A Somali woman announced her candidacy for mayor of St. Louis Park, a city in the U.S. state of Minnesota. If elected, she would become the first Muslim and Somali mayor in the state. Mohamud Mascadde has this story from Minneapolis, narrated by Salem Solomon.
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More than 1 million people have been dropped from Medicaid in the past couple months as some states moved swiftly to halt health care coverage following the end of the coronavirus pandemic.

Most got dropped for not filling out paperwork.

Though the eligibility review is required by the federal government, President Joe Biden’s administration isn’t pleased at how efficiently some states are accomplishing the task.

“Pushing through things and rushing it will lead to eligible people — kids and families — losing coverage for some period of time,” Daniel Tsai, a top federal Medicaid official recently told reporters.

Already, about 1.5 million people have been removed from Medicaid in more than two dozen states that started the process in April or May, according to publicly available reports and data obtained by The Associated Press.

Florida has dropped several hundred thousand people, by far the most among states.

The drop rate also has been particularly high in other states. For people whose cases were decided in May, around half or more got dropped in Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah and West Virginia.

By its own count, Arkansas has dropped more than 140,000 people from Medicaid.

The eligibility redeterminations have created headaches for Jennifer Mojica, 28, who was told in April that she no longer qualified for Medicaid because Arkansas had incorrectly determined her income was above the limit.

She got that resolved, but was then told her 5-year-old son was being dropped from Medicaid because she had requested his cancellation — something that never happened, she said. Her son’s coverage has been restored, but now Mojica says she’s been told her husband no longer qualifies. The uncertainty has been frustrating, she said.

“It was like fixing one thing and then another problem came up, and they fixed it and then something else came up,” Mojica said.

‘Swiftly disenroll’

Arkansas officials said they have tried to renew coverage automatically for as many people as possible and placed a special emphasis on reaching families with children.

But a 2021 state law requires the post-pandemic eligibility redeterminations to be completed in six months, and the state will continue “to swiftly disenroll individuals who are no longer eligible,” the Department of Human Services said in statement.

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has dismissed criticism of the state’s process.

“Those who do not qualify for Medicaid are taking resources from those who need them,” Sanders said on Twitter last month. “But the pandemic is over — and we are leading the way back to normalcy.”

More than 93 million people nationwide were enrolled in Medicaid as of the most recent available data in February — up nearly one-third from the pre-pandemic total in January 2020. The rolls swelled because federal law prohibited states from removing people from Medicaid during the health emergency in exchange for providing states with increased funding.

Now that eligibility reviews have resumed, states have begun plowing through a backlog of cases to determine whether people’s income or life circumstances have changed.

States have a year to complete the process. But tracking down responses from everyone has proved difficult because some people have moved, changed contact information, or disregarded mailings about the renewal process.

Outreach via text, email, phone

Before dropping people from Medicaid, the Florida Department of Children and Families said it makes between five and 13 contact attempts, including texts, emails and phone calls. Yet the department said 152,600 people have been non-responsive.

Their coverage could be restored retroactively if people submit information showing their eligibility up to 90 days after their deadline.

Unlike some states, Idaho continued to evaluate people’s Medicaid eligibility during the pandemic even though it didn’t remove anyone. When the enrollment freeze ended in April, Idaho started processing those cases — dropping nearly 67,000 of the 92,000 people whose cases have been decided so far.

Advocates fear that many households losing coverage may include children who are actually still eligible, because Medicaid covers children at higher income levels than their parents or guardians. A report last year by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services forecast that children would be disproportionately impacted, with more than half of those disenrolled still actually eligible.

That’s difficult to confirm, however, because the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services doesn’t require states to report a demographic breakdown of those dropped. In fact, CMS has yet to release any state-by-state data. The AP obtained data directly from states and from other groups that have been collecting it.

Some states haven’t been able to complete all the eligibility determinations that are due each month. Pennsylvania reported more than 100,000 incomplete cases in both April and May. Tens of thousands of cases also remained incomplete in April or May in Arizona, Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, New Mexico and Ohio.

