Month: February 2023

US Navy crews have recovered a portion of the apparatus of the Chinese spy balloon from the ocean floor of the waters off South Carolina on Monday.  A senior defense official described the apparatus as “significant” in size and said that Navy crews “got the electronics they were looking for.”

The U.S. military shot down the surveillance balloon on Feb. 4, after it was spotted flying across the country for several days. The recovery effort comes as similar events occurred in Michigan, Alaska and Canada, where other unidentified objects were shot down over the weekend. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Monday: “They do not present a military threat to anyone on the ground  They do however present a risk to civil aviation and potentially an intelligence collection threat. And we’ll get to the bottom of it.” Austin said that recovery efforts in Alaska are more challenging since the debris landed on sea ice, after the object shot down over Alaska broke apart in midair and did not float to the ground.  Austin added that U.S. officials are also supporting Canadian recovery efforts in the Yukon Territory where another object crashed landed.

The object shot down over Lake Huron, Michigan, was down at around 20,000 feet, a senior defense official said. The objects shot down over Michigan and Canada are different from the Chinese spy balloon. however, senior U.S. official said that “we cannot rule out that these are weather balloons.” 

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Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley announced her presidential bid on Tuesday, a day ahead of her formal campaign kick-off in Charleston.

The 51-year-old Haley shared a video on Twitter titled “Strong & Proud,” featuring photos of her family and the caption: ‘Get excited! Time for a new generation. Let’s do this! ’   Haley says in the video announcement: “I was the proud daughter of Indian immigrants — not Black, not white. I was different.”  Haley also embraces her heritage as a South Asian woman, saying, “My mom would always say, ‘Your job is not to focus on the differences but the similarities.’ My parents reminded me and my siblings every day how blessed we were to live in America.

Over a montage of photos, Haley urged Americans to set aside their criticism: “Some look at our past as evidence that America’s founding principles are bad. They say the promise of freedom is just made up. Some think our ideas are not just wrong, but racist and evil. Nothing could be further from the truth.”  Haley also emphasized the need for change in the Republican Party: “Republicans have lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections, that has to change … It’s time for a new generation of leadership … You should know this about me — I don’t put up with bullies. And when you kick back, it hurts them more if you are wearing heels.”

Haley, who served as the former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. in the Trump administration, now becomes the first Republican to challenge former President Donald Trump, who launched his campaign for the GOP nomination in November.

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A Justice Department prosecutor is asking a federal judge to force a lawyer for former President Donald Trump to give additional testimony to a grand jury investigating how scores of documents with classification markings wound up at Trump’s Florida home.  Special counsel Jack Smith is trying to defeat attorney-client privilege claims from Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran by arguing that the privilege has been voided because Corcoran was being used to carry out a crime or fraud.

A former federal prosecutor, Corcoran was involved in delivering some of the documents with classification markings in response to a grand jury subpoena last year; and also helped prepare a declaration attesting that all responsive records had been provided.  The search found about 100 documents with classification markings that prosecutors contend should have been returned to the National Archives.

Under court rules, Smith’s motion to compel Corcoran’s testimony would be heard by the chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Washington, Beryl Howell, an appointee of former President Barack Obama. Howell is set to turn over the chief judge’s post next month to a colleague, James Boasberg, also an Obama appointee. Attorney General Merrick Garland named Smith as a special counsel in November, assigning him to take over the ongoing investigation into the sensitive documents at Trump’s home, as well as separate probes into efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

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