An election poster sits on a bar counter at the venue for Democratic candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani's election night rally in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon
USA লেবেলটি সহ পোস্টগুলি দেখানো হচ্ছে৷ সকল পোস্ট দেখান
USA লেবেলটি সহ পোস্টগুলি দেখানো হচ্ছে৷ সকল পোস্ট দেখান
বুধবার, ৫ নভেম্বর, ২০২৫
An election poster sits on a bar counter
An election poster sits on a bar counter at the venue for Democratic candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani's election night rally in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon
New Jersey and Lieutenant governor
U.S. Representative Mikie Sherrill, Democratic gubernatorial candidate for New Jersey and Lieutenant governor-elect Dale Caldwell react on stage at her election night rally after U.S. media projected that she won, in East Brunswick, New Jersey, U.S., November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Mike Segar
Wining governor Richmond, Virginia
Democrat Abigail Spanberger walks onto stage with her family before giving her victory speech over Republican Winsome Earle-Sears in Virginia's race for governor in Richmond, Virginia, U.S. November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jay Paul
Celebrates with her family after winning
Democrat Abigail Spanberger celebrates with her family after winning Virginia's race for governor. REUTERS/Jay Paul
NYC NEW mayor Zohran Mamdani
Democratic candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks after winning the 2025 New York City Mayoral race, at an election night rally in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon
Zohran Mamdani with his mother Mira Nair
Democratic candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani waves next to his mother Mira Nair onstage after winning the 2025 New York City Mayoral race, at an election night rally in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 4, 2025.
Democrats sweep first major elections of second Trump term
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (Reuters) - Democrats swept a trio of races on Tuesday in the first major elections since Donald Trump regained the presidency, elevating a new generation of leaders and giving the beleaguered party a shot of momentum ahead of next year's congressional elections.
In New York City, Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old democratic socialist, won the mayoral race, capping a meteoric and unlikely rise from an anonymous state lawmaker to one of the country's most visible Democratic figures. And in Virginia and New Jersey, moderate Democrats Abigail Spanberger, 46, and Mikie Sherrill, 53, won their elections for governor with commanding leads, respectively.
"If anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it is the city that gave rise to him. And if there is any way to terrify a despot, it is by dismantling the very conditions that allowed him to accumulate power," Mamdani told a raucous crowd of supporters. "So Donald Trump, since I know you're watching, I have four words for you: turn the volume up."
Tuesday's contests offered a barometer of how Americans are responding to Trump's tumultuous nine months in office. The races also served as a test of differing Democratic campaign playbooks ahead of 2026, with the party locked out of power in Washington and still trying to forge a path out of the political wilderness.
That said, the midterm election is a year away, an eternity in the Trump era, and opinion polls show the Democratic brand remains broadly unpopular, even as Trump's own approval rating has declined. The most closely watched contests on Tuesday also unfolded in Democratic-leaning regions that did not support Trump in last year's presidential election.
Perhaps the biggest practical boost to Democrats on Tuesday came out of California, where voters approved a plan to redraw the state's congressional map in the party's favor, expanding a national battle over redistricting that will shape the race for the U.S. House of Representatives.
The winning candidates on Tuesday could reenergize and inspire more engagement from Democratic voters, many of whom have clamored for fresh faces at the vanguard of the party. Turnout in the New York City mayoral race was the highest since at least 1969.
All three Democratic candidates emphasized economic issues, particularly affordability, an issue that remains top of mind for most voters. But Spanberger and Sherrill hail from the party's moderate wing, while Mamdani used a viral video-fueled insurgent campaign to present himself as an unabashed progressive in the mold of U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders and U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Mamdani, who will become the first Muslim mayor of the biggest U.S. city, outlasted former Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo, 67, who ran as an independent after losing the nomination to Mamdani earlier this year. Cuomo, who resigned as governor four years ago after sexual harassment allegations that he has denied, portrayed Mamdani as a radical leftist whose proposals were unworkable and dangerous.
Mamdani has called for raising taxes on corporations and the wealthy to pay for ambitious left-wing policies such as frozen rents, free childcare and free city buses. Wall Street executives have expressed concern about putting a democratic socialist at the helm of the financial capital of the world.
Republicans have already signaled they intend to present Mamdani as the face of the Democratic Party. Trump has incorrectly labeled Mamdani a "communist" and vowed to cut funding for the city in response to Mamdani's ascension.
Democratic candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani reacts after winning the 2025 New York City Mayoral race, at an election night rally in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon Purchase Licensing Rights
In a social media post on Tuesday night, Trump blamed the losses on the fact his name was not on the ballot and on an ongoing federal government shutdown.
TRUMP LOOMS OVER RACES
Spanberger, who beat Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, will take over from Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin in Virginia. New Jersey's Sherrill defeated Republican Jack Ciattarelli and will succeed Democratic Governor Phil Murphy.
Both Sherrill and Spanberger had sought to tie their opponents to Trump in an effort to harness frustration among Democratic and independent voters over his chaotic tenure.
"We sent a message to the world that in 2025 Virginia chose pragmatism over partisanship," Spanberger said in her victory speech. "We chose our Commonwealth over chaos."
