Georgetown University could become the first college in the nation to mandate a fee to benefit descendants of slaves sold by the university nearly 200 years ago after a student referendum passed by almost a 2-to-1 margin.
The school’s undergraduates voted Thursday on the referendum, which would increase tuition by $27.20 per semester to create a fund benefiting descendants of the 272 slaves sold to pay off the Georgetown Jesuits’ debt — a move that saved the university financially.
“The Jesuits sold my family and 40 other families so you could be here,” sophomore Melisande Short-Colomb, a Georgetown student, said during a town hall to discuss the issue last week.

The White House tried to pressure immigration authorities into releasing captured immigrants into sanctuary cities, particularly targeting liberal strongholds in hopes of hurting Democrats, according to a report from The Washington Post.
The report noted that the White House has attempted to pitch the idea to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at least twice since November. The White House suggested both transporting migrants who were captured at the border and those currently being held in facilities to sanctuary cities where local authorities don’t cooperate with federal immigration enforcement authorities.
The Post reported that the proposal sought to ease the bed shortage at immigration detention centers and “send a message to Democrats.”

Elan Carr was sworn in on Thursday as the U.S. Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating Anti-Semitism.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo administered the oath of office to Carr, who placed one hand over a Hebrew Bible, or Tanach, that was held by his wife, Dahlia. The secretary remarked that the Iraq War veteran and attorney was chosen for “fierceness and vigor that he’ll bring to combating anti-Semitism,” according to a source at the event, which was closed to the press.

Former FBI Director James Comey said Thursday that he had “no idea” what Attorney General William Barr meant when he testified that he believed the government spied on President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“I have no idea what he’s talking about, so it’s hard for me to comment,” Comey said in response to a question at the Hewlett Foundation’s conference. “Maybe the only thing I can say generally is — I think that his career has earned him the presumption that he will be one of the rare Cabinet members who will stand up for things like truth and facts, and institutional values.”

President Donald Trump considered nominating his eldest daughter, Ivanka Trump, to be president of the World Bank in part because “she’s very good with numbers,” according to a new interview published Friday.
Speaking to the Atlantic, Trump lavished praised on his daughter, a 37-year-old White House adviser, and suggested she would be suitable for other administration positions, including U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
“She’s a natural diplomat,” Trump said. “She would’ve been great at the United Nations, as an example.”
Asked why he didn’t nominate her, Trump replied: “If I did, they’d say nepotism, when it would’ve had nothing to do with nepotism. But she would’ve been incredible.”

The lead article Thursday on the opinion page of the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with the 1940 Nazi antisemitic movie The Eternal Jew.
The article was titled in the paper “The Eternal Netanyahu” in a word play in connection with the antisemitic pseudo-documentary organized by Adolf Hitler’s minister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels and widely-considered to be the most violent anti-Jewish film ever made.
The Rundschau wrote in its apology it is “especially difficult” to find words that are not associated with antisemitism.
Read more at JPOST.
{Matzav.com}

President Reuven Rivlin will begin doing a round of consultations on Monday with all factions chosen for the Knesset, all of which will be broadcast live.
Rivlin will move from large to small factions that were elected for the Knesset in coordination with the chairman of the Central Elections Committee, Judge Hanan Melzer.
As is customary, Rivlin will hear the parties’ recommendations and at the end will announce the member of the Knesset to whom he has entrusted the task of forming a government. Once this has been done, that person has 28 days to form a new government.
Read more at JPOST.
{Matzav.com}
 

Mayanei Hayeshua opens Pediatric Psychiatric Department
Mayanei Hayeshua’s Mental Health Center now boats a new in-patient Department of Pediatric Psychiatry. The Department caters to children between the ages of 12 and 18 and includes two separate wards: one for girls and one for boys, and is headed by Dr Leonid Kikinzon, a senior psychiatrist who has worked in several major Israeli hospitals and is the author of several scientific papers.

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