Day: April 21, 2017

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday that he plans to be respectful and engage the United States with a fact-based approach to solving problems a day after Donald Trump called Canada a “disgrace” for policies that hurt American farmers.

Trudeau said during a news conference alongside visiting Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni on Parliament Hill that he will stand up for Canada’s interests and people.

“The way to do that is to make arguments in a respectful fashion, based on facts, and work constructively and collaboratively with our neighbors,” said the Liberal leader.

The U.S. president took aim at Canada’s dairy industry this week for creating a new lower-priced classification of milk product that he argues hurts U.S. producers. Trump said it has put farmers in Wisconsin and New York state out of business.

Canada changed its policy on pricing domestic milk to cover more dairy ingredients, leading to lower prices for Canadian products including ultra-filtered milk that compete with U.S. milk. Canada’s dairy sector is protected by high tariffs on imported products and controls on domestic production as a means of supporting prices that farmers receive.

Trump said on Thursday “what they’ve done to our dairy farm workers is a disgrace”.

The U.S. president criticized Canadian policies related to a few industries including lumber, timber and energy, adding that officials will have to get to the negotiating table with Canada very quickly.

Trump also said this week he would make “some very big changes” to the NAFTA treaty with Canada and Mexico or “we are going to get rid of NAFTA for once and for all.”

The threat to get rid of or alter NAFTA is a potential problem for Canada, whose biggest trade partner is the United States.

Gentiloni and Trudeau on the other hand were keen to display their support for free trade and open borders, including the Canada-EU free trade pact, amid growing populist opposition.

Gentiloni, who had been in Washington on Thursday, said Canada and Italy share a common, pro-trade world view and that they live in “interesting times.” He also said the anti-trade movement is bigger than one single country.

“The United States president’s opinions are perfectly legitimate,” the Italian leader said through a translator. “But we have to be aware of the fact that this push goes against free trade as a catalyst for world growth … that is why we need to work politically, culturally and economically to fight against this trend.”

Italy is to host the G7 leaders’ summit next month, which will be part of Trump’s entry into the world of multilateral summitry.
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The U.S. government says it will not waive trade sanctions for U.S. companies seeking to drill for oil in Russia, including for U.S. oil giant ExxonMobil.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin made the announcement Friday, indicating that the United States would maintain a tough stance on sanctions against Russia.

“In consultation with President Donald J. Trump, the Treasury Department will not be issuing waivers to U.S. companies, including Exxon, authorizing drilling prohibited by current Russian sanctions,” he said in a brief statement.

Exxon has sought permission to drill in several areas that are currently off limits because of the Russian sanctions, including in the Black Sea. It sought to resume a joint venture with Rosneft, a Russian state-owned oil company.

Exxon’s former CEO Rex Tillerson, who is now secretary of state in Trump’s Cabinet, has recused himself from the administration’s decision.

Tillerson has established close ties with Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, and has previously spoken out against the sanctions.

Crimea-related sanctions

The United States and the European Union imposed sanctions on Russia in 2014 in response to Moscow’s annexation of the Crimea region of Ukraine.

The European Union sanctions do not keep European oil companies from operating in Russia, a fact that has frustrated Exxon.

“We understand the statement today by Secretary Mnuchin in consultation with President Trump,” Exxon spokesman Alan Jeffers said in statement. However, he said the company was hamstrung by the U.S. government’s position.

“Our 2015 application for a license under the provisions outlined in the U.S. sanctions was made to enable our company to meet its contractual obligations under a joint venture agreement in Russia, where competitor companies are authorized to undertake such work under European sanctions,” Jeffers said.

Exxon has said the company previously received several waivers from the sanctions during the Obama administration for limited work with Rosneft.

Friday’s announcement comes as U.S. lawmakers continue to investigate possible ties between some Trump campaign aides and Moscow. It also comes at a time when relations between the United States and Russia have become more strained following a U.S. missile strike in Syria.
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The global flow of remittances declined in 2016 for the second year in a row, potentially reducing access to health care, education and food for millions of families in developing nations.

Friday’s report from World Bank experts says migrants sent $429 billion from wealthy nations back to their home countries during the year. That is a drop of 2.4 percent from the previous year. 

Falling oil prices in commodity exporting nations and weak economic growth in Europe took a toll on the flow of money.

India is the world’s largest receiver of remittances and saw money sent home by its overseas workers fall by nearly $63 billion, a drop of nearly 9 percent. Steep declines were also reported in Bangladesh, Nigeria and Egypt.

The report says it costs about $15 on average to send a $200 remittance home, with even higher costs for destinations in sub-Saharan Africa. World Bank officials would like to cut that fee by more than half, but the effort is complicated by new rules intended to make it harder to launder money and commit other illegal acts.

The report in the Migration and Development Brief also says the number of refugees headed for Europe increased by 273,000 to a total of 1.6 million. Globally, refugee flows rose by 1.4 million to a total of 16.5 million. 

