| State Department On Saudi Arabia-Canada Spat: We're Staying Out Posted: 06 Aug 2018 02:53 PM PDT  WASHINGTON ― The State Department made its first comments on the dispute
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| Trump tweets on California wildfires spark confusion, debate Posted: 06 Aug 2018 07:11 PM PDT  By Steve Gorman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Fire authorities insisted on Monday that they have ample water supplies to fight California's devastating wildfires, contrary to U.S. President Donald Trump's tweets that unspecified water diversions to the Pacific were making matters worse. Officials from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire) and the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, stressed that wild-land blazes are battled primarily by crews hacking away at dry brush with hand tools and bulldozers, not with water. "Yes, we have plenty of water," CalFire Chief Scott McLean said by telephone, adding that the two largest blazes in California this week - the Carr Fire and the Mendocino Complex Fire - were each ringed by at least three major reservoirs.
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| 1,200 tourists being evacuated from Indonesia quake islands: disaster agency Posted: 05 Aug 2018 11:28 PM PDT  More than one thousand tourists were being evacuated from Indonesia's tiny Gili islands on Monday after a powerful quake struck neighbouring Lombok, killing 91 people and injuring hundreds. The Gilis are three coral-fringed tropical islands popular with backpackers and divers, a few kilometres off the northwest coast of the larger Lombok island. Footage posted online by rescue officials showed hundreds of panicked tourists and locals crowded onto powder-white beaches desperately waiting for transport off the normally paradise islands.
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| Major explosion on motorway near Bologna leaves two dead and more than 60 injured Posted: 06 Aug 2018 07:30 AM PDT  A tanker truck exploded on a motorway just outside the northern Italian city of Bologna on Monday, engulfing the area with flames and black smoke, the fire service said, with local media reporting one person killed. The explosion occurred near Borgo Paginale to west of the city, very close to Bologna airport, at around 2.00 pm (12pm GMT), the Italian fire service said on Twitter. The cause of the blast is not yet known. Italian news agency Ansa has reported that two people died and more than 60 others were injured following the blast. A video published on Twitter by the Italian fire service shows a huge column of black smoke billowing from the wreckage of the truck on the city's ring road. The cause of the blast is not yet known Credit: @giornaleprociv / Twitter Images released earlier by the fire service showed burning cars in an adjacent carpark. Firefighters work on the motorway Credit: REUTERS One video filmed by a motorist circulating on Twitter shows the moment the tanker exploded, when a black plume of smoke was suddenly swept away by a powerful ball of flame that takes over the entire horizon.
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| Report: Dead fetus discovered on American Airlines flight at New York's LaGuardia Airport Posted: 07 Aug 2018 07:28 AM PDT  A dead fetus was reportedly discovered by cleaning crews inside a toilet
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| Israeli fire kills 2 Hamas militants in Gaza Posted: 07 Aug 2018 08:14 AM PDT  JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military said Tuesday it struck a Hamas military post in the Gaza Strip in response to militant fire at Israeli troops, while Hamas said two of its fighters were killed after taking part in a gunfire parade inside a militant camp.
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| FCA Seeks to Stop Jeep-Like Mahindra Roxor 4x4 in the U.S. Posted: 06 Aug 2018 08:37 AM PDT  The Indian manufacturer's vehicle copies Jeep's design, Chrysler claims.
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| Young boy dies 'after mistaking father's meth for cereal' Posted: 06 Aug 2018 02:37 AM PDT  An eight-year-old boy has died in Indiana after reportedly mistaking his father's methamphetamine for breakfast cereal. Curtis Collman III had 180 times the lethal limit of methamphetamine in his blood stream, a toxicology report revealed, according to the Seymore Tribune. The 41-year-old told police his son woke up early on 21 June and said he was hungry, but Collman told him there was no food in the house in Seymour, WDRB reports.
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| Brazil: judge shuts border to Venezuelan migrants fleeing hunger and hardship Posted: 06 Aug 2018 01:59 PM PDT  A judge in Brazil has blocked Venezuelans from entering the border state of Roraima as local authorities harden their stance against the flood of migrants fleeing hunger and hardship in their home country. Judge Helder Barreto said he had suspended the entry of Venezuelan immigrants until the conditions for a "humanitarian reception" are created but activists working with migrants attacked it as "absurd". Sister Telma Lage from the non-profit Migration and Human Rights Institute, which helps vulnerable migrants in Roraima's capital Boa Vista, said the judge had overstepped his authority.
