Police investigating incident at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Police say they are investigating an incident Wednesday at President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, but have not released any specifics.
They did not say what happened or what prompted the investigation, which began Wednesday afternoon.
Palm Beach police spokesman Michael Ogrodnick said in an afternoon email, “There is an open investigation,” but he did not indicate when specific information would be released. He had not responded to several follow-up phone calls and emails late Wednesday.
The president is not at the club nor is any member of his immediate family believed to be there, but they are expected to arrive for the weekend and spend the holidays there.
There have been two trespassing incidents at Mar-a-Lago in the last 13 months. A Chinese woman was arrested in March carrying a laptop, phones and other electronic gear. She was found guilty of trespassing and lying to Secret Service agents in September and was sentenced last month to time served. She is being held for deportation.
Macron, under strike pressure, mulls changes to pension plan
PARIS — The French government launched negotiations with labor unions Wednesday on potential changes to a landmark pension reform bill that sparked crippling transportation strikes and protests across the country.
Prime Minister Edouard Philippe met with union leaders and employer group representatives after French President Emmanuel Macron asked his government to hold talks on possible amendments to the reform package.
The general strike that started Dec. 5 dramatically impacted train and subway service as drivers remained off the job. Teachers, doctors and other workers joined the walkouts, and hundreds of thousands of people participated in nationwide protests.
An agreement with hard-left unions appeared to be a way off. The leader of the CGT union, Philippe Martinez, acknowledged a “deep disagreement” with the prime minister after their meeting.
“We have two clashing perspectives,” Martinez said. “We don’t have the same values.”
The government is seeking to reach a deal with more moderate unions, which Macron hopes may weaken the protest movement.
A close aide to Macron, who spoke anonymously in accordance with customary practices, said the president “won’t abandon the project” but is “willing to improve it.” Macron himself was not planning to get involved in the negotiations or to make an announcement in coming days.
Uber to pay $4.4 million to end federal sex harassment probe
SAN FRANCISCO — Uber Technologies Inc. will establish a $4.4 million fund to settle a federal investigation into allegations that the San Francisco company allowed a rampant culture of sexual harassment, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced Wednesday.
The agreement ends an investigation launched in 2017 in which the commission found reasonable cause to believe the ride-hailing tech company “permitted a culture of sexual harassment and retaliation against individuals who complained about such harassment.”
A claims administrator will send notices to women who worked at Uber between Jan. 1, 2014, and June 30, 2019. The commission will determine which claimants may be eligible for money from the $4.4 million fund.
The company has also agreed to create a system to identify serial offenders and managers who fail to respond to concerns about sexual harassment in a timely manner.
The commission initiated the investigation after a former Uber engineer wrote a widely circulated blog post exposing sexual harassment at the company, including propositions from her boss. Susan Fowler said her complaints to human resources were ignored.
Police, protesters clash outside Barcelona-Real Madrid game
BARCELONA, Spain — Riot police clashed with protesters in the streets Wednesday night outside a soccer match between Barcelona and Real Madrid, as authorities sought to keep Catalonia’s separatist movement from disrupting the game viewed by 650 million people worldwide.
The match in Barcelona’s Camp Nou stadium began without incident and was halted only briefly when some fans threw balls onto the field bearing a message for the Spanish government to open a dialogue with the separatists.
The game, which drew nearly 100,000 spectators, ended in a scoreless draw.
Thousands of police and private security guards were deployed in and around stadium.
In the street clashes, riot police used batons to force the crowd back, some threw objects at officers lined up behind shields and other protesters fought among themselves. Authorities said nine people had been arrested, and Spain’s national news agency Efe reported that 12 were injured.
R Kelly arraigned on bribe charge linked to Aaliyah wedding
NEW YORK — Singer R. Kelly pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges he schemed with others to pay for a fake ID for an unnamed female a day before he married R&B singer Aaliyah, then 15 years old, in a secret ceremony in 1994.
Kelly entered the plea in New York via a video feed from Chicago, where he remains jailed while facing multiple sex crime and other criminal charges.
A revised indictment filed earlier this month in federal court in Brooklyn accuses Kelly of paying a bribe in exchange for a “fraudulent identification document” for someone identified only as “Jane Doe” on Aug. 30, 1994.
A day later, Kelly, then 27, married Aaliyah in a secret ceremony he arranged at a hotel in Chicago. The marriage was annulled months later because of her age. Aaliyah died in a plane crash in 2001 at age 22.
The U.S. attorney’s office has declined to comment about whom the fake ID was meant for, and the indictment didn’t mention the wedding, but a person familiar with the investigation has confirmed the “Jane Doe” was Aaliyah. The person wasn’t authorized to discuss details of the new charge and spoke on condition of anonymity.