-play model,” Purce said.

Child care, covered for women for more than 25 years, will be extended to men during national team training camps and matches.

The women and men also will receive a portion of commercial revenue from tickets for matches controlled by the USSF, with bonuses for sellouts, and each team will get a portion of broadcast, partner and sponsor revenue.

Players will get a 401(k) plan and the USSF will match up to 5% of a player’s compensation, subject to IRS limits. That money will be deducted from the shares of commercial revenue.

“There were moments when I thought it was all going to fall apart and then it came back together and it’s a real credit to all the different groups coming together, negotiating at one table,” said federation President Cindy Parlow Cone, a former national team player who became head of the governing body in 2020

“I think that’s where the turning point really happened. Before, trying to negotiate a CBA with the women and then turn around and negotiate CBA terms with the men and vice versa, was really challenging. I think the real turning point was when we finally were all in the same room sitting at the same table, working together and collaborating to reach this goal.”

Women ended six years of litigation over equal pay in February in a deal calling for the USSF to pay $24 million, a deal contingent on reaching new collective bargaining agreements.

As part of the settlement, players will split $22 million, about one-third of what they had sought in damages. The USSF also agreed to establish a fund with $2 million to benefit the players in their post-soccer careers and charitable efforts aimed at growing the sport for women.

Mark Levinstein, counsel for the men’s union, said the agreement ended “more than 20 years of federation discrimination against the USWNT players.”

“Together with the USWNTPA, the USMNT players achieved what everyone said was impossible — an agreement that provides fair compensation to the USMNT players and equal pay and equal working conditions to the USWNT players,” he said. “The new federation leadership should get tremendous credit for working with the players to achieve these agreements.”
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A U.S. military investigation found that American troops did not violate the law of war or deliberately cause civilian casualties in a 2019 airstrike in Syria that killed dozens of people, including women and children. It did find that the military committed procedural mistakes in the aftermath of the attack.

The Pentagon said Tuesday that no one, including the ground force commander, was disciplined as a result of the strike, which was launched in support of Syrian partner forces who were under heavy fire from the Islamic State group near the town of Baghuz, in eastern Syria.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who ordered a new review of the airstrike last November, said he was “disappointed” with deficiencies in the handling of the initial review of the operation, which missed deadlines and led to delays in reporting to Congress and the public about civilian casualties.

“The process contributed to a perception that the Department was not committed to transparency and was not taking the incident seriously — a perception that could have been prevented by a timely review and a clear explication of the circumstances surrounding the strike,” Austin said in a memo released Tuesday.

The investigation comes amid new scrutiny on the U.S. military for strikes that cause innocent deaths. And it has all prompted Austin to order the department to create a new “Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Action Plan” to better prevent civilian deaths in military operations. He also ordered Army Gen. Michael Garrett, currently the head of U.S. Army Forces Command, to do an independent review of the Baghuz strike.

Late last year, another independent review concluded that a U.S. drone strike that killed innocent Kabul civilians and children in the final days of the Afghanistan war was not caused by misconduct or negligence. It found breakdowns in communication and in the process of identifying and confirming the target of the bombing.

The strike killed a longtime employee of an American humanitarian organization and nine of his family members, including seven children. The U.S. has promised to pay financial reparations to the family, and potentially get them out of Afghanistan, but none of that has happened yet.

In the Tuesday memo, Austin directed department leaders to meet deadlines in reporting civilian casualties, conduct thorough reviews, and reinforce the importance of the procedures to commanders across the force.

The initial investigation into the attack concluded that the strike constituted legitimate self-defense in support of Syrian partner forces under fire from the Islamic State group. Garrett, in his investigation, agreed with that conclusion.

According to Garrett’s investigation, 52 enemy combatants were killed and two were injured, and four civilians were killed and 15 were injured. Of the civilians, one female and three children were killed, and 11 women and four children were wounded. One of the enemies killed was a child.

Asked why no one was being held personally accountable for the civilian deaths, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said Tuesday that Austin was holding the department accountable, and that’s why he ordered changes in the process.

