Archives par mot-clé : video

Jared Kushner now a focus in Russia investigation

Video Marketing,

Investigators are focusing on a series of meetings held by Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and an influential White House adviser, as part of their probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and related matters, according to people familiar with the investigation.

Kushner, who held meetings in December with the Russian ambassador and a banker from Moscow, is being investigated because of the extent and nature of his interactions with the Russians, the people said.

The Washington Post reported last week that a senior White House official close to the president was a significant focus of the high-stakes investigation, though it did not name Kushner.

FBI agents also remain keenly interested in former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, but Kushner is the only current White House official known to be considered a key person in the probe.

The Post has not been told that Kushner is a target — or the central focus — of the investigation, and he has not been accused of any wrongdoing. “Target” is a word that generally refers to someone who is the main suspect of investigators’ attention, though prosecutors can and do bring charges against people who are not marked with that distinction.

Team Trump’s ties to Russian interests View Graphic Team Trump’s ties to Russian interests

“Mr. Kushner previously volunteered to share with Congress what he knows about these meetings. He will do the same if he is contacted in connection with any other inquiry,” said Jamie Gorelick, one of his attorneys.

In addition to possible coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election, investigators are also looking broadly into possible financial crimes — but the people familiar with the matter, who were not authorized to speak publicly, did not specify who or what was being examined.

[Russia probe reaches current White House official, people familiar with case say]

Sarah Isgur Flores, a Justice Department spokeswoman, said, “I can’t confirm or deny the existence or nonexistence of investigations or subjects of investigations.” The FBI declined to comment.

At the time of the December meetings, Trump already had won the election. Contacts between people on the transition team and foreign governments can be routine, but the meetings and phone calls with the Russians were not made public at the time.

In early December, Kushner met in New York with the Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, and he later sent a deputy to meet with Kislyak. Flynn was also present at the early-December meeting, and later that month, Flynn held a call with Kislyak to discuss U.S.-imposed sanctions against Russia. Flynn initially mischaracterized the conversation, even to Vice President Pence — ultimately prompting his ouster from the White House.

Kushner also met in December with Sergey Gorkov, the head of Vnesheconombank, which has been the subject of U.S. sanctions following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its support of separatists in eastern Ukraine.

White House senior adviser Jared Kushner listens as President Trump and Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni participate in a joint news conference at the White House on April 20. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

In addition to the December meetings, a former senior intelligence official said FBI agents had been looking closely at earlier exchanges between Trump associates and the Russians dating to the spring of 2016, including one at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington. Kushner and Kislyak — along with close Trump adviser and current attorney general Jeff Sessions — were present at an April 2016 event at the Mayflower where then-candidate Trump promised in a speech to seek better relations with Russia. It is unclear whether Kushner and Kislyak interacted there.

The New York Times reported that Kushner omitted from security-clearance forms his December meetings with Kislyak and Gorkov, though his attorney said that was mere error and he told the FBI soon after that he would amend the forms. The White House said that his meetings were normal and inconsequential.

Kushner has agreed to discuss his Russian contacts with the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is conducting one of several investigations into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

In many ways, Kushner is a unique figure inside the White House.

He is arguably the president’s most trusted adviser, and he is also a close member of the president’s family. His list of policy responsibilities is vast — his foreign policy portfolio alone includes Canada and Mexico, China, and peace in the Middle East — yet he rarely speaks publicly about any of them.

Former FBI director Robert S. Mueller III is now leading the probe into possible coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign, and he has set up shop in the Patrick Henry Building in downtown D.C. Even before he was picked by Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein to take over the case, investigators had been stepping up their efforts — issuing subpoenas and looking to conduct interviews, people familiar with the matter said.

A small group of lawmakers known as the Gang of Eight was recently notified of the change in tempo and focus in the investigation at a classified briefing.

It is unclear exactly how Mueller’s leadership will affect the direction of the probe. This week, Justice Department ethics experts cleared him to take over the case even though lawyers at his former firm, WilmerHale, represent several people who could be caught up in the matter, including Kushner, Manafort and Trump’s daughter Ivanka, who is married to Kushner.

Mueller resigned from the firm to take over the investigation.

Investigators are continuing to look aggressively into the dealings of Flynn, and a grand jury in Alexandria, Va., recently issued a subpoenas for records related to Flynn’s businesses and finances, according to people familiar with the matter.

Flynn’s company, the Flynn Intel Group, was paid more than $500,000 by a company owned by a Turkish American businessman close to top Turkish officials for research on Fethullah Gulen, a cleric who Turkey’s president claims was responsible for a coup attempt last summer. Flynn retroactively registered with the Justice Department in March as a paid foreign agent for Turkish interests.

Separately from the probe now run by Mueller, Flynn is being investigated by the Pentagon’s top watchdog for his foreign payments. Flynn also received $45,000 to appear in 2015 with Russian President Vladimir Putin at a dinner for RT, a Kremlin-controlled media organization.

Republican wins Montana election one night after being charged with assault

Video Marketing,

BOZEMAN, Mont. — Republican businessman Greg Gianforte won Montana’s sole House district in a special election Thursday, keeping a seat in Republican hands despite facing assault charges for allegedly attacking a reporter who’d asked him about the GOP’s health-care bill.

In his victory speech, Gianforte admitted to the attack and apologized for it.

“I shouldn’t have treated that reporter that way,” he told supporters at his rally here.

The victory, called by the Associated Press, offered some relief for Republicans, who have struggled to sell their Obamacare overhaul, the American Health Care Act. But it was a closer call than the party had expected when it tapped the multimillionaire to run in a state President Trump carried by 20 points — and when Democrats nominated folk singer Rob Quist instead of an experienced politician. With 83 percent of the vote counted, Gianforte led Quist 51 percent to 44 percent, according to preliminary returns.

Some in the crowd laughed at the mention of the incident. “I made a mistake,” said Gianforte.

“Not in our minds!” yelled a supporter.

Democrats, who called on Gianforte to quit the race after the assault charge, believed that late votes broke Quist’s way, and that the first-time candidate put the race in play by attacking the AHCA. Forcing Republicans to spend seven figures defending a typically safe seat, they argued, was worth it.