“If states are already behind in processing renewals, that’s going to snowball over time,” said Tricia Brooks, a research professor at the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families. “Once they get piles of stuff that haven’t been processed, I don’t see how they catch up easily.”
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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met Monday with China’s top diplomat Wang Yi on the second and final day of a visit to Beijing aimed at stabilizing relations between the two powers.

Blinken and Wang shook hands at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse before going into a meeting room for the talks along with delegations from both sides.

Sunday, Blinken and Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang held “candid” and “direct” talks in Beijing, the State Department said.

During the seven-and-a-half hour meeting, Qin accepted an invitation to come to the United States. Agreement was also reached on more flights between the two countries.

In addition, both sides will continue to work on several issues “at a working level,” said a senior State Department official.

After Blinken’s in-person meetings with Qin, they had a working dinner later Sunday at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse.

“The Secretary made clear that the United States will always stand up for the interests and values of the American people and work with its allies and partners to advance our vision for a world that is free, open, and upholds the international rules-based order,” said State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller in a statement.

He added the top U.S.-China diplomats also discussed how to facilitate people-to-people exchanges.

Blinken is the first secretary of state to visit Beijing since 2018. His two-day trip was rescheduled from February after a Chinese surveillance balloon flew through U.S. airspace.

“Hope this meeting can help steer China-U.S. relations back to what the two presidents (U.S. President Joe Biden and China’s Xi Jinping) agreed upon in Bali,” said Chinese Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs Hua Chunying in a Tweet. During that meeting the two leaders agreed to maintain open lines of communication.

“I think I can say with great confidence there is a recognition on both sides that we do need to have senior-level channels of communication, that we are at an important point in the relationship where I think reducing the risk of miscalculation” is important, a senior State Department official told reporters.

Topics high on the agenda during Blinken’s meetings in Beijing include regional security, counternarcotics, climate change, global macroeconomic stability, Americans wrongfully detained in China, as well as exchanges between American and Chinese people, according to senior U.S. officials.

Americans wrongfully detained in China

Children of Americans who the U.S. considers wrongfully detained by Chinese authorities asked Blinken to raise their fathers’ cases with his Chinese counterparts.

“Behind every hostage is a family suffering every day,” said “Bring Our Families Home Campaign” in a tweet Sunday.

“This Sunday will be the 7th time I’ve missed Father’s Day with my dad,” said Harrison Li. “Releasing my dad is one of the easiest things that the Chinese government can do to show they are serious about normalizing relations.”

Harrison Li’s dad, Kai Li, is an American citizen detained in China since September 2016. He was later sentenced to 10 years in prison for espionage, a charge that his family rejects.

Alice Lin is the daughter of American pastor David Lin, who was detained under unclear circumstances in 2006 and later sentenced to life in prison on charges of contract fraud. Lin’s family staunchly maintains his innocence. Lin’s sentence was later reduced, and he is expected to be released in 2029.

“Secretary Blinken, we miss my dad. Please do everything possible to bring him home,” Lin told VOA.

Taiwan

Washington has said China’s military escalation in the Taiwan Strait was “a global concern.”

A senior State Department official told VOA it is an “abiding interest” of the U.S. to maintain peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait. China is seen as ramping up economic coercion targeting Taiwan ahead of its presidential election.

In May, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told senators that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan could halt the world’s largest advanced semiconductor production, wiping out up to $1 trillion per year.

“I will say this number is way too small” because it only costs about 6% of China’s gross domestic product, said Chen-Yu Li who is the chief economist of Taishin Financial Holdings in Taiwan.

Li said a military conflict in the Taiwan Strait will affect other Asian economies such as Japan and South Korea, whose GDP totals at least $5 trillion. He also cited the market value of tech giants such as Apple, Nvidia, AMD which Li estimates is at least $3 trillion.

“If Taiwan is under attack, the stock market in the U.S. may vanish $3 trillion,” Li said during a May 12 event hosted by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“If I am Xi Jinping, I’ll be very happy to attack Taiwan. It’s just 6%.”

NGOs push for human rights

In a signed letter to Blinken, 42 nongovernmental organizations urged the top U.S. diplomat to hold the Chinese government accountable for its human rights abuses, citing repression against ordinary people who participated in peaceful protests.

