To the Global Economy . The same financial portunits. Introducing libra, a new global currency. Amy in a move that could reshape the worlds financial system, facebook has unveiled plans to launch a new Global Digital currency called libra. But regulators and lawmakers are already pushing back. Are we seeing a corporate effort to wrest Monetary Policy away from individual nations and their Central Banks . Then we go to phoenix, where police held an africanamerican family at gunpoint because their fouryearold daughter had allegedly taken a doll from a Family Dollar store. I was very much in fear for my families life in my life. I thought we were all going to be executed. It is very sad it suld not ppen ovea do. Amy we ll be ined by e family andheir sposperso th we lookt a high ntestedistrictttorneys wherequeensnew york one of the candidates is making headlines by bowing to radically shape theriminal stice system. Im a gridatina fr a rkingcls family we a with thsystem itrying toeep down. Im running to bring justice to working people. Amy we will speak to Tiffany Caban. All of that in more, coming up. Welcome to democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. Acting secretary of defense Patrick Shanahan withdrew himself from consideration for the permanent head of the department. Reports of Domestic Violence against his exwife circulated. Reports included details on a 2011 attack by shanahans then 17yearold son who beat his mother with a baseball bat. She was left unconscious with a fractured skull and internal injuries that required surgery. Patrick shanahan then wrote a memo arguing his son was acting in selfdefense after his mother verbally harassed him. He is also believed to have delayed his sons surrender to police. Shanahan apologize for the memo saying that was only intended for his sons attorneys. According to the washington post, Court Records reveal a previous incident in which they allege they were assaulted by one another. Lawmakers are raising questions about the vetting process toward ministration officials and whether the white house new a deliberately withheld allegations against shanahan as beingas 2017 when he was confirmed as deputy secretary of defense. President trump, who met with him earlier yesterday, said he did not request that shanahan withdraw. Pres. Trump were a great vetting process but this is something that came up a little bit over the last short period of time. As you know, pat was acting. Acting gives you much better flexibility, greater ease to do things. Amy the pentagon has not had a permanent head since james mattis resigned in december. Both democratic and republican lawmakers have urged for the position to be filled by a permanent head as soon as possible. Shanahan was never formally nominated by trump. Shanahan is a former boeing executive. You worked there for over 30 years. You will be replaced by mark esper, another former aerospace executive and top lobbyist for raytheon. In a highly anticipated report released wednesday, a u. N. Expert has called for Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman to be investigated for the death of journalist jamal khashoggi, citing credible evidence that he and other top saudi officials are individually liable for the october murder. Special rapporteur Agnes Callamard wrote that khashoggis death constituted an extrajudicial killing for which the state of the kingdom of saudi arabia is responsible. Call for targeted sanctions against the crown prince. In other news on saudi arabia, reuters reports that u. S. Secretary of state mike pompeo has blocked the kingdom from being included on a list of countries that recruit child soldiers, dismissing expert findings that saudi arabia has used child fighters in yemen. The u. S. Spec saudi led war in yemen has led to the worst humanitarian crisis. 80 of the population, over 24 million people, need some form of assistance. New concerns over the justice departments impartiality are emerging following reports that attorney general William Barrs top deputy intervened to prevent trumps former Campaign ManagerPaul Manafort from being transferred to Rikers Island while he awaits another trial. Manafort is now expected instead to be held at a federal prison in manhattan after he was transferred from a pennsylvania federal prison, where he is currently serving a 7. 5 year sentence on criminal conspiracy charges and charges of bank fraud and tax evasion. Katharine gorka, a Homeland Security adviser and wife of farright former trump adviser sebastian gorka, has been tapped to become the new press secretary at customs and border protection, according to cnn. Katharine gorka, a political appointee who previously wrote for breitbart, is known for her antimuslim views. At the dhs, gorka was involved in cutting funding to groups that assist people who want to leave white supremacist groups. Sebastian gorka left the white house in 2017 after reports emerged of his ties to a naziallied group and racist paramilitary militia while he served as a hungarian politician. In related news, the acting head of citizenship and immigration services, ken cuccinelli, sent an email tuesday directing asylum officers to deny entry to Asylum Seekers who express credible fear but do not have a significant possibility of receiving a grant of asylum. The letter also said that many of the claims are frivolous. Staffers say the letter read like a threat against asylum agents in a likely effort to push them towards accepting fewer