Thursday, March 12, 2026
Home Blog Page 74

Matt Gaetz tells Kevin McCarthy to "take a hint," urges GOP to move on

Fox News
-
0
Matt Gaetz tells Kevin McCarthy to "take a hint," urges GOP to move on

Representative Matt Gaetz has told Representative Kevin McCarthy to “take a hint” after successfully ousting his fellow Republican as speaker of the House.

Gaetz’s motion to vacate the speakership succeeded in a vote of 216-210 on Tuesday, with a total of eight Republicans voting in favor. McCarthy on Monday night urged Gaetz to “bring it on” after the motion was filed following weeks of threats.

Shortly after McCarthy was removed, Gaetz told reporters that Republicans had broken “the fever” of his leadership and shot down the notion that the California congressman could again seek the speakership, which took him 15 rounds of voting to secure in January.

“I think Kevin McCarthy should take a hint,” said Gaetz. “After 15 ballots to become speaker, after eight months of a failed speakership and after removal in this historic manner, I think we should move on and find somebody else.”

“I think that this represents the ripping off of the Band-Aid,” he added. “And that’s what we need to do to get back on track.”

Newsweek reached out for comment to McCarthy’s office via email on Tuesday.

Gaetz also said that some Republicans were “in the stages of grief” regarding McCarthy’s ouster, before going to float several names as potential replacements for the ex-speaker.

“I think the world of [House majority leader] Steve Scalise, I think he’d make a phenomenal speaker,” Gaetz said. “He’d be the type of person that I could see myself supporting. There are many people, though.”

“I could see myself supporting [House majority whip] Tom Emmer,” he continued. “I could see myself supporting Mike Johnson of Louisiana. I could see myself supporting Jodey Arrington of Texas. I could see myself supporting Kevin Hern of Oklahoma.”

Representative Patrick McHenry of North Carolina immediately succeeded McCarthy as speaker pro tempore just after the vote was completed, having been selected by the outgoing speaker as his temporary replacement in January.

It is unclear who might take on the role in a more permanent capacity. McHenry has been floated as a possible candidate for the job, alongside the lawmakers mentioned by Gaetz and others like GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik and House Rules Committee Chair Tom Cole.

However, Republicans will need to be united in supporting a successful replacement candidate due to their slim majority. That might be a tall order, given all of the recent GOP infighting and chaos in the House.

Democratic Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland told reporters that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries would be nominated as speaker by Democrats, according to The New York Times.

While Jeffries is very unlikely to become speaker due to the Republican majority, there is a remote possibility that a moderate candidate could take on the role if a deal were to be made with a bipartisan coalition.

Michael Zack’s last words before Florida execution

Fox News
-
0
Michael Zack’s last words before Florida execution

A convicted murderer has been executed in Florida, marking the sixth instance of capital punishment in the Sunshine State this year and the eighth during the tenure of Governor and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis.

Michael Duane Zack III, 54, died by lethal injection at 6:14 p.m. Tuesday. Zack was convicted of killing Laurie Russillo and Ravonne Smith amid a crime spree in June 1996, having met both women at beach bars in the Florida Panhandle.

Zack received a sentence of life in prison for the murder of Russillo and the death penalty for the murder of Smith, whom he was also convicted of sexually assaulting.

A Florida Department of Corrections spokesperson said in an email to Newsweek that Zack declined to request a last meal. He reportedly met with his wife and spiritual adviser in the hours before the execution.

The execution began promptly at 6 p.m., according to the Associated Press. Zack reportedly said “yes sir” after being asked whether he had any last words. He then looked at the witnesses and said, “I love you all.”

Just after being executed, a final statement from Zack was released by anti-death penalty group Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

“Twenty-seven years ago, I was an alcoholic and a drug addict,” Zack said in the statement. “I did things that have hurt a lot of people—not only the victims and their families and friends, but my own family and friends as well. I have woken up every single day since then filled with remorse and a wish to make my time here on earth mean something more than the worst thing I ever did.”