The lead author of the brief says migration will “almost certainly” increase due to large income gaps, widespread youth unemployment, climate change, fragility and conflict. Dilip Ratha of the World Bank says migration is also being driven by aging populations in wealthy nations. As developed nations lose workers to retirement, new employees may be needed to fill those gaps.
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President Donald Trump will sign an executive order Friday directing the Treasury Department to review significant tax regulations that were implemented last year, with an eye toward fulfilling a campaign promise to reduce the tax burden on Americans, according to the White House.

The president also will sign two memoranda ordering reviews of a 2010 Wall Street reform law that banks and insurance companies have said impede their ability to conduct business.

The memoranda will order reviews of two sections of the Dodd-Frank Act, which was created to prevent a repeat of the 2007-09 financial crisis. The sections detail how big banks can wind down during a financial crisis and authorizes the top U.S. financial regulators to identify excessive risks in the U.S. financial system.

The documents instruct Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to review key provisions of the tax code and the Dodd-Frank Act, and then report to the White House on ways to improve them.

Mnuchin said Thursday the Treasury Department is working “day and night” on tax reform and soon will unveil a sweeping overhaul plan.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Paul Ryan, said earlier this week the first tax overhaul in decades could be ready later this year.

Nevertheless, the tax review order Trump will sign enables his administration to conduct a review of the tax code that is independent of Congress.
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In 2014, a stranded motorist left a glowing review for Larry’s Auto and Truck Repair, located on the outskirts of Charlottesville, Virginia.

“I am in the midst of hauling my horse cross country from Northern Virginia to Denver Colorado, and as I was heading onto I64W my truck broke down…” wrote Ariel L. from Castle Rock, Colorado, on the Yelp business review website after ending up at Larry’s Auto and Truck Repair.

“The man was literally waiting for me like a surgeon expecting a seriously ill patient being transported to the hospital. I’m not exaggerating when I say he took the keys from me, said to make myself comfortable…”

The man was Yasha Ismailov, 35, whose family owns Larry’s. He is a passionate fixer of vehicles.

“We can fix any car,” he says, “So it happens a lot of times when nobody can fix it in town, they send it here.”

It is not just that his name is Yasha instead of Larry, Ismailov is an unlikely businessman in Charlottesville. He came a long way to get here.

Long journey

A Meskhetian Turk, Ismailov was born in Uzbekistan.

Meskthetians are an ethnic subgroup of Turks that were deported in rail cars from their homeland by the leader of the Soviet Union Joseph Stalin during World War II. Most of them were left in Uzbekistan.

Ismailov was not in Uzbekistan long. “My family had to flee to Russia because there was a massacre in Uzbekistan of Turks … in 1989,” he explains. Ismailov was seven.

But Russia was no more hospitable. Meskhetian Turks were barred from citizenship, property ownership and jobs.

When the U.S. began accepting Meskhetian Turks as refugees in 2004, the family came to Charlottesville. By then, Ismailov was 22. All he, his parents and his brother brought with them were suitcases of clothes.

‘We felt safe’

Charlottesville, a small city about 190 kilometers south of Washington DC, is known to welcome refugees. More than 3,000 refugees, including Ismailov, have re-started their lives here since the late 1990s with the help of the resettlement agency, the International Rescue Committee (IRC).

“[The IRC] told me it was a nice place, good and ‘You will like it, so go there,’” says Ismailov. “We felt free. We felt better than over there. We felt safe.”

What followed was hard work.

“We were working so hard [the] first three years before we started [the] business. We were working four people, sometimes working double jobs,” he says.

Ismailov worked as a painter, an air conditioner installer and something he learned in Russia.

“My third job was electric,” he says. “I love electric stuff.”

And then the family bought the auto repair shop from original owner, Larry.

Harriet Kuhr, director of IRC’s Charlottesville Office says Charlottesville has jobs and opportunity to offer refugees.

“It really adds a lot of diversity, but it also adds economic impact,” says Kuhr. “So the refugees are not takers. They’re giving back by helping the community grow economically.”

Proud to contribute

Ismailov’s shop now has seven employees and repairs about 150 cars a month. He has opened another family business called Downtown Auto Sales, a used car dealership.

Ismailov is a U.S. citizen now and owns his house. He’s married to another refugee and has two children. His life in Charlottesville looks very good to him.

“I have nice neighbors. I have a job. Nobody bothers me,” he says. “I am proud to be able to contribute to the community in Charlottesville.”

Now he is looking beyond the hard work to the future. His eight-year-old daughter is an accomplished swimmer and he hopes “one day she wins an Olympic medal for the United States.”

He also looks beyond Charlottesville to the large number of refugees around the world who have not been as fortunate as he has.

“I am lucky I am here, but they are not,” he says sadly. “I feel sorry about them. I’d like to help them with something if I can.”
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Twelve miles and a ferry ride from the New England shore, Block Island is one of the last major tourist destinations in the United States without Uber or Lyft —  and islanders want it to stay that way.

Come summer, the sleepy island welcomes thousands of vacationers, many of whom depend on taxis to get to its bluffs, lighthouses, beaches and weathered-gray shingle homes. Now, as at least one ride-hailing company proposes to deregulate the community’s strict 88-year-old taxi code, longtime drivers are fighting to protect a way of life that helps them make ends meet in a place where the median home costs $1.2 million.