“Hong Kong police detained over 20 people for commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre after banning the annual Victoria Park candlelight vigil,” said the letter.
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California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration has proposed an end to public disclosure of investigations of abusive and corrupt police officers, handing the responsibility instead to local agencies to help cover an estimated $31.5 billion budget deficit.  

The proposal, part of the governor’s budget package that he is still negotiating with the Legislature, has prompted strong criticism from a coalition of criminal justice and press freedom groups, which spent years pushing for the disclosure rules that were part of a landmark law Newsom signed in 2021.  

The law allows the state Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training to investigate and decertify police officers for misconduct, such as use of excessive force, sexual assault and dishonesty. It requires the commission to make public the records of decertification cases.

The Newsom administration now wants to get rid of that transparency element. The commission says the public could still get the records from police departments. But advocates say local police departments often resist releasing that information.

Several states with a police decertification process, including Republican-led ones such as Tennessee and Georgia, require state agencies to divulge records of police misconduct.

In Tennessee, records made available through the requirement provided a slew of new details on police officers’ actions when they brutally beat Tyre Nichols, a Black man, during a traffic stop earlier this year. Those details, released by the state police certification commission, were not previously made public by the local police department.

“It’s a slap in the face to the family members who have had their loved ones stolen from them that … a key provision of the decertification process is not being honored,” J Vasquez, of social justice group Communities United For Restorative Justice, said at a news conference last week.

Removing the transparency element from the 2021 law would continue eroding public trust, Antioch Mayor Pro Tem Tamisha Torres-Walker said. The city, 45 miles (72 kilometers) east of San Francisco, was shaken after a federal investigation found more than half of the officers in the Antioch police force were in a group text where some officers freely used racial slurs and bragged about fabricating evidence and beating suspects.

“To say, ‘go to the very people who commit the crimes against your community and ask them to reveal themselves to you so that you can hold them accountable,’ I don’t think that’s a fair process,” Torres-Walker said.

The coalition of more than 20 groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, also accused the Democratic governor of abusing the budget process to push through his proposal introduced in April.

Carmen-Nicole Cox, director of government affairs for ACLU California Action, said Newsom’s proposal should have gone through the traditional legislative process, instead of being put into the budget.

Democratic Sen. Steven Bradford, who authored the 2021 landmark bill, declined to comment on the proposed change.

The governor’s office referred questions to the commission, whose spokesperson said the proposed change is a cost-saving measure that would still allow the public to access information on decertification cases from local police departments. California is facing a nearly $32 billion budget deficit this year after enjoying several years of record-breaking surpluses and the proposal is one of many of Newsom’s cost-cutting measures.

Neither the governor’s office nor the commission shared how much money the state could save under the proposal.

According to a May budget request, the commission estimated it will handle up to 3,500 decertification cases each year. That’s about 4% of all officers in California. The commission, which has suspended or decertified 44 police officers so far this year, requested an additional $6 million to handle the large number of complaints.

“Because of the substantial fiscal implications, as well as the need to urgently implement these cost-saving measures into law, the budget process is the most appropriate avenue for this,” commission spokesperson Meagan Poulos said in a statement.

For decades, police officers in California have enjoyed layers of legal protections helping shield most of law enforcement misconduct records from public scrutiny, First Amendment Coalition Legal Director David Loy said.

In 2018, things began to shift after the Legislature passed a bill requiring the disclosure of records pertaining to police misconduct including use of excessive force, sexual assault and dishonesty. That law was expanded in 2021 to include the release of investigations into police racist or biased behavior, unlawful searches or arrests and use of unreasonable force.

The 2021 decertification law was hailed as another mechanism to hold law enforcement accountable.

“California has always been a black hole for police transparency,” said Loy, whose group is part of the coalition opposing the change. “The last thing California should be doing is taking any step backward on police transparency.”

The state Legislature passed its own version of the state budget Thursday to meet its deadline without including Newsom’s proposed change to the decertification process. Legislative leaders and the governor’s office will continue negotiations to finalize the budget by the end of the month.
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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken began two days of talks in Beijing on Sunday, the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit China since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021.