“We said at the outset that this would be a very difficult election on very red turf,” said David Nir, the political director of Daily Kos, which endorsed Quist and crowdfunded donations for him. “The playing field next month in Georgia and next year in the midterms is much more favorable. Republicans might be breathing a sigh of relief that their morally reprehensible candidate won on Thursday night, but they should still be very worried about 2018.”

Quist conceded defeat shortly after 11 pm local time. “Your voices were definitely heard in this election,” he told supporters at his election party in Missoula. “I know we came up short but the energy and the grassroots movement in this state goes on.”

In-person voting began across the state just hours after Gianforte allegedly “body-slammed” Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs, who was trying to ask him a question about the House Republican health-care plan. Gianforte has been charged with misdemeanor assault.

“I’m glad I waited to vote until today,” Wolf Redboy, 43, a software marketer and musician from Missoula, who backed Quist, said Thursday. It was the first election he’d voted in since 2012. “I couldn’t believe what I was hearing in that tape. There are lots of words that come to mind for people who want to treat reporters that way.”

The scuffle was caught on tape by the reporter and witnessed by a Fox News reporting team. Gallatin County police announced the charges late Wednesday after the Guardian published the recording.

On Thursday, as three major newspapers pulled their endorsements of the technology entrepreneur and some early voters sought in vain to change their ballots, GOP leaders urged Gianforte to apologize in an attempt to control the damage.

“There is no time where a physical altercation should occur,” House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) said at his weekly news conference on Capitol Hill. “It should not have happened. Should the gentleman apologize? Yeah, I think he should apologize.”

Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), one of Gianforte’s closest allies in Montana politics and a former co-worker at his Bozeman company, called his actions “unacceptable” and agreed that he should apologize. Quist, meanwhile, told reporters Thursday that the scuffle was a “matter for law enforcement” and declined to comment further.

[Gianforte has history of controversial views, hostile comments to journalists]

Wednesday’s incident took place after nearly four weeks of voting in a special election to replace Ryan Zinke (R), who became Trump’s interior secretary in March. By Thursday, more than 200,000 of 700,000 eligible voters had cast early absentee ballots.

In interviews at Quist’s final rally, at a Missoula microbrewery, voters were skeptical that the attack could change the race. Gianforte entered the contest with high negative ratings and an image as a hard-charging bully who had joked about outnumbering a reporter at a town hall meeting and sued to keep people from fishing on public land near his home.

“Greg thinks he’s Donald Trump,” said Brent Morrow, 60. “He thinks he could shoot a guy on Fifth Avenue and get away with it.”

Gianforte and the allied super PACs had deflected attention from his low approval numbers with ads attacking Quist over unpaid taxes and gaffes about gun rights and military spending. To the extent the assault charge hurt — a GOP-aligned poll found 93 percent of voters aware of it — Republicans thought it denied them another day of attention on Quist.

For 24 hours, the assault charge was the biggest political story in Montana. The Billings Gazette, which serves Montana’s largest city, told readers that it had made a “poor choice” by ignoring “questionable interactions” the candidate has had with reporters in the past. Two other major newspapers also pulled their Gianforte endorsements, with the Missoulian suggesting that the Republican should bow out of public life.

As word spread of the alleged assault in Bozeman, some supporters who had been knocking on doors for Quist began playing voters the audio clip. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which has invested more than $500,000 in the race, called for Gianforte to quit the race and released a last-minute radio ad featuring Jacobs’s audio of the incident.

In the recording, Jacobs could be heard asking Gianforte to respond to the newly released Congressional Budget Office score of House Republicans’ AHCA, a bill Gianforte had said he was glad to see the House approve.

After Gianforte told Jacobs to direct the question to his spokesman, there was the sound of an altercation, and a screaming candidate.

“I’m sick and tired of you guys!” Gianforte said. “The last guy that came in here did the same thing. Get the hell out of here! Get the hell out of here! The last guy did the same thing. Are you with the Guardian?”

[Analysis: Gianforte is fighting for a House seat. He might be miserable in Congress.]

Quist surprised both parties by running — and by securing the Democratic nomination. A supporter of Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential bid, he told activists he backed Canadian-style single-payer health care, and he waxed to local reporters about whether taxes should be raised on the rich, whether military spending should be slashed and whether assault weapon owners should register their guns.

In the first months of the race, Quist raised just $900,000 and appeared to be written off by Washington Democrats. Republicans attempted to define the candidate before he could go on the air, with the opposition research group America Rising paying a tracker to follow Quist, and the Congressional Leadership Fund super PAC hiring a researcher to dig up damaging stories about the musician-turned-politician’s tax problems. More than $5 million was spent by outside groups against Quist; Democrats responded with less than $1 million in positive spots.

“We knew that because Rob Quist was an unknown quantity with voters, we had the ability to define him negatively out of the gates,” said America Rising chief executive Colin Reed.

But after the March failure of the first version of the AHCA, Quist’s fundraising surged, adding up to more than $5 million by the final pre-election report — outmatching Gianforte, whom Republicans had hoped would self-fund his campaign.

The AHCA, the Republican replacement for the Affordable Care Act, had become the dominant issue in the campaign. In the closing days of the race, Quist focused his events and TV ads on his opposition to the Republican bill and brought in Sanders (I-Vt.) to help promote his position on U.S. health care: universal coverage.

The Republican struggled to talk about the AHCA. In public, he said that he would wait to weigh in on the legislation until the CBO score was released and assured him that protections for people with preexisting medical conditions wouldn’t be scrapped. On a call with donors that was leaked to newspapers including The Washington Post, the Republican said he was “thankful” for the House’s vote that moved the bill forward.

At campaign stops and on TV, the soft-spoken Quist either rebutted Republican attack ads or attacked the GOP’s health-care bill, hitting Gianforte especially hard on the donor call remarks.

“Greg Gianforte says he’s thankful for the new health-care bill, the one that eliminates protections for preexisting conditions and raises premiums on every Montanan who has one, because he gets a big tax break at our expense,” Quist said in his closing spot.

Until Wednesday, Democrats worried that a loss would bolster Republican confidence to move ahead with the health care bill. But Gianforte’s triumph over the assault charges gave the winners another reason to cheer — a victory over what the president calls “fake news.”