“I make no excuses,” he added. “I lay no blame. But how I wish that I could have a second chance, to live out my days in prison and continue to do all I can to make a difference in this world. To all my brothers on death row, please continue to help each other.”

Zack’s execution came after a last-minute appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied on Monday, with justices giving no reason for the denial. An appeal to the Florida Supreme Court was also rejected in a unanimous decision last week.

Lawyers for Zack had argued that he should not be executed due to his diminished impulse control, mental and emotional issues caused by Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS), citing a 2002 Supreme Court decision that made intellectual disabilities a disqualifying factor for the death penalty.

The office of Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody disputed the argument that FAS qualifies as an intellectual disability, writing in a Supreme Court filing that “unelected and unrepresentative experts” should not be allowed to intervene despite the argument from Zack’s attorneys that “the psychiatric community now views FAS as functionally identical to intellectual disability.”

The intellectual disability claim was also cited in one of several arguments against execution by religious and anti-death penalty groups who called on DeSantis to grant Zack clemency.

DeSantis, who has made expanding the death penalty an issue as he seeks the presidency, signed Zack’s death warrant on August 17. The governor has far outpaced his recent predecessors in death penalties carried out in his state, although most of the executions have occurred this year.

Shortly before announcing his run for president, DeSantis signed a Florida bill that allows the death penalty to be imposed on child rapists. The bill officially became law on Sunday, but is likely to be challenged, due to the punishment already having been outlawed for rapists by the Florida Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court.

Five other men convicted of murder were executed earlier this year in Florida: Donald Dillbeck, Louis Bernard Gaskin, Darryl B. Barwick, Duane Eugene Owen and James Phillip Barnes.

Kevin McCarthy has harsh words for the Republicans who ousted him

Fox News
-
0
Kevin McCarthy has harsh words for the Republicans who ousted him

Representative Kevin McCarthy of California is lashing out at the eight Republicans who voted to oust him as speaker of the House.

McCarthy’s control of the lower chamber was stripped on Tuesday after a motion to vacate the speakership was passed by a vote of 216-210. GOP Representative Matt Gaetz, who filed the motion, joined seven other Republicans and all Democrats in voting for McCarthy’s removal.

The California Republican, who served as speaker for less than nine months, became the first lawmaker to ever be removed from the job by a vote in the House. He was immediately replaced by his own choice for speaker pro tempore, Representative Patrick McHenry of North Carolina.

While the House now faces an uncertain road in choosing a more permanent successor, McCarthy made it clear in a press conference on Tuesday night that he would not be attempting to win back the gavel, arguing that the rule allowing the motion to vacate was not “good for the institution.”

“Unfortunately, 4 percent of our conference can join all the Democrats and dictate who can be the Republican speaker in this House,” McCarthy said. “I don’t think that rule is good for the institution, but apparently I’m the only one.”

“I believe I can continue to fight, maybe in a different manner,” he continued. “I will not run for speaker again, I’ll have the conference pick somebody else.”

McCarthy then attacked the “trustworthiness” of the Republicans who voted to oust him, saying that they are “not conservatives and they do not have the right to have the title.” He reserved particularly harsh words for Gaetz.

“The trustworthiness of a lot of individuals, it makes it difficult,” said McCarthy. “I do not think, regardless of who the speaker is, that you should have that rule … I don’t think this is about the Republican Party, I think it’s something about some people who are not a conservative.”

“You all know Matt Gaetz,” he added. “You know it was personal … everything he accused somebody of, he was doing. That all was about getting attention from [the press]. I mean, we’re getting email fundraisers from him as he’s doing it. ‘Join in quickly.’ That’s not governing, that’s not becoming of a member of Congress.”

Newsweek reached out for comment to the office of Gaetz via email on Tuesday night.

