BINTULU, Malaysia — In the open sea off the coast of Malaysian Borneo, industrial rigs extract massive amounts of oil and gas that fuel the economy of Malaysia.
Washington
Washington state’s capital gains tax upheld by state Supreme Court
Illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios
Washington’s highest courtroom upheld the state’s capital positive aspects tax in a much-anticipated ruling Friday.
Sure, however: The choice did not give progressives one thing some have lengthy sought: carte blanche to enact a graduated revenue tax focusing on the rich.
Why it issues: The 7% capital positive aspects tax, which Washington’s Legislature accredited in 2021, is projected to lift about $500 million per 12 months for public training and youngster care packages.
The tax applies to earnings from promoting capital property, corresponding to shares and bonds, if these earnings exceed $250,000 per particular person (or per married couple) in a 12 months.
- Gross sales of retirement accounts, actual property and sure small companies are exempt, and the tax applies solely to the portion of capital positive aspects that exceed the $250,000 threshold.
Flashback: Democrats — who management each chambers of Washington’s Legislature — argued the capital positive aspects tax was crucial to assist stability the state’s tax code, which depends closely on gross sales taxes and does not tax private revenue.
- Democrats have lengthy criticized that system as extremely regressive, which means it results in lower-income folks paying a better share of their revenue in taxes than wealthier folks.
- Republicans, in the meantime, argued the capital positive aspects tax is an revenue tax that violates the state structure.
What’s taking place: In its 7-2 majority opinion, the courtroom agreed with the state’s assertion that the capital positive aspects tax is as a substitute an excise tax that is not topic to the identical constitutional restrictions.
- On the similar time, the courtroom declined to rethink a 1933 authorized precedent that considers revenue to be property, which the state structure says should be taxed uniformly and restricted to a 1% charge.
- Which means state lawmakers will seemingly nonetheless be restricted from enacting graduated revenue taxes, by which rich folks pay greater tax charges than lower-income folks.
What they’re saying: Christine Rolfes (D-Bainbridge Island), the lead price range author within the state Senate, stated in a ready assertion that the ruling “locks in devoted funding to extend entry to inexpensive early studying and childcare.”
- On the similar time, she instructed Axios, she interprets the ruling to imply a constitutional modification could be essential to enact a graduated revenue tax.
The opposite aspect: Justices Sheryl Gordon McCloud and Charles Johnson disagreed with the bulk’s ruling, with Gordon McCloud writing in a dissenting opinion, “the tax is an revenue tax, whatever the label positioned on it by the legislature.”
What we’re watching: Whether or not the courtroom’s resolution emboldens lawmakers to experiment with different sorts of taxes, corresponding to a wealth tax, that concentrate on high-earners however are structured in another way than conventional revenue taxes.
What’s subsequent: The capital positive aspects tax took impact in January 2022, and the primary funds are due subsequent month.
This can be a creating story. Examine again for updates.
Washington
Malaysia’s appetite for oil and gas puts it on collision course with China
But Malaysia is running out of oil and gas close to shore. Increasingly, it has to venture farther out to sea, raising the likelihood of direct confrontation with Chinese forces in the South China Sea.
As tensions rise throughout the South China Sea, one of the world’s busiest and most contested bodies of water, energy demands are drawing Malaysia deeper into the fray and testing the country’s long-standing reluctance to antagonize China, according to interviews with more than two dozen government officials, diplomats, oil and gas executives and analysts in Malaysia.
Some of Asia’s biggest oil and gas reserves lie under the seabed of these disputed waters, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Since 2021, Malaysia’s state-owned energy company, Petronas, has awarded several dozen new permits for companies like Shell and TotalEnergies to explore new deposits here, many in so-called “deepwater” clusters more than 100 nautical miles from shore but still within the boundaries of what Malaysia considers its exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
These developments are teeing up more confrontations with China, warn energy and security analysts. Already, federal and provincial officials in Malaysia have been beefing up military deployments around the industrial port town of Bintulu in the state of Sarawak, where much of the country’s oil and gas industry is based, and Malaysia has been increasing military cooperation with the United States, particularly on maritime security. For the first time later this year, a bilateral army exercise that Malaysia conducts annually with the United States will be held on Borneo, said a U.S. State Department official.
China’s
maritime
claims
Shipping routes
source: World Bank
China’s
maritime
claims
Shipping routes
source: World Bank
China’s maritime claims
Shipping routes
source: World Bank
China’s maritime
claims
Shipping routes
source: World Bank
At least since 2020, China has been harassing Malaysian drilling rigs and survey vessels, leading to standoffs that have lasted months, according to satellite imagery and data that track ship movements. For years, Malaysia’s response has been muted — a calculation shaped by reliance on Chinese investment and the relative weakness of the Malaysian military, said Malaysian security analysts and defense officials. Unlike the Philippines or Vietnam, Malaysia rarely publicizes Chinese intrusions into its EEZ, which extends 200 nautical miles off the coast, and withholds how often these incidents occur from journalists and academics.
