Hunt for Tube hero who gave blind man his shoes after he lost one through the gap The hunt is on find an ‘absolute hero’

Get you up to speed: House passes bill to limit stock purchases by members of Congress

The House passed the “Stop Insider Trading Act” with a 232 to 198 vote, which aims to limit stock trading by congressional members and their families. The bill included a controversial voter ID provision that drew criticism from Democrats.

The Stop Insider Trading Act, which aims to prohibit stock trading by members of Congress and their immediate families, requires lawmakers to disclose intended sales at least seven days in advance. While there have been multiple proposals for stricter trading bans, the Restore Trust in Government Act is still lacking the necessary support to advance in the House.

The House passed the “Stop Insider Trading Act” with a 232 to 198 vote, though some Democrats expressed concern that it does not go far enough to address stock trading by lawmakers. Following the vote, GOP Rep. Chip Roy called for a standalone vote on the stock trading bill, stressing the importance of transparency in the ongoing discussions around congressional financial practices.

What remains unclear — It is uncertain whether the House will hold a straight up-or-down vote on the stock trading bill without the voter ID provision despite calls for such a vote.

House passes bill to restrict stock trading by members of Congress

Washington — The House on Wednesday passed a bill placing some limits on congressional stock trading, but the lack of tougher restrictions and the inclusion of a voter ID provision complicated its support among Democrats. 

Lawmakers approved the bill in a 232 to 198 vote, with 13 Democrats voting with all Republicans in favor. 

The Stop Insider Trading Act, introduced by Rep. Bryan Steil of Wisconsin in January, would prohibit members of Congress, their spouses and dependent children from purchasing publicly traded stocks. It would also require lawmakers to publicly disclose each intended sale of stocks at least seven days in advance to the House clerk or Senate secretary. The penalty for a violation is $2,000 or 10% of the transaction’s value, whichever is greater, as well as the forfeiture of any realized gains from the sale. 

The measure “ensures that lawmakers cannot use their position to profit off insider information they may garner while serving in Congress,” Steil said Monday. 

Republicans combined the stock trading bill with an unrelated provision that requires voters to show photo identification when voting in federal elections, as President Trump pushes for strict new voter-eligibility rules. 

Democrats panned the bill as not going far enough, pushing for an outright ban on members of Congress from owning stocks and for those limits to also extend to the president and administration officials. 

“This bill would, in fact, allow members of Congress to continue to own and trade individual stocks. The bill would let members of Congress keep every single share of stock they currently own. The bill would allow members to liquidate their holdings at any time, profiting off years of ballooning investment portfolios. There is no divestiture required under this bill, and crucially, the bill does nothing to rein in the unprecedented, absurd, and deeply offensive corruption currently taking place in the White House,” Rep. Joe Morelle of New York said Monday. 

Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington called the measure “a fake stock trading ban.” 

There have been various efforts in Congress to pass a congressional stock trading ban, with proponents saying current law does little to discourage public officials from using their positions for personal gain. Under a 13-year-old law known as the STOCK Act, members of Congress, executive branch officials and other federal employees are prohibited from using nonpublic information for their financial benefit. The law also requires officials to disclose stock trades exceeding $1,000 within 45 days. But no member of Congress has ever been prosecuted under the current law, despite violations. 

Late last year, Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida followed through on a monthslong threat to try to force a vote on the bipartisan Restore Trust in Congress Act, which would prohibit members of Congress, their spouses and dependent children from owning or trading individual stocks. But her discharge petition to circumvent GOP leaders and bring the bill to the House floor is still far short of the 218 signatures needed to move forward. 

A discharge petition led by Morelle on a Democratic measure of a similar name, the Restore Trust in Government Act, is much closer to the threshold, but still dozens of names short. The measure would ban members of Congress, the president, vice president and their families from owning or trading individual stocks. 

After Luna filed her discharge petition, House Speaker Mike Johnson said he was working with Steil, the chairman of the House Administration Committee, to find other paths to address the issue. Steil’s bill was born of that effort. 

Last year, a bill spearheaded by GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri to ban lawmakers, the president, vice president and their families from owning stocks advanced out of committee, but has since sat idle in the upper chamber. 

GOP Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, the lead sponsor of the Restore Trust in Congress Act, called for Steil’s stock trading bill to get a vote without the voter ID provision in recognition of the bipartisan negotiations that led to Wednesday’s vote. 

“I think we should be having a straight up-or-down vote on the stock trading bill,” Roy said during floor debate Wednesday. “I think my friends that worked in good faith to do that deserve that on both sides of the aisle.” 

“I’m not done this year demanding that we have a straight up-or-down vote on stock trading,” he added. 

‘Cheer up, you caught the bad guy,’ says killer Virginia McCullough as she is arrested for murdering her parents

A woman who murdered her parents “in cold blood” before hiding them in makeshift tombs for four years told officers to “cheer up, you caught the bad guy” as she was arrested in her home.