Trump gave both candidates some late-stage grist during the ongoing government shutdown.
His administration threatened to fire federal workers — a move with an outsized impact on Virginia, a state adjacent to Washington, D.C., and home to many government employees. He froze billions in funding for a new Hudson River train tunnel, a critical project for New Jersey's large commuter population.
In interviews at Virginia polling stations on Tuesday, some voters said Trump's most contentious policies were on their minds, including his efforts to deport immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally and to impose costly tariffs on imports of foreign goods, the legality of which is being weighed by the U.S. Supreme Court this week.
Juan Benitez, a 25-year-old restaurant manager and self-described independent voting for the first time, backed all of Virginia’s Democratic candidates, citing his opposition to Trump’s immigration policies and the government shutdown he blamed on the president.
For Republicans, Tuesday's elections served as a test of whether the voters who powered Trump's victory in 2024 will still show up when he is not on the ballot.
But Ciattarelli and Earle-Sears, both running in Democratic-leaning states, faced a conundrum: criticizing Trump risked losing his supporters, but embracing him too closely could have alienated moderate and independent voters who disapprove of his policies.
Reporting by Joseph Ax in Washington, Maria Tsvetkova in New York and Tim Reid in Stafford, Virginia; Additional reporting by Bo Erickson, Jasper Ward, Jonathan Allen, Costas Pitas, Ismail Shakil, Andrea Shalal, Kanishka Singh, Ashraf Fahim, Julia Harte and Andrew Hofstetter; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Howard Goller
রবিবার, ২ নভেম্বর, ২০২৫
Turkey buys more non-Russian oil
LONDON/MOSCOW, Nov 2 (Reuters) - Turkey's largest oil refineries are buying more non-Russian oil in response to the latest Western sanctions on Russia, two people with direct knowledge of the matter and several industry sources told Reuters.
Turkey is a major buyer of Russian crude along with China and India. Turkish refiners are now taking similar steps to those in India, a sign of the impact of U.S., European Union and UK efforts to clamp down on Russian oil sales used to fund the war in Ukraine.
One of the largest Turkish refineries, SOCAR Turkey Aegean Refinery (STAR), owned by Azeri company SOCAR, has recently bought four cargoes of crude from Iraq, Kazakhstan and other non-Russian producers for December arrival, according to the sources.
This amounts to 77,000 to 129,000 barrels per day (bpd) of non-Russian supply depending on cargo size based on Reuters calculations, and means SOCAR will be using less Russian crude.
Russian crude amounted to virtually all of the STAR refinery's crude intake in October and September of about 210,000 bpd, according to Kpler data.
One of the four cargoes is a Kazakh KEBCO shipment, two sources said, the same in quality as Russian Urals crude, but sourced from Kazakhstan. SOCAR's STAR refinery imported just one other cargo of the Kazakh grade this year, and none in 2024.
The other major Turkish refiner - Tupras (TUPRS.IS) - is increasing purchases of non-Russian grades similar in quality to Russian Urals, for example Iraqi grades, two of the sources said, without giving further details.
The moves by the Turkish refiners to boost purchases of non-Russian crude due to the latest sanctions have not been previously reported.
Tupras, which owns two major refineries in Turkey, is also likely to completely phase out Russian crude imports at one of these plants soon so that it can maintain fuel exports to Europe without falling foul of the EU's incoming sanctions, two sources said. The company would continue processing Russian crude at the other refinery, they said.
SOCAR declined to comment. Tupras did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Tupras has already diversified its crude supply this year, buying its first-ever cargo from Brazil and is currently waiting to receive its second ever cargo of Angolan crude, a Mostarda cargo due to arrive in early November.
Turkey is set to receive 141,000 bpd of Iraqi crude in November, according to Kpler, up from 99,000 bpd in October and compared with around 80,000 bpd on average this year. December data is not yet available.
Turkey imported around 669,000 bpd of crude oil over January-October, data from Kpler show, of which 317,000 bpd, or 47%, was Russian.
That compares with 580,000 bpd of crude imports over the same period last year, of which 333,000 bpd was from Russia.
Reporting by Robert Harvey, Ahmad Ghaddar and Enes Tunagur in London, Reuters reporters in Moscow. Editing by Alex Lawler and Sharon Singleton
''How the US is preparing''
The United States military is upgrading a long-abandoned former Cold War naval base in the Caribbean, a Reuters visual investigation has found, suggesting preparations for sustained operations that could help support possible actions inside Venezuela.
The construction activity at the former Roosevelt Roads naval base in Puerto Rico — shuttered by the Navy more than 20 years ago — was underway on September 17 when crews began clearing and repaving taxiways leading to the runway, according to photos taken by Reuters.
Until the Navy withdrew from the facility in 2004, Roosevelt Roads was one of the biggest U.S. naval stations in the world. The base occupies a strategic location and offers a large amount of space for gathering equipment, one U.S. official said.
In addition to the upgrades of landing and take-off capabilities at Roosevelt Roads, the U.S. is building out facilities at civilian airports in Puerto Rico and St Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The two U.S. territories sit roughly 500 miles from Venezuela.
