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French parliament votes to oust Michel Barnier’s government

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French parliament votes to oust Michel Barnier’s government

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The French parliament on Wednesday voted to oust Prime Minister Michel Barnier over his proposed deficit-cutting budget, plunging the country into deeper political turmoil.

A motion of no confidence was approved by 331 votes in the 577 member national assembly, as Marine Le Pen’s far-right party teamed up with a leftist bloc to bring down Barnier’s minority government.

Barnier’s administration has collapsed without adopting his contentious 2025 budget that included €60bn in tax increases and spending cuts to reduce France’s deficit, which will reach 6 per cent of GDP this year.

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President Emmanuel Macron will now have to select another prime minister, a task made difficult by a raucous parliament divided into three blocs, none of which is close to having a governing majority.

Barnier’s three-month term as prime minister was the shortest of any premier since France’s Fifth Republic was founded in 1958. It is only the second time a government has been voted down since then. 

The political tumult gripping France comes just weeks after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition collapsed, leaving the EU’s two most powerful states in limbo.

Barnier defended his record as prime minister during a national assembly debate before the confidence vote, telling lawmakers: “I have been and am proud to act to build rather than to destroy.”

He said it was “not for pleasure” that he had presented a difficult budget. France’s fiscal “reality will not disappear by the enchantment of a motion of censure”, he added.

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Macron will have to contend with an emboldened Le Pen and her Rassemblement National party, which was decisive in removing Barnier after spurning his last-ditch attempts at a compromise on his budget.

Le Pen said her decision to censure Barnier was prompted by the “necessity to put an end to the chaos, to spare the French people from a dangerous, unfair and punitive budget”.

Macron “is largely responsible for the current situation”, Le Pen told TF1 television shortly after the vote.

When the president appoints a new prime minister, that person would work on a new budget which Rassemblement National “will construct with other forces in the national assembly”, she added.

Mathilde Panot, a leader of the far-left France Unbowed party, slammed Barnier for seeking deals with the Rassemblement National to try to stay in power.

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“Barnier tried to escape censure by choosing dishonour, he has gotten dishonour and censure,” she said.

Marie Lebec, a lawmaker from Macron’s centrist alliance and former minister, said her fellow parliamentarians should put aside party squabbling to find a way forward.

The political crisis risks further spooking financial markets. Barnier had previously warned of a financial and economic “storm” should his government fall without adopting the 2025 budget, saying borrowing costs were on track to exceed €60bn next year, more than the French defence budget.

French borrowing costs on its 10-year sovereign bond hit a 12-year high against Germany’s last week, as investors fretted about the likely failure of Barnier’s government.

After the confidence vote on Wednesday, the euro was flat against the dollar at $1.052, reflecting how the result was widely expected.

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Barnier may stay on as a caretaker premier for a short time, but it will fall to his successor to craft another 2025 budget, ahead of a year-end deadline.

In the meantime, Macron and parliament have several options to pass emergency measures that would avoid a government shutdown and keep public services funded temporarily.

But unlike previously when he procrastinated on picking premiers, Macron aimed to move quickly this time, said a person familiar with his thinking, and he has drawn up a list of potential candidates to succeed Barnier.

The Elysée said Macron would address the nation on Thursday evening in a televised speech.

Barnier was appointed by Macron in September after the president’s centrist alliance lost snap parliamentary elections, which increased the ranks of the far right and leftist parties.

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His departure is a sign of how gridlocked French institutions have become since the elections.

“It feels like a series of impasses in a parliament where no one has a workable majority,” said Bruno Cautrès, political scientist at Sciences Po. “There is a risk that a new government would fall quickly, just as Barnier has done.”

Additional reporting by Ian Smith in London

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Map: 5.8-Magnitude Earthquake Strikes Nevada

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Map: 5.8-Magnitude Earthquake Strikes Nevada

Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 3 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “weak,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown. The New York Times

A moderately strong, 5.8-magnitude earthquake struck in Nevada on Monday, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The temblor happened at 3:08 p.m. Pacific time about 15 miles northeast of Yerington, Nev., data from the agency shows.

U.S.G.S. data earlier reported that the magnitude was 5.7.