At Gianforte’s party in Bozeman, Rehberg — among other revelers — spread a shaky rumor that the Fox News journalists who spoke to police were “changing their story.”

In Missoula, where Quist rallied with his voters, Democrats looked for the bright side. Matt McKenna, an adviser to the campaign and a longtime Montana politics insider, noted the ugly tenor of the race, starting with anti-Quist ads the first day of the campaign.

“This is the first day of the end of Greg Gianforte’s political career,” said McKenna. “It may seem like he got away with this because so many people already voted, but they will deny him the prize he really wants which is the governor’s office. He could go to jail. He still has to be arraigned.”

Viebeck reported from Washington. Kathleen McLaughlin in Missoula, Mont., and Ed O’Keefe and Sean Sullivan in Washington contributed to this report.

Read more at PowerPos

Marketers in Africa should leverage mobile as an amplifier

Video Marketing,

Given the mobile phone’s central role in people’s lives, it’s worth asking whether brands and agencies in Africa are investing enough in mobile advertising and marketing. For millions of people across the continent, it is their only voice communications device, payments channel, and place to access news and information. As such, it should be the starting point for a marketing strategy in Africa.

Here are a few of the trends we see unfolding across Africa’s mobile market in the years to come.

M-commerce is on the rise

Across Africa, we are seeing mobile commerce rise – whether we are talking about online shopping, or a simple USSD-based transaction, such as a farmer buying microinsurance. A report from We Are Social’s Digital shows that 78% of web pages served to web browsers in South Africa are served to mobile devices. The number is greater than 80% in East and West Africa.

It stands to reason that mobile phones, rather than desktops, will dominate e-commerce in Africa. Brands should be thinking about how they can make it as easy as possible for people to convert and buy from their mobile devices – many online advertisers and stores still take a desktop-first approach.

Feature phones have never gone away

International Data Corporation (IDC) just released some interesting statistics, showing that 215 million mobile handsets were shipped in Africa during 2016, up 10.1% from 2015. Contrary to the narrative of feature phones dying out and smartphones replacing them, feature phones accounted for 56% of the market. Smartphones only grew 3.4% year on year, compared to the double-digit growth of the years before.

One reason for this might be that volatile exchange rates caused users to shop for lower-cost feature phones, rather than pricier smartphones. But there are many sub-$50 smartphones on the market. Perhaps many users just aren’t happy with the user experience they get from a low-cost smartphone. High-data costs possibly also put off some end-users from migrating to smartphones.

Mobile innovation isn’t just about the new technologies

Following from the point above, many of Africa’s most powerful mobile applications have come from using basic GSM technologies like SMS and USSD. M-Pesa, for example, is one of the most widely used mobile money transfer services in the world, and it was created in Kenya back in 2007 using nothing fancier than USSD.

In many cases, the technical limitations of feature phones and a lack of mobile broadband have spurred innovation—necessity is often the mother of invention in Africa. This highlights the fact that marketers need a multidimensional approach to the complex and fragmented market in many African countries—mobile web pages for feature phones, apps for smartphone users, and USSD/text services for basic phones all have a role to play.

There are many innovative ways that brands can reach the ‘feature phone consumer’, from bulk SMS, to Please-Call-Me, to gamification through USSD.

Mobile video is getting bigger

Thanks to falling data prices, Africans are starting to take to mobile video. According to research from Twinpine, 78% of Kenyans and 60% of Nigerians online watch videos using their mobile phone.

Given that numerous international studies show that consumers find video ads to be more attention-grabbing and engaging, there is certainly scope for African advertisers to be making more use of video formats in their advertising. That is, provided they use bandwidth-targeting to ensure that they only address people with faster connections with their ads and use light formats that don’t drain too much of their audiences’ data.

Radio and mobile integration will make a happy pairing

Aside from the mobile phone, radio remains the largest reach and time spent engaging channel in most parts of Africa. Mobile phones with FM radios are popular in many parts of South Africa and on the continent. Regional radio, with its sense of community and its information relevant to the listener’s context, does well in many African countries.

Our experience in South and West Africa is that radio can work together well with mobile, through social media, SMS, and voice notes on station apps. Radio remains an immediate and highly interactive medium, with a high degree of mobile integration, yet often overlooked synergies with mobile. Mobile is the great amplifier of audiences, broadening the reach to like-minded communities.

Closing words: Integrated approach to marketing

African brands should think about their marketing and advertising in a more integrated and holistic manner but weave mobile into their campaigns where it makes sense. Mobile is a powerful channel in its own right but can multiply the value of investments in print, PR, TV, outdoor, and radio.

For more information, visit www.mediamark.co.za. Alternatively, connect with them on Facebook or on Twitter.

Your Marketing Spend May Require Readjustment

Video Marketing,

  • by Mary C. Long
    , Columnist,

    Yesterday

Video is the buzz for marketers, with the next generation absolutely obsessed with YouTube, Facebook Live, Snapchat and everything else that’s visual and in the moment. But most
marketers are still running two steps behind, and with virtual reality and augmented reality on the horizon, those “couple of steps behind” are about to become a couple of miles.

Making the most of your promotional videos should be second nature at this point, as it’s really an industry standard. You should have mastered email 10 years ago, your website should
be on point as of 5 years ago, and today you should have video basics down. What video basics, specifically? You should know how to manage and promote a channel, as well as how to:

  • Optimize videos for SEO, timing and sound quality
  • Script videos and run A/B testing to constantly improve
  • Find, follow and take advantage of success
    competitors are having in your space
  • Create a strong call to action to bring potential clients to a lead capture page

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You’re not doing those
things? Well, get on that yesterday because you now have to start planning ahead for augmented reality.

At the Collision Conference that happened May 2 – 4 in New Orleans,
tech startups and investors were planning for the future, and many aren’t wasting their time with virtual reality, labeling it “limited” when compared to the really exciting
technology offering limitless potential, augmented reality.

What’s the difference? Cramer.com puts it
best in a piece speaking to just that:

“Virtual reality is able to bring us someplace else, through closed visors or goggles, VR blocks out the room and puts our presence
elsewhere… . Augmented reality, however, takes our current reality and adds something to it. It does not move us elsewhere. It simply « augments » our current state of presence, often with clear
visors. The real difference? Think scuba diving vs. going to the aquarium. With virtual reality, you can swim with sharks. And with
augmented reality, you can watch a shark pop out of your business card. While VR is more immersive, AR provides more freedom for the user, and more
possibilities for marketers because it does not need to be a head-mounted display.”