Gaetz celebrated the success of the motion to vacate shortly after the vote took place. He told reporters that McCarthy was “a feature of the swamp” who had “risen to power by collecting special-interest money and redistributing that money in exchange for favors,” adding that Republicans had broken “the fever” of his leadership.

Donald Trump to be nominated for next speaker of the House

Fox News
-
0
Donald Trump to be nominated for next speaker of the House

Former President Donald Trump could become the next speaker of the House following the removal of Representative Kevin McCarthy of California.

A motion to vacate the speakership, which was filed by Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida on Monday, succeeded by a vote of 216-210 on Tuesday night. Gaetz and seven other Republicans joined forces with a unified Democratic caucus in voting to oust the California congressman.

Shortly after McCarthy was removed from the position, Representative Troy Nehls of Texas—who sided with the majority of Republicans in voting against McCarthy’s removal—announced that he intends to nominate Trump to the role as soon as possible.

“When the U.S. House of Representatives reconvenes, my first order of business will be to nominate Donald J. Trump for Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives,” Nehls said in a statement.

“President Trump, the greatest President of my lifetime, has a proven record of putting America First and will make the House great again,” he added.

GOP Congressman Greg Steube of Florida also put forward Trump’s name as the successor to McCarthy in a post on X, formerly Twitter. Additionally, Republican Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee included Trump in a poll of potential candidates on X.

Gaetz voted for Trump as speaker multiple times during the series of hearings to install McCarthy in January. He did not say he would nominate Trump for the job on Tuesday, while also suggesting that the role could be filled by someone who was not a sitting member.

The former president’s estranged niece Mary Trump joked in an X post that her uncle would not become the next speaker because the position “requires work.”

Newsweek reached out for comment to the office of Trump via email on Tuesday night.

While Trump would be eligible to become speaker since House rules do not require the position to be filled by a member, he has previously indicated that he is not interested in the role.

If the former president were to accept his nomination and managed to become the next speaker, it would represent an extraordinary turn of events as he campaigns to regain the presidency in 2024.

Trump, who was found civilly liable for business fraud and has pleaded not guilty to 91 felony criminal counts this year, would instantly become third in line for the White House.

As a presidential candidate, he would be given an unprecedented platform by serving as House speaker. It is also unclear whether Trump wielding the speakership would complicate the enforcement of any gag orders issued in his many legal proceedings.

Trump did not weigh in directly but suggested that he did not approve of the effort to remove McCarthy before the vote was held, writing on Truth Social: “Why is it that Republicans are always fighting among themselves, why aren’t they fighting the Radical Left Democrats who are destroying our Country?”

As of late on Tuesday night, neither Trump nor his campaign had publicly commented on the ousting of McCarthy or on the suggestion that he should serve as McCarthy’s replacement.

Republicans explain their votes to oust Kevin McCarthy

Fox News
-
0
Republicans explain their votes to oust Kevin McCarthy

The eight House Republicans who ousted Congressman Kevin McCarthy from the speaker’s chair have spoken out about their vote, claiming that the former leader failed to deliver on a number of conservative policies while in power.

McCarthy was removed from the speakership in a 216-210 vote Tuesday, with the small group of GOP rebels voting alongside all Democratic House members in attendance to back the motion to vacate filed by Representative Matt Gaetz.

It remains unclear who could be selected as the next speaker, and it’s unlikely that the House will reach a decision quickly with a fractured Republican majority. Those who voted to remove McCarthy include Gaetz, Ken Buck, Andy Biggs, Tim Burchett, Eli Crane, Bob Good, Nancy Mace and Matt Rosendale.

Gaetz told reporters shortly after the former speaker was removed that it was for the “benefit of this country” that the GOP pick a new leader. The Florida lawmaker brought the motion to vacate after McCarthy struck a last-minute bipartisan deal on Saturday to narrowly avert a government shutdown.

