NEW YORK – The White House reiterated Wednesday that the United States was not involved in a series of attacks that saw booby-trapped devices explode this week in Lebanon.

“What I can tell you is we were not involved in yesterday’s incidents or today’s in any way, and I don’t have anything more to share,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters during a White House press briefing.

Pressed in a follow-up exchange with another reporter, Kirby wouldn’t say if Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin received a heads up on Wednesday’s attack, which saw scores of walkie-talkies explode across Lebanon, during a Tuesday call with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Kirby repeatedly declined to confirm on the record that Israel was behind the electronics attacks, telling reporters, “I’m not going to get into intelligence assessment, estimates and assessments from here.

CNN has reported that Tuesday’s pager explosion attacks, which have heightened tensions in a region already on edge, was a joint operation between Israel’s intelligence service, the Mossad, and the Israeli military. The Lebanese government condemned the attack as “criminal Israeli aggression.”

But Kirby acknowledged the administration is concerned over the prospect of tensions escalating in the region, saying the US does not believe “additional military operations” are the solution. He pointed to diplomacy instead.

United Nations Human Rights Chief Volker Türk has condemned the pager blasts in Lebanon on Tuesday that killed at least 12 people and injured around 2,800. Türk called the attacks a violation of international humanitarian law and called for an “independent, thorough and transparent investigation.” CNN has learned that the Israeli military and intelligence service were behind Tuesday’s attack, but Israeli officials have not publicly commented on it, or on Wednesday’s walkie-talkie explosions.  Türk also did not comment on Wednesday’s walk-talkie blasts, and his comments were only in reference to the Tuesday pager blasts. (CNN)…[+]

NEW YORK – The United States Federal Reserve has cut interest rates by half of a percentage point, kicking off what is expected to be a steady easing of monetary policy with a larger-than-usual reduction in borrowing costs that follows growing unease about the health of the job market.

“The committee has gained greater confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2 percent, and judges that the risks to achieving its employment and inflation goals are roughly in balance,” policymakers on the US central bank’s rate-setting committee said in their latest statement on Wednesday, which drew a dissent from Governor Michelle Bowman, who favoured a quarter-percentage-point cut.

Policymakers see the Fed’s benchmark rate falling by another half of a percentage point by the end of this year, another full percentage point in 2025 and a final half of a percentage point in 2026 to end in a range of 2.75 percent to 3 percent.

The endpoint reflects a slight upgrade, from 2.8 percent to 2.9 percent, in the longer-run federal funds rate, considered a “neutral” stance that neither encourages nor discourages economic activity.

Even though inflation “remains somewhat elevated”, the Fed statement said policymakers chose to cut the overnight rate to the 4.75 percent to 5 percent range “in light of the progress on inflation and the balance of risks”.

The Fed “would be prepared to adjust the stance of monetary policy as appropriate if risks emerge that could impede the attainment of the Committee’s goals,” with attention to “both sides of its dual mandate” for stable prices and maximum employment, the statement said. (Aljazeera)…[+]

Acting USSS Director Ronald Rowe has made a concerted effort to put himself front and center after Sunday’s apparent assassination attempt at Donald Trump’s Florida golf course, as he makes his pitch, both publicly and privately, for Congress to provide his agency with more resources. But lawmakers are still contending with whether the Secret Service is underfunded or simply mismanaged, and many have questions about what meaningful security improvements can be made 48 days before the presidential election to an organization under whose watch two apparent assassination attempts have occurred against a former president roughly 60 days apart. Connecticut Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, chair of the Senate appropriations committee, said his panel has asked the Secret Service to “get creative” in its requests for additional resources, adding that they can’t hire new Secret Service agents to make a difference between now and the inauguration.”

Murphy said that Senate appropriators have asked the agency to look at additional overtime costs as one option, and that the Secret Service has “come to us with some good ideas,” citing technology like drones.One possibility being discussed, according to sources, is to include additional funding to the government funding extension, which needs to pass by September 30. Senate appropriators and the Biden administration are in talks about how much money to add to the upcoming stopgap bill for USSS, telling CNN it could be “hundreds of millions of dollars” to plus-up their budget, or it could be language allowing the agency to spend its existing money faster. There is an uneasiness, however, about providing more money to an agency, whose budget has increased in the past decade, that has not been fully held accountable or shown that the issues that led to both apparent assassination attempts have been fixed. House Speaker Mike Johnson said Tuesday that discussions about funding for the agency are still ongoing, telling reporters, “We’re looking at that. I think it’s a matter of manpower allocation and we don’t just want to throw more money at a broken system. Florida GOP Rep. Michael Waltz, a member of the bipartisan House task force investigating the apparent assassination attempts, told CNN, You don’t get to have these type of spectacular, once in a generation failures and then say, ‘Well, I need more money.’ How Rowe navigates that tension, coupled with how he responds to the onslaught of requests from Capitol Hill, will largely define his tenure as acting director, a role he assumed less than two months ago after his former boss was forced to resign for her handling of the first Trump assassination attempt.

While members of the bipartisan task force say the Secret Service has so far been relatively cooperative, Democratic Rep. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, who is leading the Senate’s investigation into the first assassination attempt of Trump in July said he is “on the verge of outrage and Republican Rep. Josh Hawley of Missouri told reporters that the agencies are stonewall ing lawmakers  in the wake of the second apparent attempt. As conversations about allocating more funding remain ongoing, there is also an acknowledgement that the way the Secret Service communicates both internally and with external partners needs a major overhaul, with key questions still remaining unanswered.The House task force created to investigate the assassination attempt against Trump at his July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where a gunman was able to fire eight rounds at the former president, is working behind the scenes to expand its probe to also include Sunday’s apparent assassination attempt.The bipartisan group is working with the speaker’s office to broaden its narrow jurisdiction to include both apparent attempts, lawmakers say. And the panel has already requested a full briefing with the Department of Justice and FBI by the end of this week on top of continuing their ongoing investigation into the first assassination attempt against Trump.  (CNN)…[+]