To describe it another way, remember the movie Minority Report (see below), where
Tom Cruise can see virtual information by making gestures in the air?

Augmented reality moves a step beyond that where “screens” are obsolete (or an accessory) and you
can program devices to augment the reality around you. It’s true; there’s a company called Hayo.io that’s bringing augmented reality to an Alexa-type device, where the hand signals
you make in the air will control all kinds of things in your smart-connected home — lights, sounds, temperature, even automated online activities. And that’s just the beginning.

But what does this have to do with you not having video marketing tactics up to snuff? Visual marketing is an essential element in augmented reality, as it involves interacting with your
environment and adding to what you can already see or do. If you’re not ready today with a solid one-way video connection to your audience, you’ll struggle greatly when competitors
level up and take advantage of the many augmented experiences headed our way, particularly around video. They’ll be capturing leads with hand gestures, while you’re trying to sort out ways
to attract an audience.

Planning ahead is key. Understanding what virtual reality, and more importantly, augmented reality offer in the not too distant future, and implementing new
technologies first is where you should be directing some of that marketing spend. That whole “wait and see” approach is for companies like Polaroid. Don’t be like Polaroid. Be
the disruptor instead of the disrupted.

How to use live video in your marketing campaigns

Video Marketing,

Live video is a powerful, emerging marketing tool. Daniel Littlepage explains how businesses can plan and create engaging, high quality and measurable live video content.

Daniel LittlepageVideo is now the fastest growing content category on mobile devices, making live streaming video across social platforms a powerful marketing tool. According to Forrester research, live video receives three times more engagement than pre-recorded video, which means marketers need to understand how to leverage its power.

Live video gives brands the power to engage with their audience in a way that’s immediate, unscripted and highly authentic.

While some marketers are using video in their campaigns, they’ve traditionally been pre-recorded and available on-demand. With real-time streaming comes a whole new opportunity to engage with audiences in a more human way. Brands also stand to benefit from the increase in user generated content across Facebook and Instagram as fans start to broadcast their experiences through video.

 

What is live video?

Live video is captured on smartphones, tablets or professional cameras and streamed real-time to the internet, for viewing in mobile apps or on the web. Facebook Live is one example. The feature streams video captured using the Facebook mobile app to users’ followers in real time, similar to Instagram’s livestream broadcasting.

For more secure streaming for both internal/external teams the likes of Ustream, Viostream, and Brightcove are solid options.

 

How to leverage live video in your marketing campaigns

Brands and content creators are starting to understand the types of video content that perform best on different platforms, and therefore can do a better job at engaging the right customers for their products and services. Brands are starting to apply live video on social platforms to announce new products, the open new stores and cover events linked to celebrities – instead of posting photos or traditional text.

You can also train your social media team to to answer customer questions and engage in dialogue with fans through live video. This will make your brand appear more authentic, open and accessible. A very entertaining example of this is ‘Bodyform Responds: The Truth.’

How businesses can use live video internally

If your organisation is conducting events such as off sites, product launches and annual sales conferences, there are opportunities to maximise return by live streaming some or all of these events to those who can’t attend or are in remote locations, ensuring consistency of message.

 

What about quality?

Businesses may be tempted to rule live streaming out due to lack of quality; but don’t be fooled into thinking that live streaming consists of the internal marketing coordinator filming on their iPhone 7.

Broadcast quality live streaming is possible across most platforms, and can be accomplished by working with a professional production partner. Working with a production team will ensure quality audio and vision, using the appropriate equipment, and can assist with adding live graphics such as titles and logos.

 

How to present video metrics

The way engagement with video on social media has been contested recently, it’s important that marketers tie the return on investment to actual business results. It’s less critical how many views a single video gets compared to how many powerful conversions were made to drive traffic to your website, ecommerce store or physical location.

Video engagement is a much more powerful metric than video views.

Engagement refers to the length of time a viewer remains with your content. There’s a natural drop-off that occurs but engaged viewers will stay to the end. Generally, your call to action will be at or towards the end of your video, so if viewers aren’t making it to the end of your content they are missing this critical instruction or next step.

By monitoring engagement you can begin to make decisions about future content, for example adjusting the length if viewers aren’t making it all the way to the end of your video, or positioning calls to action and key information up front.

And don’t overlook the ROI through SEO. Facebook’s algorithm currently favours Facebook Live video content, while YouTube Live videos show up in search results.

Live video can also be downloaded and then uploaded to YouTube or placed on your website. This can help gain a greater audience when consumers search on Google for topics relating to your brand and services. It’s always worth embedding your own analytics into campaigns so that you can make sure you’re presenting more than social feed and digital metrics to the C-Suite.

If live video isn’t part of your content marketing strategy in 2017, it needs to be. According to Tubular Insights, a massive 300 hours of video are being uploaded every minute on Youtube, and Snapchat and Facebook account for 14 billion video views every day, TechCrunch reported in late 2015.

Cisco predicts that by 2019, 80% of all internet traffic will be video. Brands that prepare a solid video strategy this year will leave those without in their wake.

 

 

Daniel Littlepage is managing director, Australia and New Zealand, at 90 Seconds.
Image copyright: stokkete / 123RF Stock Photo

Manchester bomber probably had ISIS training, US official says

Video Marketing, , , ,

Manchester, England (CNN)Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi likely received some ISIS training by traveling to Syria in the months before the attack, according to information gathered in the preliminary investigation, a US official told CNN Thursday.

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CNN’s Atika Shubert reported from Manchester and Laura Smith-Spark and Ray Sanchez wrote from London and New York. CNN’s Carol Jordan, Schams Elwazer, Barbara Starr, Jomana Karadsheh, Nadine Schmidt and Isil Sariyuce contributed to this report.

Trump chastises fellow NATO members, demands they meet payment obligations

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BRUSSELS — President Trump exported the confrontational, nationalist rhetoric of his campaign across the Atlantic on Thursday, shaming European leaders for not footing more of the bill for their own defenses and lecturing them to stop taking advantage of U.S. taxpayers.