Blinken’s visit, postponed after a suspected Chinese spy balloon flew over U.S. airspace in February, was aimed at stabilizing tense relations between the two world’s two biggest economies, but hopes for a breakthrough were low.

Below is a list of some other high-level U.S.-China exchanges during Biden’s term.

Biden-Xi phone call – February 10, 2021

Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping held their first phone call as leaders, appearing at odds on issues ranging from trade to human rights, even as Xi warned that confrontation would be a “disaster” for both nations.  

First high-level meeting – March 18, 2021

 

The first bilateral face-to-face meeting at a high level under Biden’s administration was in Anchorage, Alaska. It got off to a fiery start, with each side rebuking the other’s policies in a rare public display that underscored the tensions.

The talks were led on the U.S. side by Blinken and White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan and on the Chinese side by senior diplomats Yang Jiechi and Wang Yi.

First trade talks – May 26, 2021

U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and China’s then Vice Premier Liu He held talks virtually, the first such high level trade talks between the world’s two biggest economies since Biden took office.  

Senior US diplomat visits China – July 26, 2021

 

Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman held talks with State Councilor Wang Yi, in Tianjin, China. She was the top Biden official to visit China until Blinken nearly two years later.  

Biden-Xi hold meeting – November 15, 2021

 

Biden and Xi spoke via video link for the first time in talks lasting more than three hours, which covered a wide range of topics including Taiwan, North Korea and trade.  

Sullivan-Yang talks in Rome – March 14, 2022

 

Weeks after China’s close ally Russia invaded Ukraine, Sullivan held a seven-hour meeting with Yang to warn Beijing not to aid Moscow’s war effort.  

Defense chiefs hold first talks – April 20, 2022

 

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin held a call with China’s then-defense minister Wei Fenghe, the first talks between the two since Biden took office.  

Blinken-Wang talks in New York – September 23, 2022

Taiwan was the focus of 90-minute, “direct and honest” talks between Blinken and Wang on the margins of the U.N. General Assembly in New York, a U.S official told reporters.

The talks came just over a month after U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan, the democratic island China claims as its own, triggering a furious reaction from Beijing.

Biden, Xi meet in Bali – November 14, 2022

Biden and Xi held their long-awaited first face-to-face leadership talks on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia. During the three-and-a-half hours of talks the pair covered topics including Taiwan and nuclear-armed North Korea.

VP Harris greets Xi in Bangkok – November 19, 2022

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris met briefly with Xi on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Thailand. 

Blinken, Wang hold tense Munich talks – February 19, 2023

The top diplomats of the two superpowers, Blinken and Wang, met at an undisclosed location on the sidelines of a global security conference in Munich, amid the dispute over the U.S. downing of the suspected Chinese spy balloon.

US, China commerce chiefs trade barbs in Washington – May 25, 2023

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao exchanged barbs on trade, investment and export policies in face-to-face talks in Washington, D.C., described by Raimondo’s office as “candid and substantive.”

US, China defense chiefs shake hands at Shangri-la Dialogue – June 2, 2023

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin shook hands with China’s Minister of National Defense Li Shangfu on the sidelines of a security summit in Singapore but the two did not have a “substantive exchange,” according to the Pentagon. The handshake came after China rejected a proposal from the U.S. for Austin and Li to hold formal talks at the Shangri-La Dialogue.
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At least 20 people were shot, one fatally, early Sunday during a gathering in a parking lot in suburban Chicago, authorities said.

TV news video showed the strip mall lot filled with debris and police tape in Willowbrook, about 32 kilometers southwest of Chicago.

“There were at least 20 individuals shot. One victim is deceased,” said Eric Swanson, deputy chief at the DuPage County sheriff’s office. “The motive behind this incident is unclear. … We transported numerous victims from the scene. Others just walked into area hospitals.”

The conditions of the wounded were not immediately available, Swanson told reporters.

“It was supposed to be like a Juneteenth celebration. We just started hearing shooting, so we dropped down until they stopped,” witness Markeshia Avery told WLS-TV.

Another witness, Craig Lotcie, said: “Everybody ran, and it was chaos.”
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