“I understand the questions about accountability, I get it,” Kirby told Pentagon reporters. “In this case, General Garrett found that the ground force commander made the best decisions that he could, given the information he had at the time, given a very lethal, very aggressive (Islamic State) threat, in a very confined space. It is deeply regrettable … we apologize for the loss of innocent life.”

Garrett, in an unclassified summary of his report, said that the ground force commander “did not deliberately or with wanton disregard cause civilian casualties.” He said the decision to strike was necessary to defend the Syrian Democratic Forces and that “multiple efforts to distinguish civilians” from Islamic State insurgents were made.

Garrett added, however, that information not available to the commander at the time, showed that he relied on data “that was not fully accurate.” But he said the commander’s actions can’t be judged on information available only in hindsight.

Garrett, in his review, also said that while he found problems with policy compliance, “I found no evidence to support the allegation that these deficiencies were malicious or made to conceal decisions or actions.”
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Hilary Wu of Orange County, California, comes from a family who lived in Taiwan for hundreds of years. Her boyfriend identifies as a descendent of a wave of people from China who were exiled to Taiwan in the 1940s under the Chinese Nationalist government as the Communists took over mainland China.

But Wu, 40, and her boyfriend discussed that difference only once, over dinner. It doesn’t matter to them. “We’re very different in how we grew up, and we’re different people, but that doesn’t affect our values, our morals,” said Wu, a hospital dietician who moved to California with her parents when she was a child.

But the two groups’ historical differences and ongoing tensions became evident outside of Taiwan on Sunday when a gunman opened fire at a Taiwanese Presbyterian church gathering in Southern California, where Wu lives. The suspected shooter was born and raised in Taiwan and had ties to pro-China groups, Taiwanese media outlets say. The parishioners he is accused of shooting descended from families who had lived in Taiwan for centuries.

Authorities said David Wenwei Chou, 68, of Las Vegas, was arrested and accused of killing one man, 52-year-old Dr. John Cheng, who tackled the suspect, allowing others to subdue him, according to The Associated Press. Five others were injured.

Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes cited a grievance between the shooter, a U.S. citizen, and the Taiwanese community. The suspect “was upset about political tensions involving China and Taiwan,” the sheriff’s department said in a statement on Monday.

British Presbyterians who reached Taiwan in 1865 made strong connections with local Taiwanese and advocated the island’s independence from China, author-historian Christine Louise Lin wrote in her book “The Presbyterian Church in Taiwan and the Advocacy of Local Autonomy.” 

“I don’t like to think of this as a hate crime, but it’s a hate crime,” Wu said. “There’s a political aspect in the (background), but this person is also crazy. I was very shocked to find out it’s another Asian American taking something out on Taiwanese Americans.”

Taiwan’s domestic differences

The divide has influenced domestic politics, education and other facets of life in Taiwan since the 1940s.

In 1949, Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government fled mainland China and took control of the island after fleeing Mao Zedong’s Communists in the Chinese civil war. The Nationalists kept Taiwan under authoritarian rule until democratizing in the 1980s.

Taiwanese with hundreds of years of history on the island, also identified as “benshengren,” favor today’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party. That party opposes pledges by the modern Chinese government to capture the island by force if needed. The Nationalists, or “waishengren,” many who hail from China and settled in Taiwan with Chiang, take a more conciliatory stance toward China.

Paul Yang, 52, a Taiwanese-born real estate agency owner in Orange County, has lived in the United States for 31 years and knows people connected to the church where the shooting occurred. The president of the Taiwanese Chamber of Commerce of Orange County, Yang says his 200 members seldom discuss politics in public settings.

Yang still identifies as a benshengren but says he seldom hears the term anymore.

“When I go back to Taiwan and talk to younger generations, the terms ‘bensheng’ and ‘waisheng’ are not as commonly used as when I was a kid,” he said.

