The Latest: US strikes 2 more alleged drug-carrying boats, this time in the Pacific Ocean

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The U.S. military on Wednesday launched its ninth strike against an alleged drug-carrying vessel, killing three people in the eastern Pacific Ocean, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, expanding the Trump administration’s campaign against drug trafficking in South America.

It followed another strike Tuesday night, also in the eastern Pacific, that killed two people, Hegseth posted on social media hours earlier. The attacks were departures from the seven previous U.S. strikes that had targeted vessels in the Caribbean Sea. They bring the death toll to at least 37 from attacks that began last month.

The strikes represent an expansion of the military’s targeting area as well as a shift to the waters off South America, where much of the cocaine from the world’s largest producers is smuggled. Hegseth’s social media posts also drew a direct comparison between the war on terrorism that the U.S. declared after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the Trump administration’s crackdown.

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White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Thursday that the Biden administration prosecuted Zhao out of a “desire to punish the cryptocurrency industry.”

She said there were “no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims,” though Zhao had pleaded guilty in November 2023 to one count of failing to maintain an anti-money-laundering program.

“I failed here,” Zhao told the court last year. “I deeply regret my failure, and I am sorry.”

Zhao created the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange and served prison time after failing to stop criminals from using the platform to move money connected to child sex abuse, drug trafficking and terrorism.

Zhao had asked President Trump for a pardon previously.

He has deep ties to World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture the Republican president and his sons Eric and Donald Jr. launched in September.

Trump’s most recent financial disclosure report reveals he made more than $57 million last year from World Liberty Financial, which has launched USD1, a stablecoin pegged at a 1-to-1 ratio to the U.S. dollar.

World Liberty Financial also recently announced that an investment fund in the United Arab Emirates would be using $2 billion worth of USD1 to purchase a stake in Binance. Zhao also has publicly said he’d asked Trump for a pardon that could nullify his conviction.

▶ Read more about Trump’s pardon of Changpeng Zhao

President Trump is suggesting he could call on Israel to release imprisoned Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti, the most popular and potentially unifying Palestinian leader, as the United States aims to fill a leadership vacuum in postwar Gaza.

Trump, in an interview published Thursday, said he’s discussed the potential for Barghouti’s release with White House aides.

“I was literally being confronted with that question about 15 minutes before you called,” Trump told Time magazine when asked about Barghouti. “So I’ll be making a decision.”

The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment about Trump’s deliberations on the matter. But the president’s acknowledgment of the internal discussions underscores the difficult task of finding credible political figures to oversee governance in Gaza as the U.S. and Israel say they’re committed to preventing Hamas from continuing to rule the territory.

▶ Read more about Trump and Gaza

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says his message to air traffic controllers during the government shutdown is “come to work, even if you do not get a paycheck.”

His comments came as House Republicans held a news conference marking the 23rd day of the shutdown by focusing on its impact at the nation’s airports.

Duffy says safety is paramount so if there isn’t an adequate staffing level of air traffic controllers, there will be canceled flights.

“I cannot guarantee you your flight is going to be on time. I cannot guarantee your flight is not going to be canceled,” Duffy said.

He notes that air traffic controllers will miss their first full paycheck Tuesday and that some are having to make choices to pay the mortgage and other bills, at times by taking a second job.

“I don’t want my air traffic controllers to take a second job. I want them to do one job,” he said.

Democratic Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker on Thursday announced the creation of an Illinois accountability commission that would create a public record of what he called President Trump’s “military-style assault on Chicago and our suburbs.”

The commission’s members would also record the effect of the federal immigration crackdown on families and recommend actions to “prevent further harm and pursue justice,” he said.

“We hope to reveal to the public in Chicago, the state of Illinois, to people around the world the facts that are going on here,” Pritzker said Thursday. “We hope to create a detailed record of the truth.”

Wellness influencer and health entrepreneur Dr. Casey Means will appear virtually before the Senate health committee for her confirmation hearing next Thursday, the committee has announced.

The surgeon general pick and her brother, former lobbyist Calley Means, served as key advisers to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s longshot 2024 presidential bid and helped broker his endorsement of Trump last summer. Calley Means is now a White House adviser.

