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aces wild fishing charters NoneWASHINGTON (AP) — After several weeks working mostly behind closed doors, Vice President-elect JD Vance returned to Capitol Hill this week in a new, more visible role: Helping Donald Trump try to get his most contentious Cabinet picks to confirmation in the Senate, where Vance has served for the last two years. Vance arrived at the Capitol on Wednesday with former Rep. Matt Gaetz and spent the morning sitting in on meetings between Trump’s choice for attorney general and key Republicans, including members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The effort was for naught: Gaetz announced a day later that he was withdrawing his name amid scrutiny over sex trafficking allegations and the reality that he was unlikely to be confirmed. Thursday morning Vance was back, this time accompanying Pete Hegseth, the “Fox & Friends Weekend” host whom Trump has tapped to be the next secretary of defense. Hegseth also has faced allegations of sexual assault that he denies. Vance is expected to accompany other nominees for meetings in coming weeks as he tries to leverage the two years he has spent in the Senate to help push through Trump's picks. The role of introducing nominees around Capitol Hill is an unusual one for a vice president-elect. Usually the job goes to a former senator who has close relationships on the Hill, or a more junior aide. But this time the role fits Vance, said Marc Short, who served as Trump’s first director of legislative affairs as well as chief of staff to Trump’s first vice president, Mike Pence, who spent more than a decade in Congress and led the former president’s transition ahead of his first term. ”JD probably has a lot of current allies in the Senate and so it makes sense to have him utilized in that capacity,” Short said. Unlike the first Trump transition, which played out before cameras at Trump Tower in New York and at the president-elect's golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, this one has largely happened behind closed doors in Palm Beach, Florida. There, a small group of officials and aides meet daily at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort to run through possible contenders and interview job candidates. The group includes Elon Musk, the billionaire who has spent so much time at the club that Trump has joked he can’t get rid of him. Vance has been a constant presence, even as he’s kept a lower profile. The Ohio senator has spent much of the last two weeks in Palm Beach, according to people familiar with his plans, playing an active role in the transition, on which he serves as honorary chair. Vance has been staying at a cottage on the property of the gilded club, where rooms are adorned with cherubs, oriental rugs and intricate golden inlays. It's a world away from the famously hardscrabble upbringing that Vance documented in the memoir that made him famous, “Hillbilly Elegy.” His young children have also joined him at Mar-a-Lago, at times. Vance was photographed in shorts and a polo shirt playing with his kids on the seawall of the property with a large palm frond, a U.S. Secret Service robotic security dog in the distance. On the rare days when he is not in Palm Beach, Vance has been joining the sessions remotely via Zoom. Though he has taken a break from TV interviews after months of constant appearances, Vance has been active in the meetings, which began immediately after the election and include interviews and as well as presentations on candidates’ pluses and minuses. Among those interviewed: Contenders to replace FBI Director Christopher Wray , as Vance wrote in a since-deleted social media post. Defending himself from criticism that he’d missed a Senate vote in which one of President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees was confirmed, Vance wrote that he was meeting at the time "with President Trump to interview multiple positions for our government, including for FBI Director.” “I tend to think it’s more important to get an FBI director who will dismantle the deep state than it is for Republicans to lose a vote 49-46 rather than 49-45,” Vance added on X. “But that’s just me.” Story continues below video While Vance did not come in to the transition with a list of people he wanted to see in specific roles, he and his friend, Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., who is also a member of the transition team, were eager to see former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. find roles in the administration. Trump ended up selecting Gabbard as the next director of national intelligence , a powerful position that sits atop the nation’s spy agencies and acts as the president’s top intelligence adviser. And he chose Kennedy to lead the Department of Health and Human Services , a massive agency that oversees everything from drug and food safety to Medicare and Medicaid. Vance was also a big booster of Tom Homan, the former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, who will serve as Trump's “border czar.” In another sign of Vance's influence, James Braid, a top aide to the senator, is expected to serve as Trump’s legislative affairs director. Allies say it’s too early to discuss