The two groups of Taiwanese people have no “real issues” in the United States, said Chien Minze, president of the Washington-based Taiwan advocacy organization Formosan Association for Public Affairs. He knows of no other U.S. incident like the shooting. “We respect each other,” he said, referring to the two groups. “There is nothing like we have (to) go to this extreme.”

Rekindling friction in Taiwan

In Taiwan, the shooting will likely make people think about the divide again, said Chao Chien-min, dean of social sciences at Chinese Cultural University in Taipei. Domestic news reports will focus on that angle, he predicted, and the island’s political parties might bring it up on their own.

“What I’m worried about is this: The incident in California will strengthen a vicious cycle,” Chao said. “This shooting was politically motivated to start with, and the interpretation of it in Taiwan is that it’s political. Everything related to Taiwan-mainland China relations is politicized.”

The ruling party of Taiwan said in a social media statement that it “condemned” any form of violence but did not elaborate on the political angle.

Sunday’s shooting may alarm the Taiwanese about fringe political activists who have mainland Chinese sympathies and support unifying Taiwan and China, said Sean Su, an independent political analyst in Taiwan. Su said followers of a pro-China group broke his windows when he was living in New York 15 years ago.

“These groups tend to be radicalized in the United States,” Su said. “A lot of Taiwanese groups have undergone a lot of harassment and undergone lot of threats from these pro-China unification groups over the years.”

Unanswered questions

Peggy Huang, a Taiwanese American City Council member in Yorba Linda, a suburban city near the shooting site, called politics a likely “oversimplification” of reasons behind the shooting. She wonders particularly how a suspect from Las Vegas picked a church in Laguna Woods for his assault. The city of 16,000 is attractive to retirees, and Taiwanese churches operate in other parts of Orange County.

“He might no doubt have some hateful feeling toward Taiwanese people,” said Huang. “But for him to specifically come to this church? This is not an easy church to find. That’s the topic of conversation among us.”
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Police in Dallas arrested a suspect early Tuesday who is linked to a shooting last week at a hair salon that left three women of Korean descent wounded.

An FBI spokesperson also confirmed that the Dallas FBI Field Office, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District in Texas, and the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice have opened a federal hate crime investigation.

The suspect was identified as Jeremy Theron Smith, 36, according to an arrest warrant affidavit submitted by the police, according to the Dallas Police Twitter account.

Smith is accused of entering The Hair World Salon in the city’s Koreatown on May 11 and opening fire on the people inside, injuring the owner, a hairdresser on duty and a client.

The women were rushed to a hospital and treated for non-life-threatening injuries.

Smith is being detained in a Dallas County jail on three charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, jail records show.

Police Chief Eddie Garcia said investigators were looking into a possible connection between the hair salon shooting and other hate crimes against Asian Americans that recently took place in the area, according to the Dallas Police Twitter account. Garcia said a maroon or red vehicle had been spotted at all three crime scenes.

In a report released last August, the FBI said 279 anti-Asian incidents were reported in 2020, up 77% from 2019.

Garcia also said police will be increasing security measures and the number of patrol officers stationed in areas of the city with large Asian American communities.

The shooting is one of several following a surge in attacks and violence against Asian Americans across the country during the 2-year-old COVID-19 pandemic.

Some information for this report came from Reuters and NBC News.
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The Justice Department sued longtime Las Vegas casino mogul Steve Wynn on Tuesday to compel him to register as a foreign agent because of lobbying work it says he performed at the behest of the Chinese government during the Trump administration. 

The department said it had advised Wynn repeatedly over the last four years to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA, and is suing now because Wynn refused to do so. 

Though the Justice Department has ramped up efforts to criminally prosecute people who don’t register as foreign agents, officials described this case as the first lawsuit of its kind in more than three decades. 

“Where a foreign government uses an American as its agent to influence policy decisions in the United States, FARA gives the American people a right to know,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen, the head of the department’s National Security Division, said in a statement. 

A spokesperson for the department declined to comment on why the department had pursued a lawsuit rather than criminal charges. 

Wynn’s lawyers said Tuesday that they would contest the suit. 

