The Expanding Fallout From the Epstein Files, and Jesse Jackson Dies at 84

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0:37Today's Tuesday, February 17th. Here's what we're covering.

0:46Today, nuclear talks between the U.S. and Iran will kick off, and tensions are high as both countries have been flexing their military power. I think they want to make a deal. I don't think they want the consequences of not making a deal. President Trump, who has sent what he's called an armada to the Middle East, has threatened airstrikes if Iran doesn't give up its nuclear ambitions.

1:14Iran, for its part, held live military exercises in the Strait of Hormuz yesterday, a narrow waterway that connects the Persian Gulf to the ocean. Analysts say it was an apparent show of force, meant to demonstrate that Iran would be willing to go as far as closing the strait, which is a key shipping lane for oil and gas, if it needed leverage. Last year, U.S. and Iranian officials tried to negotiate a deal around nuclear facilities, but that was unsuccessful, and the U.S. joined an Israeli attack on Iran, sending stealth bombers to strike those nuclear sites. This time, Iranian officials have said they're willing to discuss their nuclear program, but the region remains on alert for the possibility of an American attack if negotiations collapse.

2:04The Times has learned that the Trump administration secretly deported nine people to Cameroon last month, even though none of them are from the Central African country. Several of the migrants told the Times they didn't know they were being sent there until they were chained, handcuffed, and put on a deportation flight out of Louisiana. One man, who had lived in the U.S. for 15 years, said they were dropped in Cameroon, quote, like UPS packages. Nearly all of the migrants had been granted court orders preventing them from being deported to their home countries because they said they were escaping war or persecution.

2:40For the Trump administration, sending them to Cameroon appears to be a kind of workaround. Since being deported there, most of them have been held in a compound and told they can't leave unless they agree to go back to their original countries. It's part of an increasingly common strategy by the White House to arrange third-country deportation agreements. According to a recent Senate investigation, the U.S. has paid upwards of$40 million to arrange these kinds of deals, sending people to countries like El Salvador and Equatorial Guinea, even if they are not from there. Critics have said the administration is using the arrangements to get around court orders, with one former ICE official from the Biden administration calling the practice, flatly illegal.

3:26Officials from Cameroon and the State Department declined to comment.

3:36My constituency is the desperate, the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected, and the despised. The civil rights leader Jesse Jackson has died at 84 years old. The Democratic Party must send them a signal that we care. He was one of the most influential figures in the push for civil rights in the U.S. for decades. He was part of Martin Luther King Jr.'s inner circle and was there when King was assassinated in 1968. Jackson then became a household name of his own, running for president twice in the 1980s, the first black candidate to become a serious contender in a national contest. We must never surrender.

4:19America will get better. And better, keep hope alive. He gave galvanizing speeches at national democratic conventions, articulating a vision for the party that drew in people of color and others who'd been marginalized. And he remained active. As recently as 2021, when he was 79 years old, he was among protesters arrested in D.C. while speaking out against voting restrictions that were being pushed by Republicans. Over the years, Jackson also faced some personal controversies, and critics accused him of trying to seize the spotlight after King's death. His full political ambitions were never fully realized, but some historians credit Jackson with helping to pave the way, after the voting gains of the 1960s, to the eventual election of the country's first Black president.

5:09One historian said, quote, you're not going to get a Nobel Prize for what Jesse Jackson did, But it took a lot of talent, initiative, energy, imagination, and charisma, and he had those in full supply.

5:25From Manhattan to Norway, from Hollywood to Dubai, a growing number of the wealthy and powerful figures whose names surfaced in the Epstein files are now facing consequences for their associations with the convicted sex offender. In just the past week, the top lawyer at Goldman Sachs, who was a former White House counsel in the Obama administration, resigned from her position after the extent of her relationship with Epstein became clear. She was mentioned in more than 10 ,000 of the documents, calling Epstein sweetie and Uncle Jeffrey and advising him on how to respond to questions about his sex crimes.

6:03In exchange, Epstein showered her with luxury gifts. In Norway, the former prime minister was charged with gross corruption and had several of his properties searched over accusations that he might have received gifts from Epstein. And in another resignation just yesterday, the billionaire Thomas Pritzker stepped down from his role as executive chairman of the Hyatt Hotels Corporation. In 2018, Epstein asked Pritzker to help his girlfriend, Karina Shuliak, arrange a trip to Southeast Asia, with Shuliac chiming in to say she was, quote, going to try to find a new girlfriend for Jeffrey. Pritzker responded with a smiley face.

6:43And at Columbia University, two people affiliated with the dental college have been punished for bypassing the normal admissions process to help Shuliac, Epstein's girlfriend, get into the program. She had initially been rejected, but after Epstein said he was considering a donation to the school, Several influential people there moved to get her admitted. Colombia says it's identified over$200 ,000 in donations from what it called entities related to Epstein and said it would be donating that amount to groups that support survivors of sexual abuse and human trafficking.

7:22And finally. But now look at him go. At the Winter Games this year, the soundtrack isn't just cheering fans and breathless announcers. It's the high-pitched whine of drones. Never had a medal, John, in this event. The tiny buzzing machines with all their cameras are racing down slopes behind alpine skiers, tracking speed skaters around rinks, and bringing viewers at home up close first-person views of the Olympic action. It can feel like you're right over the athlete's shoulder. Drones made their debut more than a decade ago at the Winter Games in Russia, but now they're everywhere, controlled by pilots in a little white tent off to the side of the finish line.

8:06One of the drone pilots at the Games said that his team had done test runs with athletes before the Games started so the Olympians could get used to the zzzz, zzzz, zzzz, zzzz. And he said that they could decline drone footage if they were worried about being distracted while they're competing. For some of the spectators, though, the drones themselves have become the show to watch. People have stuck around after races to see the drones navigate back to home base, cheering as they stick their landings. Those are the headlines. Today on The Daily, how the Trump administration is closer than ever to forcing regime change in Cuba.

8:45You can listen to that in the New York Times app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.

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