what portfolio Vance might take on in the White House. While he gravitates to issues like trade, immigration and tech policy, Vance sees his role as doing whatever Trump needs. Vance was spotted days after the election giving his son’s Boy Scout troop a tour of the Capitol and was there the day of leadership elections. He returned in earnest this week, first with Gaetz — arguably Trump’s most divisive pick — and then Hegseth, who has was been accused of sexually assaulting a woman in 2017, according to an investigative report made public this week. Hegseth told police at the time that the encounter had been consensual and denied any wrongdoing. Vance hosted Hegseth in his Senate office as GOP senators, including those who sit on the Senate Armed Services Committee, filtered in to meet with the nominee for defense secretary. While a president’s nominees usually visit individual senators’ offices, meeting them on their own turf, the freshman senator — who is accompanied everywhere by a large Secret Service detail that makes moving around more unwieldy — instead brought Gaetz to a room in the Capitol on Wednesday and Hegseth to his office on Thursday. Senators came to them. Vance made it to votes Wednesday and Thursday, but missed others on Thursday afternoon. Vance is expected to continue to leverage his relationships in the Senate after Trump takes office. But many Republicans there have longer relationships with Trump himself. Sen. Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican, said that Trump was often the first person to call him back when he was trying to reach high-level White House officials during Trump's first term. “He has the most active Rolodex of just about anybody I’ve ever known,” Cramer said, adding that Vance would make a good addition. “They’ll divide names up by who has the most persuasion here,” Cramer said, but added, “Whoever his liaison is will not work as hard at it as he will.” Cramer was complimentary of the Ohio senator, saying he was “pleasant” and ” interesting” to be around. ′′He doesn’t have the long relationships," he said. "But we all like people that have done what we’ve done. I mean, that’s sort of a natural kinship, just probably not as personally tied.” Under the Constitution, Vance will also have a role presiding over the Senate and breaking tie votes. But he's not likely to be needed for that as often as was Kamala Harris, who broke a record number of ties for Democrats as vice president, since Republicans will have a bigger cushion in the chamber next year. Colvin reported from New York. Associated Press writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

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AHEAD OF THEIR YEARS The author, who is also the paper’s Sports editor, talks about his work in the Inquirer, which gets sampled later by members of his audience. —Photos from Abba’s Orchard School and Con Cabrera/Contributor MANILA, Philippines — On the second floor of Abba’s Orchard Montessori School’s campus on Bayani Road, Taguig City, a cozy reading corner rests against one side of the L-shaped classroom. There, students are free—at any time during their class hours—to sit down, pick up a copy of the Inquirer, and read about current events. The kids are age 9 to 11. A floor below, in a classroom filled with students age 6 to 8, there is a similar reading space where a comfy bean bag rests next to a shelf of books. The young kids can also pick up a newspaper to check on the day’s headlines. “This started when our elementary children began bringing national concerns into their group discussions,” Jusy Garcia, the head of the Bayani and McKinley campuses of Abba’s Orchard, told the Inquirer. “We’ve gone through a life-changing pandemic and a national election. There was a lot to talk about, and we didn’t want to keep them in a bubble.” Garcia started the initiative with the school’s seven campuses in the National Capital Region. “As a Montessori school, we want to encourage the children to speak their minds. But before we could do that, they must be well-informed in order to make sound opinions. Children must be given the keys to unlock doors of learning opportunities. We trust that the Philippine Daily Inquirer can give our children just that,” she added. The reception among students has been enthusiastic. “The first week they received newspapers, they were over the moon!” Garcia said. “At a time of artificial intelligence (AI) and fake news, providing a reliable source of information gives them a relevant seat at the discussion table.” Now, that partnership has expanded to all of the school’s campuses nationwide. LOOK, MA, NO SCREENS One can say that the so-called Generation Alpha at Abba’s Orchard Montessori School is on the same page with the much older regular readers of the Inquirer. —Abba’s Orchard School, Con Cabrera/Contributor “[I]n every paper delivered to our doorstep each school day is a slice of verified information that would help our children become active thinkers,” she said. The Inquirer paid a visit to the Bayani campus as part of the school’s program where they invite experts from their field and give the students a peek at their profession. During the Inquirer’s visit, however, the discussion turned to the