Virginia McCullough, 36, poisoned her father John McCullough, 70, with prescription medication and fatally stabbed her mother Lois McCullough, 71, shortly afterwards in 2019.

She ran up large debts on credit cards in her parents’ names and after their deaths, she continued to spend their pensions until she was finally caught in 2023.

In body-worn video footage released by police, a handcuffed – and eerily calm – McCullough told officers: “I did know that this would kind of come eventually.

“It’s proper that I serve my punishment.”

She said she had slipped something into her father’s drink then put his body under a bed on the ground floor, and put her mother’s body in an upstairs wardrobe.

McCullough, having been arrested on suspicion of double murder, told an officer: “Cheer up, at least you’ve caught the bad guy.”

She added: “I know I don’t seem 100% evil.”

At the police station, she told officers where a kitchen knife was, which she described as a “murder weapon”, and a hammer which she said “will still have blood on it”.

McCullough, of Pump Hill, Chelmsford, Essex, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday with a minimum term of 36 years at Chelmsford Crown Court, after she admitted to their murders between 17 and 20 June 2019 at an earlier hearing at the same court.

Chelmsford Crown Court heard how she hid their bodies in makeshift tombs at the family home in Great Baddow in Essex, then told persistent lies to cover her tracks.

The court heard she cancelled family arrangements and frequently told doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday or away on lengthy trips.

But concerns over Mr and Mrs McCullough’s welfare were raised in September 2023 by a GP at their registered practice, and Essex County Council’s safeguarding team referred these to police.

The GP had not seen the couple for some time and said Mr McCullough had failed to collect medication and attend scheduled appointments. It was found McCullough had frequently cancelled appointments, using a range of excuses to explain her father’s absence.

Police said a missing persons investigation was initially launched and McCullough lied to officers, claiming her parents were travelling and would be returning in October.

It became a murder investigation, and when officers forced entry to the house in Pump Hill on September 15 2023, McCullough confessed that her parents’ bodies were in the house and that she had killed them.

Nicola Rice, a specialist prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “McCullough callously and viciously killed both of her parents before concealing their bodies in makeshift tombs within their home address.

“She spent the next four years manipulating and lying to family members, medical staff, financial institutions, and the police, spending her parents’ money and accruing large debts in their name.”

She added: “This was a truly disturbing case, which has left behind it a trail of devastation, and I can only hope that the sentence passed today will help those who loved and cared for Lois and John begin to heal.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/virginia-mccullough-arrest-video-murder-parents-chelmsford-b2627978.html

Sarah Wilkinson
Sarah Wilkinson@swilkinsonbc
To downplay the genocide, the israelis claim there’s only 20,000 people left in north Gaza, says @MahaGaza : the real number exceeds 400,000
Carol Voderman
Carol Voderman@carolvorders
Man of the right wing Nigel Farage taking more second jobs and freebie helicopter rides Gosh he’ll soon be a true blue Tory at this rate Or far far worse
Zarah Sultana
Zarah Sultana@ZarahSultana
The cost-of-living crisis is far from over, yet the government’s 50% increase to the bus fare cap is a political choice, adding hundreds to annual costs. To address hardship & the climate crisis, the government must keep the £2 cap & make public transport accessible for all.

Defense alliance NATO chief Mark Rutte has met US President-elect Donald Trump to discuss global security issues, according to a NATO spokesperson.

The meeting took place in Palm Beach, Florida.

During his first term as US president, 2017-2020, Trump pushed for European NATO countries to spend more on defense and described the alliance’s cost-sharing as unfair to the US.

Rutte took over as NATO chief from Norwegian Jens Stoltenberg in November.

Before taking office in January, Trump has nominated Pete Hegseth for the post of defense secretary, which has raised eyebrows among many allies.

Hegseth, 44, has served as an infantry captain in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has no senior military or government officer experience.

Multiple missiles were fired in an airstrike towards a densely populated part of Lebanon’s capital early on Saturday.

The huge airstrike targeted Beirut’s Basta neighbourhood, and no prior warnings were given by the Israeli military. The largely residential area was struck last month.

At least one violent explosion was heard across the city, Reuters witnesses said, and plumes of smoke could be seen. Scenes of massive destruction at the site were shared online, including a massive crater in the ground.

“Beirut, the capital, woke up to a horrific massacre, as the Israeli enemy’s air force completely destroyed an eight-story residential building with five missiles on Al-Mamoun Street in Basta,” the state-run National News Agency reported.

The health ministry put the initial death toll at four, with 23 wounded. The number is expected to climb in the coming hours as search and rescue efforts continue.

It came after a long day of Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, which have been non-stop since last week.

The cross-border fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group escalated into a full-blown war in mid-September.

Israel has bombed southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs and the eastern Beqaa region, and has sent ground troops across the border. Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets deeper into Israel.

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