“Kevin McCarthy couldn’t keep his word. He made an agreement in January regarding the way Washington would work, and he violated that agreement,” Gaetz said while speaking with members of the media outside the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday.

Other Republicans, such as Biggs, agreed that McCarthy “failed to demonstrate himself as an effective leader” during his roughly eight months as speaker. Crane said in a statement shared to his social accounts that he is looking for a speaker “to change the ineffective and dishonest way that this town works.”

Rosendale said in a post to X prior to the House voting on the motion to vacate that he intended to support the measure because McCarthy “violated his promise to the American people and the Republican Conference by working against them repeatedly and supporting ploys to aid the Left.”

McCarthy has faced criticism from members of the GOP for months, including after agreeing to raise the debt ceiling for President Joe Biden in May. At the time, many conservatives argued that the negotiations brokered between Biden and McCarthy were a win for the Democrats.

“We are $33 trillion in debt and on track to hit $50 trillion by 2030. We cannot continue to fund the government by continuing resolutions and omnibus spending bills,” Buck wrote in a post to X on Tuesday. “That’s why I voted to oust [McCarthy]. We must change course to sensible budgeting and save our country.”

Mace agreed that McCarthy “has not lived up to his word on how the House would operate” and said that the former speaker had allowed “chaos” in the chamber.

“We need a fresh start so we can get back to the people’s business free of these distractions,” Mace added in a string of posts to X.

Good also said while speaking on the House floor during debate on the motion to vacate that a “red line was crossed” for him after McCarthy had agreed to push through a bipartisan stopgap bill.

Burchett told CNN that his mind was made after McCarthy supposedly “belittled” his Christian faith during a phone call with the former speaker in the morning of the vote. The Tennessee representative declined to share how McCarthy mocked his religion, but told CNN’s Jake Tapper, “when someone mocks me like that and mocks my religion, honestly, the Bible is pretty clear about God being mocked, so that’s what sealed it right there for me.”

Newsweek reached out to McCarthy’s office via email on Tuesday night for comment.

More judges need to "shut Trump up" with gag orders: Kirschner

Fox News
-
0
More judges need to "shut Trump up" with gag orders: Kirschner

More judges need to follow the protective lead of a New York City bench presiding over ex-President Donald Trump‘s civil trial by imposing gag orders in his criminal cases as well, according to former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner.

Judge Arthur Engoron issued a gag order on Trump and his legal team in the former president’s civil fraud trial on Tuesday, barring them from making public statements about the court’s staff after Trump made a dig at one of Engoron’s clerks, attorney Allison Greenfield, in a now-deleted Truth Social post. Trump is facing a civil lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who has accused Trump of misleading investors by overvaluing his assets tied to The Trump Organization.

In the post attached to Engoron’s order, Trump shared a picture of Greenfield with Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and suggested, without evidence, that the two had a romantic relationship. Engoron said Tuesday, “Personal attacks on members of my court staff are unacceptable and inappropriate, and I won’t tolerate it.”

Kirschner, a staunch critic of Trump, said during his latest episode of his Justice Matters podcast that judges are “ordinarily very protective of their law clerks,” adding that he was glad Engoron took steps to protect his staff.

“But Donald Trump has been endangering witnesses, jurors, prosecutors, judges and their respective family members for so very long,” Kirschner said.

“It took this kind of a threat to a law clerk and a very appropriately protective judge to snap into action to protect that clerk and to protect all of the judge’s staff,” the legal expert added. “How about judges step up and protect all of the witnesses and prosecutors and jurors and others … who Donald Trump continues to endanger with his reckless speech, with his dangerous posts, because he’s been able to do it with complete impunity thus far.”

Trump could also face a limited gag order in his federal election interference case. Special Counsel Jack Smith requested last month that such an order be placed on the former president’s speech in relation to the investigation of Trump’s efforts to stay in office after losing the 2020 election, pointing to a plethora of recent social media posts in which Trump has attacked Smith, his office and others tied to the case.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who has faced her own threats from Trump supporters, has scheduled a hearing on Smith’s request for October 16.

