Reuters World News - Trump’s Marjorie Taylor Greene fight, MBS and Epstein latest

Episode Date: November 17, 2025

In a 180, President Trump tells Republicans to vote to release the Epstein files and dismisses Marjorie Taylor Greene’s claim that his attacks put her at risk. The Saudi crown prince, widely known as MbS, heads to the White House with a wish list. And the UK will announce a plan to make refugee status temporary.  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 Kim Vinal in Wanganui, New Zealand. It's Monday, November 17th, today. Trump changes his mind on the Epstein files, calling for lawmakers to force the release of the Justice Department documents. Saudi Arabia's crown prince prepares to head to the White House, and the UK toughens its stance on immigration, as the Labor government looks to reverse far-right gains. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, seven days a week.

President Donald Trump is calling on lawmakers to vote to release the Epstein files, saying, quote, we have nothing to hide. Trump made the comments in a post on Truth Social. The House of Representatives is due to vote as early as this week to force the Justice Department to release a swel of documents related to late sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. That bill would then need to pass the Senate and be signed off by Trump himself. Many documents have already been released by the Justice Department, by Democrats and by Republicans, but it's thought these documents would be far more comprehensive than anything made public so far. One of the Republicans who wants the Justice Department files to be made public is Marjorie Taylor Green. Once a staunch Trump ally, she now says her criticism of him,

and his online attacks and response have put her life in danger. White House reporter Graham Slattery explains how things got so heated. She's been critical of Trump for focusing so much on international affairs in the first 10 months of his term. One of the tenets of sort of Trumpian political philosophy, many Trump supporters thought, was that it was a neo-isolationist policy, or at least one that was skeptical of military intervention or the threat thereof.

But the biggest issue is Greens' vote in the House for the Epstein file release. Essentially, this measure is called a discharge petition, and it basically got the final vote it needed when the House came back in the session after the government shutdown ended. It got the votes necessary with MTG's vote, and that's really upset the White House and Trump personally. So there's two serious riffs here. I don't think any Republicans are going to vote Democratic next year in the congressional elections,

but this is a turnout game. If Trump's base is disenchanted, they're just not going to show up in the numbers they need to, and that's going to make a different. In a truth social post, Trump says she's making herself a victim and that no one cares about this, quote, traitor to our country. Protests in Charlotte, as federal agents arrested more than 80 people in just five hours in North Carolina over the weekend. It's a major escalation of President Trump's mass deportation campaign. U.S. Border Patrol says the arrests involved people with significant criminal and immigration history. The Department of Homeland Security says the Charlotte raids were in response to local officials refusing to carry out more than a thousand detainer requests,

which allow suspects to be held for up to 48 hours beyond the time they would ordinarily be released. Wall Street faces a big week of earnings and data, including Thursday's delayed September jobs report, although private surveys have already flagged a labour market slowdown. The real focus is 19 speeches from Federal Reserve officials on the agenda for this week, which markets will scrutinise for rate clues. And on earnings, Home Depot, Target and Walmart report, as does NVIDIA, its results will test the AI rally that's pushed shares up more than 40% this year

and passed a $5 trillion market cap. Plus, some markets news from the other side of the world. The Japanese economy has shrunk. A drop in exports caused by US tariffs has resulted in the first contraction in six quarters. The US military has released footage, it says, shows another attack on a drug-smuggling boat in the eastern Pacific. The Pentagon says three people were killed when the vessel, allegedly carrying narcotics along a known trafficking route, was attacked by US troops in international.

waters. The U.S. has carried out more than 20 similar strikes in the past three months as part of an effort to disrupt the flow of narcotics into the states. More than 80 people have been killed. Critics say the raids may violate international law, but the Trump administration says it has legal authority, and military personnel who carry out the attacks are immune from prosecution. Despite accusing Venezuela's president Nicolas Maduro of leading one of the drug cartels, the Cartel de Los Solis, President Trump now says he's open to meeting with him. We may be having some discussions with Maduro, and we'll see how that turns out. They would like to talk.

Senior Trump administration officials have held several meetings at the White House this week to discuss options for possible military operations in Venezuela. The U.S. is already building up its military presence in the Caribbean, deploying warships, a nuclear submarine and F-35 aircraft. And speaking of F-35s, the US is hoping to ink a deal to sell some of the Lockheed Martin fighter jets to Saudi Arabia when President Trump meets with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House this week. Muhammad bin Salman has some big economic goals on the agenda too.

But as our White House reporter, Steve Holland explains, Trump will have his own set of asks. MBS, as he is known, is wanting to seal a defense agreement with the United States. We're expecting agreements on manufacturing, technology, defense. Now, President Trump wants Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords, the series of deals between Israel and other nations. The Saudis do not want to go that far. They're not ready yet. They want to see the steps toward Palestinian statehood before they would agree.

normalized relations with Israel. So this is a point of potential tension between the president and MBS. This meeting continues efforts by MBS to revive his image on the world stage after the 2018 murder of Jamal Khashokji at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. U.S. intelligence shows that bin Salman approved the operation to capture or kill the journalist. He has worked to try to avoid the fallout from that ever since it happened. Joe Biden once called MBS a pariah, but then later did a fist bump with him on a trip to Saudi Arabia. Trump does not have the same qualms about the Kinshogi murder as Biden did. And so he's quite willing to play up their friendship with the Saudi Crown Tress.

To the UK now, where the government is coming under pressure to deliver on it, promise to secure the country's borders. Immigration has surged to the top of voters' concerns, according to recent polls, helping the right-wing Reform UK Party gain political ground. In response, the UK's Interior Minister, Shabana Mahmoud, is set to announce a major shake-up of asylum policy later today. Here's reporter Alistair Smout in London. The Labour government is proposing refugee status will be temporary, reviewed every two and a half years and refugees could be returned to their home countries if it's deemed to be safe. Previously, Mamut has said that after five years, in many cases, refugees can apply for settlement

and stay forever. Now it will take 20 years, so that's a quadrupling of that amount of time. But the Labour Party is losing support among father left-leaning voters who tend to be more sympathetic to asylum seekers, and that leaves a difficult needle to threat for the party. So the government is always keen to stress that it believes in helping those in genuine need. And the government also likes to talk about these safe and legal routes as a sort of carrot when they're announcing the stick of tougher measures on asylum seekers, on immigration, on refugee status. So what they've outlined this weekend was a capped route for displaced students to study in the UK, a similar route for skilled workers and a refugee sponsorship scheme to give voluntary organisations

a bigger role in resettling people. They say that builds on an approach seeing at the start of the war in Ukraine when hundreds of thousands of British people hosted Ukrainians in their homes. And finally, some good news for Thanksgiving travellers. The FAA is lifting flight restrictions at 40 major US airports starting today. The cuts were imposed during the federal shutdown over air traffic control, shortages, but officials say staffing concerns have eased. Airlines expected the move.

Cancellations are already near record lows, so operations should be smooth as holiday travel ramps up. And for today's recommended read, Taiwan will, for the first time, begin distributing millions of security handbooks to households across the country. It's an unprecedented effort to prepare residents for emergencies, such as a Chinese attack. It also includes a reminder that any claims of Taiwan,

winning surrender should be considered false. There's a link to that story in the description. 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.