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Trump proposes 2027 defense spending increase

President Donald Trump is proposing setting U.S. military spending at $1.5 trillion in 2027, citing “troubled and dangerous times.” Trump called for the massive surge in spending days after he ordered a U.S. military operation to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and spirit him out of the country to face drug trafficking charges in the United States. U.S. forces continue to mass in the Caribbean Sea. The 2026 military budget is set at $901 billion. Trump in recent days has also called for taking over the Danish territory of Greenland for national security reasons and has ...

Warner Bros again rejects Paramount takeover bid

NEW YORK — Warner Bros. again rejected a takeover bid from Paramount and told shareholders Wednesday to stick with a rival offer from Netflix. Warner’s leadership has repeatedly rebuffed Skydance-owned Paramount’s overtures — and urged shareholders just weeks ago to back the sale of its streaming and studio business to Netflix for $72 billion. Paramount, meanwhile, has made efforts to sweeten its $77.9 billion hostile offer for the entire company. Warner Bros. Discovery said Wednesday that its board determined Paramount’s offer is not in the best interests of the company or ...

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to close

PITTSBURGH — The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s owners announced Wednesday the paper will be shutting down in a few months, citing financial losses. Block Communications Inc. announced it will cease publication on May 3. The paper is printed on Thursdays and Sundays and says on its website the average paid circulation is 83,000. A couple dozen union members returned to work at the Post-Gazette in November after a three-year strike. More than five years ago, the newspaper declared it had reached a bargaining impasse with the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh and unilaterally imposed ...

Ticker: Trump says US to get up to 50 million barrels of oil

CARACAS, Venezuela — President Donald Trump says Venezuela will be providing 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil to the U.S., and he pledges to use proceeds from the sale of this oil “to benefit the people” of both countries. Earlier Tuesday, officials in Caracas announced that at least 24 Venezuelan security officers were killed in the dead-of-night U.S. military operation to capture Nicolas Maduro and spirit him to the United States to face drug charges. How Delcy Rodriguez courted Donald Trump MIAMI — Delcy Rodriguez, Venezuela’s interim president, has risen to ...

US 250th calls for more to volunteer

NEW YORK — The U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission wants to turn America’s 250th birthday celebration into the country’s single biggest year for volunteering. But America Gives, the program unveiled Wednesday just before the U.S. begins commemorating the 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence, will have to revitalize a culture of service that has recently waned. Declining volunteering rates still haven’t returned to pre-pandemic levels. Just 28% of Americans said they volunteered time to a religious or secular charitable organization this year, according to a December ...