As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.

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Aftershocks in the region

An aftershock is usually a smaller earthquake that follows a larger one in the same general area. Aftershocks are typically minor adjustments along the portion of a fault that slipped at the time of the initial earthquake.

Quakes and aftershocks within 100 miles

Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.

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Source: United States Geological Survey | Notes: Shaking categories are based on the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale. When aftershock data is available, the corresponding maps and charts include earthquakes within 100 miles and seven days of the initial quake. All times above are Pacific time. Shake data is as of Monday, Dec. 9 at 7:46 p.m. Eastern. Aftershocks data is as of Monday, Dec. 9 at 10:08 p.m. Eastern.

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‘Person of interest’ in UnitedHealth executive’s murder faces gun charge

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‘Person of interest’ in UnitedHealth executive’s murder faces gun charge

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A 26-year-old Ivy League graduate has been hit with gun and other charges in Pennsylvania as authorities investigate his connection to the murder of a senior UnitedHealth Group executive ahead of an investor event in New York last week.

Local police in Altoona, Pennsylvania, apprehended Luigi Mangione, 26, of Maryland at a McDonald’s restaurant following a tip from an employee, New York police authorities said at a press conference on Monday.

Eric Adams, the New York mayor, described Mangione as a “strong person of interest” in possession of several items potentially connected to the crime. Jessica Tisch, New York Police Department commissioner, said NYPD detectives alongside officials from the district attorney’s office were heading to Pennsylvania to interview Mangione.

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Mangione was in possession of an untraceable “ghost gun” with a suppressor and fake New Jersey ID card matching the description of those used by the individual suspected of shooting Brian Thompson, the chief executive of UnitedHealthcare, the Minnesota-based group’s insurance unit, before dawn on December 4.

Mangione was also carrying a handwritten, three-page document which outlined “some ill will towards corporate America” but did not mention any specific individuals, said Joseph Kenny, the NYPD chief of detectives.

He made a brief initial court appearance in Pennsylvania on Monday evening, where he was charged with weapons violations, forgery and false identification, among others.

Mangione was an engineering graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, according to a LinkedIn profile of a person matching his description. He was born and raised in Maryland, and his last known address was Honolulu, Hawaii, the NYPD said.

The development comes after a five-day manhunt in which NYPD detectives and federal investigators have criss-crossed the city and nearby states in an attempt to solve the murder that shocked New York and corporate America.

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Tisch said: “For just over five days, our NYPD investigators combed through thousands of hours of video, followed up on hundreds of tips and processed every bit of forensic evidence — DNA, fingerprints, IP addresses and so much more — to tighten the net.”

The NYPD released CCTV images of the suspect checking into a hostel on the Upper West Side of Manhattan before the murder and in the back of taxi following the killing. Tisch credited the images with progress in the case: “The images that we shared with the public were spread far and wide and the tips we received led to recovery of crucial evidence,” she said.

Thompson’s murder before dawn on his way to an investor event organised by UnitedHealth Group at a Marriott hotel off Sixth Avenue in midtown Manhattan has raised concerns about the security of high-ranking executives.

The killing has also fuelled a debate about the state of medical care in the world’s costliest healthcare system — UnitedHealthcare is the country’s biggest insurer, covering nearly 50mn Americans. “Our hope is that today’s apprehension brings some relief to Brian’s family, friends, colleagues and the many others affected by this unspeakable tragedy,” UnitedHealth said.

Thompson was shot from behind three times outside the Marriott Midtown hotel at 6.45am local time, and was pronounced dead shortly afterwards at nearby Mount Sinai hospital. Detectives later discovered bullet casings at the scene with inscriptions including “deny” and “defend” — a possible nod to a 2010 book about how insurers deny claims.

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Since then the NYPD gradually pieced together the killer’s movements before and after the shooting. The suspect arrived in New York in late November, staying in the Upper West Side hostel.

Following the shooting, he first travelled uptown on an e-bike through Central Park, where his backpack was later recovered. Then, he made his way to an interstate bus station, where he boarded a bus out of the city.