Speaking in front of a twisted shard of the World Trade Center at NATO’s gleaming new headquarters in Brussels, Trump upbraided America’s longtime allies for “not paying what they should be paying.” He used a ceremony to dedicate the memorial to NATO’s resolve in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States as a platform from which to exhort leaders to “focus on terrorism and immigration” to ensure their security.

And he held back from the one pledge NATO leaders most dearly wanted to hear: an unconditional embrace of NATO’s solemn treaty commitment that an attack on a single alliance nation is an attack on all of them.

Instead, European leaders gazed unsmilingly at Trump while he said that “23 of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they should be paying and what they are supposed to be paying,” and that they owe “massive amounts” from past years — a misstatement of NATO’s spending targets, which guide nations’ own domestic spending decisions.

[Fact checker: Why Trump is simply wrong about NATO funding]

The harsh tone had a toll, as Trump was left largely on his own after the speech as leaders mingled and laughed with each other, leaving the U.S. president to stand silently on a stage ahead of a group photo.

The long day of gruff Brussels meetings was a contrast from his friendlier Middle East encounters, where Trump embraced the authoritarian Saudi monarchy and said he had been wowed by Saudi King Salman’s wisdom.

In Brussels, Trump sat in a morning meeting with top E.U. leaders, where one emerged to say there were deep differences between them about whether the West can work with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The president lunched with French President Emmanuel Macron, where the two leaders shook hands in a tense, white-knuckled embrace. And he sped across Brussels to NATO, where British Prime Minister Theresa May, the leader of Washington’s closest ally, buttonholed him about her anger over intelligence leaks following Monday’s terrorist attack in Manchester.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer, traveling with the president, downplayed the absence of Trump’s formal commitment to security guarantees during the speech, saying that there was no question of U.S. support for NATO and all of the obligations that are entailed in membership.

“Having to reaffirm something by the very nature of being here and speaking at a ceremony about it is almost laughable,” Spicer said after the speech.

Leaders offered modest applause at the end of a speech that he began by asking for a moment of silence in remembrance of the victims of Monday’s terrorist attack in Manchester, England, that killed 22 and wounded many more.

Addressing the British, Trump said, “May all the nations here grieve with you and stand with you.” The attack, he said, “demonstrates the depths of the evil we face with terrorism.”

Trump did not refer to British prime minister’s irritation, expressed earlier in the day, over what officials in England have said was the leak to U.S. news media of intelligence information that Britain gathered in the investigation of the Manchester case and shared with the United States.

“We have strong relations with the United States, our closest partner,” May told reporters as she entered NATO’s $1.2 billion new headquarters for the ceremony, “and that is, of course, built on trust. Part of that is knowing intelligence can be shared confidently, and I will make clear to President Trump that intelligence shared with law enforcement agencies must be secure.”

May talked with Trump about the issue inside the closed meetings, a senior British government official said.

[Trump calls for investigation of U.S. leaks in Manchester bomb probe ]

Trump is already under fire at home for violating intelligence agreements, following a Washington Post report that he revealed sensitive information on the Islamic State, obtained from Israel, to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador to Washington. 

In a presidential statement issued while Trump was at the ceremony, he called the Manchester leaks “deeply troubling,” vowed to “get to the bottom” of them and called for a full investigation by U.S. agencies, one that could end with prosecutions, he said.

Trump’s speech likely disappointed leaders who had hoped for a public commitment from the U.S. president to NATO’s security guarantees, which he called into question during his presidential campaign last year when he said he would check a country’s defense spending before coming to its aid. Trump’s Cabinet officials have made the direct pledge in recent months, but top officials of other NATO allies said that Trump’s personal guarantee would eliminate any lingering doubts.

In the speech, Trump gave no specific commitment to Article 5, the collective security provision that has been invoked only once — following the September 2001 attacks. “Our NATO allies responded swiftly and successfully, invoking for the first time the Article 5 commitment,” Trump recalled.

A senior administration official said that no one should “read into” Trump’s remarks any lack of U.S. commitment to the alliance’s collective defense obligations.

“The intent was to deliver a direct message, which he’s done before,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to expand on Trump’s remarks. “He’s been direct with them in rallies in speeches. He wanted to give the same message that he’s been giving when NATO leaders are present or are not present. It’s the same message he gave on the campaign trail, it’s the same message he gives to the American people, and it’s the same message he gives to leaders one on one.”

Trump’s “confrontational approach has yielded results so far,” the official said. “A lot more countries have stepped up and said we’re going to meet this target sooner.”

Trump began his day in Brussels at a meeting with European Union leaders Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker.

Speaking after the half-hour session, Tusk, president of the European Council, said pointedly that the West needs to concentrate on “values, not just interests.”

“Values and principles first, this is what we — Europe and America — should be saying,” Tusk told reporters. Tusk, who has expressed concern before about the new U.S. administration, said he and Trump agreed on counterterrorism, but did not see eye to eye on a number of other issues, including climate change, trade and Russia.

After the E.U. meeting, Trump had a private lunch with Macron at the residence of the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, where he is staying while in Brussels. Trump greeted the new French president at the door with a handshake and a hearty,“ How are you?” as Macron stepped out of his black limousine. France has urged Trump not to pull out of the 2015 Paris climate accord, a decision he has hinted at but that the administration says has not yet been made.

[Video: Trump scolds NATO leaders at Brussels ceremony]

On this fourth and penultimate stop on Trump’s nine-day trip, the first overseas travel of his presidency, Trump did not appear to find the near adulation he experienced from Arab leaders in Saudi Arabia, and from the Israeli government in Jerusalem.

At those stops, they agreed with Trump’s call to concentrate on counterterrorism and economic growth, with no discussion, at least in public, about human and civil rights concerns that had dogged U.S.-Middle East relationships under President Barack Obama.

NATO’s leaders used the excuse of the vast new headquarters to invite the former real estate mogul for a ribbon-cutting, even though construction on the site — a former military airfield — is not yet finished. Beyond its official purpose, however, the meeting was designed to allow Trump and NATO to take the measure of each other.

Some allies feel the golden word of the president would finalize the message to Russia and others across the NATO border. It still could come up in their private conversations over dinner.