In an exclusive interview, the director general of Malaysia’s National Security Council dismissed concerns of Chinese harassment even as he acknowledged that Chinese vessels had been patrolling Malaysian waters nearly nonstop.
“Obviously, we prefer for Chinese assets not to be in our waters,” said Nushirwan bin Zainal Abidin, who was ambassador to China from 2019 to 2023. But there’s no need, he added, for the dispute to “color” Malaysia’s broader relationship with its largest trading partner. “We can let sleeping dogs lie,” Nurshirwan said.
Despite objections from countries in Southeast Asia, China has laid claim to almost the entire South China Sea, building artificial islands and deploying vessels to enforce what it calls the “10-dash line,” delimiting on maps the boundaries of what China says are its waters, which come within 30 nautical miles of the Malaysian coast.
While much attention in recent months has been paid to China’s intensifying encounters in contested waters with Filipino fishermen and coast guard, tensions stirring farther south, where the world’s biggest oil and gas companies have deeper interests, have gained far less notice. Asked about Malaysia’s claims of Chinese incursions, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that Chinese vessels have been conducting “normal navigation and patrol activities” in areas under its jurisdiction.
Malaysia has for decades sought to “decouple” the South China Sea dispute from trade and investment with China, said a high-ranking Malaysian official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he had not been authorized to address the issue.
But the country’s need for offshore oil and gas is starting to upset this delicate balancing act, the official said. He noted that Chinese coast guard vessels have repeatedly disrupted operations at the Kasawari gas field, which contains an estimated 3 trillion cubic feet of gas and where Malaysia has recently built its biggest offshore platform. “For what’s happening at Kasawari, I don’t have a solution,” the official said. “Right now, no one does.”
Venturing into deeper waters
In the 1970s, before Shell discovered large deposits of oil and gas off the coast, Bintulu was a small fishing village with a single stretch of road connecting a mosque to a market. Today, it’s a throbbing hub of industry, anchored by a 682-acre processing facility that produces 30 million tons of liquefied natural gas per year. In 2023, Malaysia was the world’s fifth-largest exporter of LNG, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Malaysia has relied on these resources to drive growth for decades, deriving 20 percent of its gross domestic product from oil and gas. But several years ago, industry analysts warned that the country’s era of “easy exploration” was ending. Oil and gas found in shallow waters, meaning at depths less than 1,000 feet, were running out. Companies knew there were more deposits remaining, said San Naing, a senior oil and gas analyst at BMI, a market research firm. “They just had to go farther out.”
Nearly 60 percent of Malaysia’s gas reserves are located off the state of Sarawak, says the country’s energy regulator. Starting in 2020, Petronas ramped up exploration. Two years later, having reported a string of new discoveries, the company awarded 12 new licensing contracts to energy conglomerates looking to operate in Malaysia, the most since 2009.
Malaysia has harnessed offshore oil and gas for decades but began markedly increasing
exploration in waters further offshore starting in 2021.
Seven islands occupied
by China in the Spratly
Island chain.
China’s maritime
claims
Existing
oil and gas
pipelines
Oil and gas blocks
licensed for exploration
by Malaysia in the
last three years
Source: Petronas and MarineRegions.org
Malaysia has harnessed offshore oil and gas for
decades but began markedly increasing exploration
in waters further offshore starting in 2021.
Oil and gas blocks
licensed for exploration
by Malaysia in the
last three years
China’s
maritime
claims
Existing
oil and gas
pipelines
Seven
islands
occupied
by China
within the
Spratly
Island
chain
Malaysia Exclusive Economic
Zone (EEZ) boundary
Source: Petronas and MarineRegions.org
Malaysia has harnessed offshore oil and gas
for decades but began markedly increasing
exploration in waters further offshore since
starting in 2021.
Oil and gas blocks
licensed for exploration
by Malaysia in the
last three years
China’s
maritime
claims
Existing
oil and gas
pipelines
Seven
islands
occupied
by China
within the
Spratly
Island
chain
Malaysia Exclusive Economic
Zone (EEZ) boundary
Source: Petronas and MarineRegions.org
Malaysia has harnessed offshore oil and gas for decades but began markedly
increasing exploration in waters further offshore starting in 2021.
