By Nandita Bose and Simon Lewis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden announced new funding to bolster democracies around the world at a meeting on Wednesday, although dozens of countries were holding back on a summit declaration laying out commitments to democratic principles.

Amid criticism his administration has made little progress in advancing human rights and democracy in its foreign policy, Biden announced a planned $690 million in funding to help fight corruption, support free and fair elections and advance technologies that support democratic governments.

“We’re turning the tide here. As we often say, we’re at an inflection point in history here, when the decisions we make today are going to affect the course of our world for the next several decades for certain,” Biden said addressing the largely virtual Summit for Democracy, the second such event organized by the White House.

Although leaders of 120 nations were invited, a summit declaration — which included backing to basic tenets of democracy like free and fair elections and called out Russia for its invasion of Ukraine — was initially endorsed by only 73 countries.

Twelve of those dissociated themselves from parts of the text, including India, Israel and the Philippines, which all opted out of a part backing accountability for human rights abusers and acknowledging the importance of the International Criminal Court.

“To meet the rising challenges to democracy worldwide, we commit to strengthen democratic institutions and processes and build resilience,” the declaration said.

A senior administration official said the declaration remained open and additional countries could still endorse it.

“As is the case with any joint statement, negotiations can sometimes be intense. In this case, we were dealing with an extraordinarily large number of governments and some of the conversations went pretty far down to the wire,” said the official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

Biden announced over $400 million for similar programs in 2021 when he last held such an event.

Rights advocates say there is little evidence the countries joining the summit have made progress on improving their democracies, and that there is no formal mechanism to hold participants to the modest commitments made at an earlier meeting.

More recently, a move by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition government to weaken the power of Israel’s judiciary; Mexico’s move to gut its election oversight body; and India’s decision to disqualify a top opposition political leader have all cast a pall over Biden’s repeated claims that democracies have become stronger.

Netanyahu, one of 85 world leaders who addressed the summit on Wednesday, voiced confidence that a political compromise could be reached on the judicial reforms, which he argued could be reconciled with civil liberties even as his opponents have accused him of seeking to curb judicial independence.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy pleaded for more weapons to help defeat Russia. Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has killed tens of thousands and reduced cities to rubble.

“The enemies of democracy must lose,” Zelenskiy said.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose, Simon Lewis and Daphne Psaledakis in Washington; Additional writing by Susan Heavey; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Alistair Bell)

By Jody Godoy

(Reuters) – U.S. criminal charges should be dropped against two former Societe Generale SA bankers for allegedly trying to rig the London interbank offered rate, prosecutors told a New York court on Wednesday.

Muriel Bescond, a former head of Societe Generale SA’s Treasury desk in Paris, and her boss Danielle Sindzingre, who was SocGen’s global head of treasury, were charged in 2017 with preparing inaccurate Libor submissions in 2010 and 2011.

U.S. Attorney Breon Peace did not give reasons in the motion asking a judge in New York state’s Long Island to dismiss the case.

Bescond’s attorney Laurence Shtasel said “she looks forward to being relieved of this burden and moving forward with her professional life.”

Peace’s spokesperson declined to comment. A spokesman for the Department of Justice’s Washington-based Fraud Section, which led the Libor prosecutions, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

An attorney representing Sindzingre did not reply to a similar request.

The move by prosecutors comes after court rulings undermined several cases alleging traders at the world’s largest financial institutions rigged the lending benchmark, which was phased out last year.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 2021 that Bescond could fight the charges from France, rather than travel to the United States.

The same appeals court reversed the convictions of two Deutsche Bank AG traders last year and two London-based Rabobank traders in 2017.

Two Deutsche Bank traders who cooperated with prosecutors had their guilty pleas reversed by judges last August, and traders from other banks are seeking to do the same.

Libor-rigging investigations resulted in about $9 billion of fines worldwide for banks. SocGen agreed in June 2018 to pay $750 million of fines to settle U.S. criminal and civil Libor-rigging charges.

The case is U.S. v. Sindzingre et al., U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York, No. 17-00464.

