10 things you need to know today: November 22, 2016

Donald Trump waves from his golf course in New Jersey

(Image credit: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Jump to category:

1. Trump vows to scrap Trans-Pacific Partnership on first day in office
2. Earthquake off Japan's coast triggers tsunami
3. Trump criticizes TV coverage in meeting with anchors, executives
4. Argentina's president denies Trump sought business favors in call
5. New York man charged with plotting ISIS attack in Times Square
6. Markets close at record highs
7. 6 children die in Chattanooga school bus crash
8. Activists call on Trump to denounce white nationalists
9. Olympic doping scandal grows
10. Jurgen Klinsmann fired as U.S. men's soccer coach

published 22 November 2016

1. Trump vows to scrap Trans-Pacific Partnership on first day in office

President-elect Donald Trump released a video Monday listing six things he plans to do on his first day in office in January "to restore our laws and bring back our jobs." Trump said the U.S. would quit the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, a 12-nation pact he called a "potential disaster for our country." He also promised executive actions canceling "job-killing" restrictions on "shale energy" (i.e. fracking) and "clean coal," reducing federal regulations, investigating visa abuses that "undercut the American worker," improving cybersecurity, and imposing restrictions on lobbying by former government officials. New Zealand Prime Minister John Key said Tuesday that he was "disappointed" about Trump's decision to scrap the TPP trade deal.

A powerful earthquake struck early Tuesday off Japan's east coast, near the Fukushima area where a 2011 earthquake and tsunami killed nearly 19,000 people and caused three nuclear reactors to melt down. The quake triggered evacuation warnings ahead of a four-foot tsunami, which hit about an hour and a half after the quake. No deaths were immediately reported, although there were some minor injuries. The Japan Meteorological Agency put the quake at magnitude 7.4; the U.S. Geological Survey estimated its magnitude at 6.9. The tsunami warning was lifted later in the morning, and people who had evacuated coastal areas were able to return to their homes.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

President-elect Donald Trump met with executives and news anchors from major news networks — including ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox News, and CNN — for what his transition team called a "reset" after a divisive campaign. "It was an off-the-record meeting, very cordial, very productive, genial," said Kellyanne Conway, a top Trump adviser. "But it was also very candid and very honest." Participants who talked to the New York Post told a different story, with one telling the newspaper, "It was like a f–ing firing squad," where Trump slammed the media for what he said was inaccurate coverage of him during the campaign.

Both President-elect Donald Trump and the government of Argentina on Monday denied a report that when Argentine President Mauricio Macri called to congratulate Trump on his election, Trump asked for help getting permits for a stalled office-building project in Buenos Aires. The report came from Jorge Lanata, a prominent journalist at one of Argentina's most prestigious daily newspapers, La Nacion. "It wasn't just a geopolitical chat," Lanata said in a TV appearance. The report surfaced after numerous critics called for clearer separation from Trump's duties as incoming president and his business interests. Trump has said his children will handle his companies independent of him, but The Wall Street Journal urged him to liquidate.

The FBI on Monday arrested a Brooklyn man, Mohamed Rafik Naji, on charges that he traveled to Turkey and Yemen last year to join the Islamic State. Naji, 37, is accused of plotting an attack with a garbage truck in Times Square, modeled after a July attack in Nice, France, in which an ISIS-sympathizer smashed into pedestrians on a seaside promenade. "They want an operation in Times Square," Naji told an informant, according to investigators. Defense lawyer Susan Kellman said it was unclear whether Naji "actually said those words if or if they were fed to him by the confidential source."

All three of the main U.S. stock indexes extended a post-election rally to close at record highs on Monday, the first time that has happened since summer. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.47 percent, the Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 0.89 percent, and the S&P 500 Index advanced 0.75 percent, all setting intraday and closing records. Stock futures gained overnight, pointing to fresh records on Tuesday. The surge followed a rise in oil prices as OPEC appeared to near a deal to lower production. "I don't know if it will happen, but the market certainly hopes that it will," Robert Pavlik, chief market strategist at Boston Private Wealth, told CNBC about the pending deal. The markets also saw a jump in technology, led by Facebook.

At least six children died Monday when a bus carrying 35 elementary school children crashed into a tree in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Twelve children were hospitalized — six of them injured critically — and 20 others were treated and released. Police arrested the driver, 24-year-old Johnthony Walker, and charged him with vehicular homicide, reckless endangerment, and reckless driving. Chattanooga Police Chief Fred Fletcher said it was too early to pinpoint the cause of the wreck, but, "Certainly, speed is being investigated very, very strongly as a factor in this crash."

Civil rights groups on Monday called on President-elect Donald Trump to condemn "hate speech" by extremists in the wake of a white nationalist meeting in Washington, D.C., over the weekend. Critics say Trump has emboldened so-called alt-right extremists in many ways, including his hardline immigration rhetoric, occasional promotion of white nationalist accounts on Twitter, and his appointment of Steve Bannon, former head of a website linked to the alt-right, as his chief strategist. Trump's transition team said he has spoken out repeatedly against divisive groups. "President-elect Trump has continued to denounce racism of any kind and he was elected because he will be a leader for every American," Trump-Pence transition spokesman Bryan Lanza said.

New tests of urine samples from the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics have found more than 75 athletes to be guilty of doping violations. Most of the athletes, at least 40 of whom won medals, were from Russia and other Eastern European countries. The numbers are expected to rise as the investigation continues. Olympic officials announced penalties for 16 athletes last week and 12 more on Monday. "The numbers are just impossible, incredible," said Gian-Franco Kasper, an executive board member of the International Olympic Committee. "We lose credibility. Credibility is a major concern."

U.S. Soccer fired Jurgen Klinsmann as head coach of the men's national soccer team on Monday. The move came less than a week after the team suffered a stunning 4-0 defeat by Costa Rica that hurt the Americans' chances of qualifying for the World Cup. It was the first U.S. home loss in a World Cup qualifier in 15 years, and it came after a 2-1 defeat by Mexico in another qualifier. "While we remain confident that we have quality players to help us advance to Russia 2018, the form and growth of the team up to this point left us convinced that we need to go in a different direction," said Sunil Gulati, U.S. Soccer's president.

Explore More

Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.