“Steve Wynn has never acted as an agent of the Chinese government and had no obligation to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act,” said a statement from attorneys Reid Weingarten and Brian Heberlig. “We respectfully disagree with the Department of Justice’s legal interpretation of FARA and look forward to proving our case in court.” 

The complaint alleges that Wynn, who stepped down from his company, Wynn Resorts, in 2018 after multiple women accused him of sexual misconduct, lobbied then-President Donald Trump and members of his administration for several months in 2017 to remove from the United States a Chinese national who had been charged with corruption in China and was seeking political asylum in America. The efforts to have the man removed from the U.S. were ultimately unsuccessful. 

The lawsuit says the lobbying effort was done on behalf of senior Chinese government officials, including Sun Lijun, the then-vice minister of the Ministry of Public Security who sought Wynn’s help in trying to get the Chinese national’s new visa application denied, according to the complaint. 

The lobbying effort also included conversations over dinner with Trump and by phone, and multiple visits to the White House for apparently unscheduled meetings with the issue was discussed. 

The complaint says Wynn was motivated to protect his business interests in China. At the time, his company owned and operated casinos in the Chinese territory of Macau. The government in Macau had restricted the number of gaming tables and machines that could be operated at Wynn’s casino, the Justice Department says, and he was scheduled to renegotiate licenses to operate casinos in 2019. 

FARA, enacted in 1938 to unmask Nazi propaganda in the United States, requires people to disclose to the Justice Department when they advocate, lobby or perform public relations work in the U.S. on behalf of a foreign government or political entity. 

The complaint alleges that Wynn was drawn into the lobbying effort by Elliott Broidy, a prominent fundraiser for Trump and the Republican Party who pleaded guilty in 2020 in an illicit lobbying campaign aimed at getting the Trump administration to drop an investigation into the multibillion-dollar looting of a Malaysian state investment fund and for his role in a covert lobbying effort that sought to arrange for the return of a Chinese dissident living in the U.S. 

Broidy was later pardoned by Trump at the end of his administration. 

The dissident was not referred to by name by prosecutors, but it matches the description of Guo Wengui. Guo left China in 2014 during an anti-corruption crackdown led by President Xi Jinping that ensnared people close to Guo, including a top intelligence official. Chinese authorities have accused Guo of rape, kidnapping, bribery and other offenses and have sought the return of the self-exiled tycoon. 
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Nearly 43,000 people were killed on U.S. roads last year, the highest number in 16 years as Americans returned to the roads after the coronavirus pandemic forced many to stay at home. 

The 10.5% jump from 2020 numbers was the largest percentage increase since the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began its fatality data collection system in 1975. Exacerbating the problem was a persistence of risky driving behaviors during the pandemic, such as speeding and less frequent use of seat belts, as people began to venture out more in 2021 for out-of-state and other road trips, analysts said. 

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said America faces a crisis on its roads. The safety administration urged state and local governments, drivers and safety advocates to join in an effort to reverse the rising death trend. 

“Our nation has taken a dangerous and deadly step backwards in traffic safety and impaired driving,” said MADD National President Alex Otte, who urged strong public-private efforts akin to the seat belt and air bag public safety campaigns of the 1990s to stem reckless driving. “More families and more communities are feeling the crushing magnitude of this crisis on our roads.” 

Preliminary figures released Tuesday by the agency show that 42,915 people died in traffic crashes last year, up from 38,824 in 2020. Final figures will be released in the fall. 

Forty-four states as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico had increases in traffic deaths in 2021 compared with the previous year, led by Texas, California and Florida. Posting declines were Wyoming, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Maryland and Maine. Rhode Island’s figures were unchanged. 

Americans drove about 325 billion more miles last year, 11.2% higher than in 2020, which contributed to the increase. 

Nearly 118 people died in U.S. traffic crashes every day last year, according to the agency’s figures. The Governors Highway Safety Association, a group of state traffic safety officials, blamed the increase on dangerous behavior such as speeding, driving while impaired by alcohol and drugs, and distracted driving, as well as “roads designed for speed instead of safety.” 