(Reporting by Jody Godoy in New York; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Maryland grand jury has indicted a former mayor of College Park on 80 counts of possession of child pornography and intent to distribute, prosecutors in Prince George’s County said on Wednesday.

A representative of the former mayor, Patrick Wojahn, could not immediately be reached. His lawyer told the New York Times earlier this month after Wojahn’s arrest that he was fully cooperating with law enforcement.

An investigation leading to the charges began in February after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children identified a social media account operating in the county that trafficked in suspected child pornography. The account belonged to Wojahn, the county police said.

He subsequently resigned as mayor of the city, which is home to the main campus of the University of Maryland.

Wojahn was arrested after investigators recovered cell phones, a storage device, a tablet and a computer from his home, police said.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Frank McGurty and Stephen Coates)

By Andrew Hay

(Reuters) -The New Mexico district attorney who charged actor Alec Baldwin for the shooting death of “Rust” cinematographer Halyna Hutchins said on Wednesday she would step down as a prosecutor on the case, marking another win for defense lawyers.

First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies said in a statement she was passing prosecution of the case over to long-time New Mexico lawyers Kari Morrissey and Jason Lewis.

Just five weeks before a high-profile preliminary hearing, the Albuquerque attorneys will take over the case as special prosecutors.

Carmack-Altwies is the second prosecutor to resign from a legal team in the case, which has been beset by errors since Baldwin and armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed were charged in January for the death of the rising-star cinematographer.

A previous special prosecutor, Andrea Reeb, a Republican state representative, stepped down on March 15 after Baldwin’s lawyers argued it was unlawful for her to serve as a member of the state judiciary and legislature at the same time.

Lawyers for Gutierrez-Reed this month filed a motion to stop Carmack-Altwies acting as a co-prosecutor in the case, arguing that she could not appoint a new special prosecutor and continue to take part in the prosecution herself.

District court Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer agreed, giving the district attorney until Friday to make a decision.

“Carmack-Altwies will step aside from personally prosecuting the ‘Rust’ case, allowing her to focus on the broader public safety needs in New Mexico’s First Judicial District,” said Heather Brewer, a spokeswoman for the district attorney.

At a hearing starting May 3 Sommer will decide if there is probable cause to try Gutierrez-Reed and Baldwin on criminal charges that require prosecutors prove the pair showed intentional disregard for Hutchins’ safety.

Both were charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter, the most serious of which was subsequently dropped after Baldwin’s lawyers found the law underpinning it was passed after Hutchins was shot.

Baldwin has pleaded not guilty and Gutierrez-Reed is expected to do the same.

Hutchins was killed and “Rust” director Joel Souza wounded on the film set on Oct. 21, 2021 when a revolver Baldwin was rehearsing with fired a live round.

Dave Halls, first assistant director on “Rust, was the only member of the cast and crew charged for Hutchins’ death to enter a guilty plea.

At a 4 p.m. ET (2000 GMT) hearing on Friday Sommer will consider a plea deal he reached with prosecutors for a misdemeanor charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon.

(Reporting By Andrew Hay in Taos, New Mexico; Editing by Leslie Adler, Cynthia Osterman and Sandra Maler)

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Maryland grand jury has indicted a former mayor of College Park on 80 counts of possession of child pornography and intent to distribute, prosecutors in Prince George’s County said on Wednesday.

A representative of the former mayor, Patrick Wojahn, could not immediately be reached. His lawyer told the New York Times earlier this month after Wojahn’s arrest that he was fully cooperating with law enforcement.

An investigation leading to the charges began in February after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children identified a social media account operating in the county that trafficked in suspected child pornography. The account belonged to Wojahn, the county police said.

He subsequently resigned as mayor of the city, which is home to the main campus of the University of Maryland.

Wojahn was arrested after investigators recovered cell phones, a storage device, a tablet and a computer from his home, police said.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Frank McGurty and Stephen Coates)

By Nandita Bose and Susan Heavey

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The White House made an emotional plea on Wednesday for Republican action to curb mass shootings, criticizing conservative lawmakers for saying nothing can be done after the nation’s latest high-profile mass shooting at a school in Tennessee this week.