Reuters spoke to three U.S. military officials and three maritime experts who said the new construction in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands pointed to preparations that could enable the U.S. military to carry out operations inside Venezuela. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has repeatedly alleged that the U.S. is hoping to drive him from power.
“All of these things are, I think, are designed to scare the pants off the Maduro regime and the generals around him, with the hope that it will create fissures,” Christopher Hernandez-Roy, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, told Reuters.
To monitor U.S. military activity in the region over the last two months, Reuters photographed U.S. military bases and reviewed satellite imagery, ship and flight tracking data and social media posts. The news agency also tracked movements of U.S. military vessels through on-the-ground reporting and open-source photos and videos.
The military buildup in the region is the largest unrelated to disaster relief since 1994, when the United States sent two aircraft carriers and more than 20,000 troops to Haiti to take part in “Operation Uphold Democracy.”
Since early September, the United States has carried out at least 14 strikes against alleged drug vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific, killing 61 people.
The strikes on alleged drug vessels have increased tensions with Venezuela and Colombia and drawn attention to a part of the world that has received limited resources within the U.S. military in recent years.
Asked for comment on the military expansion in the region, the White House said President Donald Trump had promised on the campaign trail to take on the region’s drug cartels.
“He has taken unprecedented action to stop the scourge of narcoterrorism that has resulted in the needless deaths of innocent Americans,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement to Reuters.
The U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean began in August with the arrival of warships, a nuclear-powered submarine, fighter jets and spy planes.
The Ford aircraft carrier strike group, with roughly 10,000 troops and dozens of aircraft and weapons systems, is on its way from the Adriatic Sea. One of the Ford’s destroyers cleared Gibraltar on October 29, according to satellite imagery and ship tracking data.
Presented with Reuters’ findings, the Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment. The governor of Puerto Rico did not respond to a request for comment.
Building up Caribbean bases
Some of the most dramatic infrastructure improvements are occurring at the former Roosevelt Roads base, where crews are upgrading taxiways with improvements that analysts say would enable use by fighter jets as well as cargo planes.
Mark Cancian, a retired U.S. Marine Corps colonel and senior adviser with the CSIS, said the changes were consistent with preparations for an increase in landings and takeoffs of military aircraft.
In addition to the taxiway refurbishments, Reuters observed the installation of portable air traffic support and other mobile security equipment.
Satellite imagery taken on October 29 shows 20 new tents southeast of the runway near an abandoned aircraft hangar.
U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Air Force aircraft and helicopters are parked at the former Roosevelt Roads military base in Ceiba, Puerto Rico, September 30, 2025. REUTERS/Ricardo Arduengo
Hernandez-Roy, the CSIS fellow, told Reuters it was possible that the U.S. military was simply repairing potholes. But he added: “If your focus is now going to be on Western Hemisphere, it makes perfect sense that you would want to reopen what was once a huge naval station and make sure that it can accommodate the range of airframes that the U.S. military uses.”
Reuters also found significant changes at Rafael Hernandez Airport, the second-busiest civilian airport in Puerto Rico.
By mid-October, the U.S. military had moved in communications gear and a mobile air traffic control tower — typically used to coordinate a surge of aircraft in war zones or after disasters.
Mobile air traffic control towers are used to coordinate a larger number of aircraft moving in and out of a region, according to military experts.
Satellite images show construction of an ammunition storage facility at the airport – although the experts Reuters spoke to said it was not immediately clear what weapons could be stored there.
“That’s very important,” Cancian said. “They could be used in the near-term for an operation against Venezuela.” But he acknowledged the facility could also signal long-term planning against counter-cartel operations.
On the nearby island of St. Croix, satellite imagery taken in September and October also shows construction activity at a civilian airport.
The images, from Henry E. Rohlsen Airport, show active construction near the apron, where planes are parked and serviced. Improving aprons could allow more U.S. military aircraft to park and refuel, the U.S. officials told Reuters.
A video filmed by a local resident at the request of Reuters shows a new radar system at the airport.
Albert Bryan Jr., the governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands, said in a statement through his office that while there was a level of coordination with the U.S. military over troop deployments on the territory, his office was not privy to operational details and future planning of those operations.
“He believes a regional presence of the U.S. military strengthens security and deters the trafficking of drugs and weapons through the territory,” the statement said.
Hernandez-Roy, with the CSIS, said the changes could be intended to support the large number of U.S. military aircraft coming into the region. The upgrades could also help plug gaps in radar surveillance capabilities, if drug traffickers turn from ships towards aircraft.
“The one gap in radar (coverage) that is a perennial problem for intercepting drug flights, is actually over Haiti, and it’s kind of like this big black hole,” Hernandez-Roy added.
According to the State Department, Haiti is used as a transit point to move cocaine and marijuana from South America to the United States.
The Haitian embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Shipping in U.S. Naval firepower
According to Reuters reporting and U.S. officials, the Trump administration since August has deployed at least 13 warships, five support vessels and a nuclear submarine to the region from various naval bases and global deployments — including the Gerald Ford aircraft carrier, the largest vessel of its kind.
Eight warships remain in the region, along with supporting vessels.
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