The combination, the group said, “has wiped out a decade and a half of progress in reducing traffic crashes, injuries and deaths.” 

Deaths last year increased in almost all types of crashes, NHTSA reported. Crashes occurring during out of state travel jumped 15%, compared with 2020, many of them on rural interstate roads or access roads off city highways. Fatalities in urban areas and deaths in multi-vehicle crashes each rose 16%. Pedestrian deaths were up 13%. 

By age, fatalities among drivers 65 and older rose 14%, reversing a declining trend seen among them in 2020. Deaths also surged among middle-aged drivers, led by those 35 to 44, which rose 15%. Drivers under age 16 saw traffic fatalities increase 6%. 

By vehicle, fatalities involving at least one big truck were up 13%, while motorcycle deaths were up 9% and deaths of bicyclists rose 5%. Fatalities involving speeding drivers and deaths in alcohol-related crashes each were up 5%. 

Government estimates show the rate of road deaths declined slightly from 2020. Last year there were 1.33 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled, compared with 1.34 in 2020. The fatality rate rose in the first quarter of last year, but declined the rest of the year, NHTSA said. 

Traffic deaths began to spike in 2020. NHTSA has blamed reckless driving behavior for increases during the pandemic, citing behavioral research showing that speeding and traveling without a seat belt have been higher. Before 2020, the number of fatalities had fallen for three straight years. 

Buttigieg pointed to a national strategy unveiled earlier this year aimed at reversing the trend. He said earlier that over the next two years his department will provide federal guidance as well as billions in grants under President Joe Biden’s new infrastructure law to spur states and localities to lower speed limits and embrace safer road design such as dedicated bike and bus lanes, better lighting and crosswalks. The strategy also urges the use of speed cameras, which the department says could provide more equitable enforcement than police traffic stops. 

In Tuesday’s statement, the department said it opened its first round of applications for the program, which will spend up to $6 billion over five years on local efforts to cut crashes and deaths. 

The Transportation Department is moving in the right direction to stem the increase in deaths, but it will take years for many of the steps to work, said Michael Brooks, acting executive director of the nonprofit Center for Auto Safety. 

NHTSA, for instance, has regulations pending to require electronic automatic emergency braking and pedestrian detection systems on all new light vehicles, and to require automatic emergency braking on heavy trucks, he said. Automatic emergency braking can slow or stop a vehicle if there’s an object in its path. 

The agency also is requiring automakers to install systems that alert rear-seat passengers if their safety belts aren’t buckled.
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Swiss food giant Nestlé is to fly baby formula from Switzerland and the Netherlands to the United States amid shortages there, a group spokeswoman said Tuesday. 

The Swiss group will specifically import two brands of hypoallergenic milk, as the shortage has become an additional source of stress for parents of babies intolerant of cow’s milk protein. 

“We prioritized these products because they serve a critical medical purpose,” the spokeswoman told AFP, confirming a press report.  

The two brands are already imported: Gerber Good Start Extensive HA milk from the Netherlands, and Alfamino milk from Switzerland.  

Faced with the shortage, Nestlé decided to airlift the milk “to help fill immediate needs,” said the group, which also has two factories in the United States producing infant formula.  

Initially caused by supply chain problems and a shortage of workers due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the formula shortage worsened in February when an Abbott factory in Michigan closed after a recall of products suspected of causing the deaths of two babies. 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration released the milk but issued a “483” form alleging irregularities at the plant, Abbott said Friday, adding that it “immediately” began implementing corrective measures.  

On Monday, Abbott reached an agreement with U.S. authorities to restart production at the plant.  

The White House is in constant contact with the four major manufacturers — Nestlé, Reckitt, Abbott and Perrigo — to identify transportation, logistics and supplier barriers to increasing production. 
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Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu is due to meet Wednesday in Washington with Secretary of State Antony Blinken — the latest step in the process of repairing ties between the two NATO allies. The Turkish diplomat will have tough questions to answer when it comes to Turkey’s efforts to veto bids by Finland and Sweden to join the Atlantic alliance.