“That would be important if the president personally and explicitly states it,” said Latvian Foreign Ministry State Secretary Andrejs Pildegovics, who was in Brussels for the meeting. “At the end of the day, all important decisions are made by the president. And usually the president has a few options on the table.”

NATO has officially pledged that all members will reach the goal of spending at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense by 2024. Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg noted Thursday morning that overall spending among members has been up for two years in a row, and he said he anticipated that increases would now speed up as the alliance addresses the terrorist threat.

He said NATO was ready to join the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State — to which all individual members already belong — although he said NATO would not have a combat role on the ground in Iraq and Syria. Among increased contributions to counterterrorism, he said the alliance would step up support of NATO AWACS planes and intelligence-sharing, and provide refueling capabilities. 

“We will now establish a new intelligence fusion cell at the headquarters addressing terrorism, including foreign fights.

“And we will also appoint a special coordinator for NATO’s efforts fighting terrorism,” Stoltenberg said. He called it a “strong political message,” as well as a practical one.

Stoltenberg also said NATO would consider increasing its noncombat troop presence in Afghanistan. The administration is currently reviewing its own presence there, including adding up to 5,000 troops to the nearly 10,000 already on the ground and expanding their role assisting Afghan government forces fighting both the Taliban and a local Islamic State presence.

Federal appeals court largely maintains freeze of Trump’s travel ban

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A federal appeals court on Thursday left in place the freeze on President Trump’s revised entry ban, handing the administration another legal setback in its efforts to block the issuance of new visas to citizens of six Muslim majority countries.

The ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit means the Trump administration still cannot enforce its travel order that the government says is urgently needed for national security.

In its 10 to 3 decision, the Richmond-based court said the president’s broad immigration power to deny entry into the U.S. is not absolute and sided with challengers, finding that the travel ban “in context drips with religious intolerance, animus and discrimination.”

The president’s authority, the court said, “cannot go unchecked when, as here, the president wields it through an executive edict that stands to cause irreparable harm to individuals across this nation,” according to the majority opinion written by Chief Judge Roger L. Gregory, and joined in part by nine other judges.

The 4th Circuit declined to lift an order from a Maryland federal judge, who ruled against the travel ban in March and sided with opponents who said the ban violates the Constitution by intentionally discriminating against Muslims. The ruling leaves the injunction in place and means citizens from Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Syria and Libya can continue entering the United States.

Protesters hold signs and march outside the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond, Va., in advance of the hearing earlier this month on the Trump administration’s travel ban. (Steve Helber/AP)

[Judges press Trump’s lawyers in travel ban case on campaign statements]

Even if the appeals court had sided with the Trump administration, the president’s order would have remained on hold because of a separate opinion from a federal judge in Hawaii. To put the ban in motion, the Justice Department would also have had to win at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, which heard oral arguments on May 15 in the government’s appeal of the Hawaii decision.

Federal immigration law gives the president broad immigration powers and government lawyers urged the court to defer to the president and not second guess his judgment.

But the ruling from the 4th Circuit was the latest in a series of defeats for the administration. President Trump rewrote the entry ban after the 9th Circuit in February refused to lift an earlier injunction.

The revised version would temporarily suspend the U.S. refugee program and halt for 90 days the issuance of new visas to travelers from the six countries while the administration reviews its screening process.

The next step for the Trump administration would be to ask the Supreme Court to stay the 4th Circuit’s decision. Such a request usually requires showing that the government would suffer irreparable harm if the lower court decision was allowed to stand. The passage of time since the executive order was first issued might make that difficult.

A challenge to the 4th Circuit decision would go to Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who receives emergency petitions from that court, and then be referred to the rest of the justices. It would take five votes to stay the decision.

The administration might also wait until it receives a ruling from a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. Those judges are considering a ruling from a judge in Hawaii who put the travel ban on hold. The full 9th Circuit upheld a freeze on Trump’s previous executive order.

[9th Circuit rules 3 to 0 against Trump on first version of travel ban]

The challenge in Maryland was brought by organizations and individuals, including a Muslim in the United States whose relative would be affected by the ban.

In its 79-page opinion, the court said challengers had shown real harm that would come from delaying or disrupting pending visa applications, in addition to the “psychological harm that flows from confronting official action preferring or disfavoring a particular religion.”

During oral arguments this month, many of the 4th Circuit judges expressed doubts about the viability of the president’s order. They questioned whether there was a link between barring of citizens from the six countries identified by the administration and ensuring U.S. security.

In its opinion Thursday, the court said, “plaintiffs point to ample evidence that national security is not the true reason” for the order, pointing to the president’s “numerous campaign statements expressing animus towards the Islamic faith” and his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the U.S.

The majority opinion recounts in detail then-candidate Trump’s statement on his campaign website, and quotes from his tweets, television interviews and comments made by his advisers.

The establishment clause of the First Amendment specifically prohibits the government from denigrating a particular religion.

Karen Tumlin, legal director at the National Immigration Law Center, one of the lawyers on the cases said Thursday that the court had concluded that this executive order has to be blocked because it “steps over the constitutional line in a way that is out of step with our constitutional values of religious tolerance.”

All of the judges in the majority were placed on the court by Democratic presidents and the three dissenting judges — Paul V. Niemyer, Dennis W. Shedd and G. Steven Agee — were all nominated to the bench by Republican presidents.

Niemeyer called the decision unprecedented and unworkable. “The majority looks past the face of the order’s statements on national security and immigration, which it concedes are neutral in terms of religion, and considers campaign statements made by candidate Trump to conclude that the order denigrates Islam, in violation of the Establishment Clause,” he wrote. He said that approach plainly violates Supreme Court precedent, misapplies the Constitutional’s prohibition on establishing religion and “adopts a new rule of law that uses campaign statements to recast the plain, unambiguous, and religiously neutral text of an executive order.”

He said the majority decision would not withstand Supreme Court review.

“The Supreme Court surely will shudder at the majority’s adoption of this new rule that has no limits or bounds — one that transforms the majority’s criticisms of a candidate’s various campaign statements into a constitutional violation,” wrote Niemeyer, whose opinion was joined by the other dissenting judges.

Read more:

There’s a word that no longer describes the federal appeals court in Richmond

Despite a mother’s plea, a gun store sold her mentally ill daughter a weapon. With tragic consequences.