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| Deadly wildfires in Northern California Posted: 07 Aug 2018 04:45 AM PDT ![Deadly wildfires in Northern California]( "Deadly wildfires in Northern California") On Monday, twin fires being treated as one incident north of San Francisco became the largest wildfire in state history, destroying 443 square miles (1,148 square kilometers) — nearly the size of the city of Los Angeles.
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| Eleven children in US rescued from 'extremists' at 'filthy' hideout Posted: 06 Aug 2018 03:05 PM PDT  Five people have been arrested in New Mexico after police raided a remote desert encampment and found 11 children living among potential Muslim extremists in "filthy" conditions. The three women – mothers of the 11 children aged between one and 15 – and two men were all charged with child abuse. One of the men, Siraj Wahhaj, 39, was wanted in his home state of Georgia for questioning over the disappearance of his three-year-old son, Abdul. Both father and son were last seen in December, when Wahhaj told his wife, Hakima Ramzi, that he was taking the boy to the park. The boy's mother told police her child suffered from seizures along with development and cognitive delays. Documents made public in a court filing on Monday said Wahhaj told the boy's mother, before fleeing Georgia, that he wanted to perform an exorcism on the child because he believed he was possessed by the devil. Abdul was unable to walk owing to his disability. Georgia man Siraj Ibn Wahhaj after his arrest Credit: AFP Wahhaj's relatives, including his father, an imam at a mosque in Brooklyn, New York, launched a social media campaign to try and find the missing boy. The toddler was not found in Friday's raid, however, which was months in the making. Police finally went in after the sheriff in Taos, New Mexico, was forwarded a note from someone on the property, given to Georgia police, which read: "we are starving and need food and water." Jerry Hogrefe, sheriff of Taos County, said: "I absolutely knew that we couldn't wait on another agency to step up, and we had to go check this out as soon as possible." The sheriff described planning "a tactical approach for our own safety because we had learned the occupants were most likely heavily armed and considered extremist of the Muslim belief." Relatives' social media accounts show the Wahhaj family to be devout, but with no evidence of extremist beliefs. A view of the compound in Amalia, New Mexico, where police rescued 11 children and arrested two armed "extremists" Credit: AFP Mr Hogrefe and his men were met by Wahhaj and his colleague, Lucas Morten, who were armed with an AR-15 rifle, five loaded 30-round magazines and four loaded pistols, including one in Wahhaj's pocket. The men at first refused to follow verbal direction, police said, during Friday's day-long operation. The women - Jany Leveille, 35, Wahhaj's second wife; Hujrah Wahhaj, 38; and Subhannah Wahhaj, a 35-year-old author of Muslim self-help books – gave themselves up. Subhannah Wahhaj is married to Morten, a relative told The Telegraph. The compound in Amalia, New Mexico Credit: AP When officials finally entered the makeshift compound, in remote northern New Mexico, they found what one officer called "the saddest living conditions and poverty I have seen". Mr Hogrefe told ABC News the children were hungry, thirsty and filthy. "I've been a cop for 30 years. I've never seen anything like this. Unbelievable," he said. Police described the compound as a small underground trailer covered by plastic, with no running water or electricity "They were skinny, their ribs showed, they were in very poor hygiene and very scared," he said. Police described the compound as a small underground trailer covered by plastic, with no running water or electricity Credit: AP All five adults were held in detention in Taos, charged on Sunday with child abuse. The children were taken away for medical tests. Mr Hogrefe said authorities have reason to believe the boy was at the compound several weeks ago, and they were continuing their search for him. Morten was additionally charged with harbouring a fugitive and Wahhaj was booked without bond on his Georgia warrant for child abduction. Sherry Jarrell, an occupational therapist who lives on a 70-acre property not far from where the arrests were made on Friday said the area is beautiful, but residents don't always know who their neighbours are. "It's a great place," she told Taos News. "But strange people live out on the mesa. People that are trying to get away from things."