“It’s time to shut Trump up with a narrowly tailored set of restrictions designed to put a stop to the danger he presents to others,” Kirschner added.

Trump is also facing federal charges over his handling of classified documents upon leaving the White House, in a Georgia racketeering case involving attempts to overturn the state’s 2020 election results and in a New York City business fraud investigation.

The former president has maintained his innocence in all cases, claiming that the investigations are aimed at upsetting his 2024 reelection run.

Newsweek reached out to Trump’s campaign team for comment via email on Tuesday night.

Russian state TV suggests Elon Musk is "our agent"

Fox News
-
0
Russian state TV suggests Elon Musk is "our agent"

Kremlin propagandists have praised Elon Musk for his mockery of Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky’s appeals for military aid to fight Russian aggression.

The comments made on the Russia-1 channel follow a meme Musk shared on his X (formerly Twitter) account of a photoshopped image of Zelensky.

The caption said, “when it’s been 5 min and you haven’t asked for a billion dollars in aid,” in a variation of what is often called the “strained face meme.”

The anchor of the program 60 Minutes, Olga Skabeyeva, said the post expressed war fatigue in the U.S, amid a push by MAGA supporting Republicans to cut aid.

The U.S. has approved four aid packages for Ukraine worth around $113 billion, although The Washington Post has reported that Kyiv has only received $43 billion in military assistance and $23 billion in macro-financial and humanitarian aid.

In front of a screen showing the meme, Skabeyeva told viewers on Monday, “It’s impossible not to notice that the West is getting sick not only of Zelensky but Ukraine as a whole.”

“Elon Musk is magnificent, he is wonderful and perhaps he really is our agent,” she added in a clip shared by Russia watcher Julia Davis.

Referring to the U.S. congressional bill passed to avoid a shutdown that omitted aid to Ukraine, Skabeyeva could barely conceal her joy.

“Only recently, it was impossible to even imagine anything like this,” she said.

“Unless something changes in the next 45 days, the United States will certainly stop helping” Kyiv, added Skabeyeva, describing Ukraine as “a walking corpse.”

She also called the Tesla founder “Elon Moskal,” which means “Elon the Muscovite.”

State Duma deputy Andrey Isayev weighed in, saying that the West’s support for Ukraine was recently “consolidated” but that support “keeps on fading” and Zelensky’s recent welcome in Washington was a far cry from the standing ovation he got from lawmakers in 2022.

Musk’s meme drew condemnation for playing into the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Co-founder of the International Centre for Ukrainian Victory, Olena Halushka, wrote on X that on Monday night Russia fired 31 drones and a cruise missile at Ukraine, “but Elon Musk won’t be interested in this continuous terrorism. It’s funnier to mock a sovereign state which aims for a luxury of survival.”

“Musk has lost his mind,” wrote Alexander Vindman, the Ukrainian-born former director for European Affairs for the United States National Security Council. “This is more than attention seeking.”

“Elon, don’t you have empathy?” wrote Mariana Betsa, Ukraine’s ambassador to Estonia. “Ukrainians are killed daily by Russia. We are fighting for our lives, for our families, for our country, for our freedom.”

Ukrainian academic Roman Sheremeta called Musk “a mouthpiece” of Russian propaganda as well as an “indecent human being.”

Newsweek has contacted Musk’s company Tesla by email.

Russia and China on collision course as Beijing rejects Putin’s price hike

Fox News
-
0
Russia and China on collision course as Beijing rejects Putin’s price hike

Russia’s state energy holding company, Inter RAO, has started restricting electricity supplies to China after Vladimir Putin‘s key ally and trading partner rejected a price hike.

The dispute stems from China facing severe electricity problems due to droughts and limits on increasing domestic coal production, while Russia is trying to offset the slump in its currency, which has hurt export revenues.

