Reuters World News - BBC, banana tariffs, Starbucks and shopping under ICE

Episode Date: November 14, 2025

The BBC apologizes to President Trump over its editing of his January 6 speech but declines to pay him compensation. The U.S. is cutting tariffs on bananas and coffee to ease the burden on consumers. Starbucks baristas walk out in a push for a deal on pay. Why Hispanic shoppers are shopping online. Plus, Cleveland Guardian pitchers indicted in an alleged betting scheme.  Sign up for the Reuters Econ World newsletter here. Listen to the Reuters Econ World podcast here. Find the Recommended Read here. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, I'm Carmel Crimmons in Dublin. It's Friday, November 14th. Today, the BBC apologises to Trump but refuses to pay compensation. The White House says it's going to cut tariffs on bananas and coffee. Starbucks baristas walk out in a push for contract talks. Ice raids push Hispanic shoppers to buy online. And Guardian's pitchers plead not guilty in a pitch-rigging scheme. This is Reuters' World News, bringing you every. everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, seven days a week. The BBC has apologised to President Trump over a documentary he says was deceptively edited, but the broadcaster is refusing to pay compensation, saying there's no legal basis for Trump to sue. Earlier this week, lawyers for the president threatened to sue for damages of up to $1 billion over the documentary edit, which spliced together three different parts of Trump's January 6th speech,

creating the impression he was inciting violence. For more on that story, be sure to tune in this weekend. Our On Assignment podcast takes a closer look at the crisis at the BBC after its boss and head of news quit in the face of those accusations from the Trump administration. That podcast drops on Saturday. Some good news for US consumers,

Washington says it will remove tariffs on bananas, coffee and other foodstuffs from four Latin American countries. The move, which affects Argentina, Ecuador, Guartheonels, Guatemala and El Salvador is part of a push by the Trump administration to drive down the cost of living for Americans. Trump is focusing on the issue of affordability after a string of defeats for Republican candidates in last week's elections. It's a first under President Trump.

The US has approved the sale of fighter jet parts worth $330 million to Taiwan. The Taiwanese government says it will help the island's ability to respond to China's gray zone incursions. Trump says Chinese President Xi Jinping. has told him he will not invade Taiwan while he's in the White House. Starbucks Union employees are on strike in 40 cities, pushing to get contract negotiations restarted after months of impasse. Meanwhile, the coffee giant kicked off its Red Cup Day on Thursday,

officially ringing in the holiday season. Our reporter Wayland Cunningham said that the union is using Starbucks holiday kickoff event to highlight its demands. Red Cup Day has a lot of significance because, with a lot of traffic and with a lot of sales, this is a day that a lot of bristers are under strain because there's this kind of a rush that's not actually even tied to another particular holiday. One of the union proposals last year before talks broke down was considering additional pay on days like Red Cup Day. The baristas say they're not seeing the impacts of what the new CEO has called this surge.

in staffing levels. Wayland says the biggest sticking point between Starbucks and the union boils down to one issue. More take-home pay. That could be something as simple as bumping up the starting wage increases annually or on certain days

like Red Cup Day, more hours. So Starbucks says we already offer what they call the best job in retail. The company told me last week, that it pays on average about $19 an hour, and that when they work 20 hours a week or more, they say they also get around $30 an hour in benefits. The union says not enough people actually qualify for those benefits. The average barista doesn't work enough hours for those benefits.

And again, the parties are not even at the table. So this could stretch on for a while. The US has hired 50,000 employees since President Trump took office, and the new hires are mostly in national security positions. Reported first by Reuters, most of them work at immigration and customs enforcement. The staff changes are part of the president's campaign to recast the government while sharply cutting other jobs. That's according to the HR director for the federal government.

The uptick in immigration enforcement activity is making consumers, especially in predominantly Latino neighborhoods, think twice. before going out to shop. Reporter Siddart Kaval covers the retail industry and says with one in five people identifying as Latino, the chilling effect could have a real impact on the US economy. This is disproportionately affecting smaller businesses. Since the start of this year, they have seen traffic drop.

And some of the weekdays, you barely see any people in these stores. And what's happening simultaneously is that we're seeing a rise in online shopping. at big places like Walmart, Home Depot, Best Buy. And as you can imagine, a lot of these small stores do not have online businesses. We're also seeing bigger businesses getting impacted by immigration enforcement. Heineken, the beer maker, Coke, Constellation brands. Now, these people sell beverages that are mostly bought in store and not online. They also noticed an impact to their sales because of this heightened immigration enforcement.

It's still early days, but this is a big segment of the U.S. economy. Today, 19% of the US population identifies as Hispanic. So that's like one in five people. And this demographic has grown the fastest than any other group since 2010. And they're also projected to spend more. Kantar projects that they will spend $2.8 trillion in 20206. So they are a subset you cannot ignore. The Major League baseball season may be over, but two pitchers for the Cleveland Guardians are in the hot seat.

Louise Ortiz and Emmanuel Claude have both pled not guilty to charges, claiming they scheme to throw specific pitches in exchange for bribes from sports betters. Legal reporter Jack Queen says the expansion of legal sports betting in the U.S. has made this type of scheme harder to catch. It was really hard to detect because there would be sometimes when these guys would just throw pitches in the dirt and guys throw pitches in the dirt all the time by accident.

It doesn't always mean that they're trying to do it on purpose in order to make one of those bets cash. Prosecutors say in this indictment that Claise and, Ortiz would get bribes and kickbacks from these betters. And in total, they say that by rigging these pitches, Class A and Ortiz, were able to help the betters win around $400,000 in fraudulent wagers. These sports books, they offer this huge range of possible bets that people can place on really minute, tiny details of games. And those are clearly creating opportunities for people to cheat the system. Because it's much harder to tell, for instance, if someone intentionally threw a pitch as a ball

or faked an injury or something like that. While Clausee and Ortiz have denied any wrongdoing, Major League Baseball says it's working to address the issue. Both players have been suspended and are on non-disciplinary paid leave currently. The Guardians and the MLB have both said that they're aware of this situation and are cooperating with law enforcement, and the MLB and sports books separately announced that they're going to be limiting how much people can bet on individual pitch prop bets. And to bets of an entirely different kind. Michael Burry, the investor whose successful wagers against the U.S. housing market in 2008, inspired the movie The Big Short, is closing his hedge fund. Burry told his investors in a letter he'd liquidate Cyan asset management's funds and return

capital by year end. And finally to South Korea, where more than half a million students are very ready for their weekends after sitting the country's grueling university entrance exams. And the country got behind them. Police mobilised to make sure they made it to the test sites on time. And flights at all airports were banned from landing or taking off for 35 minutes to ensure a silence for the English listening comprehension section. And for today's recommended read, a Reuters exclusive.

According to sources, Russia is using its spare oil refining capacity to offset Ukrainian drone damage. Russia's oil processing has fallen just 3% this year, in spite of the biggest Ukrainian drone attacks to date. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app. Don't forget to follow us on your favourite podcast player. If you're listening on a smart speaker, just ask for the latest news from Reuters seven days a week. We'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show.