Seven islands occupied by China
within the Spratly Island chain
China’s maritime
claims
Existing
oil and gas
pipelines
Oil and gas blocks
licensed for exploration
by Malaysia in the
last three years
Malaysia’s
Exclusive Economic
Zone (EEZ) boundary
Source: Petronas and MarineRegions.org
Petronas executives say this enthusiasm is a sign of “investor confidence.” But in private, investors have been fretting over the risks of operating in the South China Sea, said a veteran oil and gas analyst who researches Malaysia and who spoke on the condition of anonymity to protect business interests. “What happens when the Chinese boats turn up? That’s always front of mind,” said the analyst.
In 2018, after harassment by Chinese vessels, Vietnam called off a major oil project midway through construction, leaving the companies involved with an estimated $200 million in losses. That incident was a “shock to the industry” and drove companies to reconsider investments in the South China Sea, said the analyst. Malaysia’s new discoveries are encouraging companies to return. But the risks now are arguably higher than ever.
A handful of Chinese vessels patrol the waters at Luconia Shoals, about 60 nautical miles off the Malaysian coast, near major gas fields like Kasawari. But a much bigger fleet of hundreds of Chinese coast guard ships and maritime militia are based farther north, near the Spratly Islands, where Petronas has designated new clusters for oil and gas exploration. The closer Malaysia’s energy projects come to the Spratlys, the greater the likelihood of confronting the Chinese, said Harrison Prétat, deputy director at the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.
In recent months, Chinese officials have said pointedly that the exploration of resources in the South China Sea “should not undermine China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests.”
Petronas rejected requests for interviews and did not respond to inquiries about the South China Sea. But last year, after Beijing released a new map of the waterway that expanded Chinese claims, Petronas’ chief executive, Tengku Muhammad Taufik Aziz, made an unusually strong statement of objection. Extracting offshore oil and gas is within Malaysia’s sovereign rights, he said. “Petronas,” he added, “will very vigorously defend Malaysia’s rights.”
The U.S. government has rejected China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea but has not formally endorsed Malaysia’s claims.
A ‘fundamental rethinking’
Three years ago, a fleet of 16 Chinese military planes conducting an exercise over the South China Sea entered Malaysian airspace, said Malaysian officials. The incursion elicited rare rebuke from the Malaysian air force, which called it a threat to national security, and prompted the Malaysian minister of foreign affairs to summon the Chinese ambassador. Writing for a think tank, a trio of Malaysian scholars said the incident had “sparked fundamental rethinking within the Malaysian establishment about the country’s China policy.”
Chinese officials, however, denied that its planes had ever entered foreign airspace. A Chinese state-run think tank, the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, said military aircraft were free to fly over the airspace of the South China Sea since its boundaries were “unclear.”
By the end of 2021, Malaysia had announced that a new air base would be built near Bintulu. Soon after, an army regiment from a neighboring city was moved in and last year, defense officials said they had worked out a plan to establish a new naval base. Speaking in Parliament, Defense Minister Seri Mohamad Hasan said Malaysia’s oil and gas would be protected “at any cost.”
Since 2021, Malaysia has also been increasing defense spending and strengthening military cooperation with the United States. Malaysia has received drones, communication equipment and surveillance programs, including long-range radar systems, installed on Borneo, to “monitor the sovereignty of airspace over the coastlines,” officials say. Later this year, Malaysia is set to get a decommissioned U.S. Coast Guard cutter and hold the annual bilateral army exercises with the U.S., called Keris Strike, on Borneo, according to the State Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share private negotiations.
Little of this has been highlighted by Malaysia. It is eager to avoid becoming “entangled” in the geopolitical contest between the United States and China, said the high-ranking Malaysian official.
He said he presumes that China “sees” everything happening in the South China Sea. “The question is will they see what we’re doing and allow it.”
Christian Shepherd in Taipei, Taiwan and Desmond Davidson in Kuching, Malaysia contributed to this report. Maps by Laris Karklis.
Washington
Missing person search underway in Washington County
WASHINGTON COUNTY, Fla. (WTVY) – The Washington County and Holmes County Sheriff’s Offices are asking the public to help with information regarding the whereabouts of a 29-year-old man last seen on Monday.
According to information posted to WCSO, Kyle Brandon Slay was last seen at around 9 p.m. on May 6. According to family, Slay left his Caryville-area home on St. Mary’s Road to take a friend back home.
After dropping off that friend a couple miles away, Slay never returned back to his residence. Later, WCSO deputies discovered the truck Slay was driving in the woods close to Caryville Civic Center, just a couple of miles north from his home. Family and friends have not heard from him during this time.
Slay stands at 6 feet 4 inches tall with brown hair and brown eyes and was last seen wearing a bright orange shirt, camo pants and brown boots.