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Soft medium, hard truths – National Endowment for the Arts recognizes a Navajo quilter

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Soft medium, hard truths – National Endowment for the Arts recognizes a Navajo quilter

An image of Susan Hudson’s quilt, “Tears or our Children, Tears for our Children,” as displayed at the National Museum of the American Indian

National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution (26/9331). Photo by NMAI Photo Services/NMAI-Natl. Museum of the America


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National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution (26/9331). Photo by NMAI Photo Services/NMAI-Natl. Museum of the America

Susan Hudson’s studio near Ignacio, Colorado, is often a chaotic mess of brightly colored fabrics and half-finished projects.

“I’m disorganized/organized,” she said with a laugh. “I know where everything is. But I did clean up a little when I knew you were coming for a visit.”

At the time, Hudson was finishing work on her latest show quilt, “Standing Strong In The Face of Genocide.” Trimmed in black fabric, the four-paneled quilt showed a sequence of images focused on a single figure, like frames in a graphic novel.

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In the first frame, a Native American boy in traditional clothing stands in front of what appears to be the whitewashed wooden siding of a building. The figure has black braids, leather and velvet clothing decorated in metal and bone, and oyster shell earrings. The light brown area of the figure’s face is blank, with no features.

In the second frame, Hudson has sewn pieces of red fabric on the figure’s pants, shaped like droplets of blood. In the third frame, the figure is slumped down, with a red smear on the wall behind him. The fourth panel has only Hudson’s trademark cursive writing, like lines in a ledger book, dedicating the quilt to the Native children who did not capitulate to the administrators and federal officials who carried out federal Indian boarding school policies.

These frames tell the story of an execution-style killing of a Native American boy.

Indian boarding schools operated for decades across the US, beginning in the late 19th century, as part of an ongoing federal effort to separate Native youth from their families, culture, traditions, and language. Children were forbidden to speak their native language, to wear traditional clothes, and to practice their religion. Their hair was cut, and they were given European names.

Susan Hudson

Susan Hudson

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In recent years, federal agencies in the US and Canada have begun investigating the tragic histories of boarding schools.

With “Standing Strong In The Face of Genocide,” Hudson wanted to honor the children who refused to comply with these practices.

“We all know what happened to these kids who went to the boarding schools,” Hudson said. “But what happened to the ones who said, ‘hell no, we’re not doing it’? When you have a defiant child, what do you do with them?”

The idea for this quilt came to Hudson in dreams and waking visions over the past few years.

“I would wake up crying,” she said. “I could smell the blood, the sweat. I could hear the screams.”

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Initially, Hudson didn’t know how she would represent the story in fabric. Eventually, she settled on taking the perspective of the person holding the gun and inviting the viewer to imagine the moral difficulty of the decision at hand.

“So you’re standing here,” Hudson said, gesturing toward the quilt where it hung on the wall. “You’re looking at that kid who’s defiant. You’ve got the gun. Are you going to shoot him or not? There were some people who didn’t want to do it. But some said, ‘Yes, we’re killing a dirty Indian…How dare they buck the system!’”

Susan Hudson's quilt "Standing strong in the face of genocide"

Susan Hudson’s quilt “Standing Strong In The Face of Genocide”

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Hudson travels to Indian markets across the US. Her show quilts often receive ribbons and awards at some of these shows. And each year, Hudson’s show quilt finds a buyer.

“The quilts know where they’re going to go,” she said. “It’ll go where it’s supposed to go. Some of my quilts have gone to places I never thought they would go to.”

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By the end of the summer, “Standing Strong in the Face of Genocide,” had found a buyer.

Hudson’s quilts have been acquired by the Smithsonian’s Museum of the American Indian in Washington, DC, by the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona, and by a number of private collectors.

In September, Hudson was honored as one of 10 National Endowment for the Arts Heritage Fellows, at a ceremony at the Library of Congress.

A Long and Difficult Road

Long before they became tools of artistic liberation, needle and thread were sources of pain and suffering for Susan Hudson and her family, stretching back to her mother’s enrollment at an Indian boarding school in the 1940s.

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“She didn’t learn to sew in the boarding schools. It was beaten into her,” Hudson said. “If she wiggled or anything, she got hit. If her stitches weren’t straight, tiny, and precise, she got hit.”