value of sourcing news from newspapers. And it seemed like the students have learned a lot from their reading experiences. “Newspapers help us deal with fake news.” “There’s so much AI today and it’s hard to tell what news is real that’s why newspapers are important.” “Newspapers keep us updated about things we should know.” Those were just some of the comments raised by the young kids. The teachers of the different campuses already have a collection of anecdotes about how the habit of reading newspapers daily has impacted their students’ lives. Bea Vergara and Joana Sapolato, the guides who handle the Level 2 students (Grades 4 to 6 in the traditional setting) recounted how, during an immersive discussion of martial law, the kids were given roles to play: police and military, political detainees, cronies, journalists, students, and citizens. To make the discussion even more resonant, the guides took away some classroom privileges, like limiting the use of the reading corner to chosen students and the use of art materials from the art shelf. When the students playing the role of citizens felt the burden of the restrictions and voiced their opposition to it, guess who came to their side? “What’s surprising was the journalists started writing about what was going on in the classroom,” the teachers said. “Their idea of a newspaper has been modeled after the Philippine Daily Inquirer. They made their own headline and the front page contained a catchy drawing as the ‘photo’ of the article they wrote.” “They saw how big of an effect the newspapers came to play during the immersive activity and how it also had a big role in shaping our history.” Christine Amper, a guide from the Cebu campus, told the story of how newspapers have become part of her student’s discussions. During a class trip, a student named Nathan surprised his peers with a currency update during a discussion about the cost of an item being sold online. “I remember it’s already P57.80,” he said when asked about exchange rates. The casual discussion led to broader reflections on the economy, with one student proclaiming, “Oh no, we’re doomed!” In that same Cebu campus, students also turned to the newspaper when their interest was piqued by the filing of candidacies for next year’s national elections. Eventually, their discussion led to a History discussion on the three branches of government and actual elections were held in the classroom. The impact of newspapers extends beyond facts and figures, Garcia said, adding that teachers reported how students are mastering critical skills like distinguishing between fact and opinion. “They’ve learned to create objective opinions on social issues,” noted Garcia. “We’ve also used newspapers for vocabulary lessons, sentence analysis, and even blackout poetry.” In the classroom handled by Blessy Salaritan and Angela Rivera, Level 1 kids (Grades 1 to 3) use the Inquirer to learn new words and for literary purposes, such as blackout poetry. But even when doing so, they eventually drift to the news. For Garcia, the decision to have the Inquirer as the newspaper of choice for Abba’s Orchard’s campuses was a no-brainer. Subscribe to our daily newsletter By providing an email address. I agree to the Terms of Use and acknowledge that I have read the Privacy Policy . “Writing has always been so dear to me. I started writing for the school paper when I was 10. Since then, I was in every school press conference and writing contest. The Philippine Daily Inquirer was part of my writing journey as my coaches would use it as our study material,” she said. “Even if I wasn’t able to pursue that childhood dream of writing as a career, I’m more than fulfilled now because ... I was able to pass on my love for writing to them. I do have the Philippine Daily Inquirer to thank for that. Now that the children at school are able to turn the pages of the same newspaper I read through during my student days many years ago, it’s truly a personal full circle moment for me just seeing them do the same,” Garcia added.Trump names David Sacks as White House AI and crypto czar

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Deluxe Corp CEO Barry McCarthy purchases $53,975 in stockTexas law doesn’t define or outlaw “speed traps,” a term generally describing a part of road, often near a change in speed limit, regularly policed by officers or devices trying to catch speeders. However, Texas bans citations based on images captured by cameras installed at traffic signals. Cities are also prohibited from maintaining informal or formal quotas that encourage officers to issue a target number of citations. Cities with populations fewer than 5,000 can have up to 30% of their annual tax revenue come from traffic citations. Any funds exceeding the limit are sent to the Texas comptroller. This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one . Fort Worth Report partners with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. Read our methodology to learn how we check claims. DriveSafe Online Speed Traps in Texas: How to Dismiss a Ticket in the Lone Star State FindLaw Are Speed Traps Legal? Texas Transportation Code Title 7, Subtitle C, Chapter 545, Subchapter A Texas Transportation Code Title 7, Subtitle I, Chapter 707 Texas Transportation Code Title 7, Subtitle I, Chapter 720 Triple your impact today! It’s # GivingTuesday ! Today only, all donations to our nonprofit newsroom will be TRIPLED. Don’t miss this opportunity to support trusted local news—this match ends at 11:59 PM! Get essential daily news for the Fort Worth area. Sign up for insightful, in-depth stories — completely free. Related Fort Worth Report is certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative for adhering to standards for ethical journalism . Republish This Story Republishing is free for noncommercial entities. Commercial entities are prohibited without a licensing agreement. Contact us for details. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License . Look for the "Republish This Story" button underneath each story. To republish online, simply click the button, copy the html code and paste into your Content Management System (CMS). Do not copy stories straight from the front-end of our web-site. You are required to follow the guidelines and use the republication tool when you share our content. The republication tool generates the appropriate html code. You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. You can’t sell or syndicate our stories. Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization. If you use our stories in any other medium — for example, newsletters or other email campaigns — you must make it clear that the stories are from the Fort Worth Report. In all emails, link directly to the story at fortworthreport.org and not to your website. If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @FortWorthReport on Facebook and @FortWorthReport on Twitter. You have to credit Fort Worth Report. Please use “Author Name, Fort Worth Report” in the byline. If you’re not able to add the byline, please include a line at the top of the story that reads: “This story was originally published by Fort Worth Report” and include our website, fortworthreport.org . You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. Our stories may appear on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories. You can’t sell or syndicate our stories. You can only publish select stories individually — not as a collection. Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization. If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @FortWorthReport on Facebook and @FortWorthReport on Twitter. by Drew Shaw, Fort Worth Report December 3, 2024

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump said he can't guarantee his promised tariffs on key U.S. foreign trade partners won't raise prices for American consumers and suggested once more that some political rivals and federal officials who pursued legal cases against him should be imprisoned. The president-elect, in a wide-ranging interview with NBC's "Meet the Press" that aired Sunday, also touched on monetary policy, immigration, abortion and health care, and U.S. involvement in Ukraine, Israel and elsewhere. Trump often mixed declarative statements with caveats, at one point cautioning "things do change." Here's a look at some of the issues covered: Trump hems on whether trade penalties could raise prices Trump threatened broad trade penalties, but said he didn't believe economists' predictions that added costs on those imported goods for American companies would lead to higher domestic prices for consumers. He stopped short of a pledge that U.S. an households won't be paying more as they shop. "I can't guarantee anything. I can't guarantee tomorrow," Trump said, seeming to open the door to accepting the reality of how import levies typically work as goods reach the retail market. That's a different approach from Trump's typical speeches throughout the 2024 campaign, when he framed his election as a sure way to curb inflation. In the interview, Trump defended tariffs generally, saying that tariffs are "going to make us rich." He has pledged that, on his first day in office in January, he would impose 25% tariffs on all goods imported from Mexico and Canada unless those countries satisfactorily stop illegal immigration and the flow of illegal drugs such as fentanyl into the United States. He also has threatened tariffs on China to help force that country to crack down on fentanyl production. "All I want to do is I want to have a level, fast, but fair playing field," Trump said. Trump suggests retribution for his opponents while claiming no interest in vengeance He offered conflicting statements on how he would approach the justice system after winning election despite being convicted of 34 felonies in a New York state court and being indicted in other cases for his handling of national security secrets and efforts to overturn his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden. "Honestly, they should go to jail," Trump said of members of Congress who investigated the Capitol riot by his supporters who wanted him to remain in power. The president-elect underscored his contention that he can use the justice system against others, including special prosecutor Jack Smith, who led the case on Trump's role in the siege on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump confirmed his plan to pardon supporters who were convicted for their roles in the