Once a close ally of Washington, Ankara has seen relations strained over Turkey’s poor human rights record and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s close ties with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

Turkey’s strong backing of Ukraine in the face of Russia’s invasion has offered an opportunity to reset U.S.-Turkish relations, and analysts predict Cavusoglu’s visit to Washington will help that process.

But Asli Aydintasbas, a senior fellow at the European Council, warned Erdogan’s threat to veto Sweden and Finland’s NATO membership bids is casting a shadow over the visit.

“It certainly complicates the visit but also makes it more important,” Aydintasbas said. “The Biden administration started out with a policy of social distancing, retrenchment from the Middle East, and also no longer treating Turkey as the big geopolitical prize in a large chess game. And Turkey is showing it’s not going to let that happen.

“And, of course, the Ukraine war has clearly enhanced once again Turkey’s geostrategic location and importance.”

On Monday, Erdogan accused Finland and Sweden of supporting terrorist organizations fighting Turkey, referring to Kurdish groups. He said Stockholm and Helsinki shouldn’t bother to send diplomatic delegations to change his mind.

Erdogan’s hardening stance, analysts warn, will likely add to concerns in Washington over the Turkish president’s close ties with Putin. In addition, Turkey’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 missile system prompted Washington to impose military sanctions on Ankara.

Soli Ozel, an international relations specialist at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University, said one of Cavusoglu’s objectives — persuading Washington to allow the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey — will likely be complicated by renewed questions over where Erdogan’s ultimate allegiances lie.

“There will be voices raising that question,” Ozel said. “I am afraid it might also lead to a much more negative sentiment selling the F-16s and the kits for upgrading the existing F-16s in the U.S. Congress. In that sense I don’t find such a public move so advisable.”

Russian media on Tuesday announced Putin was planning to visit Turkey in the coming days, a report that has not been confirmed by Ankara but will likely add to the unease among Turkey’s Western allies, including Washington. Aaron Stein, head of the Pennsylvania-based Foreign Policy Research Institute, said sentiments in Washington toward Turkey are likely to become only more entrenched.

“It’s more or less reinforced that Ankara is to pursue its own interests,” Stein said. “So, some people suggest it’s time to sell them F-16s, and others suggest we need compromise on the S-400. But things happen and rabbits can be pulled out of hats. But this one has proved particularly sticky with the S-400s and the F-16s.”

Analysts also expect Cavusoglu will underline the importance of restoring closer communication between the country’s two presidents. How such requests are met may depend on Washington’s approach, and whether U.S. officials decide to confront or acquiesce to Erdogan’s veto threats on Sweden and Finland.
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In the wake of Saturday’s killings of 10 Black people in a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery store, allegedly by a white man driven by white-supremacist ideology, U.S. civil rights groups are calling on social media companies to be more aggressive about policing online hate speech and the sharing of racist incitements to violence.

The 18-year-old who is believed to have carried out the killings wrote, in a 180-page document released in advance of the attack, that he had become a white supremacist after reading about racist ideology on various websites, including the notoriously unregulated site 4chan.

As of Monday afternoon, the site still contained links to the document, which overflows with hateful rhetoric and accurately describes how the attack was to take place, as well as the weapons, equipment and tactics used by the alleged killer.

The document also appears to refer to so-called great replacement theory — the idea that there is a conspiracy to flood the U.S. with nonwhite immigrants in order to change electoral patterns and disadvantage white voters. Long a staple of fringe internet white supremacy groups, versions of replacement theory have recently been mainstreamed by, among others, Fox News personality Tucker Carlson.

On Monday night, Carlson addressed the killings, and the calls to restrict comments considered “hate speech” by the government.

“What is hate speech?” Carlson asked at the beginning of his show. “Well, it’s speech that our leaders hate. So because a mentally ill teenager murdered strangers, you cannot be allowed to express your political views out loud.”