“This is our livelihood,” said taxi driver Champlin Starr, a retired oil tanker captain whose family first landed here in the 1660s. “People come to Block Island because they want an experience. They’re not going to get it with someone who doesn’t know where the landmarks are. This is our home.”

With 32 licensed taxis, each with up to four drivers, Starr said, nearly 10 percent of the island’s roughly 1,000 year-round residents spend part of the summer driving fares around. The school’s principal is a taxi proprietor. So is the retired police chief.

But some residents say they could use some competition, especially to attract younger tourists accustomed to the convenience of using apps.

“My guests are always complaining about how expensive the taxis are, how fast their drivers are driving,” said Emma Rose Tripler, a lifelong resident who manages two inns. “They’re cranky, on top of it. And some of them are pretty aggressive.”

The town of New Shoreham, which encompasses the island, has been setting its own taxi rates since 1929. Its rules include a surcharge for dirt roads and a requirement that someone vouch for a driver’s moral character. The average wait to get a taxi license is 15 years.

“I’m a retiree and a widow,” said Fran Migliaccio, owner of Mig’s Rig Taxi. “It’s my sole source of income.” Migliaccio said that she’s not proposing to ban Uber and Lyft, but that their drivers should be “subject to the same level of scrutiny” as everyone else on the taxi waitlist.

Rhode Island enacted a statewide law last year to formally legalize and regulate Uber and Lyft, but Block Island residents are now pushing for an exemption.

“What Uber and Lyft are going to do is come out for two months, skim all the cream off the top and leave,” said state Rep. Blake Filippi, a Block Island Republican who proposed the exemption, to which both San Francisco companies object.

So far, the debate is just theoretical. Uber and Lyft don’t appear to be operating there yet.

On a recent April weekday — only two taxis operate in the off-season before Memorial Day — Vin McAloon, the 77-year-old retired police chief, was unusually busy as the weather began to warm.

At the ferry station, he picked up house painters and a sales team visiting the town hospital. At the tiny airport, he picked up a resident returning from a dentist appointment on the mainland. When fares called for a ride, McAloon usually knew them by name.

Ride-hailing apps are now allowed in tourist destinations throughout the country, most recently Wyoming, where they were legalized in March, and upstate New York, where they’ll be available after July Fourth to riders in Niagara Falls and other popular spots. The exceptions are Alaska, where legislation is pending, and Austin, Texas, after a dispute last year. When they’re not available elsewhere, it’s usually because of a lack of drivers or customer demand.

The costly ferry ride across Block Island Sound has been the island’s strongest defense against an Uber onslaught.

Ferry distance hasn’t stopped other island resorts, such as Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket in Massachusetts, from grudgingly accepting Uber and Lyft. But remote Block Island, once known as a pirate hideout, has always had an independent streak.

The town’s taxi drivers made an expedition to Rhode Island’s State House this month to testify in favor of the exemption, leaving a day before the hearing because of wind that could have shut down the ferry. The exemption’s sole voice of opposition was Sami Naim, a public policy manager for Lyft, who said it was “an opportunity for us to work together to help deregulate” the island’s onerous taxi regulations.

In a sign that the state is likely to side with Block Island taxi operators, lawmakers scoffed at his comments.

“They’re saying, `Leave us alone,’ but you’re being very persistent,” state Rep. Anastasia Williams, a Providence Democrat, told Naim. “Sometimes you have to know when to fold it and run away.”
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A judge on Friday ordered Volkswagen to pay a $2.8 billion criminal penalty in the United States for cheating on diesel emissions tests, blessing a deal negotiated by the government for a “massive fraud” orchestrated by the German automaker.

U.S. District Judge Sean Cox stuck to the plea deal during the sentencing hearing, six weeks after VW pleaded guilty to conspiracy and obstruction of justice in a scheme involving nearly 600,000 diesel cars in the U.S. They were programmed to turn on pollution controls during testing and off while on the road.

Speaking from the bench in the heart of the global auto industry, Cox said he was amazed that VW would commit such a crime.

“Who has been hurt by this corporate greed? From what I can see it’s not the managers at VW, the ones who get paid huge salaries and large bonuses. As always it’s the little guy,” the judge said, referring to car buyers and VW’s blue-collar workers who might earn less in the future.

Separately, VW is paying $1.5 billion in a civil case brought by government regulators and spending $11 billion to buy back cars and offer other compensation.

Seven employees have also been charged with crimes in the U.S., but five are in Germany and are unlikely to be extradited.

Cox urged the German government to “prosecute those responsible for this deliberate massive fraud that has damaged an iconic automobile company.”

In brief remarks to the judge, VW defense attorney Jason Weinstein said the criminal fine is an “appropriate and serious sanction.”

VW general counsel Manfred Doess said the company is not the same one that was caught 18 months ago.

“Volkswagen deeply regrets the behavior that gave rise to this case. … Plain and simple it was wrong,” Doess said. “We let people down and for that we’re deeply sorry.”
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