Man cleared of murder conviction after 24 years behind bars, with help of an ex-cop

President Trump’s lawyers on revised travel ban repeatedly asked about campaign promises

Manchester attack: Police ‘not sharing information with US’

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Possible detonator and backpack remnantsImage copyright
New York Times

Image caption

The New York Times says this evidence was gathered at the scene of the attack

Police investigating the Manchester Arena bomb attack have stopped sharing information with the US after leaks to the media, the BBC understands.

UK officials were outraged when photos appearing to show debris from the attack appeared in the New York Times.

It came after the name of bomber Salman Abedi was leaked to US media just hours after the attack, which killed 22 – including children – and injured 64.

Theresa May is to raise concerns with Donald Trump at a Nato meeting later.

Greater Manchester Police hopes to resume normal intelligence relationships – a two-way flow of information – soon but is currently « furious », the BBC understands.

The force – which is leading the investigation on the ground – gives its information to National Counter-Terrorism, which then shares it across government and – because of the Five Eyes intelligence sharing agreement – with the US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

In total eight men are now in custody following the attack, carried out by Manchester-born Abedi, a 22-year-old from a family of Libyan origin.

It has also emerged two people who had known Abedi at college made separate calls to a hotline to warn the police about his extremist views.

Pictures of debris

Home Secretary Amber Rudd had said she was « irritated » by the disclosure of Abedi’s identity against the UK’s wishes and had warned Washington « it should not happen again ».

However, the pictures of debris – which appear to show bloodstained fragments from the bomb and the backpack used to conceal it – were subsequently leaked to the New York Times, prompting an angry response from within Whitehall and from UK police chiefs.

BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera says UK officials believe that US law enforcement rather than the White House is the likely culprit for the leaks.

A Whitehall source described the second US leak as « on another level », and said it had caused « disbelief and astonishment » across the British government.

Analysis

By Dominic Casciani, BBC home affairs correspondent

The police decision to stop sharing information specifically about the Manchester attack with their security counterparts in the US is a hugely significant move and shows how angry British authorities are.

The information from the crime scene wasn’t shared on a whim: the British and Americans have a lot of shared world-leading expertise in improvised explosive devices and scientists would be discussing whether the Manchester device tells them something new that could, ultimately, track down a bomb-maker.

Other sharing will continue. The UK and US share a vast amount of information about terror and espionage threats – its a tight-knit network that also encompasses Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

That system is based on trust and the « control principle »: if a piece of intelligence is shared, the receiving nation has no right to further disseminate it without permission.

The UK’s National Police Chiefs’ Council described the « unauthorised disclosure » as a breach of trust which had potentially undermined a « major counter-terrorism investigation ».

Counter-terrorism detectives have spoken in the past about how a delay of about 36 hours before the public know who is being investigated can allow known associates of the suspect to be arrested without being tipped off.

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham said the leaks had worried him « greatly », and he had raised them with the US ambassador.

Lord Blair, who was the head of the Metropolitan Police at the time of the bombings in London on 7 July 2005 said intelligence leaks by the US were not new.

« I’m afraid it just reminds me exactly of what happened after 7/7 when the US published a complete picture of the way the bombs in 7/7 had been made up, » he said.

« It’s a different world in which the US operate in terms of how they publish things and this is a very grievous breach but I’m afraid it’s the same as before. »

In other developments:

  • Two men were arrested following a search of an address in the Withington area of Greater Manchester on Thursday morning, taking the number of people held to eight
  • The government has announced a minute’s silence will be held at 11:00 BST in remembrance of those who lost their lives or were affected by the attack
  • The Conservatives and Labour are to resume local general election campaigning on Thursday, and national campaigning on Friday
  • Manchester United fans observed a minute’s silence in memory of the victims of Monday’s bombing, ahead of the team’s Europa League final win

What’s happening with the investigation?

Image caption

Ismail Abedi was detained in Chorlton, south Manchester; his father, Ramadan, was held in Tripoli

Eight men and one woman have been arrested in the UK since Monday night, including Abedi’s older brother Ismail, 23. The woman has since been released.

Abedi’s younger brother Hashem, 20, was held by special forces linked to the interior ministry in the Libyan capital Tripoli, as was their father.

Speaking on Wednesday, Greater Manchester Chief Constable Ian Hopkins said: « It’s very clear that this is a network that we are investigating.

« And as I’ve said, it continues at a pace. There’s extensive investigations going on and activity taking place across Greater Manchester. »

As part of their investigation, police raided a block of flats near Manchester Piccadilly station in the city centre, requiring them to carry out a controlled explosion and briefly close the railway line.

Police carried out another controlled explosion in the early hours of Thursday morning at an address in the Moss Side area of Manchester.

Anyone with information can call the anti-terror hotline on 0800 789321.

Who are the victims?

Image caption

Clockwise, from top left: Georgina Callander, Saffie Roussos, Olivia Campbell, Martyn Hett, Michelle Kiss, Sorrell Leczkowski, Alison Howe, Lisa Lees, Jane Tweddle-Taylor, Nell Jones, Marcin Klis, Angelika Klis, Kelly Brewster and John Atkinson

Some of the victims had been making their way outside at the end of the Ariana Grande gig when Abedi detonated his « nuts-and-bolts » bomb.

They include children and teenagers and others who had been waiting in the foyer to pick up concert-goers.

The youngest so far known to have died is eight-year-old Saffie Roussos, while an off-duty Cheshire police officer Elaine McIver was also among the dead.

Among the latest victims to be named are Wendy Fawell, aged 50 from Otley, west Yorkshire and Eilidh MacLeod, a 14-year-old from Barra in the Outer Hebrides.

Of the 64 injured, 20 are in a critical condition. Twelve of them are children.

Who was the attacker?

Image caption

Salman Abedi was described by a former classmate as short-tempered and gullible

Salman Abedi was a 22-year-old born in Manchester to Libyan parents, and a former University of Salford student.

He attended Burnage Academy for Boys in Manchester between 2009 and 2011, and The Manchester College until 2013.

A former classmate told the BBC that Abedi was a « very jokey lad » but also « very short tempered » and would get angry at « the littlest thing ».