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| Venezuela Detains 6 Suspects Over a Failed Drone Attack Aimed at President Maduro Posted: 05 Aug 2018 07:33 PM PDT  Explosives-laden drones were allegedly used in a failed assassination attempt
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| Manafort defense questions star witness Gates about 'secret life' Posted: 07 Aug 2018 03:37 PM PDT  By Sarah N. Lynch, Nathan Layne and Karen Freifeld ALEXANDRIA, Va. (Reuters) - The star witness in the trial against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort faced tough questioning on cross-examination on Tuesday about a "secret life" that included an extramarital affair and stealing funds from his former boss. Rick Gates, who served as a right-hand man to Manafort in his political consulting business for a decade, acknowledged maintaining a flat in London for the affair, inflating expense reports and a long list of other misdeeds. Under questioning by defense attorney Kevin Downing on Tuesday, Gates acknowledged writing a fraudulent letter to prospective investors in a movie project and possibly submitting personal expenses to Trump's inaugural committee for reimbursement.
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| Iran FM says Trump, Bin Salman, Netanyahu are 'isolated' Posted: 06 Aug 2018 03:18 AM PDT  Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Monday that the leaders of the United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel were isolated in their hostility to Iran. "Today, the entire world has declared they are not in line with US policies against Iran," Zarif said in a speech, according to the semi-official ISNA news agency. "Talk to anyone, anywhere in the world and they will tell you that (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu, (US President Donald) Trump and (Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed) bin Salman are isolated, not Iran," he said.
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| Earth risks tipping into 'hothouse' state: study Posted: 06 Aug 2018 12:48 PM PDT  The planet urgently needs to transition to a green economy because fossil fuel pollution risks pushing the Earth into a lasting and dangerous "hothouse" state, researchers warned on Monday. If polar ice continues to melt, forests are slashed and greenhouse gases rise to new highs -- as they currently do each year -- the Earth will pass a tipping point. - What is 'Hothouse Earth'?
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| President Trump Tweets 'Total Endorsement' for Controversial Kansas Candidate Kris Kobach Despite Warning From Aides Posted: 06 Aug 2018 09:34 AM PDT  Aides warned against Kobach for his hawkish immigration views
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| Device to clean-up Great Pacific Garbage Patch could harm wildlife, warn conservationists Posted: 07 Aug 2018 02:00 PM PDT  A controversial scheme to clean up plastic in the Pacific Ocean could harm wildlife and release unnecessary greenhouse gases into the air, conservationists have warned. On September 9th, The Ocean Cleanup foundation will launch a device to sweep up plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and remove it from the water. The system uses a 2000ft long u-shaped floating cylinder with a 10ft skirt beneath which moves along with the current capturing plastic as it goes. The refuse is corralled into a small area and then picked up by boat every few months and taken to land for processing and recycling. A section of the floating system which will move with the water currents collecting plastic Credit: The Ocean Cleanup The Ocean Cleanup claims that full-scale deployment of their system could clean up 50 per cent of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in just 5 years. However marine experts claim the project could do more harm than good. Dr Sue Kinsey, Senior Pollution Policy Officer at the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) said: "We have serious concerns about the Ocean Cleanup and its effectiveness. "It seems likely that wildlife will be affected, especially the smaller floating plankton that many creatures depend on and those organisms that passively float in the oceans who won't be able to avoid these arrays. "Also much of this litter is distributed throughout the water column and this may only pick up the surface material." Some of the plastic picked up from The Great Pacific garbage patch during monitoring Credit: The Ocean Cleanup The MCS also warned that the time and energy it takes to collect and return the waste could result in large amounts of greenhouse gases and carbon, and called for organisations to do more to stop litter entering oceans in the first place. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which is located between California and Hawaii is the area where plastic rubbish accumulates because of ocean currents, known as gyres which act like a vortex pulling waste into a central channel. It is around three times the size of Spain. Research by the foundation found that, at its peak, the patch contains around 330lbs of plastic per square mile, reducing to 33lbs at the outer edges. The project to clean up the patch is the brainchild of Boyan Slat, a 24 year old Dutch inventor and entrepreneur, who founded the foundation in 2013. Last month the company published its Environmental Impact Assessment and found there was a 'medium' risk to sea turtles who found themselves trapped within the floating tube system. The cleanup system works by using a floating cylinder with a trailing skirt which picks up debris Credit: The Ocean Cleanup A survey of 15 experts by the ecologist and shark researcher David Shiffman of Simon Fraser University in Vancouver also found that it is unlikely that the floating device will clean up a significant amount of plastic without harming wildlife. One in four believed that the entire concept is "a bad idea with little or no redeeming value." Writing on the website Southern Fried Science Dr Shiffman said: "This device is designed to aggregate objects of a certain size to remove them from the water but cannot distinguish between plastic and living things. The captured plastic will be collected by boats and taken to the mainland for processesing Credit: The Ocean Cleanup Commenting in the survey Eben Schwartz, Marine Debris Program Manager, California Coastal Commission, said: "To make the claim, as the Ocean Cleanup Project is, that they will "clean the oceans" by 2040 or whenever, is disingenuous and misleading, when it will, at best, clean a very small percentage of what's found on the surface." However The Ocean Cleanup said that the device moved slowly enough through the water that any animals would easily have time to escape. "Every year, millions of tons of plastic enter the ocean," said a spokesman. "The Ocean Cleanup is developing a passive system, that moves with the currents - just like the plastic - to catch it. ""The Ocean Cleanup's passive system is comprised of a floater with an impermeable screen underneath, concentrating the debris before it is extracted by support vessel, while also moving slow enough for sea life to follow the slight downward current as not to be entangled in the system."