One expert told Newsweek that China is displaying a “hard-nosed” negotiating approach over Russia’s demand and that it’s in a strong bargaining position.

Western sanctions on Russia, which followed Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, have forced Moscow to pivot to other trade markets, with Russia terming countries “friendly” and “non-friendly.” Putin championed this new world order and touted Moscow’s strong ties with Beijing during a visit to Moscow in March of Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.

Outside the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union of other former Soviet states, China was the biggest market for Russian electricity exports in 2022, receiving a record 4.7 billion kWh (kilo watt/hour), Russian state news agency Tass reported.

Inter RAO said that new export duties that came into force on October 1 would mean it would raise electricity prices by 7 percent for customers in China, as well as in Mongolia, Azerbaijan and the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia.

Moscow announced in September that these export duties would be linked to the ruble exchange rate on certain goods between 4 percent and 7 percent, if the ruble was less than 80 to the U.S. dollar.

On Tuesday, the Russian currency traded at 99 to the greenback. Oil and gas were among Russian exports exempt from the price hike that has come into force.

In August, Russian business newspaper Kommersant reported that Inter RAO representative Alexandra Panina had told reporters that if the price were to be rejected it may “completely cut off” electricity supplies.

“Talks with China are continuing,” an Inter RAO representative told Reuters. “We are starting partial restrictions from today.” Mongolia agreed to Russia’s price rise.

“Chinese energy firms and the state have always been famously hard-nosed and very patient in energy negotiations with Russia,” said Thomas O’Donnell, a Berlin-based geopolitical analyst and energy expert who is a global fellow with the Wilson Center think tank.

“China has reaped great benefits for squeezing Russia when in a bind to export oil and gas,” he told Newsweek, with Beijing getting beneficial prices for piped gas and cheaper oil after Putin’s “fiasco” of losing the European market due to sanctions.

“The Russian state power export monopoly can’t make a profit, or very little with a 7 percent export tax,” O’Donnell said. “So it must demand higher rates from their biggest customer, China, and some other customers.”

He said that Chinese resistance to paying higher rates for Russian electricity imports suggests that “given the power sector crisis in China, it may aggressively turn to LNG gas imports for generation.”

“Unlike last year’s winter, when still under COVID lockouts, it resold LNG deliveries, greatly benefiting Europe. This could change Europe’s luck this winter to secure sufficient non-Russian natural gas,” he said.

Newsweek has contacted Inter RAO by email for comment

Putin ally forces rare concession from Ukraine

Fox News
-
0
Putin ally forces rare concession from Ukraine

Ukraine has removed the largest commercial bank in Hungary from its blacklist of those supporting Russia’s full-scale invasion with the hope the move could secure Budapest’s commitment to funding Kyiv’s war effort.

The Ukrainian National Agency of Corruption Prevention’s (NACP) withdrawal of OTP Bank from Kyiv’s “international sponsors of war” list comes as the EU said it would unfreeze funds for the country whose prime minister, Viktor Orban, is considered an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In May, the bank was added to Ukraine’s blacklist, which was created to deter foreign operations in Russia. But the Ukrainian agency said it would temporarily remove the bank following talks with the European Union‘s External Action Service, saying OTP had “made a number of commitments regarding its future plans for the Russian market.”

The move being made permanent will depend on the bank’s willingness to terminate cooperation with Russia, the agency added.

The NACP said the move was aimed at securing Budapest’s support for the latest package of EU military aid to Ukraine. The anti-corruption agency said in a statement that the decision was the result of negotiations with the bank and officials in Budapest with the hope that Hungary will unblock €500 million ($523 million) “of vital EU military aid for the Ukrainian people.”

However, the Hungarian government said that “no significant changes have occurred due to the temporary suspension” of the bank. Hungarian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mate Paczolay told local media that until the bank removed from the list, “Hungary will not participate in further EU funding for arms shipments to Ukraine.”