migrants based on initial assessments. While asylum agents are charged with determining an applicants credible fear claim, judges ultimately determine whether the asylum will be granted after due process. New york congressmember alexandria ocasiocortez has come under fire for comments made in an Instagram Video monday, in which she called immigrant prisons concentration camps. The United States is running concentration camps on our southern border. And that is exactly what they are. Concentration camps. Amy the congressmember defended her remarks tuesday, tweeting and for the shrieking republicans who dont know the difference concentration camps are not the same as death camps. Concentration camps are considered by experts as the mass detention of civilians without trial. and thats exactly what this administration is doing. In more news about alexandria ocasiocortez, amazon responded to comments made by the Congress Member to abc news sunday, in which she said that Ceo Jeff Bezos fortune is built on amazons practice of paying starvation wages and denying healthcare to its workers. Amazon tweeted aoc is just wrong. Amazon is a leader on pay at 15 min wage full benefits from day one. We also lobby to raise federal min wage. Amazon has been criticized for its poor working conditions and efforts to suppress unionization. The company did not pay any federal taxes last year, despite making over 11 billion in profits. Jeff bezos is the worlds richest man with a net worth 131 billion. In mali, armed men killed at least 40 people in two villages monday in the latest deadly attack to hit the country amid mounting ethnic tensions between dogon and fulani fighters. The mayor of one of the villages, which are populated by ethnic dogons, says around 100 gunmen on motorbikes stormed both towns, opening fire at residents. The attack comes just a week after another deadly raid on a dogon village. In march, suspected dogon militias killed over 150 fulani in two villages in central mali. The u. N. Warned earlier this month the atrocities in central mali are likely to continue unless immediate action is taken. Back in u. S. , President Trump kicked off his 2020 president ial bid with a keep America Great rally in orlando, florida, tuesday evening. He attacked immigrants as 2016 opponent Hillary Clinton and cnn and democratic lawmakers, accusing them of flooding the country with illegal immigrants. David cicilline tweeted, it was a hate rally. Bernie sanders called trump a racist, sexist, and xenophobia and accused him of neglecting climate change, gun violence, and inequality. The House Judiciary Panel will hold a hearing today on reparations for slavery, the first hearing in over a decade on the subject. Among others, writer Tanehisi Coates and actor and activist danny glover are set to testify. The question of reparations is expected to be a key issue as the 2020 president ial Campaign Rolls out. Ahead of todays hearing, Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell was asked by reporter eva mckend whether the government should issue a public apology slavery. Apology for slavery. I dont think reparations for something that happened 150 years ago, for whom none of us currently living a responsible, is a good idea. Amy todays hearing coincides with juneteenth, a day which commemorates june 19, 1865, when slaves in galveston, texas, finally learned that the emancipation proclamation had abolished slavery. As the fallout mounts over the handling of the 1989 central park 5 case, President Trump refused to apologize for his actions at the time. Trump ran full page ads during the 1989 case, calling for the Death Penalty for the five teenage boys of color who were wrongfully accused and convicted of raping a white woman in central park. They were eventually exonerated and the case has been brought back into the spotlight following the release of Ava Duvernays netflix miniseries when they see us. Longtime White House Correspondent april ryan asked trump if he would apologize for his actions. Pres. Trump you have people on both sides of that that admitted their guilt. If you look at Linda Fairstein and some of the prosecutors, they think the city should never have settled that case. We will even at that. Amy the city settled with the five teenagers for 41 million. Former prosecutor Linda Fairstein was dropped by her publisher and forced to step down from several nonprofit and education boards in recent weeks. Meanwhile, new yorks public advocate Jumaane Williams has backed a call from activists to reopen the cases. District attorney cyrus vance has so far refused. In a 54 decision, Supreme Court justices ruled monday along partisan lines that new york citys publicaccess station mnn is not bound by the first amendment, which would protect producers from editorial control or censorship by the network. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote the opinion for the conservative majority. The case against the nonprofit cable channel Manhattan Neighborhood Network known as mnn was brought by independent producer deedee halleck, who said she and her coproducer were suspended after submitting a video accusing the station of neglecting the east harlem area, where one of its production facilities is located. Mnn alleged she was suspended because her video contained footage in which her coproducer made statements intended to incite violence and harassed staff in violation of mnn Program Content restrictions. In her dissent, Justice Sonia sotomayor, wrote new york city opened up a public forum on publicaccess channels in which it has a property interest. It asked mnn to run that public forum, and mnn accepted the job. That makes mnn subject to the first amendment, just as if the city had decided to run the public forum itself. In california, pacific gas and electric has agreed to pay the town of paradise, butte county, and other surrounding municipalities 1 billion for its role in destructive wildfires in northern california, including last years recordbreaking camp fire, which killed 85 people and burned the town of paradise to the ground. Last month, california fire investigators concluded that pg e was to blame for the camp fire, which started after electrical transmission lines ignited by dry vegetation in at least two spots. And canadian Prime MinisterJustin Trudeau approved tuesday the expansion of trans mountain pipeline, which the canadian government took purchased from Kinder Morgan last year, despite Major Concerns by environmental and indigenous rights groups, and multiple legal challenges against the pipeline. Construction on the pipeline, which carries crude oil from albertas tar sands to british columbias pacific coast, will resume this year. First nations groups have said they will continue to challenge the expansion, which was previously halted by the courts in 2016. This is khelsilem of the Squamish Nation council. It is unfortunate this government that run on the promise of doing things differently decides to behave this way. But our interests as a people is to protect our community, our territory, the livelihood of our generations living today and the ones to come. And we are committed to fighting this Climate Emergency and the climate crisis, but we have a government that does not seem to want to be leaders when it comes to fighting the Climate Emergency. Climate leaders do not build pipelines. Amy and those are some of the headlines. This is democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. Juan and im juan gonzalez. Welcome to all of our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. In a move that could reshape the worlds financial system, facebook has unveiled plans to launch a new Global Digital currency called libra. Facebook announced its plans on tuesday after secretly working on the cryptocurrency for more than a year. It plans to launch libra next year in partnership with other large companies. Among them visa, mastercard, paypal, and uber. Facebook said it wants to create a simple global currency and infrastructure that empowers billions of people. David rcus, fabooks cryptocuency chi, appeared on cnbc on tuesday. If you want to compare libra with traditional cryptocurrency, the first thing in the first big difference is that typically cryptocurrency is Investment Vehicle or Investment Assets rather than being great medium of exchange. And this is really designed from the ground up to be a great medium of exchange, a very high quality form of digital money that you can use for everyday payments and crossborder payments, margaret transactions, and all kind of different things. Amy facebooks plan has already come under fierce criticism from financial regulators and lawmakers. French finance minister Bruno Le Maire said libra must not become a sovereign currency. In washington, the chair of the House Financial Services committee, congresswoman maxine waters, called on facebook to pause its development of libra until lawmakers and regulators have an opportunity to examine these issues and take action. Democratic senator Sherrod Brown tweeted facebook is already too big and too powerful, and it has used that power to exploit users data without protecting their privacy. We cannot allow facebook to run a risky new cryptocurrency out of a Swiss Bank Account without oversight. To talk more about facebooks plans for a new digital currency, we are joined by david dayen, executive editor of the american prospect. He recently wrote a piece for the new republic headlined, the final battle in big techs war to dominate your world. Welcome to democracy now talk about these major developments, david dayen. Explain exactly what libra is and what facebook is trying to do. Libra, as facebook describes it, is a currency a cryptocurrency. When you talk about that, you think of Something Like bitcoin. But this would actually have reserves, so they call it sort of a stable coin. It is backed by actual money that is various International Currencies and also government securities. So that should prevent volatility from the unit of exchange, libra going up or down very much. It will fluctuate a little, but not in the ways we think of when we think of bitcoin. So according to facebook, that is the way this can be used to purchase goods on the facebook app or any other app or website that offers payment in libra. It is a way to transfer money to other people in the facebook app. We have over 2 billion people that use facebook. It is a way to transfer something of value between those users. Because it is backed by International Currencies and can be used across borders, it is really supplanting theeed to change money fromont have to go dollars to euros, necessarily, you can just pay in libra. So that is sort of the pitch that facebook would make. The other side of this is that there is no real regulatory set up. It is displacing global currencies in some ways. There are serious Monetary Policy concerns, serious regulatory concerns. Could this be used to fa