The experience was so traumatic, that Hudson’s mother never spoke of it to her daughter. But when Susan Hudson learned to sew from her mother as a 9-year-old girl, she felt the sharp edge of that trauma nonetheless.

“I got a taste of the brutality that she went through,” Hudson recalled. “I hated sewing. I hated it. When I was in my 20’s I finally asked her why and then she told me the story. She goes, ‘I’m going to tell you once, and I’m never going to tell you again.’”

Still, Hudson kept sewing. As an adult and a single mother, she made shawls and star quilts and sold them at powwows.

“When I started making star quilts, it was mostly to survive,” she said. “To buy food for my kids, to buy them shoes.”

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Then, around 15 years ago, an artist friend told Hudson he thought her quilts were boring and challenged her to make more original work. That friend was former US Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, whom Hudson has known since she was a teenager. Campbell is a jeweler, and he was willing to share his knowledge of the art world with Hudson.

“I was pissed off at first,” Hudson said. “After I shared a few choice words and calmed down, I realized Ben was right. That was the kick in the butt I needed. Those puzzle pieces came together, and I knew that I was chosen for this.”

Hudson started to learn more about the artistic side of quilt-making. She realized, too, that her family history, as well as the visions from her most vivid dreams, were stories that could be told through her quilts.

Visions, dreams and history

Hudson’s human figures have no facial features. At first glance, they seem like paper dolls, but every material detail has a story. Beadwork, leather, yarn, and fabric are arranged into richly detailed narrative scenes depicting some of the most traumatic chapters in Native American history. From the legacy of Indian boarding schools to the Navajo Long Walk, when people were forcibly removed from their homeland in the 1860s.

“Every one of us Natives, we’re descendants from boarding school survivors,” said Hudson.

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One quilt, “Tears of Our Children, Tears for Our Children,” depicts boarding school trauma. In one frame a row of children are dressed in colorful, traditional regalia. In another, their hair is cut, and they’re wearing drab, institutional clothing. In the bottom frame, children sitting in wagons are guarded by cavalry soldiers with guns.

“The mothers were trying to get their children,” Hudson said. “And the soldiers would shoot them if they tried to get their children. But this little girl represented my mother.”

Emil Her Many Horses was immediately drawn to this quilt, when he first laid eyes on it at the Heard Indian Fair and Market in Phoenix, Arizona. He’s a curator at the National Museum of the American Indian and a member of the Oglala Lakota nation.

“She was telling the story in a new medium–cotton fabric,” said Her Many Horses. “And there’s a lot of detail that she took the time to stitch into this quilt. And so I thought this would be something that would add to our permanent collection.”

In addition to Hudson’s family histories, Her Many Horses noticed the ledger art references in her work.

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The Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona, has two of Hudson’s quilts in its collection, including “The Beginning of the End,” another quilt documenting Indian boarding school history.

“The details that Susan puts into these quilts are just amazing,” said Diana Pardue, chief curator at the Heard Museum. “There’s an incredible intricacy to the work. At first, your eye looks at the overall quilt, and then you start realizing there’s a very complex story embedded in the artwork, and as you look closer, you learn something more.”

Ironic award

Success with collectors and museums has led to more national recognition. When Hudson received word last Spring that she would be honored by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the irony was not lost on her.

“Congress is giving me this award because I make quilts showing the atrocities that Congress did to our people,” Hudson said.

In September 2024, Susan Hudson stood on the stage of Coolidge Auditorium at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., to accept a medal from the NEA. In her speech that followed, Hudson’s words pierced the silence of the theater.

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“I should not be standing here receiving this award,” she told the audience. “I should not be having to make these quilts to talk about the atrocities that happened to our people…. My descendants will remind your descendants of the things that happened to our people.”

After a long pause, Hudson released some of the tension with a touch of humor.

“But I appreciate the award,” she said with a smile. The audience roared with laughter and showered her with applause.

Through the soft medium of quiltmaking, Hudson has found a way to share hard truths–stories her family members would only speak of in whispers when she was growing up.

“You know everybody was talking about it quietly,” she said “But no, I don’t care, I’m going to talk about it because that’s my story. That’s my history. My family tree.”

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