Means, 38, has no government experience and dropped out of her surgical residency program, saying she became disillusioned with traditional medicine. She founded a health tech company, Levels, that helps users track blood sugar and other metrics.

Stocks are drifting on Wall Street and oil prices are jumping after President Donald Trump announced “massive” new sanctions on Russia’s crude industry.

The S&P 500 rose 0.1% in the early going Thursday. It’s just a bit below the all-time high it set earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed, and the Nasdaq composite was also flat.

Tesla fell after reporting a weaker profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected, even though its revenue rose more than forecast.

The price of oil jumped 5.6% after Trump announced sanctions against Russian oil giants Rosneft and Lukoil.

▶ Read more about the financial markets

The government shutdown has reopened debate on what has been a central issue for both major political parties in the last 15 years: the future of health coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

Tax credits for people who get health insurance through the marketplaces created by the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, expire at the end of the year.

Democrats say they won’t vote to reopen the government until Republicans negotiate an extension of the expanded subsidies. Republicans say they won’t negotiate until Democrats vote to reopen the government. Lawmakers in both parties have been working on potential solutions behind the scenes, hoping leaders will eventually start to talk, but it’s unclear if the two sides could find compromise.

▶ Read more about the government shutdown and health care

The European Union has agreed on a new raft of sanctions against Russia targeting its shadow fleet of oil tankers and banning its imports of liquefied natural gas, the Danish EU presidency announced Thursday.

“Today is a good day for Europe and Ukraine,” Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said in a statement, as EU leaders were gathering for a summit in Brussels.

He said the new sanctions “will introduce new and comprehensive measures on oil and gas, the shadow fleet and Russia’s financial sector.” A new system for limiting the movement of Russian diplomats within the 27-nation EU will also be introduced.

The move comes a day after U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration announced new sanctions against Russia’s oil industry that are aimed at moving Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table and ending Moscow’s war on Ukraine.

▶ Read more about the European Union summit

China’s Commerce Ministry announced Thursday that Vice Premier He Lifeng would lead a delegation to Malaysia from Friday to Monday to hold trade talks with the United States.

The talks are expected to lay the groundwork for a meeting next week between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in South Korea.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said that delegations led by him and the Chinese vice premier would meet in Malaysia, probably on Saturday.

“We could start reconstruction of the areas that are free of Hamas very quickly. We think that we could potentially get hundreds of thousands of Gazans living in that area very quickly,” Vance said before winding down his visit to Israel on Thursday. “But again, this is all still pretty early. But that’s the basic idea.”

Vance added that it will take to two to three years to rebuild the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah.

Rafah’s population surged early in the war as many Palestinians were displaced by Israeli operations elsewhere in the territory. By this past spring, Rafah was also largely decimated by the fighting.

The vice president made clear he wasn’t happy with comments from Psaki, who on a podcast earlier this week jokingly suggested Usha Vance was being held captive and that she stood ready to save her.

“I think it’s disgraceful,” Vice President JD Vance told reporters before departing Israel on Thursday. “But of course, the second lady can speak for herself, and I’m very lucky to have a wonderful wife. And I know at least I hope, that my wife feels the same about me.”

Psaki, who served as White House press secretary early in Democrat Joe Biden’s administration, speaking on the “I Had It” podcast also referred to Vance as “the little Manchurian candidate,” who “wants to be president more than anything else.”

“I always wonder what’s going on in the mind of his wife. Like, are you OK? Please blink four times. We’ll come over here. We’ll save you,” Psaki said.

Vice President JD Vance criticized Israel’s parliament vote on West Bank annexation, saying the move was an “insult.”

Speaking on the tarmac of Tel Aviv’s international airport before departing at the end of his visit to Israel this week, Vance said that if the vote was a “political stunt, then it is a very stupid political stunt.”

“I personally take some insult to it,” Vance said about the Knesset vote. “The policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel.”

The Israeli parliament on Wednesday took the symbolic step of giving preliminary approval to a bill that would give Israel authority to annex the occupied West Bank — a move the U.S. opposes.