When contacted by Newsweek, OTP Bank said in a statement that it was “reassuring…that the competent Ukrainian authorities are convinced that its inclusion on the list is unjustified.”

However, it rejected a number of NACP’s accusations that put it on the list in the first place. These included that it operated in Russian-occupied territories in the Donbas and Crimea and that it recognized the existence of the so-called people’s republics of Luhansk and Donetsk.

OTP Bank also rejected the NACP’s claim it had provided “preferential credit” to Russian army members and had played an important role in the Russian economy.

“During the negotiations with the NACP, OTP Bank undertook to maintain its cooperation with the international investment advisor Rothschild Martin Maurel, with whose assistance it will continue to examine all its strategic options for the future of the Russian subsidiary,” the statement said.

Newsweek has contacted the NACP for comment by email.

Orbán enjoys good relations with Putin, having pushed back against EU sanctions and tried to dampen the military support of NATO, of which Budapest is a member. While Russia has restricted gas supplies to other European countries, it has agreed to increase its deliveries of fuel to Hungary.

It has been reported that the EU intends to unfreeze $13.6 billion in funding by the end of November. In December 2022, the EU froze $23 billion in funding which would have helped Hungary develop and improve infrastructure.

In response to demands from Brussels, Hungary carried out judicial reforms in May that could unlock the payments, known as cohesion funds, as the EU seeks unanimity among its member states to continual financial support for Kyiv.

HIMARS strike blows up Russia’s deadly Giatsint-S artillery system: video

Fox News
-
0
HIMARS strike blows up Russia’s deadly Giatsint-S artillery system: video

Video shared on social media purportedly shows Ukraine’s armed forces striking a high-value Russian target using the U.S.-supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS).

“Ukrainian HIMARS strike sending a Russian Giatsint-S artillery system into the underworld,” posted the X (formerly Twitter) pro-Ukrainian account of War is Translated, which shares video and reports about the conflict, next to the clip.

The 37-second drone footage gives an aerial view of the target in a field surrounded by trees being blown up and smoke billowing into the sky. Before the blast, soldiers can be seen running away from the site, which the X account of Neonhandrail geolocated to Novokrasnyanka, in Ukraine’s Luhansk Oblast.

The pro-Ukrainian Telegram channel MYSYAGIN posted the video, adding that the destruction was caused by “tungsten carbide balls” fired by the HIMARS.” That “worked out very nicely,” added the post, according to a translation.

Newsweek has been unable to verify the authenticity of the video, which as of Tuesday had been viewed over 100,000 times. Newsweek has contacted the Russian defense ministry by email for comment.

First produced in 1976, the Giatsint-S can hit targets at longer ranges and at a higher rate of fire than the more widely produced 2S3 Akatsiya 152 mm self-propelled gun.

It can carry 30 152 mm rounds with a range of up to 20 miles and can fire cluster, smoke and nuclear projectiles. It is used by both the Ukrainian and Russian armies.

Since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia had lost 41 of the artillery systems, according to the website Oryx, which uses open sources to track losses on both sides in the war.

The footage has emerged as the U.S. is set to send Ukraine another missile system, which Kyiv hopes will make a difference on the battlefield.

Doug Bush, the assistant secretary of the U.S. military for acquisition, logistics, and technology, said that the military is ready to send some of its long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) armed with cluster munitions.

He told Bloomberg that the the U.S. military “has been postured for this eventuality for a while,” and that “we’re ready when and if the president decides to do this.”

Cluster-armed ATACMS have a range of up to 190 miles and can carry up to 950 cluster munitions, which would boost Ukraine’s capabilities in the counteroffensive that they have been undertaking since around June 4.

During Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky‘s visit to Washington last month, President Joe Biden announced a further trance of military support for Kyiv.

1...737475...86Page 74 of 86

EDITOR PICKS

POPULAR POSTS

POPULAR CATEGORY