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| 20 arrested during 'No to Marxism in America 2' march, rally in Berkeley Posted: 05 Aug 2018 11:30 PM PDT  Berkeley city streets are open again following a protest by a pro-Trump conservative group that says it is anti-Marxist and an even larger opposition group that says it is anti-fascist. Police arrested 20 people, most of them for bringing items that could be used as weapons.
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| Parkland suspect: Voice told him to burn, kill, destroy Posted: 06 Aug 2018 03:40 PM PDT  FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Florida school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz told a detective that a demon in his head — "the evil side" — told him to burn, kill and destroy, and that he thought about going to a park to kill people about a week before 17 people were gunned down at the school, according to a transcript of his interrogation released Monday.
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| Israel minister welcomes Syria scientist killing Posted: 07 Aug 2018 04:18 AM PDT  Israeli Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz on Tuesday welcomed the killing of a leading Syrian weapons scientist but declined to comment on reports his government was behind the fatal bombing. General Aziz Asbar, head of a Syrian government weapons research centre, was killed along with his driver when the bomb hit his car on Saturday, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Asbar headed the Maysaf research centre in Hama, which was hit by Israeli air strikes last month and in September last year, the Observatory said.
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| Vintage Photos Show Lucille Ball's Unmatched Style Through The Years Posted: 06 Aug 2018 02:45 AM PDT  Lucille Ball was a star in more ways than one. She was a television pioneer, a
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| Man Who Lost Limbs After He Was Licked by Dog Says He's Happy to Be Alive Posted: 07 Aug 2018 07:36 AM PDT  Greg Manteufel has been left disfigured by the ordeal as well.
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| Rick Gates Shows Why Trump Is So Worried About Witness Flipping Posted: 06 Aug 2018 06:45 PM PDT  When Rick Gates took the stand in Paul Manafort's Virginia trial Monday, he quickly showed the power of witness flipping.
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| Beachgoers Stunned After Dead Baby Blue Whale Washes Up On Japan Shores Posted: 06 Aug 2018 03:41 PM PDT  A dead baby blue whale washed up on the shores of Japan on Sunday, about 40
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| Canada defiant after Saudi Arabia freezes new trade over human rights call Posted: 06 Aug 2018 04:11 PM PDT  By Aziz El Yaakoubi and David Ljunggren RIYADH/OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada on Monday refused to back down in its defense of human rights after Saudi Arabia froze new trade and investment and expelled the Canadian ambassador in retaliation for Ottawa's call to free arrested Saudi civil society activists. In her first public response to Saudi Arabia's actions, Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland said, "Canada will always stand up for human rights in Canada and around the world, and women's rights are human rights." Riyadh on Sunday recalled its ambassador from Canada and gave the Canadian ambassador 24 hours to leave.
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| California challenges border wall at appeals court Posted: 07 Aug 2018 09:37 AM PDT  PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — A federal appeals court will hear arguments Tuesday by the state of California and advocacy groups who contend the Trump administration overreached by waiving environmental reviews to speed construction of the president's prized border wall with Mexico.
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| Dog Wearing Wedding Dress Steals the Show During Her Owner's Big Day Posted: 06 Aug 2018 01:29 PM PDT  Gia was even wearing a veil.