“It’s unacceptable that Republicans are saying there is nothing that we can do,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at a briefing on Wednesday. “Our schools, our churches, our places of worships have now become deadly places for many Americans.”

Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden has called for bipartisan action to help stop such shootings, including a renewed ban on assault weapons, and described Monday’s attack in Nashville that killed six people, including three children, as “sick.” He told reporters this week he has done what he could through executive action but needs Congress to step up.

Several Republican lawmakers in Congress this week, asked what legislative action could help address the rising tide of gun violence, have said there was little they could do.

“When we start talking about bans or challenging the Second Amendment, I think the things that have already been done have gone about as far as we’re going to with gun control,” Republican U.S. Senator Mike Rounds told CNN earlier on Wednesday, saying instead schools need more funding to harden their security.

The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects the right of Americans to bear arms.

Biden spoke about the shooting by phone on Wednesday with U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, who has often been a harsh critic of his administration, according to the White House. It did not say whether they discussed policy responses.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose and Susan Heavey; Additional reporting by Katharine Jackson and Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican Senator Rand Paul on Wednesday opposed efforts in Congress to ban popular Chinese-owned social media app TikTok, which is used by more than 150 million Americans.

A small but growing number of Democrats and Republicans have raised concerns, citing free speech and other issues and have objected to legislation targeting TikTok as overly broad.

Republican Senator Josh Hawley said this week he hoped to get unanimous consent for a TikTok ban bill.

“Congressional Republicans have come up with a national strategy to permanently lose elections for a generation: Ban a social media app called TikTok that 94 million, primarily young Americans, use,” Paul said in an opinion piece published Wednesday in Louisville, Kentucky’s Courier-Journal.

“Before banning TikTok, these censors might want to discover that China’s government already bans TikTok. Hmmm … do we really want to emulate China’s speech bans?”

Paul added: “If you don’t like TikTok or Facebook or YouTube, don’t use them. But don’t think any interpretation of the Constitution gives you the right to ban them.”

TikTok Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew appeared before Congress last week and faced tough questions about national security concerns over the ByteDance-owned app.

Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a TikTok video Friday opposed a TikTok ban, calling it “unprecedented” and said Congress has not gotten classified TikTok briefings. “It just doesn’t feel right to me,” she said.

Last week, three Democrats in the House of Representatives opposed a TikTok ban, as do free speech groups like the American Civil Liberties Union.

Many Democrats argue Congress should pass comprehensive privacy legislation covering all social media sites, not just TikTok.

Senators Mark Warner, a Democrat, and John Thune, a Republican, have proposed the RESTRICT Act, which now has 22 Senate cosponsors, to give the Commerce Department power to impose restrictions up to and including banning TikTok and other technologies that pose national security risks. It would apply to foreign technologies from China, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Venezuela and Cuba.

A growing number of conservatives oppose the measure. Former Republican Representative Justin Amash said the “RESTRICT Act isn’t about banning TikTok; it’s about controlling you. It gives broad powers to the executive branch, with few checks, and will be abused in every way you can imagine.”

A Warner spokeswoman said “to be extremely clear, this legislation is aimed squarely at companies like Kaspersky, Huawei and TikTok that create systemic risks to the United States’ national security – not at individual users.”

(Reporting by David Shepardson)

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Democratic U.S. Senator John Fetterman plans to return to the Senate the week of April 17 after a weeks-long treatment for depression, a source familiar with the situation told Reuters on Wednesday.

In an update issued in late February, Fetterman’s office said he was doing well and remained on a path to recovery.

The return of Fetterman, who flipped a Republican-held seat in last November’s midterm elections, will be good news for Democrats, who hold a narrow 51-49 majority in the Senate.

Politico first reported Fetterman’s plans to return.

Fetterman had checked into a Washington-area hospital for treatment for clinical depression in mid-February. He had also suffered a near-fatal stroke months before his election win.