riot, saying he would take that action on his first day in office. As for the idea of revenge driving potential prosecutions, Trump said: "I have the absolute right. I'm the chief law enforcement officer, you do know that. I'm the president. But I'm not interested in that." At the same time, Trump singled out lawmakers on a special House committee who investigated the insurrection, citing Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and former Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo. "Cheney was behind it ... so was Bennie Thompson and everybody on that committee," Trump said. Asked specifically whether he would direct his administration to pursue cases, he said, "No," and suggested he did not expect the FBI to quickly undertake investigations into his political enemies. At another point, Trump said he would leave the matter up to Pam Bondi, his pick as attorney general. "I want her to do what she wants to do," he said. Such threats, regardless of Trump's inconsistencies, have been taken seriously enough by many top Democrats that Biden is considering issuing blanket, preemptive pardons to protect key members of his outgoing administration. Trump did seemingly back off his campaign rhetoric calling for Biden to be investigated, saying, "I'm not looking to go back into the past." Swift action on immigration is coming Trump repeatedly mentioned his promises to seal the U.S.-Mexico border and deport millions of people who are in the U.S. illegally through a mass deportation program. "I think you have to do it," he said. He suggested he would try to use executive action to end "birthright" citizenship under which people born in the U.S. are considered citizens — though such protections are spelled out in the Constitution. Asked specifically about the future for people who were brought into the country illegally as children and were shielded from deportation in recent years, Trump said, "I want to work something out," indicating he might seek a solution with Congress. But Trump also said he does not "want to be breaking up families" of mixed legal status, "so the only way you don't break up the family is you keep them together and you have to send them all back." Trump commits to NATO, with conditions, and waffles on Putin and Ukraine Long a critic of NATO members for not spending more on their own defense, Trump said he "absolutely" would remain in the alliance "if they pay their bills." Pressed on whether he would withdraw if he were dissatisfied with allies' commitments, Trump said he wants the U.S. treated "fairly" on trade and defense. He waffled on a NATO priority of containing Russia and President Vladimir Putin. Trump suggested Ukraine should prepare for less U.S. aid in its defense against Putin's invasion. "Possibly. Yeah, probably. Sure," Trump said of reducing Ukraine assistance from Washington. Separately, Trump called for an immediate cease-fire. Asked about Putin, Trump said initially that he has not talked to the Russian leader since Election Day last month, but then hedged. "I haven't spoken to him recently," Trump said when pressed, adding that he did not want to "impede the negotiation." Trump says Powell is safe at the Fed, but not Wray at the FBI The president-elect said he has no intention, at least for now, of asking Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to step down before Powell's term ends in 2028. Trump said during the campaign that presidents should have more say in Fed policy, including interest rates. Trump did not offer any job assurances for FBI Director Christopher Wray, whose term is to end in 2027. Asked about Wray, Trump said: "Well, I mean, it would sort of seem pretty obvious" that if the Senate confirms Kash Patel as Trump's pick for FBI chief, then "he's going to be taking somebody's place, right? Somebody is the man that you're talking about." Trump is absolute about Social Security, not so much on abortion and health insurance Trump promised that the government efficiency effort led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will not threaten Social Security. "We're not touching Social Security, other than we make it more efficient," he said. He added that "we're not raising ages or any of that stuff." He was not so specific about abortion or his long-promised overhaul of the Affordable Care Act. On abortion, Trump continued his inconsistencies and said he would "probably" not move to restrict access to the abortion pills that now account for a majority of pregnancy terminations, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which supports abortion rights. But pressed on whether he would commit to that position, Trump replied, "Well, I commit. I mean, are — things do — things change. I think they change." Reprising a line from his Sept. 10 debate against Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump again said he had "concepts" of a plan to substitute for the 2010 Affordable Care Act, which he called "lousy health care." He added a promise that any Trump version would maintain insurance protections for Americans with preexisting health conditions. He did not explain how such a design would be different from the status quo or how he could deliver on his desire for "better health care for less money."