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| Teenager who died at Lollapalooza identified after ‘scorching’ Chicago music festival sends hundreds to hospital Posted: 06 Aug 2018 09:58 AM PDT  A teenager who died after attending the Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago has been identified as Evan Kitz-Miller. The 16-year-old was attending the popular annual festival in Grant Park on Sunday when he was found unresponsive and rushed to the Northwestern Memorial Hospital in critical condition. Temperatures were scorching in the park at the time of the incident, with at least 119 concertgoers being sent to the hospital within the festival's first three days.
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| 10 feet apart: It's mentor vs. protege at Manafort trial Posted: 07 Aug 2018 10:48 AM PDT  ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — Paul Manafort and Rick Gates shared a long business partnership that took them to the helm of Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.
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| Ai Weiwei Says Chinese Government Has Demolished His Beijing Studio Posted: 06 Aug 2018 01:13 AM PDT  Chinese authorities began demolishing one of Ai Weiwei's Beijing studios
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| Walmart employee steps in when nail salon turns away woman with cerebral palsy Posted: 06 Aug 2018 11:01 AM PDT  A Walmart cashier stepped in to help pamper a woman with cerebral palsy who was turned away from a nail salon in Michigan.
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| 89 Insanely Awesome Dessert Bars Posted: 06 Aug 2018 02:00 PM PDT |
| 11 People Were Killed and Nearly 70 Wounded in Shootings in Chicago This Weekend Posted: 06 Aug 2018 09:47 AM PDT  Trump's lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, used the violence criticize the city's Democratic leadership.
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| New York's Cuomo rejects NRA claim that 'blacklisting' jeopardizes mission Posted: 06 Aug 2018 08:33 AM PDT  New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Friday rejected a claim by the National Rifle Association that his efforts to get banks and insurers to stop doing business with the group threatened its ability to advocate for gun rights. Underwood acknowledged Cuomo's and the NRA's "longstanding history of strong disagreement" on gun control, but said the lawsuit did not allege that New York "directly inhibited the NRA from expressing its opposition to gun regulation.
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| Iraq sentences German and French Isil members to life in prison Posted: 06 Aug 2018 06:05 AM PDT  An Iraqi court on Monday sentenced a French man and a German woman to life in prison in the latest punishments handed down for belonging to the Islamic State jihadist group. Frenchman Lahcen Gueboudj, 58, and a German woman whose name was given only as Nadia were sentenced separately at the Baghdad central criminal court. Nadia's mother, a German woman of Moroccan origin, was sentenced to death in January for Isil membership but the sentence was later commuted to life, which in Iraq is equivalent to 20 years. The mother and daughter were arrested in July 2017 in Mosul, the jihadists' former de-facto capital in Iraq where the government declared victory over Isil in December last year. Neekor Israel Abdul Karim, 28, from Uzbekistan is convicted of joining Isil in Baghdad Central Criminal Court, on April 25 Credit: Sam Tarling for The Telegraph Wearing a black abaya in court, Nadia said she travelled from Syria to Iraq "to run away from the people of IS". Speaking in German with a few Arabic words, she said she travelled to Syria from Turkey with her mother, her daughter Yamana and her mentally disabled sister who was killed in a bombardment. Nadia's lawyer stressed that she was a minor at the time and that her marriage to an Isil jihadist in Syria was "not a decision taken by an adult in full conscience". The French defendant, meanwhile, refuted statements made during his interrogations. "I signed confessions in Arabic without knowing what was written," said Gueboudj, with short grey hair and stubble, wearing a brown prison uniform. "I would never have left France, if my eldest son Nabil, 25-years-old, hadn't gone to Syria," he said in French. "I wanted to convince him to return with us to France," added Gueboudj. The French citizen had travelled with his wife and children to Turkey before entering Syria, and later being arrested in Iraq.
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| Trump 'planning to make it harder for legal immigrants to gain citizenship' Posted: 07 Aug 2018 01:29 PM PDT  The Trump administration is reportedly planning to penalise immigrants to the who have applied for public benefits, in a major departure from current US practice that could affect millions of people. The White House intends to issue a proposal in the coming weeks that would make it harder for immigrants to get a green card or become a citizen if they have used benefits like Obamacare, children's health insurance, or food stamps, according to NBC News. The proposal is reportedly part of White House policy adviser Stephen Miller's plan to reduce the number of immigrants eligible to stay permanently in the US.
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