Known for his large tattooed frame, goatee and penchant for hoodies and shorts, Fetterman gained a national profile for his progressive positions. The former Pennsylvania lieutenant governor beat Republican celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz by a large margin in November’s elections to replace former Republican Senator Pat Toomey, who retired.

Fetterman, who suffered a stroke last May and later acknowledged he had “almost died,” has faced challenges adjusting to life in the Senate during his recovery.

Since the stroke, he has suffered lingering problems with his ability to speak and to process the speech he hears. As a result, he used monitors that provide audio-to-text transcription, according to a New York Times report in February.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh; additional reporting by Jasper Ward; editing by Tim Ahmann)

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The New York grand jury probing former President Donald Trump’s alleged role in a hush-money payment to a porn star is not expected to reconvene on the matter for most of April as it takes a pre-scheduled break, U.S. media reported on Wednesday, citing sources.

The grand jury has been hearing evidence from the Manhattan District Attorney’s office about possible crimes related to a $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 presidential election.

The payment was in exchange for her silence about a sexual encounter Daniels said she had with Trump a decade earlier. If indicted Trump, who denies an affair took place, would become the first U.S. president to face a criminal charge in court.

The Washington Post, citing two people familiar with the matter, said the grand jury hiatus was due in part to a pre-scheduled two-week break starting April 10, following the April 9 Easter holiday.

That period also includes parts of the Jewish Passover festival and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The earliest jurors are expected to hear the case again is April 24, the Post reported. Politico and the Associated Press reported similar timeframes.

A law enforcement source told Reuters the grand jury is not expected to reconvene on the Trump case until after Easter, without providing a specific date.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Grand jury proceedings are secret. The grand jury is believed to meet generally on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons.

Trump falsely claimed he would be arrested in the case last week. He has repeatedly attacked Bragg and warned of potential “death and destruction” if charged with a crime.

Trump faces several other criminal investigations, including one tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters. He maintains his false claims that his 2020 defeat was the result of fraud.

(Reporting by Karen Freifeld and Rami Ayyub; Editing by Tim Ahmann, Howard Goller and Daniel Wallis)

By Erwin Seba

(Reuters) – California can begin regulating how much profit the state’s oil refiners can earn on selling gasoline beginning this summer under that Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law on Tuesday.

“With this legislation, we’re ending the oil industry’s days of operating in the shadows,” said Newsom, a Democrat, after signing the bill. Oil companies had opposed the measure that starting June 26 empowers the California Energy Commission to set a state gross gasoline refining profit margin, and to levy penalties for exceeding it.

“California took on Big Oil and won. We’re not only protecting families, we’re also loosening the vice grip Big Oil has had on our politics for the last 100 years.”

Chevron, the largest oil refiner by volume in the state, called the measure “a step backward” and its approval “likely to result in less reliable, less affordable fuel for state motorists,” said spokesperson Ross Allen.

Energy investment firm Tudor Pickering & Holt said this week that independent refiner PBF Energy has the largest single exposure in the California market with 32% of its refining capacity in the state.

PBF did not respond to a request for comment.

“Refiners will also have to report more information to the watchdog,” said Matthew Blair, Tudor Pickering’s managing director of refiners, chemicals, and renewable fuels research.

California is the largest U.S. market for motor fuels but has some of the highest retail prices. It is isolated from Gulf Coast and Midwest refining centers, so is more reliant on a shrinking number of West Coast refineries and fuel imports from Asia and Europe.

Those limits make the state vulnerable to plant outages and spikes in crude oil prices such as the summer and fall of 2022.

The law will do nothing to increase gasoline supply to the West Coast, said John Auers, managing director of Refined Fuels Analytics. “It won’t do any good and it will do harm.”

The uncertainty of possible penalties will weigh on the industry, said David Hackett, chairman of fuels consulting firm Stillwater Associates.

“I think that’s exactly what they are doing: Death by a thousand cuts.”

(Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by Richard Chang and David Gregorio)