The man, who did not want to be identified, said Abedi had hung around « the wrong crowd and was very, very gullible ».

Before leaving Burnage Academy, Abedi had become « more and more religious », the man added.

A Muslim community worker, who did not want to be identified, has told the BBC that two people who had known Abedi at college had made separate calls five years ago to a hotline to warn about his extremist views.

He said they had been worried that Abedi was « supporting terrorism » and he had expressed the view that « being a suicide bomber was ok ».

Profile: Who was Salman Abedi?

Uninsured ranks still to grow by tens of millions under latest House health-care bill, CBO says

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Health-care legislation adopted by House Republicans earlier this month would leave 23 million more Americans uninsured by 2026 than under current law, the Congressional Budget Office projected Wednesday — only a million fewer than the estimate for the House’s previous bill.

The nonpartisan agency’s finding, which drew immediate fire from Democrats, patient advocates, health industry officials and some business groups, is likely to complicate Republicans’ push to pass a companion bill in the Senate.

The new score, which reflects last-minute revisions that Republicans made to win over several conservative lawmakers and a handful of moderates, calculates that the American Health Care Act would reduce the federal deficit by $119 billion between 2017 and 2026. That represents a smaller reduction than the $150 billion CBO estimated in late March, largely because House leaders provided more money in their final bill to offset costs for consumers with expensive medical conditions and included language that could translate to greater federal spending on health insurance subsidies.

[What is in the Republican health-care bill? Questions and answers on preexisting conditions, Medicaid and more.]

As GOP senators quickly distanced themselves from the updated numbers, what became apparent is the difficult balancing act congressional leaders face as they seek to rewrite large portions of the Affordable Care Act. Some senators are eager to soften portions of the House bill, including cuts to entitlement programs and provisions that would allow insurers in individual states to offer fewer benefits in their health plans or to charge consumers with costly medical conditions higher premiums.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who did not issue a statement in response to the new budget score, suggested in an interview with Reuters that he still harbored doubts over whether his party could muster enough votes to pass any kind of health-care bill this year.

“I don’t know how we get to 50 [votes] at the moment,” he said, referring to a situation in which Vice President Pence would cast the deciding vote. “But that’s the goal.”

To avoid a filibuster by Democrats, Senate Republicans plan to take the bill up under budget reconciliation rules — which only require a majority vote but mean the legislation cannot increase the federal deficit within a 10-year window. The Republicans have been working for weeks on their own health-care bill and emphasize that they do not intend to simply follow the House’s lead.

“Exactly what the composition of [our legislation] is, I’m not going to speculate about because it serves no purpose,” McConnell told Reuters.

Some, like Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.), said the CBO score would have no impact on his chamber’s efforts to write its own bill.

[The three numbers you need to understand the CBO report on Republicans’ health-care bill]

“Regardless of any CBO score, it’s no secret Obamacare is collapsing under its own weight,” Perdue said in a statement. “Doing nothing is not an option.”

Instead of addressing the future number of uninsured Americans under the Republican plan — projected to immediately jump in 2018 by 14 million — House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) on Wednesday chose to focus on the CBO’s estimate that premiums overall would fall under the AHCA.

“This CBO report again confirms that the American Health Care Act achieves our mission: lowering premiums and lowering the deficit,” Ryan said in a statement. “It is another positive step toward keeping our promise to repeal and replace Obamacare.”

Congressional analysts concluded that one change to the House bill aimed at lowering premiums, by allowing states to opt out of some current insurance requirements, would encourage some employers to maintain coverage for their workers and get younger, healthier people to buy plans on their own. But those gains would be largely offset by consumers with preexisting conditions, who would face higher premiums than they do now.

“Their premiums would continue to increase rapidly,” the report found.

The CBO estimated that states seeking waivers to strip the ACA’s “essential health benefits” would affect roughly one-sixth of the population and that obtaining maternity coverage outside a basic plan, for example, “could be more than $1,000 per month.”

But Rep. John Faso (R-N.Y.), who supported the House bill, called the CBO’s assumption that waivers would affect that many Americans “grossly wrong.”

“Frankly I doubt any state would try to take advantage of that provision,” he said. “I think that is completely out of the ballpark.”

Asked why the House included the provision if no state would seek such waivers, he replied, “I’m sure it will be stripped out in the Senate.”

The administration’s reaction came from Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, who questioned the congressional analysts’ latest numbers while noting that many Americans on the individual insurance market are paying more than double the premiums they were before the ACA was passed in 2010.

“The CBO was wrong when they analyzed Obamacare’s effect on cost and coverage, and they are wrong again,” Price said.

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Joseph Antos, a resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute who specializes in health-care policy, said the new estimate “is the same signal repeated,” conveying that the changes congressional Republicans envision would cut the price of premiums and trim the deficit while leaving more Americans without insurance.

The AHCA’s proposal to cut spending on Medicaid — a federal program that covers roughly 69 million Americans — by $834 billion over the next decade is the thorniest political issue facing the Senate, Antos said.

“They’re going to have to do something on Medicaid, and that something is a real question,” he said.

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, said he was confident the Senate would be able to craft a bill that could pass muster in the House — even in light of the CBO’s analysis.

He said that he expected senators to address the situation of the roughly 10 million Americans who now enjoy Medicaid coverage under the ACA “in a less conservative way” than the House and that the measure “would still have conservative support in the House when it came back.”

Senate Democrats seized on the new budget estimate, arguing that their GOP counterparts would be foolhardy to press ahead along the same lines as the House’s final legislation. The bill was passed May 4 with no support from Democrats.

“These were cosmetic changes. They thought they could put lipstick on a pig,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), adding that it’s now obvious “we’re going to have well over 20 million people uninsured.”

Several key outside groups, including those representing physicians, hospitals and patients, said in statements that the updated projections underscored the need for the Senate to shift course.

The president of the American Medical Association urged the Senate to take a different approach. The CBO estimates “show that last-minute changes to the AHCA made by the House offered no real improvements,” Andrew Gurman said.

And Rick Pollack, president and chief executive of the American Hospital Association, said the new numbers “only reinforce our deep concerns about the importance of maintaining coverage for those vulnerable patients who need it.”

Mike DeBonis and Sean Sullivan contributed to this report.