In addition to publishing his document online, the alleged killer also used a helmet-mounted camera to broadcast the killings on the live-streaming platform Twitch.

Calls for accountability

“There’s got to be a recognition of the role that social media, and therefore social media companies, can play in ferreting out the use of technology to promote hate,” Marc H. Morial, president and CEO of the National Urban League, told VOA.

“This guy was radicalized on the internet. Who’s producing this content? Why is it not taken down? Americans must make the distinction that free speech does not allow you to … promote racism, and to promote antisemitism, Islamophobia, all sorts of hatred and also suggest that violence is the appropriate response to hate,” Morial said.

“We have to decide as a society, as a country: how are we going to address domestic terrorism?” Derrick Johnson, CEO of the NAACP, said in an appearance on MSNBC. “How are we going to address the platforms that allow for this type of hate radicalization to take place? Whether it is on social media, whether it’s Fox News, at some point, we have to stop repeating these stories.”

“The real question is what are we going to do about it?” Johnson continued. “When will Facebook, when will the other social media platforms be held accountable? When will Fox News be held accountable? When will we deal with a gun industry that continues to allow this to happen? This nation has to deal with domestic terrorism. We must do so aggressively. We must do so decisively. So we won’t continue to repeat this same story over and over again.”

Response widespread

Although the alleged killer’s targets on Saturday were Black residents of Buffalo, his writings revealed broad hatred of other ethnic groups, most notably Jews, but also all nonwhite people living on what he described as “White lands.”

The response to the killings came from across the spectrum of groups working to protect minority rights in the U.S., and many included calls for more regulation of online hate speech.

“The murderous attack of the gunman at the Buffalo supermarket was not an isolated hate crime, but the result of racially motivated violent White extremists who spread hate on the internet and beyond,” Sindy Benavides, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said in a statement.

She called on the Department of Justice to prosecute the killings as a hate crime, and said the group is “asking law enforcement to shut down these networks of hate before more innocent people are hurt or killed.”

“This was yet another predicable attack by an avowed white supremacist who imbibed hateful conspiracy theories online and then turned to violent action, this time targeting mostly Black victims,” Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO and national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a statement.

“We know the shooter targeted the Black community, and apparently did so in part because he sought to ignite a ‘holy war’ between ‘Jews and Gentiles.’ We cannot remain complacent in the face of this continuing and serious national security threat,” he said. “More must be done — now — to push back against the racist and antisemitic violence propounded by the far right.”

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution safeguards free speech, including speech that shocks or offends. But that protection does not extend to speech that incites violence or puts the public in danger.

Action urged

Many groups called for a widespread response to the problem at the state and federal levels.

In an email exchange with VOA, the Southern Poverty Law Center recommended multiple measures. According to Susan Corke, director of the law center’s Intelligence Project, it is vital for elected leaders and others in positions of authority to condemn racist attacks and racist language. The group also called for federal agencies to provide more funding for early intervention and for programs to support victims of racist violence.

“Tech companies must create — and enforce — Terms of Service and policies to ensure that social media platforms, payment service providers and other internet-based services do not provide forums where hateful activities and extremism can grow and lead to domestic terrorism,” she said. “Social media platforms and online payment service providers must act to disrupt the funding of hate online, to prevent their services from helping to incubate and bankroll terrorists and extremism.”

Legislation pending

Several civil rights organizations called on lawmakers to support the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act, a bill pending before both houses of Congress.

The legislation, according to the Congressional Research Service, “establishes new requirements to expand the availability of information on domestic terrorism, as well as the relationship between domestic terrorism and hate crimes. It authorizes domestic terrorism components within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to monitor, analyze, investigate, and prosecute domestic terrorism.”

Among other things, the bill would require law enforcement agencies to jointly report on domestic terrorism, “including white-supremacist-related incidents or attempted incidents.” It also creates an interagency task force “to analyze and combat white supremacist and neo-Nazi infiltration of the uniformed services and federal law enforcement agencies.”
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