Anyone with information that would help with finding Kyle Brandon Slay is asked to contact either the Washington County Sheriff’s Office at 850-638-6111, the Holmes County Sheriff’s Office at 850-547-3681 or by contacting your local law enforcement agency through their phone numbers or by dialing 911.
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Copyright 2024 WTVY. All rights reserved.
Washington
U.S. Senate in FAA bill adds flights at Washington National, bucking local opponents • Georgia Recorder
After hours of uncertainty Thursday, the U.S. Senate struck a deal to reauthorize several Federal Aviation Authority programs for the next five years, though Maryland and Virginia senators were vehemently opposed and lawmakers hoping to attach unrelated provisions lost out.
The bill heads to the House next week for final approval. Lawmakers from the lower chamber left Wednesday after approving a one-week extension for the FAA programs that expire Friday night. The Senate also passed the extension.
The late night vote, 88-4, drew resistance from the Democratic senators representing Maryland and Virginia. They held up speedier passage of the bill over objections to a provision that would allow more flights in and out of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, just over the Virginia border from Washington, D.C.
In a joint statement after the vote, Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner of Virginia said the Senate “abdicated its responsibility to protect the safety of the 25 million people” who annually fly through Reagan airport, known as DCA.
The airport, a favorite for lawmakers as it’s closest to the Capitol, is limited by federal regulation on the number of “slots,” or flights that can take off and land per day.
“Just weeks after two aircraft nearly crashed into one another at DCA, this body refused to take up our commonsense amendment to remove a dangerous provision that would have crammed more flights onto the busiest runway in America,” the statement from Kaine and Warner continued, referring to an April 18 near-miss when two planes cleared to take off came within 400 feet of crashing.
The Virginia senators, as well as Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, held out for hours Thursday as they negotiated a vote for an amendment to strike or tighten a provision that would increase slots at DCA to five more landings and five more take-offs.
‘Over 200 member priorities’
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., agreed to bring what the senators described as a “compromise” amendment to the floor Thursday evening. The amendment proposed giving the final say on slots to the Transportation secretary after considering delays and safety.
But GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, one of the bill’s managers, objected, saying that the bill already “contains over 200 member priorities.”
Cruz, ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, managed the bill with the committee’s chair, Democrat Maria Cantwell of Washington.
Cruz is a proponent of increasing slots at DCA, particularly for a direct flight from San Antonio.
Others support the increase as well: Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia had originally proposed adding 28 new slots per day. That idea was scrapped and replaced with Cruz’s amendment to allow five new daily flights in and out.
On the floor Thursday evening, Cruz pushed back on the safety argument, saying that “the FAA experts have recently clarified that this near miss (on April 18) had absolutely nothing to do with traffic on the runway.” He also blamed opposition on a lobbying effort from United Airlines, which operates a massive hub at Dulles International Airport in Virginia and wants to thwart competition.
Cruz said the final bill addresses safety issues by “ensuring we have sufficient air traffic controllers to monitor the traffic and protect safety.”
Late Thursday night after the bill’s passage, Cantwell took the floor to praise provisions that she said expand the aviation workforce, enhance pilot training and protect consumers.
Among its many provisions, the roughly 1,000-page legislation:
- Directs the FAA to increase air traffic controller hiring targets;
- Raises the commercial pilot retirement age to 67 from 65;
- Prohibits mask-wearing and COVID-19 vaccine policies for passengers or employees;
- Directs the FAA to update drone testing and operating rules;
- Requires the Department of Transportation to create a seating policy to allow children to sit next to parents or guardians at no extra charge; and
- Requires airlines to automatically refund customers after three hours of delay for domestic flights and after six hours for international flights.
“These statutory rights are a big win for consumers,” Cantwell said.
Last flight out of the airport
Many lawmakers view the FAA reauthorization bill as the last major vehicle to which they can attach their priorities before November elections and the close of the 118th Congress.
That opportunity disappeared Thursday when the legislation’s managers decided against allowing non-germane amendments to ride on the bill.
Among the proposals lawmakers were eyeing as additions was Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden’s bipartisan tax bill that would expand the child tax credit and revive corporate tax breaks. Another included Sen. Josh Hawley’s Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, or RECA, which would reauthorize a fund for victims of U.S. radiation testing exposure. The fund expires June 7.
Hawley said Thursday afternoon that he wouldn’t object to the FAA bill, even if RECA wasn’t added on.
“I have no desire to tank the FAA reauthorization,” Hawley, a Missouri Republican, told reporters outside the Senate chamber. “I think we should have a reasonable process around it. But, if we’re not going to, we’re not going to.”
“At least we got automatic refunds for consumers out of this deal, which was good,” Hawley added, referring to his amendment with Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts that senators agreed to Tuesday.
Jacob Fischler contributed to this report.
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